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Neoconservatism Bulletin, 2017

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[Feb 29, 2020] A very interesting and though provoking presentation by Ambassador Chas Freeman "America in Distress: The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change"

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... the American-led takedown of the post-World War II international system has shattered long-standing rules and norms of behavior. ..."
"... The combination of disorder at home and abroad is spawning changes that are increasingly disadvantageous to the United States. With Congress having essentially walked off the job, there is a need for America's universities to provide the information and analysis of international best practices that the political system does not. ..."
Feb 29, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

likbez , February 29, 2020 7:38 pm

A very interesting and though provoking presentation by Ambassador Chas Freeman "America in Distress: The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvILLCbOFo4

I think this would be very informative for anybody seriously interested in the USA foreign policy. Listening to him is so sad to realize that instead of person of his caliber we have Pompous Pompeo, who forever is frozen on the level of a tank repair mechanical engineer, as the Secretary of State.

Published on Feb 24, 2020

In the United States and other democracies, political and economic systems still work in theory, but not in practice. Meanwhile, the American-led takedown of the post-World War II international system has shattered long-standing rules and norms of behavior.

The combination of disorder at home and abroad is spawning changes that are increasingly disadvantageous to the United States. With Congress having essentially walked off the job, there is a need for America's universities to provide the information and analysis of international best practices that the political system does not.

Ambassador Chas W. Freeman, Jr. is a senior fellow at Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, a former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense, ambassador to Saudi Arabia (during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm), acting Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and Chargé d'affaires at both Bangkok and Beijing. He began his diplomatic career in India but specialized in Chinese affairs. (He was the principal American interpreter during President Nixon's visit to Beijing in 1972.)

Ambassador Freeman is a much sought-after public speaker (see http://chasfreeman.net ) and the author of several well-received books on statecraft and diplomacy. His most recent book, America's Continuing Misadventures in the Middle East was published in May 2016. Interesting Times: China, America, and the Shifting Balance of Prestige, appeared in March 2013. America's Misadventures in the Middle East came out in 2010, as did the most recent revision of The Diplomat's Dictionary, the companion volume to Arts of Power: Statecraft and Diplomacy. He was the editor of the Encyclopedia Britannica entry on "diplomacy."

Chas Freeman studied at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México and in Taiwan, and earned an AB magna cum laude from Yale University as well as a JD from the Harvard Law School.

He chairs Projects International, Inc., a Washington-based firm that for more than three decades has helped its American and foreign clients create ventures across borders, facilitating their establishment of new businesses through the design, negotiation, capitalization, and implementation of greenfield investments, mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, franchises, one-off transactions, sales and agencies in other countries.

He is the author of several books including the most recent

Interesting times: China, America, and the shifting balance of prestige (2013)

[Dec 21, 2019] A walk down memory lane

Oct 30, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Patient Observer , October 28, 2017 at 2:29 pm

A walk down memory lane:
http://theduran.com/5-discarded-anniversaries-of-western-led-aggression/
And here is the list:

1 The Korean War ends (1953
2 President Kennedy invades South Vietnam (1962)
3 The US overthrows Allende in Chile (1973)
4 The West installs Iranian dictator the Shah (1953)
5 The US-led Iraq invasion (2003)

Many honorable mentions including:
– NATO bombing of Serbia
– Libya
– Afghanistan
– Syria (support of ISIS and its predecessors and spinoffs)

The US body count is simply staggering – many millions killed, millions more wounded or poisoned (Vietnam – agent orange and other chemical agents) and tens of millions of lives forever damaged.

USA! USA! USA! (its elites that rule us of course!)

Cortes , October 29, 2017 at 6:23 pm
And no mention of

Indonesia.

Just the 1m plus deaths.

[Dec 21, 2019] All The Countries America Has Invaded... In One Map

Notable quotes:
"... Using data compiled by a Geography and Native Studies professor from Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, the indy100 team created an interactive map of U.S. military incursions outside its own borders from Argentina in 1890 to Syria in 2014. ..."
"... " Deployment of the military to evacuate American citizens, covert military actions by US intelligence, providing military support to an internal opposition group, providing military support in one side of a conflict, use of the army in drug enforcement actions. ..."
Aug 27, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com
Tyler Durden Aug 26, 2017 9:15 PM 0 SHARES US has had a military presence across the world , from almost day one of its independence. For those who have ever wanted a clearer picture of the true reach of the United States military - both historically and currently - but shied away due to the sheer volume of research required to find an answer, The Anti Media points out that a crew at the Independent just made things a whole lot simpler.

Using data compiled by a Geography and Native Studies professor from Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, the indy100 team created an interactive map of U.S. military incursions outside its own borders from Argentina in 1890 to Syria in 2014.

To avoid confusion, indy100 laid out its prerequisites for what constitutes an invasion:

" Deployment of the military to evacuate American citizens, covert military actions by US intelligence, providing military support to an internal opposition group, providing military support in one side of a conflict, use of the army in drug enforcement actions.

But indy100 didn't stop there. To put all that history into context, using data from the Department of Defense (DOD), the team also put together a map to display all the countries in which nearly 200,000 active members of the U.S. military are now stationed.

For more details, click on the country:

[Dec 21, 2019] War is the health of the state, but death of empires

Notable quotes:
"... As for Washington and the proverbially bombastic, failed futurists across the Beltway, do they even know what is the end game of "investing" in two never-ending wars with no visible benefits? ..."
Aug 25, 2017 | www.unz.com

Sean , August 25, 2017 at 6:42 pm GMT

As for Washington and the proverbially bombastic, failed futurists across the Beltway, do they even know what is the end game of "investing" in two never-ending wars with no visible benefits?

You start by assuming that the absence of war is the ultimate good, but none can say what a world without war would be like, or how long it would last.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/20/wars-john-gray-conflict-peace
Has the world seen moral progress? The answer should not depend on whether one has a sunny or a morose temperament. Everyone agrees that life is better than death, health better than sickness, prosperity better than privation, freedom better than tyranny, peace better than war. All of these can be measured, and the results plotted over time. If they go up, that's progress.

For John Gray, this is a big problem. As a part of his campaign against reason, science and Enlightenment humanism, he insists that the strivings of humanity over the centuries have left us no better off. This dyspepsia was hard enough to sustain when Gray first expressed it in the teeth of obvious counterexamples such as the abolition of human sacrifice, chattel slavery and public torture-executions. But as scholars have increasingly measured human flourishing, they have found that Gray is not just wrong but howlingly, flat-earth, couldn't-be-more-wrong wrong. The numbers show that after millennia of near-universal poverty and despotism, a steadily growing proportion of humankind is surviving infancy and childbirth, going to school, voting in democracies, living free of disease, enjoying the necessities of modern life and surviving to old age.

And more people are living in peace. In the 1980s several military scholars noticed to their astonishment that the most destructive form of armed conflict – wars among great powers and developed states – had effectively ceased to exist. At the time this "long peace" could have been dismissed as a random lull, but it has held firm for an additional three decades.

In my opinion Gray, though wrong that violence is not decreasing, is onto something about the future being bleak because of the rise of meliorist assumptions, because perpetual peace will be humanity's tomb.

While many suggest a danger for our world along the lines of Brian Cox's explanation for the Fermi Paradox (ie intelligent life forms cross grainedly bring on self-annihilation through unlimited war) I take a different view.

Given that Pinker appears substantially correct that serious war (ie wars among great powers and developed states) have effectively ceased to exist, the trend is for peace and cooperation. Martin Nowak in his book The Supercoperators shows cooperation, not fighting, to be the defining human trait (and indeed the most cooperative groups won their wars in history, whereby nation states such the US are the result of not just individuals but familial tribal regional , and virtually continental groupings coming together for mutual advantage and defence .

The future is going to be global integration pursuit of economic objectives, and I think this exponential moral progress bill begat technological advances beyond imagining.. An escape from the war trap is almost complete and the Singularity becomes. The most likely culprit in the paradox is a technological black hole event horizon created by unlimited peace and progress.

Cross-grained though it may be to say that the good war hallows every cause, I think it not so bad in comparison with the alternative.

[Dec 21, 2019] War Profiteers and the Roots of the War on Terror

Aug 22, 2017 | warprofiteerstory.blogspot.com

JWalters , August 18, 2017 at 7:02 pm

Well put. These people are like the "nobles" of medieval times. They care not a whit about the "peasants" they trample. They are wealth bigots, compounded by some ethnic bigotry or other, in this case Jewish supremacism. America has an oligarchy problem. At the center of that oligarchy is a Jewish mafia controlling the banks, and thereby the big corporations, and thereby the media and the government. This oligarchy sees America as a big, dumb military machine that it can manipulate to generate war profits.

"War Profiteers and the Roots of the War on Terror" . http://warprofiteerstory.blogspot.com

[Dec 21, 2019] There has been a gradual decline in the rationality of UK military forces thinking

Notable quotes:
"... There has been a gradual decline in the rationality of UK forces thinking. They insisted on UN legal cover cover the invasion of Iraq but were totally on board with pre-emptive action in Libya, happily training effectively ISIS forces before Gaddafi was removed. They are now training Ukrainian Neo-Nazis and training ISIS/whatever in Syria, effectively invading the country. I guess this may reflect the increasing direct Zionist control of Perfidious Albion with attendant levels of hubris. ..."
Aug 10, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

Anonymous | Aug 4, 2017 7:00:33 PM | 37

Enrico Malatesta @13

The Russians were there in Yugoslavia but they were not following NATO's script. There was an incident where Russian forces took control of a key airport to the total surprise of NATO. The US overall commander ordered the UK to go in and kick the Russians out. The UK ground commander wisely said he was not prepared to start WW III over Russian control of an airfield.

There has been a gradual decline in the rationality of UK forces thinking. They insisted on UN legal cover cover the invasion of Iraq but were totally on board with pre-emptive action in Libya, happily training effectively ISIS forces before Gaddafi was removed. They are now training Ukrainian Neo-Nazis and training ISIS/whatever in Syria, effectively invading the country. I guess this may reflect the increasing direct Zionist control of Perfidious Albion with attendant levels of hubris.

[Dec 21, 2019] William Astore on War as Art and Advertising – Antiwar.com Blog

Notable quotes:
"... A lot of art depicts war scenes, and why not? War is incredibly exciting, dynamic, destructive, and otherwise captivating, if often in a horrific way. But I want to consider war and art in a different manner, in an impressionistic one. War, by its nature, is often spectacle; it is also often chaotic; complex; beyond comprehension. Perhaps art theory, and art styles, have something to teach us about war. Ways of representing it and capturing its meaning as well as its horrors. But also ways of misrepresenting it; of fracturing its meaning. Of manipulating it. ..."
"... My point (and I think I have one) is that America's wars are in some sense elaborate productions and representations, at least in the ways in which the government constructs and sells them to the American people. To understand these representations -- the ways in which they are both more than real war and less than it -- art theory, as well as advertising, may have a lot to teach us. ..."
"... Afghanistan as the unfinished masterpiece....most people forget that the government is yet to complete it except when a Marine dies, they think about it for a day and then forget all over again. ..."
Jul 12, 2017 | www.antiwar.com

Consider this article a work of speculation; a jumble of ideas thrown at a blank canvas.

A lot of art depicts war scenes, and why not? War is incredibly exciting, dynamic, destructive, and otherwise captivating, if often in a horrific way. But I want to consider war and art in a different manner, in an impressionistic one. War, by its nature, is often spectacle; it is also often chaotic; complex; beyond comprehension. Perhaps art theory, and art styles, have something to teach us about war. Ways of representing it and capturing its meaning as well as its horrors. But also ways of misrepresenting it; of fracturing its meaning. Of manipulating it.

For example, America's overseas wars today are both abstractions and distractions. They're also somewhat surreal to most Americans, living as we do in comparative safety and material luxury (when compared to most other peoples of the world). Abstraction and surrealism: two art styles that may say something vital about America's wars.

If some aspects of America's wars are surreal and others abstract, if reports of those wars are often impressionistic and often blurred beyond recognition, this points to, I think, the highly stylized representations of war that are submitted for our consideration. What we don't get very often is realism. Recall how the Bush/Cheney administration forbade photos of flag-draped coffins returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Think of all the war reporting you've seen on U.S. TV and Cable networks, and ask how many times you saw severed American limbs and dead bodies on a battlefield. (On occasion, dead bodies of the enemy are shown, usually briefly and abstractly, with no human backstory.)

Of course, there's no "real" way to showcase the brutal reality of war, short of bringing a person to the front and having them face fire in combat -- a level of "participatory" art that sane people would likely seek to avoid. What we get, as spectators (which is what we're told to remain in America), is an impression of combat. Here and there, a surreal report. An abstract news clip. Blown up buildings become exercises in neo-Cubism; melted buildings and weapons become Daliesque displays. Severed limbs (of the enemy) are exercises in the grotesque. For the vast majority of Americans, what's lacking is raw immediacy and gut-wrenching reality.

Again, we are spectators, not participants. And our responses are often as stylized and limited as the representations are. As Rebecca Gordon put it from a different angle at TomDispatch.com , when it comes to America's wars, are we participating in reality or merely watching reality TV? And why are so many so prone to confuse or conflate the two?

Art, of course, isn't the only lens through which we can see and interpret America's wars. Advertising, especially hyperbole, is also quite revealing. Thus the US military has been sold, whether by George W. Bush or Barack Obama, as "the world's finest military in history" or WFMH, an acronym I just made up, and which should perhaps come with a copyright or trademark symbol after it. It's classic advertising hyperbole. It's salesmanship in place of reality.

So, when other peoples beat our WFMH, we should do what Americans do best: sue them for copyright infringement. Our legions of lawyers will most certainly beat their cadres of counsels. After all, under Bush/Cheney, our lawyers tortured logic and the law to support torture itself. Talk about surrealism!

My point (and I think I have one) is that America's wars are in some sense elaborate productions and representations, at least in the ways in which the government constructs and sells them to the American people. To understand these representations -- the ways in which they are both more than real war and less than it -- art theory, as well as advertising, may have a lot to teach us.

As I said, this is me throwing ideas at the canvas of my computer screen. Do they make any sense to you? Feel free to pick up your own brush and compose away in the comments section.

P.S. Danger, Will Robinson. I've never taken an art theory class or studied advertising closely.

William J. Astore is a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF). He taught history for fifteen years at military and civilian schools and blogs at Bracing Views . He can be reached at [email protected] . Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author's permission.

Jim Savell , 19 hours ago

Afghanistan as the unfinished masterpiece....most people forget that the government is yet to complete it except when a Marine dies, they think about it for a day and then forget all over again.

[Dec 21, 2019] In places like Yemen, Syria and Iraq, the United States is deepening its involvement in wars while diplomacy becomes largely an afterthought

Mar 31, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
anne , March 30, 2017 at 12:47 PM
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/29/world/middleeast/us-war-footprint-grows-in-middle-east.html

March 29, 2017

U.S. War Footprint Grows, With No Endgame in Sight
By BEN HUBBARD and MICHAEL R. GORDON

In places like Yemen, Syria and Iraq, the United States is deepening its involvement in wars while diplomacy becomes largely an afterthought.

ilsm -> anne... , March 30, 2017 at 01:51 PM
14 years as if US were going strong on Hanoi in '79!

Putin is a Tibetan Buddhist compared to Obama and so forth

mulp -> anne... , March 30, 2017 at 04:30 PM
Well, sending US troops is a US jobs program.

Why would you object to government creating more demand for labor? Over time, wages will rise and higher wages will fund more demand for labor produced goods.

[Dec 21, 2019] The Pentagon s New Map War and Peace in the Twenty-First Century

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Barnett's main thesis in "The Pentagon's New Map" is that the world is composed of two types of states: those that are part of an integrated and connected "Core," which embrace globalization; and states of the "Gap," which are disconnected from the effects of globalization. Barnett proclaims that globalization will move the world into an era of peace and prosperity, but can only do so with the help of an indispensable United States. He writes that America is the lynchpin to the entire process and he believes that the United States should be midwife to a new world that will one day consist of peaceful democratic states and integrated economies. Barnett is proposing no less than a new grand strategy - the historical successor to the Cold War's strategy of containment. His approach to a future world defined by America's "exportation of security" is almost religious in its fervor and messianic in its language. ..."
"... At this point in his book, Barnett also makes bold statements that America is never leaving the Gap and that we are therefore never "bringing our boys home." He believes that there is no exiting the Gap, only shrinking it. These statements have incited some of Barnett's critics to accuse him of fostering and advocating a state of perpetual war. Barnett rebuts these attacks by claiming that, "America's task is not perpetual war, nor the extension of empire. It is merely to serve as globalization's bodyguard wherever and whenever needed throughout the Gap." Barnett claims that the strategy of preemptive war is a "boundable problem," yet his earlier claim that we are never leaving the Gap and that our boys are never coming home does not square with his assertion that there will not be perpetual war. He cannot have it both ways. ..."
"... Barnett therefore undermines his own globalization-based grand strategy by pointing out in detail at least ten things that can go wrong with globalization - the foundation upon which his theory is built. ..."
"... Globalization is likely here to stay, though it may be slowed down or even stopped in some regions of the planet. ..."
"... I would strongly recommend "The Pentagon's New Map" to students who are studying U.S. foreign policy. I would also recommend it to those who are studying the Bush administration as well as the Pentagon. The ideas in the book seem to be popular with the military and many of its ideas can be seen in the current thinking and policy of the Pentagon and State Department. ..."
"... I would only caution the reader that Barnett's theories are heavily dependent upon the continued advancement of globalization, which in turn is dependent upon the continued economic ability of the U.S. to sustain military operations around the world indefinitely. Neither is guaranteed. ..."
"... "Globalization" has turned out to be nothing but the polite PR term to disguise and avoid the truth of using the more accurate name, "Global Empire" --- and there is no doubt that Barnett is more than smart enough to see that this has inexorably happened. ..."
"... Liberty, democracy, justice, and equality Over Violent/'Vichy' Rel 2.0 Empire, ..."
"... We don't MERELY have; a gun/fear problem, or a 'Fiscal Cliff', 'Sequestration', and 'Debt Limit' problem, or an expanding wars problem, or a 'drone assassinations' problem, or a vast income & wealth inequality problem, or a Wall Street 'looting' problem, or a Global Warming and environmental death-spiral problem, or a domestic tyranny NDAA FISA spying problem, or, or, or, or .... ad nauseam --- we have a hidden EMPIRE cancerous tumor which is the prime CAUSE of all these 'symptom problems'. ..."
"... "If your country is treating you like ****, and bombing abroad, look carefully --- because it may not be your country, but a Global Empire only posing as your former country." ..."
Aug 26, 2017 | www.amazon.com

Azblue on July 31, 2006

Global cop

Barnett's main thesis in "The Pentagon's New Map" is that the world is composed of two types of states: those that are part of an integrated and connected "Core," which embrace globalization; and states of the "Gap," which are disconnected from the effects of globalization. Barnett proclaims that globalization will move the world into an era of peace and prosperity, but can only do so with the help of an indispensable United States. He writes that America is the lynchpin to the entire process and he believes that the United States should be midwife to a new world that will one day consist of peaceful democratic states and integrated economies. Barnett is proposing no less than a new grand strategy - the historical successor to the Cold War's strategy of containment. His approach to a future world defined by America's "exportation of security" is almost religious in its fervor and messianic in its language.

The foundation upon which Barnett builds his binary view of the world is heavily dependant upon the continued advancement of globalization - almost exclusively so. However, advancing globalization is not pre-ordained. Barnett himself makes the case that globalization is a fragile undertaking similar to an interconnected chain in which any broken link destroys the whole. Globalization could indeed be like the biblical statue whose feet are made of clay. Globalization, and therefore the integration of the Gap, may even stop or recede - just as the globalization of the early 20th century ended abruptly with the onset of WW I and a global depression. Moreover, Barnett's contention that the United States has an exceptional duty and moral responsibility for "remaking the world in America's image" might be seen by many as misguided and perhaps even dangerous.

The divide between the `Functioning Core' and the `Non-Integrating Gap' differs from the gulf between rich and poor in a subtle yet direct way. State governments make a conscious decision to become connected vs. disconnected to advancing globalization. States and their leaders can provide the infrastructure and the opening of large global markets to their citizens in ways that individuals cannot. An example can serve to illustrate the point: You can be rich and disconnected in Nigeria or poor and disconnected in North Korea. In each case the country you live in has decided to be disconnected. Citizens in this case have a limited likelihood of staying rich and unlimited prospects of staying poor. But by becoming part of the functioning Core, the enlightened state allows all citizens a running start at becoming part of a worldwide economic system and thus provide prospects for a better future because global jobs and markets are opened up to them. A connected economy such as India's, for example, enables citizens who once had no prospects for a better life to find well-paying jobs, such as computer-related employment. Prospects for a better Indian life are directly the result of the Indian government's conscious decision to become connected to the world economy, a.k.a. embracing globalization.

After placing his theory of the Core/Gap and preemptive war strategy firmly into the church of globalization, Barnett next places his theory squarely upon the alter of rule sets. Few would argue that the world is an anarchic place and Barnett tells us that rule sets are needed to define `good' and `evil' behavior of actors in this chaotic international system. An example of such a rule set is the desire of the Core to keep WMDs out of the hands of terrorist organizations. Other examples are the promulgation of human rights and the need to stop genocide. Barnett also uses rule sets to define `system' rules that govern and shape the actions, and even the psychology, of international actors. An example that Barnett gives of a system-wide rule set is the creation of the `rule' defined by the United States during the Cold War called Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). Barnett claims that this rule set effectively ended the possibility of war for all time amongst nuclear-capable great powers. Barnett states that the U.S. now should export a brand new rule set called `preemptive war,' which aims to fight actors in the lawless Gap in order to end international terrorism for all time. Barnett makes it clear that the Core's enemy is neither a religion (Islam) nor a place (Middle East), but a condition (disconnectedness).

Next, Barnett points out that system-wide competition has moved into the economic arena and that military conflict, when it occurs, has moved away from the system-wide (Cold War), to inter-state war, ending up today with primarily state conflict vs. individuals (Core vs. bin Laden, Core vs. Kim, etc.). In other words, "we are moving progressively away from warfare against states or even blocs of states and toward a new era of warfare against individuals." Rephrased, we've moved from confrontations with evil empires, to evil states, to evil leaders. An example of this phenomenon is the fact that China dropped off the radar of many government hawks after 9/11 only to be replaced by terrorist groups and other dangerous NGOs "with global reach."

Barnett also points out that the idea of `connectivity' is central to the success of globalization. Without it, everything else fails. Connectivity is the glue that holds states together and helps prevent war between states. For example, the US is not likely to start a war with `connected' France, but America could more likely instigate a war with `disconnected' North Korea, Syria or Iran.

Barnett then examines the dangers associated with his definition of `disconnectedness.' He cleverly describes globalization as a condition defined by mutually assured dependence (MAD) and advises us that `Big Men', royal families, raw materials, theocracies and just bad luck can conspire to impede connectedness in the world. This is one of few places in his book that Barnett briefly discusses impediments to globalization - however, this short list looks at existing roadblocks to connectedness but not to future, system-wide dangers to globalization.

At this point in his book, Barnett also makes bold statements that America is never leaving the Gap and that we are therefore never "bringing our boys home." He believes that there is no exiting the Gap, only shrinking it. These statements have incited some of Barnett's critics to accuse him of fostering and advocating a state of perpetual war. Barnett rebuts these attacks by claiming that, "America's task is not perpetual war, nor the extension of empire. It is merely to serve as globalization's bodyguard wherever and whenever needed throughout the Gap." Barnett claims that the strategy of preemptive war is a "boundable problem," yet his earlier claim that we are never leaving the Gap and that our boys are never coming home does not square with his assertion that there will not be perpetual war. He cannot have it both ways.

Barnett then takes us on a pilgrimage to the Ten Commandments of globalization. Tellingly, this list is set up to be more like links in a chain than commandments. Each item in the list is connected to the next - meaning that each step is dependent upon its predecessor. If any of the links are broken or incomplete, the whole is destroyed. For example, Barnett warns us that if there is no security in the Gap, there can be no rules in the Gap. Barnett therefore undermines his own globalization-based grand strategy by pointing out in detail at least ten things that can go wrong with globalization - the foundation upon which his theory is built.

What else could kill globalization? Barnett himself tells us: "Labor, energy, money and security all need to flow as freely as possible from those places in the world where they are plentiful to those regions where they are scarce." Here he is implying that an interruption of any or all of these basic necessities can doom globalization. Barnett states clearly: "...(these are) the four massive flows I believe are essential to protect if Globalization III is going to advance." Simply put, any combination of American isolationism or closing of borders to immigration, a global energy crisis, a global financial crisis or rampant global insecurity could adversely affect "connectedness," a.k.a. globalization. These plausible future events, unnerving as they are, leave the inexorable advancement of globalization in doubt and we haven't yet explored other problems with Barnett's reliance on globalization to make the world peaceful, free and safe for democracy.

Barnett goes on to tell us that Operation Iraqi Freedom was an "overt attempt to create a "System Perturbation" centered in the Persian Gulf to trigger a Big Bang." His definition of a Big Bang in the Middle East is the democratization of the many totalitarian states in the region. He also claims that the Big Bang has targeted Iran's "sullen majority."

Barnett claims that our problem with shrinking the Gap is not our "motive or our means, but our inability to describe the enemies worth killing, the battles worth winning, and the future worth creating." Managing the global campaign to democratize the world is no easy task. Barnett admits that in a worst-case scenario we may be stuck in the "mother of all intifadas" in Iraq. Critics claim this is something that we should have planned for - that the insurgency should not have been a surprise, and that it should have been part of the "peacemaking" planning. Barnett blithely states that things will get better "...when America internationalizes the occupation." Barnett should not engage in wishful thinking here, as he also does when he predicted that Iraqis would be put in charge of their own country 18 months after the fall of Baghdad. It would be more accurate if he claimed this would happen 18 months after the cessation of hostilities. Some critics claim that Iraq is an example that we are an "empire in a hurry" (Michael Ignatieff), which then results in: 1) allocating insufficient resources to non-military aspects of the project and 2) attempting economic and political transformation in an unrealistically short time frame.

The final basic premise of Barnett's theory of the Core and the Gap is the concept of what he calls the "global transaction strategy." Barnett explains it best: "America's essential transaction with the outside world is one of our exporting security in return for the world's financing a lifestyle we could far more readily afford without all that defense spending." Barnett claims that America pays the most for global stability because we enjoy it the most. But what about the other 80 countries in the Core?

Why is America, like Atlas, bearing the weight of the world's security and stabilization on its shoulders?

Barnett claims that historical analogies are useless today and point us in the wrong direction. I disagree. James Madison cautioned us not to go abroad to seek monsters to destroy. We can learn from his simple and profound statement that there are simply too many state (and individual) monsters in today's world for the U.S. to destroy unilaterally or preemptively. We must also avoid overstretching our resources and power. Thucydides reminds us that the great democracy of Athens was brought to its knees by the ill-advised Sicilian expedition - which resulted in the destruction of everything the Athenians held dear. Do not ignore history as Barnett councils; heed it.

Globalization is likely here to stay, though it may be slowed down or even stopped in some regions of the planet. Therefore, America needs to stay engaged in the affairs of the world, but Barnett has not offered conclusive evidence that the U.S. needs to become the world's single Leviathan that must extinguish all global hot wars. Barnett also has not proved that America needs to be, as he writes, "the one willing to rush in when everyone else is running away." People like Barnett in academia and leaders in government may proclaim and ordain the U.S. to be a global Leviathan, but it is a conscious choice that should be thoroughly debated by the American people. After all, it is upon the backs of the American people that such a global Leviathan must ride. Where is the debate? The American people, upon reflection, may decide upon other courses of action.

I would strongly recommend "The Pentagon's New Map" to students who are studying U.S. foreign policy. I would also recommend it to those who are studying the Bush administration as well as the Pentagon. The ideas in the book seem to be popular with the military and many of its ideas can be seen in the current thinking and policy of the Pentagon and State Department.

It seems to be well researched - having 35 pages of notes. Many of Barnett's citations come from the Washington Post and the New York Times, which some may see as a liberal bias, but I see the sources as simply newspapers of record.

I would only caution the reader that Barnett's theories are heavily dependent upon the continued advancement of globalization, which in turn is dependent upon the continued economic ability of the U.S. to sustain military operations around the world indefinitely. Neither is guaranteed.

Alan H. Macdonald on April 1, 2013
A misused book waiting for redemption

I don't think poorly of Thomas Barnett himself. He's very bright and, I think, good hearted, BUT his well thought-out, well argued pride and joy (and positive intellectual pursuit) is being badly distorted ---- which happens to all 'tools' that Empire gets its hands on.

For those who like predictions, I would predict that Barnett will wind up going through an epiphany much like Francis Fukuyama (but a decade later) and for much the same reason, that his life's work gets misused and abused so greatly that he works to reverse and correct its misuse. Fukuyama, also brilliant, wrote "The End of History" in 1992 (which was misused by the neocons to engender war), and now he's working just as hard to reverse a misuse that he may feel some guilt of his work supporting, and is writing "The Future of History" as a force for good --- and I suspect (and hope) that Barnett will, in even less time, be counter-thinking and developing the strategy and book to reverse the misuse of his 2004 book before the Global Empire pulls down the curtain.

"Globalization" has turned out to be nothing but the polite PR term to disguise and avoid the truth of using the more accurate name, "Global Empire" --- and there is no doubt that Barnett is more than smart enough to see that this has inexorably happened.

Best luck and love to the fast expanding 'Occupy the Empire' educational and revolutionary movement against this deceitful, guileful, disguised EMPIRE, which can't so easily be identified as wearing Red Coats, Red Stars, nor funny looking Nazi helmets ---- quite yet!

Liberty, democracy, justice, and equality Over Violent/'Vichy' Rel 2.0 Empire,
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine

We don't MERELY have; a gun/fear problem, or a 'Fiscal Cliff', 'Sequestration', and 'Debt Limit' problem, or an expanding wars problem, or a 'drone assassinations' problem, or a vast income & wealth inequality problem, or a Wall Street 'looting' problem, or a Global Warming and environmental death-spiral problem, or a domestic tyranny NDAA FISA spying problem, or, or, or, or .... ad nauseam --- we have a hidden EMPIRE cancerous tumor which is the prime CAUSE of all these 'symptom problems'.

"If your country is treating you like ****, and bombing abroad, look carefully --- because it may not be your country, but a Global Empire only posing as your former country."

[Dec 21, 2019] We are all Palestinians: possible connection between neocons and Pentagon

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Lt. Col. Karen U. Kwiatkowski has written extensively about the purges of the patriots in the Defense Department that happened in Washington during the lead up and after the commencement of the Iraq war in 2003. ..."
"... If anybody thinks what I have written is an exaggeration, research what the late Admiral Thomas Moorer had to say years ago about the total infiltration of the Defense Department by Israeli agents. ..."
Aug 25, 2017 | www.unz.com

schrub , August 25, 2017 at 7:18 pm GMT

People who seem to think that Trump's generals will somehow go along and support his original vision are sadly mistaken.

Since 2003, Israel has had an increasingly strong hand in the vetting who gets promoted to upper positions in the American armed forces. All of the generals Trump has at his side went through a vetting procedure which definitely involved a very close look at their opinions about Israel.

Lt. Col. Karen U. Kwiatkowski has written extensively about the purges of the patriots in the Defense Department that happened in Washington during the lead up and after the commencement of the Iraq war in 2003.

Officers who openly oppose the dictates of the Israel Lobby will see their prospects for advancement simply vanish like a whiff of smoke.. Those who support Israel's machinations are rewarded with promotions, the more fervent the support the more rapid the promotion especially if this knowledge is made known to their congressman or senator..

Generals who support Israel already know that this support will be heavily rewarded after their retirements by being given lucrative six figure positions on company boards of directors or positions in equally lucrative think tanks like the American Enterprise Institution or the Hoover Institute. They will receive hefty speaking fees. as well. They learned early that their retirements could be truly glorious if they only "went" along with The Lobby. They will be able to then live the good life in expensive places like Washington, New York or San Francisco, often invited to glitzy parties with unlimited amount of free prawns "the size of your hand".

On the other hand, upper officers who somehow get then get "bad" reputations for their negative views about Israel ( like Karen U. Kwiatkowski for instance) will end up, once retired, having to depend on just their often scanty pensions This requires getting an often demeaning second jobs to get by in some place where "their dollar goes further". No bright lights in big cities for them. No speaking fees, no college jobs. Once their fate becomes known, their still active duty contemporaries suddenly decide to "go along".

If anybody thinks what I have written is an exaggeration, research what the late Admiral Thomas Moorer had to say years ago about the total infiltration of the Defense Department by Israeli agents.

Face it, we live in a country under occupation by a hostile power that we willingly pay large amounts monetary tribute to. Our government does whatever benefits Israel regardless of how negatively this effects the USA. We are increasing troop strength in Afghanistan because, somehow, this benefits Israel. If our presence in Afghanistan (or the Mideast in general) didn't benefit Israel, our troops would simply not be there.

We are all Palestinians.

[Dec 30, 2017] The recent blather in the "Conservative" Commentariat that Haley is looking like Presidential material. God help us all

Dec 30, 2017 | www.unz.com

The Alarmist , December 29, 2017 at 2:32 pm GMT

"Nikki Haley -- there is the real imbecile!"

And yet there is recent blather in the "Conservative" Commentariat that Haley is looking like Presidential material. God help us all.

[Dec 30, 2017] Nikki Haley The Bold Scold of the Trump Administration by Doug Bandow

This reincarnation of Madeleine "Not so bright" Albright is capable mostly of imperial bulling. But times changed...
Notable quotes:
"... While you are here For the last 15 years, our magazine has endeavored to be your refuge from the nasty partisan politics and Washington echo chamber with thoughtful, smart conservatism, fresh and challenging writing, and authors who, above all, bravely hew to our most basic tenets: Ideas over ideology, principles over party. Please consider a tax-deductible, year-end contribution so that TAC can make an even bigger difference in 2018! ..."
"... for reasons unknown (other than perhaps her Indian heritage), Donald Trump tapped her to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. There, she has performed to perfection, offering a model of the hubris and lack of awareness that consistently characterize U.S. foreign policy. ..."
"... What makes Americ a different from other nations when it comes to foreign policy is the certainty that it is the right -- indeed, the duty -- of Americans to run the world. That means telling everyone everywhere what they should do, not just internationally, but in their own nations, too. ..."
"... U.S. officials believe they know how other societies should organize their governments, who foreign peoples should elect, what economic policies other nations should implement, and what social practices foreigners should encourage and suppress ..."
"... . On Fox News (where else?) she declared: "We have the right to do whatever we want in terms of where we put our embassies." As for foreign criticism: "We don't need other countries telling us what's right and wrong." ..."
"... What could be more obvious? Other governments have no right to make decisions about their own countries, and need to be told what's right and wrong by Washington on any and every subject, day or night, in sunshine, rain, or snow. But another element of American exceptionalism is the fact that the U.S. is exempt from the rules it applies to other nations. Washington gets to lecture, but no one gets to tell Americans what they should do. ..."
"... The sad irony is that the U.S. would have greater credibility if it better practiced what it preached, and didn't attempt social engineering abroad that's routinely failed at home. Especially nice would be a bit more humility and self-awareness by Washington's representatives. But Nikki Haley seems determined to continue as a disciple of the Madeleine Albright school of all-knowing, all-seeing, all-saying diplomacy. As such, she's unlikely to fool anyone other than herself. ..."
Dec 27, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
Carrying on the tradition of hubris and hypocrisy of every other modern U.N. ambassador. While you are here For the last 15 years, our magazine has endeavored to be your refuge from the nasty partisan politics and Washington echo chamber with thoughtful, smart conservatism, fresh and challenging writing, and authors who, above all, bravely hew to our most basic tenets: Ideas over ideology, principles over party. Please consider a tax-deductible, year-end contribution so that TAC can make an even bigger difference in 2018!

As governor of South Carolina, Nikki Haley didn't have much need to worry about foreign policy. Yet for reasons unknown (other than perhaps her Indian heritage), Donald Trump tapped her to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. There, she has performed to perfection, offering a model of the hubris and lack of awareness that consistently characterize U.S. foreign policy.

What makes Americ a different from other nations when it comes to foreign policy is the certainty that it is the right -- indeed, the duty -- of Americans to run the world. That means telling everyone everywhere what they should do, not just internationally, but in their own nations, too.

U.S. officials believe they know how other societies should organize their governments, who foreign peoples should elect, what economic policies other nations should implement, and what social practices foreigners should encourage and suppress .

There is precedent for Washington as all-seeing and all-knowing. A sparrow cannot "fall to the ground apart from the will of" God, Jesus explained. So, too, it appears, is such an event impossible in America's view apart from U.S. approval.

Washington officials rarely are so blunt, but their rhetoric is routinely suffused with arrogance. The concept of American exceptionalism is one example. The country's founding was unique and the U.S. has played an extraordinary role in international affairs, but that does not sanctify policies that have often been brutal, selfish, incompetent, perverse, and immoral. Sometimes America's actions share all of those characteristics simultaneously -- such as aiding the royal Saudi dictatorship as it slaughters civilians in Yemen in an attempt to restore a puppet regime there.

In recent history, Madeleine Albright, both as UN ambassador and secretary of state under Bill Clinton, perhaps came closest to personifying the clueless American diplomat. As Washington made a hash of the Balkans and Middle East, she explained that "we stand tall. We see further than other countries in the future." The U.S., of course, was "the indispensable nation." Which presumably is why she felt entitled to announce that "we think the price is worth it" when asked about the reported deaths of a half million Iraqi children as a result of sanctions against Baghdad.

And, of course, there was her extraordinary exchange with Colin Powell, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, when she asked, "What's the point of having this superb military you're always talking about if we can't use it?" Presumably she had no family members at risk as she planned to wage global crusades with other people's lives.

Albright has large shoes to fill but Haley appears to be well on her way. In a position that theoretically emphasizes diplomacy, the former South Carolina governor has been cheerleading for war with North Korea. Never mind that a nuke or two landing on Seoul or Tokyo would wipe out millions of people. No doubt she will cheerfully put a positive spin on disaster if the administration decides it's time for Armageddon in Northeast Asia.

Haley has also brilliantly played the sycophantic spokeswoman for the Saudi royals. Riyadh's intervention in the unending Yemeni civil war has killed thousands of civilians, imposed a starvation blockade, and led famine and cholera to sweep through what was already one of the poorest nations on earth. All of this has been done with U.S. support: supplying munitions, refueling aircraft, and aiding with targeting.

But when the Yemenis returned fire with a missile, Haley summoned her best sanctimonious demeanor and denounced Iran for allegedly making this outrageous, shocking attack possible. Apparently the Saudi sense of entitlement goes so far as to believe that Saudi Arabia's victims aren't even supposed to shoot back.

Yet Haley's finest hubristic moment may have come after the president's decision to move America's embassy to Jerusalem. Israel treats that city as its capital, of course. But Jerusalem is the holiest land for Jews and Christians, third holiest for Muslims, and the most emotional point of dispute between Israelis and Palestinians. Indeed, since conquering East Jerusalem in the 1967 war, the Israeli government has been working assiduously to squeeze Palestinians out of the city.

Congress's approval in 1995 of legislation mandating that the State Department move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem was politics at its most cynical. Members in the Republican-controlled Congress postured as great friends of Israel while adding a waiver that they expected presidents to always employ. Everyone did so until Donald Trump. At least his decision ostentatiously puts the lie to the claim that Washington can play honest broker in promoting a Middle East peace. No sentient Palestinian could have believed so, but the president finally made it official.

That Haley kept a straight face while explaining how Washington could upset the status quo, outrage Palestinians, undercut Arab allies, and anger Muslims, yet still bring peace, harmony, and calm to the Middle East was to be expected. "We can see the peace process really come together," she declared without a hint of irony.

But her finest moment -- almost Churchillian in significance -- was when she responded to criticism of the president's decision, including by the other 14 members of the UN Security Council . On Fox News (where else?) she declared: "We have the right to do whatever we want in terms of where we put our embassies." As for foreign criticism: "We don't need other countries telling us what's right and wrong."

Of course.

What could be more obvious? Other governments have no right to make decisions about their own countries, and need to be told what's right and wrong by Washington on any and every subject, day or night, in sunshine, rain, or snow. But another element of American exceptionalism is the fact that the U.S. is exempt from the rules it applies to other nations. Washington gets to lecture, but no one gets to tell Americans what they should do.

The sad irony is that the U.S. would have greater credibility if it better practiced what it preached, and didn't attempt social engineering abroad that's routinely failed at home. Especially nice would be a bit more humility and self-awareness by Washington's representatives. But Nikki Haley seems determined to continue as a disciple of the Madeleine Albright school of all-knowing, all-seeing, all-saying diplomacy. As such, she's unlikely to fool anyone other than herself.

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan. He is the author of Foreign Follies: America's New Global Empire.

All of us at TAC wish you a Merry Christmas holiday and the best wishes for 2018. Our 501(c)(3) depends on your generosity to make the biggest impact possible. Please consider your tax deductible donation to our magazine, here .* Thank you!

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[Dec 30, 2017] Denouncing and openly hating Russia has now become a form of virtue-signaling. Since the entire US political elites have endorsed this phobia, it is exceedingly unlikely to change in the foreseeable future. That increases the probably of confrontation by The Saker

Notable quotes:
"... What will not stop is the full-spectrum demonization of Russia, thus the relationship between the two countries will further deteriorate. Putin's Russia is a kind of Mordor which represents all evil and stands behind all evil. Denouncing and openly hating Russia has now become a form of virtue-signaling. Since the entire US political elites have endorsed this phobia, it is exceedingly unlikely to change in the foreseeable future. ..."
Dec 29, 2017 | www.unz.com

Russia option 1 : rumors that the US would disconnect Russia from SWIFT or steal (that is politely called "freeze") Russian assets and funds in the US have been going in for a long time already. And the Russians have been making all sorts of menacing noises about this, but all of them very vague which tells me that Russia might not have any good retaliatory options and that this time around the hot air is blowing from Moscow. Of course, Putin is a unpredictable master strategist and the folks around him are very, very smart. They might hold something up their sleeve which I am not aware of but I strongly suspect that, unlike me, the US intelligence community must be fully aware of what this might be. I am not an economist and there is much I don't know here, I therefore assessed the risk as "unknown" for me.

Russia option 2 : the reaction of Russia to the shooting down by Turkey of a SU-24 in 2015 might well have given the US politicians and commanders a feeling that they could do the same and get away with it. In truth, they might be right. But they might also be wrong. The big difference with the case of the SU-24 is that Russia has formidable air-defenses deployed in Syria which present a major threat for US forces. Furthermore, if a Russian aircraft is under attack and the Russians reply by firing a volley of ground-to-air missiles, what would the US do – attack a Russian S-400 battery?

The US is also in a tricky situation in an air-to-air confrontation. While the F-22 is an excellent air superiority fighter it has one huge weakness: it is designed to engage its adversaries from a long range and to shoot first, before it is detected (I mention only the F-22 here because it is the only US aircraft capable of challenging the Su-30SM/Su-35). But if the rules of engagement say that before firing at a Russian aircraft the F-22 has to issue a clear warning or if the engagement happens at medium to short range distances, then the F-22 is at a big disadvantage, especially against a Su-30SM or Su-35.

Another major weakness of the F-22 is that, unlike the Su-30/Su-35, it does not have a real electronic warfare suite (the F-22's INEWS does not really qualify). In plain English this means that the F-22 was designed to maximize its low radar cross section but at a cost of all other aspects of aerial warfare (radar power, hyper maneuverability, electronic warfare, passive engagement, etc.).

This all gets very technical and complicated very fast, but I think that we can agree that the Neocons are unlikely to be very impressed by the risks posed by Russian forces in Syria and that they will likely feel that they can punch the russkies in the nose and that these russkies will have to take it. Local US commanders might feel otherwise, but that is also entirely irrelevant. Still, I place the risk here at 'medium' even if, potentially, this could lead to a catastrophic thermonuclear war because I don't think that the Neocons believe that the Russians will escalate too much (who starts WWIII over one shot down aircraft anyway, right?!). Think of it: if you were the commander of the Russian task force in Syria, what would you do if the US shot down on of your aircraft (remember, you assume that you are a responsible and intelligent commander, not a flag-waving delusional maniac)?

What will not stop is the full-spectrum demonization of Russia, thus the relationship between the two countries will further deteriorate. Putin's Russia is a kind of Mordor which represents all evil and stands behind all evil. Denouncing and openly hating Russia has now become a form of virtue-signaling. Since the entire US political elites have endorsed this phobia, it is exceedingly unlikely to change in the foreseeable future.

Donbass : will the Ukronazis finally attack? Well, they have been for many months already! Not only did they never stop shelling the Donbass, but they have this new "frog-jump" (pseudo) strategy which consists of moving in military forces in the neutral zone, seize an undefended town and then declare a major victory against Russia. They have also been re-arming, re-organizing, re-grouping and otherwise bolstering their forces in the East. As a result, the Urkonazis have at least 3:1 advantage against the Novorussians. However, we should not look at this from the Ukronazi or Novorussian point of view. Instead we should look at it from the Neocon point of view:

Possible outcomes US reactions
Option one: Ukronazis win Russia is defeated, US proves its power
Option two: Novorussians win Russia is accused of invading the Ukraine
Option three: Novorussians lose and Russia openly intervenes A Neocon dream come true: the NATO has a purpose again:decades of Cold War v2 in Europe.

The way I see it, in all three cases the AngloZionist prevail though clearly option #2 is the worst possible outcome and option #3 is the best one. In truth, the AngloZionists have very little to lose in a Ukronazi attack on Novorussia. Not so the Ukrainian people, of course.

Right now the US and several European countries are shipping various types of weapons to the Ukronazis. That is really a non-news since they have been doing that for years already. Furthermore, western made weapons won't make any difference, at least from a military point of view, if only because it will always be much easier for Russia to send more weapons in any category.

The real difference is a political one: shipping "lethal weapons" (as if some weapons were not lethal!) is simply a green light to go on the attack. Let's hope that the Urkonazis will be busy fighting each other and that their previous humiliating defeat will deter them from trying again, but I consider a full-scale Urkonazi attack on the Donbass as quite likely.

[Dec 30, 2017] The recent blather in the "Conservative" Commentariat that Haley is looking like Presidential material. God help us all

Dec 30, 2017 | www.unz.com

The Alarmist , December 29, 2017 at 2:32 pm GMT

"Nikki Haley -- there is the real imbecile!"

And yet there is recent blather in the "Conservative" Commentariat that Haley is looking like Presidential material. God help us all.

[Dec 29, 2017] Will War Cancel Trump's Triumphs by Pat Buchanan

Dec 29, 2017 | www.unz.com

But it is in the realm of foreign policy where the real perils seem to lie. President Trump has been persuaded by his national security team to send Javelin anti-tank missiles to Ukraine, for use against the tanks and armor of pro-Russian rebels in Donetsk and Luhansk.

Should Petro Poroshenko's Kiev regime reignite the war in his breakaway provinces bordering Russia, Vladimir Putin is less likely to let him crush the rebels than to intervene with superior forces and rout the Ukrainian army.

Trump's choice then? Accept defeat and humiliation for our "ally" -- or escalate and widen the conflict with Russia.

Putin's interest in the Donbass, a part of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union for centuries, is obvious.

What, exactly, is ours -- to justify a showdown with Moscow?

In this city there is also a powerful propaganda push to have this country tear up the nuclear deal John Kerry negotiated with Iran, and confront the Iranians in Syria, Iraq, Yemen and the Persian Gulf.

... ... ...

The Korean War finished Truman. Vietnam finished LBJ. Reagan said putting Marines into Lebanon was his worst mistake. Iraq cost Bush II both houses of Congress and his party the presidency in 2008.

Should Trump become a war president, he'll likely become a one-term president.

Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, "Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever."

[Dec 28, 2017] How CrowdStrike placed malware in DNC hacked servers by Alex Christoforou

Highly recommended!
If this is true, then this is definitely a sophisticated false flag operation. Was malware Alperovich people injected specifically designed to implicate Russians? In other words Crowdstrike=Fancy Bear
Images removed. For full content please thee the original source
One interesting corollary of this analysis is that installing Crowdstrike software is like inviting a wolf to guard your chicken. If they are so dishonest you take enormous risks. That might be true for some other heavily advertized "intrusion prevention" toolkits. So those criminals who use mistyped popular addresses or buy Google searches to drive lemmings to their site and then flash the screen that they detected a virus on your computer a, please call provided number and for a small amount of money your virus will be removed get a new more sinister life.
I suspected many of such firms (for example ISS which was bought by IBM in 2006) to be scams long ago.
Notable quotes:
"... Disobedient Media outlines the DNC server cover-up evidenced in CrowdStrike malware infusion ..."
"... In the article, they claim to have just been working on eliminating the last of the hackers from the DNC's network during the past weekend (conveniently coinciding with Assange's statement and being an indirect admission that their Falcon software had failed to achieve it's stated capabilities at that time , assuming their statements were accurate) . ..."
"... To date, CrowdStrike has not been able to show how the malware had relayed any emails or accessed any mailboxes. They have also not responded to inquiries specifically asking for details about this. In fact, things have now been discovered that bring some of their malware discoveries into question. ..."
"... there is a reason to think Fancy Bear didn't start some of its activity until CrowdStrike had arrived at the DNC. CrowdStrike, in the indiciators of compromise they reported, identified three pieces of malware relating to Fancy Bear: ..."
"... They found that generally, in a lot of cases, malware developers didn't care to hide the compile times and that while implausible timestamps are used, it's rare that these use dates in the future. It's possible, but unlikely that one sample would have a postdated timestamp to coincide with their visit by mere chance but seems extremely unlikely to happen with two or more samples. Considering the dates of CrowdStrike's activities at the DNC coincide with the compile dates of two out of the three pieces of malware discovered and attributed to APT-28 (the other compiled approximately 2 weeks prior to their visit), the big question is: Did CrowdStrike plant some (or all) of the APT-28 malware? ..."
"... The IP address, according to those articles, was disabled in June 2015, eleven months before the DNC emails were acquired – meaning those IP addresses, in reality, had no involvement in the alleged hacking of the DNC. ..."
"... The fact that two out of three of the Fancy Bear malware samples identified were compiled on dates within the apparent five day period CrowdStrike were apparently at the DNC seems incredibly unlikely to have occurred by mere chance. ..."
"... That all three malware samples were compiled within ten days either side of their visit – makes it clear just how questionable the Fancy Bear malware discoveries were. ..."
Dec 28, 2017 | theduran.com

Of course the DNC did not want to the FBI to investigate its "hacked servers". The plan was well underway to excuse Hillary's pathetic election defeat to Trump, and CrowdStrike would help out by planting evidence to pin on those evil "Russian hackers." Some would call this entire DNC server hack an "insurance policy."

... ... ...

[Dec 28, 2017] Our well informed, and, on top of it all, UN ambassador

Dec 28, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Kooshy 26 December 2017 at 12:54 PM

Colonel, FYI, our well informed, and, on top of it all, UN ambassador Nikki the bookkeeper, is hoping for a newly independent island nation of "Binomo" rising from bottom of South China Sea, and delivered by Santa to her huge Christmas tree in Guatemala.
https://www.rt.com/news/414086-prank-nikki-haley-russia-place/

[Dec 27, 2017] Bannon Puts Jared Through the Grinder

Notable quotes:
"... After scorning the Russia collusion theories as fiction, Bannon acknowledged the grisly reality that the Russia investigation poses for his former boss. And he blamed it all on Kushner, for having created the appearance that Putin had helped Trump. Dropping Kushner head first into the grinder, Bannon turned the crank. ..."
"... "[Kushner was] taking meetings with Russians to get additional stuff. This tells you everything about Jared," Bannon told the magazine's Gabriel Sherman. "They were looking for the picture of Hillary Clinton taking the bag of cash from Putin. That's his maturity level." ..."
"... Informing Vanity Fair that Kushner's hunt for political smut led him to over-fraternize with the Russians might not be the best way for Bannon to throw special counsel Robert S. Mueller III off the collusion scent. ..."
"... Sherman's piece reveals the cognitive split that evolved between Bannon and others, specifically Trump, on how to handle the mess that had been created. "Goldman Sachs teaches one thing: don't invent shit. Take something that works and make it better," Bannon told Sherman. He said he consulted with Bill Clinton's former lawyer Lanny Davis about how the Clintons responded to Ken Starr's probe. "We were so disciplined. You guys don't have that," Bannon recalls Davis advising him. "That always haunted me when he said that," Bannon told Sherman. Bannon said the investigation was an attempt by the establishment to undo the election, but he took it seriously and warned Trump he was in danger of being impeached. ..."
"... There's even more hot Bannon on Kushner action. Bannon tells of an Oval Office meeting he attended with Trump, Kushner and Kushner's wife Ivanka Trump in which he called Ivanka "the queen of leaks." "You're a fucking liar!" Ivanka allegedly responded. Hard to know how to score this round, but shattering the public image of Ivanka as poised princess must have been satisfying for a guy who called Javanka "the Democrats." ..."
"... Although "people close to Kushner, who decline to be named" told the Times they don't think the Mueller investigation exposes him to legal jeopardy, the young prince isn't taking chances. The Washington Post reports that his lawyer, Abbe Lowell, has been shopping for a "crisis public relations firm" over the past two weeks. (Senator Robert Menendez, the recent beneficiary of a deadlocked corruption trial, is another Lowell client.) ..."
"... Why hire super flacks now? Does Kushner sense disaster? Another Bannon offensive? The Flynn plea bargain exposed him -- according to the press -- as the "very senior member" of the Trump transition team described in court documents who told former national security adviser Michael Flynn to lobby the Russian ambassador about a U.N. resolution on Israeli settlements. Maybe he's just buying reputation insurance. Or maybe he's taken to heart Chris Christie's scathing comments. Christie was squeezed out of the Trump transition early on, some say by Kushner who is said to hold a grudge against Christie who, when he was federal prosecutor, put Kushner's father in jail . This week Christie said that Kushner "deserves the scrutiny" he's been getting. It was almost as if Christie and Bannon were operating a twin-handled grinder, cranking out an extra helping of Kushner's tainted reputation. ..."
"... President Putin and President Trump occupied the same page about the scandal this week in what was either a matter of collusion or of great minds thinking alike. Speaking at a four-hour media event in Moscow, Putin blamed the scandal on the U.S. "deep state" and said, "This is all made up by people who oppose Trump to make his work look illegitimate." According to CNN , Trump took the opportunity this week to call the Russia investigation "bullshit" in private. In public, he told reporters, "There's absolutely no collusion. I didn't make a phone call to Russia. I have nothing to do with Russia. Everybody knows it." ..."
Dec 27, 2017 | www.politico.com

Former Trump chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon milled his former Oval Office colleague Jared Kushner into a bloody chunk of battle sausage this week and smeared him across the shiny pages of Vanity Fair . You've got to read Bannon's quote three or four times to fully savor the tang of its malice and cruelty. After scorning the Russia collusion theories as fiction, Bannon acknowledged the grisly reality that the Russia investigation poses for his former boss. And he blamed it all on Kushner, for having created the appearance that Putin had helped Trump. Dropping Kushner head first into the grinder, Bannon turned the crank.

"[Kushner was] taking meetings with Russians to get additional stuff. This tells you everything about Jared," Bannon told the magazine's Gabriel Sherman. "They were looking for the picture of Hillary Clinton taking the bag of cash from Putin. That's his maturity level."

Informing Vanity Fair that Kushner's hunt for political smut led him to over-fraternize with the Russians might not be the best way for Bannon to throw special counsel Robert S. Mueller III off the collusion scent. So what was the big man in the Barbour coat up to?

That Bannon and Kushner skirmished during their time together in the White House has been long established. Kushner advocated the sacking FBI Director James B. Comey, for example, and Bannon opposed it. He later told 60 Minutes that the firing was maybe the worst mistake in "modern political history" because it precipitated the hiring of the special counsel and had thereby expanded the investigation.

Sherman's piece reveals the cognitive split that evolved between Bannon and others, specifically Trump, on how to handle the mess that had been created. "Goldman Sachs teaches one thing: don't invent shit. Take something that works and make it better," Bannon told Sherman. He said he consulted with Bill Clinton's former lawyer Lanny Davis about how the Clintons responded to Ken Starr's probe. "We were so disciplined. You guys don't have that," Bannon recalls Davis advising him. "That always haunted me when he said that," Bannon told Sherman. Bannon said the investigation was an attempt by the establishment to undo the election, but he took it seriously and warned Trump he was in danger of being impeached.

Bannon's gripe against Kushner in Vanity Fair continues: He claims that Donald Trump's disparaging tweets about Attorney General Jeff Sessions were designed to provide "cover" for Kushner by steering negative media attention toward Sessions and away from Kushner as he was scheduled to testify before a Senate committee.

There's even more hot Bannon on Kushner action. Bannon tells of an Oval Office meeting he attended with Trump, Kushner and Kushner's wife Ivanka Trump in which he called Ivanka "the queen of leaks." "You're a fucking liar!" Ivanka allegedly responded. Hard to know how to score this round, but shattering the public image of Ivanka as poised princess must have been satisfying for a guy who called Javanka "the Democrats."

Getting mauled by Steve Bannon might not be the worst thing to happen to the president's son-in-law this week. He and Ivanka were sued by a private attorney for failing to disclose assets from 30 investment funds on their federal financial disclosure forms. Perhaps more ominous for Kushner, and according to the New York Times , federal prosecutors in Brooklyn have subpoenaed Deutsche Bank records about Kushner's family's real estate business. "There is no indication that the subpoena is related to the investigation being conducted by Robert S. Mueller III," the Times allowed. Yeah, but wouldn't you want to be there when Mueller's team invites Bannon in to talk to him about the Vanity Fair article, and they ask him, "What did you mean about Jared taking meetings with Russians to get additional stuff? Like, what stuff?"

Although "people close to Kushner, who decline to be named" told the Times they don't think the Mueller investigation exposes him to legal jeopardy, the young prince isn't taking chances. The Washington Post reports that his lawyer, Abbe Lowell, has been shopping for a "crisis public relations firm" over the past two weeks. (Senator Robert Menendez, the recent beneficiary of a deadlocked corruption trial, is another Lowell client.)

Why hire super flacks now? Does Kushner sense disaster? Another Bannon offensive? The Flynn plea bargain exposed him -- according to the press -- as the "very senior member" of the Trump transition team described in court documents who told former national security adviser Michael Flynn to lobby the Russian ambassador about a U.N. resolution on Israeli settlements. Maybe he's just buying reputation insurance. Or maybe he's taken to heart Chris Christie's scathing comments. Christie was squeezed out of the Trump transition early on, some say by Kushner who is said to hold a grudge against Christie who, when he was federal prosecutor, put Kushner's father in jail . This week Christie said that Kushner "deserves the scrutiny" he's been getting. It was almost as if Christie and Bannon were operating a twin-handled grinder, cranking out an extra helping of Kushner's tainted reputation.

President Putin and President Trump occupied the same page about the scandal this week in what was either a matter of collusion or of great minds thinking alike. Speaking at a four-hour media event in Moscow, Putin blamed the scandal on the U.S. "deep state" and said, "This is all made up by people who oppose Trump to make his work look illegitimate." According to CNN , Trump took the opportunity this week to call the Russia investigation "bullshit" in private. In public, he told reporters, "There's absolutely no collusion. I didn't make a phone call to Russia. I have nothing to do with Russia. Everybody knows it."

Everybody, perhaps, except former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Appearing on CNN , Clapper used direct language to bind former KGB officer Putin to Trump tighter than a girdle to a paunch. "[Putin] knows how to handle an asset, and that's what he's doing with the president," Clapper said. "I think some of that experience and instincts of Putin has come into play here in his managing of a pretty important account for him, if I could use that term, with our president."

Writing in Newsweek , Jeff Stein collected other tell-tale signs of Trump's cooptation: He refused to take Russian meddling in the election seriously. He responds favorably to Putin's praise and seems to crave more. He dismisses worries about his circle's connections to Kremlin agents before the election and during the transition -- and he tried to call off the Flynn investigation.

It's enough to make you wonder why Bannon thinks Kushner is the enemy, not Trump.

******

If you've read this far, you're probably disappointed that more didn't happen in the Trump Tower scandal this week. Sue me in small claims court via email to [email protected] . My email alerts never believed in collusion, my Twitter feed is set to cut a plea deal with Mueller, and my RSS feed has several crisis PR firms on retainer.

[Dec 25, 2017] The USA as neocons occupied country

Apr 28, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
XXX, April 28, 2017 at 06:29 PM
Sanjait,

"Hillary Clinton, following a long tradition of mainstream Democrats, had a grab bag of proposals that, if enacted, would collectively make a huge difference in the lives of working people. "

I think you are wrong here.

Hillary was/is a neoliberal, and as such is hostile to the interests of working people and middle class in general. Like most neoliberals she is a Machiavellian elitist. Her election promises are pure demagogy, much like Trump or Obama election promised (immortalized in the slogan "change we can believe in" which now became the synonym of election fraud)

Also she was/is hell-bent of preserving/expanding the US neoliberal empire and the wars for neoliberal dominance (in ME mainly for the benefit of Israel and Saudis). War are pretty costly ventures and they are financed at the expense of working class and lower middle class, never at the expense of "fat cats" from Wall Street.

All-in-all I think the role of POTUS is greatly "misunderestimated" in your line of thinking. As we can see differences between Trump and Hillary in foreign policy are marginal. Why are you assuming that the differences in domestic economic policies would be greater ?

In reality there are other powerful factors in play that diminish the importance of POTUS:

  1. The US Presidential Elections are no longer an instrument for change. They are completely corrupted and are mostly of "bread and circuses" type of events, where two gladiators preselected by financial elite fight for the coveted position, using all kind of dirty tricks for US public entertainment.
  2. While the appearance of democracy remains, in reality the current system represents that rule of "deep state". In the classic form of "National security state". In the National Security State, the US people no longer have the any chances to change the policies.
  3. Political emasculation of US voters has led to frustration, depression and rage. It feeds radical right movement including neo-fascists, which embrace more extreme remedies to the current problems because they correctly feel that the traditional parties no longer represent the will of the people.
  4. Insulated and partially degenerated US elite have grown more obtuse and is essentially a hostage for neocons. They chose to ignore the seething anger that lies just below the surface of brainwashed Us electorate.
  5. The "American Dream" is officially dead. People at a and below lower middle class level see little hope for themselves, their children or the country. The chasm between top 1% (or let's say top 20%) and the rest continues to fuel populist anger.
  6. While Trump proved to be "yet another turncoat" like Barak Obama (who just got his first silver coin in the form of the $400K one hour speech) Trump's election signify a broad rejection of the country's neoliberal elite, including neoliberal MSM, neocon foreign policy as well as neoliberal economic system (and first of all neoliberal globalization).
  7. The country foreign policy remains hijacked by neocons (this time in the form of fiends of Paul Wolfowitz among the military brass appointed by Trump to top positions in his administration) and that might spell major conflict or even WWIII.

The level of subservience to neocon agenda in Trump administration might well be higher then in previous administration. And "make America first" was already transformed into "full spectrum dominance" == "America uber alles". http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/deutschland-uber-alles-and-america-first-in-song

8. We can now talk about the USA as "neocon occupied country" (NOC), because the neocons policies contradict the USA national interests and put heavy burden of taxpayers, especially in lower income categories. Due to neglect in maintaining infrastructure, in some areas the USA already looks like third word country. Still we finance Israel and several other countries to the tune of $40 billion dollars in military aid alone (that that's in case of Israel just the tip of the iceberg; real figure is probably double of that) https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

Since Bill Clinton POTUS is more or less a marionette of financial oligarchy (which Obama -- as a person without the past (or with a very fuzzy past) - symbolizes all too well).

[Dec 25, 2017] The Israel-gate Side of Russia-gate Consortiumnews

Notable quotes:
"... In this case, what Flynn and Kushner were doing was going directly against US foreign policy, because Obama wanted the resolution to pass; He just didn't want to vote for it because that would cross the Israel lobby in the United States. The US finally ended up abstaining on the resolution and it passed 14-0. ..."
"... But before that happened, Flynn went to the Russians and to Egypt, both members of the Security Council, and tried to get the resolution delayed. But all of Israel's machinations to derail this resolution failed and that is what Mueller was investigating, the intervention and disruption of American foreign policy by private citizens who had no official role. ..."
"... While I think Bibi is an idiot, I also think the Logan Act is overinvoked, overstated, probably of dubious legal value and also of dubious constitutional value. ..."
"... In short, especially because Trump had been elected, though not yet inaugurated, I think he is not at all guilty of a Logan Act violation. This is nothing close to Spiro Agnew calling Anna Chenault from the airplane in August 1968. ..."
"... Probably true, although evidence of extreme collusion with Israel eliminates any case against Russia, with whom we have far more reasons for amity. Bringing out the Israel collusion greatly improves public understanding of political corruption. Perhaps it will awaken some to the Agnew-Chennault betrayal of the people of the US. ..."
"... It's ironic that Russia-gate is turning out to be Israel's effort to distract attention from its complete control over the Democratic party in 2016. From Israeli billionaires behind the scenes to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz at the helm. ..."
"... "Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state." So that is how it works, the White House says it is an enemy state and therefore it is. The so called declaration is the hammer used for trying to make contact with Russia a criminal offense. We are not at war with Russia although we see our leaders doing their best to provoke Russia into one. ..."
"... The Israel connection disclosed by the malpracticer hack Mueller in the recent Flynn-flam just made Trump bullet-proof (so to speak). ..."
"... So Mueller caught Kushner and Flynn red-handed, sabotaging the Obama administration? What of it? He can't use that evidence, because it would inculpate the Zionist neocons that are orchestrating his farcical, Stalinist witchhunt. And Mueller, being an efficient terminator bot, knows that his target is Russia, not Israel. ..."
"... So Mueller will just have to continue swamp-fishing for potential perjurers ahem witnesses, for the upcoming show trials (to further inflame public opinion against Russia and Russia sympathizers). And continue he will, because (as we all know from Schwarzenegger's flicks), the only way to stop the terminator is to terminate him/it first. ..."
"... Trump and Kushner have nothing to worry about, even if a smoking gun is found that proves their collusion with Israel. That's because the entire political and media establishment will simply ignore the Israeli connection. ..."
"... Journalists and politicians will even continue to present Mike Flynn's contacts as evidence of collusion with Russia. They'll keep on repeating that "Flynn lied about his phone call to the Russian ambassador". But there will be no mention of the fact that the purpose of this contact was to support Israel and not any alleged Russian interference. ..."
"... I think you have it right Brendan. The MSM, Intelligence Community, and Mueller would never go down any path that popularized undue Israeli influence on US foreign policy. "Nothing to see here folks, move along." ..."
"... The Nice Zionists responsible for the thefts and murders for the past 69 years along with the "Jewish Community" in the rest of the world will resolve the matter so as to be fair to both parties. This is mind-boggling fantasy. ..."
"... FFS, Netanyahu aired a political commercial in Florida for Romney saying vote for this guy (against Obama)! I mean, it doesn't get any more overtly manipulative than that. Period. End of story. ..."
"... God, I hate to go all "Israel controls the media" but there it is. Not even a discussion. Just a fact. ..."
"... I also have to point out that he "fist pumped" Hillary Clinton at Mohammed Ali's eulogy. If he's as astute as he purports to be, he has to know that Hillary would have invaded Syria and killed a few hundred thousand more Syrians for the simple act of defiantly preserving their country. By almost any read of Ali's history, he would have been adamantly ("killing brown people") against that. But there was Silverstein using the platform to promote, arguably, perpetual war. ..."
"... Yeah I found a couple of Silverstein's statements to be closer to neocon propaganda than reality: "Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby . . ." "Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead." My impression was that the whole "terrible relationship between Obama and Netanyahu" was manufactured by the Israel lobby to bully Obama. However these are small blips within an otherwise solid critique of the Israel lobby's influence. ..."
Dec 25, 2017 | consortiumnews.com

The Israel-gate Side of Russia-gate December 23, 2017

While unproven claims of Russian meddling in U.S. politics have whipped Official Washington into a frenzy, much less attention has been paid to real evidence of Israeli interference in U.S. politics, as Dennis J Bernstein describes.

By Dennis J Bernstein

In investigating Russia's alleged meddling in U.S. politics, special prosecutor Robert Mueller uncovered evidence that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pressured the Trump transition team to undermine President Obama's plans to permit the United Nations to censure Israel over its illegal settlement building on the Palestinian West Bank, a discovery referenced in the plea deal with President Trump's first National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.

President Donald J. Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel at the United Nations General Assembly (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)

At Netanyahu's behest, Flynn and President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner reportedly took the lead in the lobbying to derail the U.N. resolution, which Flynn discussed in a phone call with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak (in which the Russian diplomat rebuffed Flynn's appeal to block the resolution).

I spoke on Dec, 18 with independent journalist and blogger Richard Silverstein, who writes on national security and other issues for a number of blogs at Tikun Olam .

Dennis Bernstein: A part of Michael Flynn's plea had to do with some actions he took before coming to power regarding Israel and the United Nations. Please explain.

Richard Silverstein:

The Obama administration was negotiating in the [UN] Security Council just before he left office about a resolution that would condemn Israeli settlements. Obviously, the Israeli government did not want this resolution to be passed. Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead. They approached Michael Flynn and Jared Kushner became involved in this. While they were in the transition and before having any official capacity, they negotiated with various members of the Security Council to try to quash the settlement resolution.

One of the issues here which is little known is the Logan Act, which was passed at the foundation of our republic and was designed to prevent private citizens from usurping the foreign policy prerogatives of the executive. It criminalized any private citizen who attempted to negotiate with an enemy country over any foreign policy issue.

In this case, what Flynn and Kushner were doing was going directly against US foreign policy, because Obama wanted the resolution to pass; He just didn't want to vote for it because that would cross the Israel lobby in the United States. The US finally ended up abstaining on the resolution and it passed 14-0.

But before that happened, Flynn went to the Russians and to Egypt, both members of the Security Council, and tried to get the resolution delayed. But all of Israel's machinations to derail this resolution failed and that is what Mueller was investigating, the intervention and disruption of American foreign policy by private citizens who had no official role.

This speaks to the power of the Israel lobby and of Israel itself to disrupt our foreign policy. Very few people have ever been charged with committing an illegal act by advocating on behalf of Israel. That is one of the reasons why this is such an important development. Until now, the lobby has really ruled supreme on the issue of Israel and Palestine in US foreign policy. Now it is possible that a private citizen will actually be made to pay a price for that.

This is an important development because the lobby till now has run roughshod over our foreign policy in this area and this may act as a restraining order against blatant disruption of US foreign policy by people like this.

Bernstein: So this information is a part of Michael Flynn's plea. Anyone studying this would learn something about Michael Flynn and it would be part of the prosecution's investigation.

Silverstein:

That's absolutely right. One thing to note here is that it is reporters who have raised the issue of the Logan Act, not Mueller or Flynn's people or anyone in the Trump administration. But I do think that Logan is a very important part of this plea deal, even if it is not mentioned explicitly.

Bernstein: If the special prosecutor had smoking-gun information that the Trump administration colluded with Russia, in the way they colluded with Israel before coming to power, this would be a huge revelation. But it is definitely collusion when it comes to Israel.

Silverstein: Absolutely. If this were Russia, it would be on the front page of every major newspaper in the United States and the leading story on the TV news. Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby and they have so much influence on US policy concerning Israel, it has managed to stay on the back burner. Only two or three media outlets besides mine have raised this issue of Logan and collusion. Kushner and Flynn may be the first American citizens charged under the Logan Act for interfering on behalf of Israel in our foreign policy. This is a huge issue and it has hardly been raised at all.

Bernstein: As you know, Rachel Maddow of MSNBC has made a career out of investigating the Russia-gate charges. She says that she has read all this material carefully, so she must have read about Flynn and Israel, but I haven't heard her on this issue at all.

Silverstein:

Even progressive journalists, who you'd think would be going after this with a vengeance, are frightened off by the fact the lobby really bites back. So, aside from outlets like the Intercept and the Electronic Intifada, there is a lot of hesitation about going after the Israel lobby. People are afraid because they know that there is a high price to be paid. It goes from being purely journalism to being a personal and political vendetta when they get you in their sights. In fact, one of the reasons I feel my blog is so important is that what I do is challenge Israeli policy and Israeli intervention in places where it doesn't belong.

Bernstein: Jared Kushner is the point man for the Trump administration on Israel. He has talked about having a "vision for peace." Do you think it is a problem that this is someone with a long, close relationship with the prime minister of Israel and, in fact, runs a foundation that invests in the building of illegal Israeli settlements? Might this be problematic?

Silverstein:

It is quite nefarious, actually. When Jared Kushner was a teenager, Netanyahu used to stay at the Kushner family home when he visited the United States. This relationship with one of the most extreme right political figures in Israel goes back decades. And it is not just Kushner himself, but all the administration personnel dealing with these so-called peace negotiations, including Jason Greenblatt and David Friedman, the ambassador. These are all orthodox Jews who tend to have very nationalist views when it comes to Israel. They all support settlements financially through foundations. These are not honest brokers.

We could talk at length about the history of US personnel who have been negotiators for Middle East peace. All of them have been favorable to Israel and answerable to the Israel lobby, including Dennis Ross and Makovsky, who served in the last administration. These people are dyed-in-the-wool ultra-nationalist supporters of [Israeli] settlements. They have no business playing any role in negotiating a peace deal.

My prediction all along has been that these peace negotiations will come to naught, even though they seem to have bought the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, which is something new in the process. The Palestinians can never accept a deal that has been negotiated by Kushner and company because it will be far too favorable to Israel and it will totally neglect the interests of the Palestinians.

Bernstein: It has been revealed that Kushner supports the building of settlements in the West Bank. Most people don't understand the politics of what is going on there, but it appears to be part of an ethnic cleansing.

Silverstein:

The settlements have always been a violation of international law, ever since Israel conquered the West Bank in 1967. The Geneva Conventions direct an occupying power to withdraw from territory that was not its own. In 1967 Israel invaded Arab states and conquered the West Bank and Gaza but this has never been recognized or accepted by any nation until now.

The fact that Kushner and his family are intimately involved in supporting settlements–as are David Friedman and Jason Greenblatt–is completely outrageous. No member of any previous US administration would have been allowed to participate with these kinds of financial investments in support of settlements. Of course, Trump doesn't understand the concept of conflict of interest because he is heavily involved in such conflicts himself. But no party in the Middle East except Israel is going to consider the US an honest broker and acceptable as a mediator.

When they announce this deal next January, no one in the Arab World is going to accept it, with the possible exception of Saudi Arabia because they have other fish to fry in terms of Iran. The next three years are going to be interesting, supposing Trump lasts out his term. My prediction is that the peace plan will fail and that it will lead to greater violence in the Middle East. It will not simply lead to a vacuum, it will lead to a deterioration in conditions there.

Bernstein: The Trump transition team was actually approached directly by the Israeli government to try to intercede at the United Nations.

Silverstein:

I'm assuming it was Netanyahu who went directly to Kushner and Trump. Now, we haven't yet found out that Trump directly knew about this but it is very hard to believe that Trump didn't endorse this. Now that we know that Mueller has access to all of the emails of the transition team, there is little doubt that they have been able to find their smoking gun. Flynn's plea meant that they basically had him dead to rights. It remains to be seen what will happen with Kushner but I would think that this would play some role in either the prosecution of Kushner or some plea deal.

Bernstein: The other big story, of course, is the decision by the Trump administration to move the US embassy from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem. Was there any pre-election collusion in that regard and what are the implications?

Silverstein:

Well, it's a terrible decision which goes against forty to fifty years of US foreign policy. It also breaches all international understanding. All of our allies in the European Union and elsewhere are aghast at this development. There is now a campaign in the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution condemning the announcement, which we will veto, but the next step will be to go to the General Assembly, where such a resolution will pass easily.

The question is how much anger, violence and disruption this is going to cause around the world, especially in the Arab and Muslim world. This is a slow-burning fuse. It is not going to explode right now. The issue of Jerusalem is so vital that this is not something that is simply going to go away. This is going to be a festering sore in the Muslim world and among Palestinians. We have already seen attacks on Israeli soldiers and citizens and there will be many more.

As to collusion in all of this, since Trump always said during the campaign that this was what he was going to do, it might be difficult to treat this in the same way as the UN resolution. The UN resolution was never on anybody's radar and nobody knew the role that Trump was playing behind the scenes with that–as opposed to Trump saying right from the get-go that Jerusalem was going to be recognized as the capital of Jerusalem.

By doing that, they have completely abrogated any Palestinian interest in Jerusalem. This is a catastrophic decision that really excludes the United States from being an honest broker here and shows our true colors in terms of how pro-Israel we are.

Dennis J Bernstein is a host of "Flashpoints" on the Pacifica radio network and the author of Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom . You can access the audio archives at www.flashpoints.net .

Drew Hunkins , December 23, 2017 at 5:37 pm

As most regular readers of CN already know, some dynamite books on the inordinate amount of influence pro-Israel zealots have on Washington:

1.) 'The Host and the Parasite' by Greg Felton
2.) 'Power of Israel in the United States' by James Petras
3.) 'They Dare to Speak Out' by Paul Findley
4.) 'The Israel Lobby' by Mearsheimer and Walt
5.) 'Zionism, Militarism and the Decline of U.S. Power' by James Petras

I suggest that anyone relatively knew to this neglected topic peruse a few of the aforementioned titles. An inevitable backlash by the citizens of the United States is eventually forthcoming against the Zionist Power Configuration. It's crucial that this impending backlash remain democratic, non-violent, eschews anti-Semitism, and travels in a progressive in direction.

Annie , December 23, 2017 at 5:47 pm

Which one would you suggest? I already read "The Israel Lobby."

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:38 pm

Findley and Mearsheimer are certainly worthwhile. I will look for Petras.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:38 pm

If you haven't already read them, the end/footnotes in "The Israel Lobby" are more illuminating.

SocraticGadfly , December 23, 2017 at 6:10 pm

That influence is also shown, of course, by the fact that Obama waited until the midnight hours of his tenure and after the 2016 election to even start working on this resolution.

SocraticGadfly , December 23, 2017 at 6:05 pm

While I think Bibi is an idiot, I also think the Logan Act is overinvoked, overstated, probably of dubious legal value and also of dubious constitutional value.

In short, especially because Trump had been elected, though not yet inaugurated, I think he is not at all guilty of a Logan Act violation. This is nothing close to Spiro Agnew calling Anna Chenault from the airplane in August 1968.

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:41 pm

Probably true, although evidence of extreme collusion with Israel eliminates any case against Russia, with whom we have far more reasons for amity. Bringing out the Israel collusion greatly improves public understanding of political corruption. Perhaps it will awaken some to the Agnew-Chennault betrayal of the people of the US.

JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:32 am

It's ironic that Russia-gate is turning out to be Israel's effort to distract attention from its complete control over the Democratic party in 2016. From Israeli billionaires behind the scenes to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz at the helm.

The leaked emails showed the corruption plainly, and based on the ACTUAL evidence (recorded download time), most likely came from a highly disgruntled insider. The picture was starting to spill into public view. I'd estimate the real huge worry was that if this stuff came out, it could bring out other Israeli secrets, like their involvement in 9/11. That would mean actual jail time. Might be hard to buy your way out of that no matter how much money you have.

Annie , December 23, 2017 at 10:48 pm

The Logan act states that anyone who negotiates with an enemy of the US, and Israel is not defined as an enemy.

Annie , December 23, 2017 at 6:59 pm

The Logan act would not apply here, although I wish it would. I don't think anyone has been convicted based on this act, and they were part of a transition team not to mention the Logan act clearly states a private citizen who attempts to negotiate with an enemy state, and that certainly doesn't apply to Israel. In this administration their bias is so blatant that they can install Kushner as an honest broker in the Israeli-Palestine peace process while his family has a close relationship with Netanyahu, and he runs a foundation that invests in the building of illegal settlements which goes against the Geneva conventions. Hopefully Trump's blatant siding with Israel will receive a lot of backlash as did his plan to make Jerusalem the capital of Israel.

I also found that so called progressive internet sites don't cover this the way they should.

Al Pinto , December 24, 2017 at 9:16 am

@Annie

"The Logan act would not apply here, although I wish it would."

You and me both .

From the point of starting to read this article, it has been in my mind that the Logan act would not apply here. After reading most of the comments, it became clear that not many people viewed this as such. Yes, Joe Tedesky did as well

The UN is the "clearing house" for international politics, where countries freely contact each other's for getting support for their cause behind the scene. The support sought after could be voting for or against the resolution on hand. At times, as Israel did, countries reach out to perceived enemies as well, if they could not secure sufficient support for their cause. This is the normal activity of the UN diplomacy.

Knowing that the outgoing administration would not support its cause, Israel reached out to the incoming administration to delay the vote on the UN resolution. I fail to see anything wrong with Israel's action even in this case; Israel is not an enemy state to the US. As such, there has been no violation of any acts by the incoming administration, even if they tried to secure veto vote for Israel. I do not like it, but no action by Mueller in this case is correct.

People, just like the article in itself, implying that the Logan Act applies in this case are just plain wrong. Not just wrong, but their anti-Israel bias is in plain view.

Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state. Even then, Russia contacting the incoming administration is not a violation of the Logan Act. That is just normal diplomacy in the background between countries. What would be a violation is that the contacted official acted on the behalf of Russia and tried to influence the outgoing administration's decision. That is what the Mueller investigation tries to prove hopelessly

Herman , December 24, 2017 at 10:54 am

"Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state." So that is how it works, the White House says it is an enemy state and therefore it is. The so called declaration is the hammer used for trying to make contact with Russia a criminal offense. We are not at war with Russia although we see our leaders doing their best to provoke Russia into one.

Annie , December 24, 2017 at 1:55 pm

Thanks for your reply. When I read the article and it referenced the Logan Act, which I am familiar with in that I've read about it before, I was surprised that Bernstein and Silverstein even brought it up because it so obviously does not apply in this case, since Israel is not considered an enemy state. Many have even referenced it as flimsy when it comes to convictions against those in Trump's transition team who had contacts with Russia. No one has ever been convicted under the Logan Act.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:41 pm

The Logan Act either should apply equally, or not apply at all. This "Russia-gate" hype seems to apply it selectively.

mrtmbrnmn , December 23, 2017 at 7:36 pm

You guys are blinded by the light. The Israel connection disclosed by the malpracticer hack Mueller in the recent Flynn-flam just made Trump bullet-proof (so to speak).

There is no doubt that Trump is Bibi's and the Saudi's ventriloquist dummy and Jared has been an Israel agent of influence since he was 12.

But half the Dementedcrat Sore Loser Brigade will withdraw from the field of battle (not to mention most of the GOP living dead too) if publically and noisily tying Israel to Trump's tail becomes the only route to his removal. Which it would have to be, as there is no there there regarding the yearlong trumped-up PutinPutinPutin waterboarding of Trump.

Immediately (if not sooner) the mighty (pro-Israel) Donor Bank of Singer (Paul), Saban (Haim), Sachs (Goldman) & Adelson (Sheldon), would change their passwords and leave these politicians/beggars with empty begging bowls. End of $ordid $tory.

alley cat , December 23, 2017 at 7:45 pm

So Mueller caught Kushner and Flynn red-handed, sabotaging the Obama administration? What of it? He can't use that evidence, because it would inculpate the Zionist neocons that are orchestrating his farcical, Stalinist witchhunt. And Mueller, being an efficient terminator bot, knows that his target is Russia, not Israel.

Mueller can use that evidence of sabotage and/or obstruction of justice to try to coerce false confessions from Kushner and Flynn. But what are the chances of that, barring short stayovers for them at some CIA black site?

So Mueller will just have to continue swamp-fishing for potential perjurers ahem witnesses, for the upcoming show trials (to further inflame public opinion against Russia and Russia sympathizers). And continue he will, because (as we all know from Schwarzenegger's flicks), the only way to stop the terminator is to terminate him/it first.

Leslie F. , December 23, 2017 at 8:28 pm

He used it, along with other info, to turn flip Flynn and possibly can use it the same way again Kusher. Not all evidence has end up in court to be useful.

JWalters , December 23, 2017 at 8:40 pm

This is an extremely important story, excellently reported. All the main "facts" Americans think they know about Israel are, amazingly, flat-out lies.

1. Israel was NOT victimized by powerful Arab armies. Israel overpowered and victimized a defenseless, civilian Arab population. Military analysts knew the Arab armies were in poor shape and would not be able to resist the zionist army.

2. Muslim "citizens" of Israel do NOT have all the same rights as Jews.

3. Israelis are NOT under threat from the indigineous Palestinians, but Palestinians are under constant threats of theft and death from the Israelis.

4. Israel does NOT share America's most fundamental values, which rest on the principle of equal human rights for all.

Maintaining such a blanket of major lies for decades requires immense power. And this power would have to be exercised "under the radar" to be effective. That requires even more power. Both Congress and the press have to be controlled. How much power does it take to turn "Progressive Rachel" into "Tel Aviv Rachel"? To turn "It Takes a Village" Hillary into "Slaughter a Village" Hillary? It takes immense power AND ruthlessness.

War profiteers have exactly this combination of immense war profits and the ruthlessness to victimize millions of people.
"War Profiteers and the Roots of the War on Terror"
http://warprofiteerstory.blogspot.com

Vast war profits easily afford to buy the mainstream media. And controlling campaign contributions for members of Congress is amazingly cheap in the big picture. Such a squalid sale of souls.

And when simple bribery is not enough, they ruin a person's life through blackmail or false character assassination. And if those don't work they use death threats, including to family members, and finally murder. Their ruthlessness is unrestrained. John Perkins has described these tactics in "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man".

For readers who haven't seen it, here is an excellent riff on the absurdly overwhelming evidence for Israel's influence compared to that of Russia, at a highly professional news and analysis website run by Jewish anti-Zionists.
"Let's talk about Russian influence"
http://mondoweiss.net/2016/08/about-russian-influence/

mike k , December 23, 2017 at 8:44 pm

Hitler and Mussolini, Trump and Netanyahoo – matches made in Hell. These characters are so obviously, blatantly evil that it is deeply disturbing that people fail to see that, and instead go to great lengths to find some complicated flaws in these monsters.

mike k , December 23, 2017 at 8:49 pm

Keep it simple folks. No need for complex analyses. Just remember that these characters as simply as evil as it gets, and proceed from there. These asinine shows that portray mobsters as complex human beings are dangerously deluding. If you want to be victimized by these types, this kind of overthinking is just the way to go.

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 9:00 pm

There is a modern theory of fiction that insists upon the portrayal of inconsistency in characters, both among the good guys and the bad guys. It is useful to show how those who do wrongs have made specific kinds of errors that make them abnormal, and that those who do right are not perfect but nonetheless did the right thing. Instead it is used by commercial writers to argue that the good are really bad, and the bad are really good, which is of course the philosophy of oligarchy-controlled mass publishers.

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:54 pm

A very important article by Dennis Bernstein, and it is very appropriate that non-zionist Jews are active against the extreme zionist corruption of our federal government. I am sure that they are reviled by the zionists for interfering with the false denunciations of racism against the opponents of zionism. Indeed critics face a very nearly totalitarian power of zionism, which in league with MIC/WallSt opportunism has displaced democracy altogether in the US.

backwardsevolution , December 23, 2017 at 9:18 pm

A nice little set-up by the Obama administration. Perhaps it was entrapment? Who set it up? Flynn and Kushner should have known better to fall for it. So at the end of his Presidency, Obama suddenly gets balls and wants to slap down Israel? Yeah, right.

Nice to have leverage over people, though, isn't it? If you're lucky and play your cards right, you might even be lucky enough to land an impeachment.

Of course, I'm just being cynical. No one would want to overturn democracy, would they?

Certainly people like Comey, Brenner, Clinton, Clapper, Mueller, Rosenstein wouldn't want that, would they?

Joe Tedesky , December 23, 2017 at 10:33 pm

I just can't see any special prosecutor investigating Israel-Gate. Between what the Zionist donors donate to these creepy politicians, too what goods they have on these same mischievous politicians, I just can't see any investigation into Israel's collusion with the Trump Administration going anywhere. Netanyahu isn't Putin, and Russia isn't Israel. Plus, Israel is considered a U.S. ally, while Russia is being marked as a Washington rival. Sorry, this news regarding Israel isn't going to be ranted on about for the next 18 months, like the MSM has done with Russia, because our dear old Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, or so they tell us. So, don't get your hopes up.

JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:33 am

It's true the Israelis have America's politicians by the ears and the balls. But as this story gets better known, politicians will start getting questions at their town meetings. Increasingly the politicians will gag on what Israel is force-feeding them, until finally they reach a critical mass of vomit in Congress.

Joe Tedesky , December 24, 2017 at 11:12 am

I hope you are right JWalters. Although relying on a Zionist controlled MSM doesn't give hope for the news getting out properly. Again I hope you are right JWalters. Joe

Jeff Blankfort , December 24, 2017 at 12:18 am

Actually, Netanyahu was so desperate to have the resolution pulled and not voted on that he reached out to any country that might help him after the foreign minister of New Zealand, one of its co-sponsors refused to pull the plug after a testy phone exchange with the Israeli PM ending up threatening an Israeli boycott oturnef the KIwis.

He then turned to his buddy, Vladimir Putin, who owed him a favor for having Israel's UN delegate absent himself for the UNGA vote on sanctioning Russia after its annexation of Crimea.

Putin then called Russia's UN Ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, since deceased, and asked him to get the other UNSC ambassadors to postpone the vote until Trump took over the White House but the other ambassadors weren't buying it. Given Russia's historic public position regarding the settlements, Churkin had no choice to vote Yes with the others.

This story was reported in detail in the Israeli press but blacked out in the US which, due to Zionist influence on the media, does not want the American public to know about the close ties between Putin and Netanyahu which has led to the Israeli PM making five state visits there in the last year and a half.

Had Clinton won the White House we can assume that there would have been no US veto. That Netanyahu apparently knew in advance that the US planned to veto the resolution was, I suspect, leaked to the Israelis by US delegate Samantha Power, who was clearly unhappy at having to abstain.

Abe , December 24, 2017 at 12:39 am

The Israeli Prime Minister made five state visits to Russia in the last year and a half to make sure the Russians don't accidentally on purpose blast Israeli warplanes from the sky over Syria (like they oughtta). Putin tries not to snicker when Netanyahu bloviates ad nauseum about the purported "threat" posed by Iran.

argos , December 24, 2017 at 7:00 am

He thinks Putin is a RATS ASS like the yankee government

JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:34 am

"This story was reported in detail in the Israeli press but blacked out in the US"

We've just had a whole cluster of big stories involving Israel that have all been essentially blacked out in the US press. e.g.
"Dionne and Shields ignore the Adelson in the room"
http://mondoweiss.net/2017/12/jerusalem-israels-capital

This is not due to chance. There is no doubt that the US mainstream media is wholly controlled by the Israelis.

alley cat , December 24, 2017 at 4:49 am

"He [Netanyahu] then turned to his buddy, Vladimir Putin "

Jeff, that characterization of Putin and Netanyahu's relationship makes no sense, since the Russians have consistently opposed Zionism and Putin has been no exception, having spoiled Zionist plans for the destruction of Syria.

"Had Clinton won the White House we can assume that there would have been no US veto."

Not sure where you're going with that, since the US vote was up to Obama, who wanted to get some payback for all of Bibi's efforts to sabotage Obama's treaty with Iran.

For the record, Zionism has had no more rabid supporter than the Dragon Lady. If we're going to make assumptions, we could start by assuming that if she had won the White House we'd all be dead by now, thanks to her obsession (at the instigation of her Zionist/neocon sponsors) with declaring no-fly zones in Syria.

Brendan , December 24, 2017 at 6:18 am

Trump and Kushner have nothing to worry about, even if a smoking gun is found that proves their collusion with Israel. That's because the entire political and media establishment will simply ignore the Israeli connection.

Journalists and politicians will even continue to present Mike Flynn's contacts as evidence of collusion with Russia. They'll keep on repeating that "Flynn lied about his phone call to the Russian ambassador". But there will be no mention of the fact that the purpose of this contact was to support Israel and not any alleged Russian interference.

Skip Scott , December 24, 2017 at 7:59 am

I think you have it right Brendan. The MSM, Intelligence Community, and Mueller would never go down any path that popularized undue Israeli influence on US foreign policy. "Nothing to see here folks, move along."

argos , December 24, 2017 at 6:57 am

The zionist will stop at nothing to control the middle east with American taxpayers money/military equiptment its a win win for the zionist they control America lock stock and barrel a pity though it is a great country to be led by a jewish entity.

Herman , December 24, 2017 at 10:47 am

What will Israel-Palestine look like twenty years from now? Will it remain an apartheid regime, a regime without any Palestinians, or something different. The Trump decision, which the world rejects, brings the issue of "final" settlement to the fore. In a way we can go back to the thirties and the British Mandate. Jewish were fleeing Europe, many coming to Palestine. The British, on behalf of the Zionists, were delaying declaring Palestine a state with control of its own affairs. Seeing the mass immigration and chafing at British foot dragging, the Arabs rebelled, What happened then was that the British, responding to numerous pressures notably war with Germany, acted by granting independence and granting Palestine control of its borders.

With American pressure and the mass exodus of Jews from Europe, Jews defied the British resulting in Jewish resistance. What followed then was a UN plan to divide the land with a Jerusalem an international city administered by the UN. The Arabs rebelled and lost much of what the UN plan provided and Jerusalem as an international city was scrapped.

Will there be a second serious attempt to settle the issue of the land and the status of Jerusalem? Will there be a serious move toward a single state? How will the matter of Jerusalem be resolved. The two state solution has always been a fantasy and acquiescence of Palestinians to engage in this charade exposes their leaders to charges of posturing for perks. Imagined options could go on and on but will there be serious options placed before the world community or will the boots on the ground Israeli policies continue?

As I have commented before, it will most probably be the Jewish community in Israel and the world that shapes the future and if the matter is to be resolved that is fair to both parties, it will be they that starts the ball rolling.

Zachary Smith , December 24, 2017 at 1:34 pm

As I have commented before, it will most probably be the Jewish community in Israel and the world that shapes the future and if the matter is to be resolved that is fair to both parties, it will be they that starts the ball rolling.

The Nice Zionists responsible for the thefts and murders for the past 69 years along with the "Jewish Community" in the rest of the world will resolve the matter so as to be fair to both parties. This is mind-boggling fantasy.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 5:56 pm

Truly mind-boggling. Ahistorical, and as you say, fantasy.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 5:48 pm

FFS, Netanyahu aired a political commercial in Florida for Romney saying vote for this guy (against Obama)! I mean, it doesn't get any more overtly manipulative than that. Period. End of story.

$50K of Facebook ads about puppies pales in comparison to that blatant, prima facia, public manipulation. God, I hate to go all "Israel controls the media" but there it is. Not even a discussion. Just a fact.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:11 pm

Just for the record, Richard Silverstein blocked me on Twitter because I pointed out that he slammed someone who was suggesting that the Assad government was fighting for its (Syria's) life by fighting terrorists. Actually, more specifically, because of that he read my "Free Palestine" bio on Twitter and called me a Hamas supporter (no Hamas mentioned) and a "moron" for some seeming contradiction.

I also have to point out that he "fist pumped" Hillary Clinton at Mohammed Ali's eulogy. If he's as astute as he purports to be, he has to know that Hillary would have invaded Syria and killed a few hundred thousand more Syrians for the simple act of defiantly preserving their country. By almost any read of Ali's history, he would have been adamantly ("killing brown people") against that. But there was Silverstein using the platform to promote, arguably, perpetual war.

Silverstein is probably not a good (ie. consistent) arbiter of Israeli impact on US politics. Just sayin'.

I wish it were otherwise.

Taras 77 , December 24, 2017 at 6:35 pm

https://www.therussophile.org/virus-found-inside-dnc-server-is-linked-to-a-company-based-in-pakistan.html/

This may be a tad ot but it relates to the alleged hacking of the DNC, the role debbie wasserman schultz plays in the spy ring (awan bros) in house of rep servers: I have long suspected that mossad has their fingers in this entire mess. FWIW

Good site, BTW.

Zachary Smith , December 24, 2017 at 7:35 pm

I can't recall why I removed the Tikun Olam site from my bookmarks – it happened quite a while back. Generally I do that when I feel the blogger crossed some kind of personal red line. Something Mr. Silverstein wrote put him over that line with me.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/06/us/06leak.html?hp

In the course of a search I found that at the neocon NYT. Mr. Silverstein claims several things I find unbelievable, and from that alone I wonder about his ultimate motives. I may be excessively touchy about this, but that's how it is.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 8:51 pm

Yeah Zachary, "wondering about ultimate motives" is probably a good way to put it/his views. He's obviously conflicted, if not deferential in some aspects of Israeli policy. He really was a hero of mine, but now I just don't get whether what he says is masking something or a true belief. He says some good stuff, but, but, but .

P. Michael Garber , December 24, 2017 at 11:54 pm

Yeah I found a couple of Silverstein's statements to be closer to neocon propaganda than reality: "Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby . . ." "Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead." My impression was that the whole "terrible relationship between Obama and Netanyahu" was manufactured by the Israel lobby to bully Obama. However these are small blips within an otherwise solid critique of the Israel lobby's influence.

[Dec 25, 2017] The Israel-gate Side of Russia-gate Consortiumnews

Notable quotes:
"... In this case, what Flynn and Kushner were doing was going directly against US foreign policy, because Obama wanted the resolution to pass; He just didn't want to vote for it because that would cross the Israel lobby in the United States. The US finally ended up abstaining on the resolution and it passed 14-0. ..."
"... But before that happened, Flynn went to the Russians and to Egypt, both members of the Security Council, and tried to get the resolution delayed. But all of Israel's machinations to derail this resolution failed and that is what Mueller was investigating, the intervention and disruption of American foreign policy by private citizens who had no official role. ..."
"... While I think Bibi is an idiot, I also think the Logan Act is overinvoked, overstated, probably of dubious legal value and also of dubious constitutional value. ..."
"... In short, especially because Trump had been elected, though not yet inaugurated, I think he is not at all guilty of a Logan Act violation. This is nothing close to Spiro Agnew calling Anna Chenault from the airplane in August 1968. ..."
"... Probably true, although evidence of extreme collusion with Israel eliminates any case against Russia, with whom we have far more reasons for amity. Bringing out the Israel collusion greatly improves public understanding of political corruption. Perhaps it will awaken some to the Agnew-Chennault betrayal of the people of the US. ..."
"... It's ironic that Russia-gate is turning out to be Israel's effort to distract attention from its complete control over the Democratic party in 2016. From Israeli billionaires behind the scenes to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz at the helm. ..."
"... "Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state." So that is how it works, the White House says it is an enemy state and therefore it is. The so called declaration is the hammer used for trying to make contact with Russia a criminal offense. We are not at war with Russia although we see our leaders doing their best to provoke Russia into one. ..."
"... The Israel connection disclosed by the malpracticer hack Mueller in the recent Flynn-flam just made Trump bullet-proof (so to speak). ..."
"... So Mueller caught Kushner and Flynn red-handed, sabotaging the Obama administration? What of it? He can't use that evidence, because it would inculpate the Zionist neocons that are orchestrating his farcical, Stalinist witchhunt. And Mueller, being an efficient terminator bot, knows that his target is Russia, not Israel. ..."
"... So Mueller will just have to continue swamp-fishing for potential perjurers ahem witnesses, for the upcoming show trials (to further inflame public opinion against Russia and Russia sympathizers). And continue he will, because (as we all know from Schwarzenegger's flicks), the only way to stop the terminator is to terminate him/it first. ..."
"... Trump and Kushner have nothing to worry about, even if a smoking gun is found that proves their collusion with Israel. That's because the entire political and media establishment will simply ignore the Israeli connection. ..."
"... Journalists and politicians will even continue to present Mike Flynn's contacts as evidence of collusion with Russia. They'll keep on repeating that "Flynn lied about his phone call to the Russian ambassador". But there will be no mention of the fact that the purpose of this contact was to support Israel and not any alleged Russian interference. ..."
"... I think you have it right Brendan. The MSM, Intelligence Community, and Mueller would never go down any path that popularized undue Israeli influence on US foreign policy. "Nothing to see here folks, move along." ..."
"... The Nice Zionists responsible for the thefts and murders for the past 69 years along with the "Jewish Community" in the rest of the world will resolve the matter so as to be fair to both parties. This is mind-boggling fantasy. ..."
"... FFS, Netanyahu aired a political commercial in Florida for Romney saying vote for this guy (against Obama)! I mean, it doesn't get any more overtly manipulative than that. Period. End of story. ..."
"... God, I hate to go all "Israel controls the media" but there it is. Not even a discussion. Just a fact. ..."
"... I also have to point out that he "fist pumped" Hillary Clinton at Mohammed Ali's eulogy. If he's as astute as he purports to be, he has to know that Hillary would have invaded Syria and killed a few hundred thousand more Syrians for the simple act of defiantly preserving their country. By almost any read of Ali's history, he would have been adamantly ("killing brown people") against that. But there was Silverstein using the platform to promote, arguably, perpetual war. ..."
"... Yeah I found a couple of Silverstein's statements to be closer to neocon propaganda than reality: "Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby . . ." "Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead." My impression was that the whole "terrible relationship between Obama and Netanyahu" was manufactured by the Israel lobby to bully Obama. However these are small blips within an otherwise solid critique of the Israel lobby's influence. ..."
Dec 25, 2017 | consortiumnews.com

The Israel-gate Side of Russia-gate December 23, 2017

While unproven claims of Russian meddling in U.S. politics have whipped Official Washington into a frenzy, much less attention has been paid to real evidence of Israeli interference in U.S. politics, as Dennis J Bernstein describes.

By Dennis J Bernstein

In investigating Russia's alleged meddling in U.S. politics, special prosecutor Robert Mueller uncovered evidence that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pressured the Trump transition team to undermine President Obama's plans to permit the United Nations to censure Israel over its illegal settlement building on the Palestinian West Bank, a discovery referenced in the plea deal with President Trump's first National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.

President Donald J. Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel at the United Nations General Assembly (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)

At Netanyahu's behest, Flynn and President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner reportedly took the lead in the lobbying to derail the U.N. resolution, which Flynn discussed in a phone call with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak (in which the Russian diplomat rebuffed Flynn's appeal to block the resolution).

I spoke on Dec, 18 with independent journalist and blogger Richard Silverstein, who writes on national security and other issues for a number of blogs at Tikun Olam .

Dennis Bernstein: A part of Michael Flynn's plea had to do with some actions he took before coming to power regarding Israel and the United Nations. Please explain.

Richard Silverstein:

The Obama administration was negotiating in the [UN] Security Council just before he left office about a resolution that would condemn Israeli settlements. Obviously, the Israeli government did not want this resolution to be passed. Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead. They approached Michael Flynn and Jared Kushner became involved in this. While they were in the transition and before having any official capacity, they negotiated with various members of the Security Council to try to quash the settlement resolution.

One of the issues here which is little known is the Logan Act, which was passed at the foundation of our republic and was designed to prevent private citizens from usurping the foreign policy prerogatives of the executive. It criminalized any private citizen who attempted to negotiate with an enemy country over any foreign policy issue.

In this case, what Flynn and Kushner were doing was going directly against US foreign policy, because Obama wanted the resolution to pass; He just didn't want to vote for it because that would cross the Israel lobby in the United States. The US finally ended up abstaining on the resolution and it passed 14-0.

But before that happened, Flynn went to the Russians and to Egypt, both members of the Security Council, and tried to get the resolution delayed. But all of Israel's machinations to derail this resolution failed and that is what Mueller was investigating, the intervention and disruption of American foreign policy by private citizens who had no official role.

This speaks to the power of the Israel lobby and of Israel itself to disrupt our foreign policy. Very few people have ever been charged with committing an illegal act by advocating on behalf of Israel. That is one of the reasons why this is such an important development. Until now, the lobby has really ruled supreme on the issue of Israel and Palestine in US foreign policy. Now it is possible that a private citizen will actually be made to pay a price for that.

This is an important development because the lobby till now has run roughshod over our foreign policy in this area and this may act as a restraining order against blatant disruption of US foreign policy by people like this.

Bernstein: So this information is a part of Michael Flynn's plea. Anyone studying this would learn something about Michael Flynn and it would be part of the prosecution's investigation.

Silverstein:

That's absolutely right. One thing to note here is that it is reporters who have raised the issue of the Logan Act, not Mueller or Flynn's people or anyone in the Trump administration. But I do think that Logan is a very important part of this plea deal, even if it is not mentioned explicitly.

Bernstein: If the special prosecutor had smoking-gun information that the Trump administration colluded with Russia, in the way they colluded with Israel before coming to power, this would be a huge revelation. But it is definitely collusion when it comes to Israel.

Silverstein: Absolutely. If this were Russia, it would be on the front page of every major newspaper in the United States and the leading story on the TV news. Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby and they have so much influence on US policy concerning Israel, it has managed to stay on the back burner. Only two or three media outlets besides mine have raised this issue of Logan and collusion. Kushner and Flynn may be the first American citizens charged under the Logan Act for interfering on behalf of Israel in our foreign policy. This is a huge issue and it has hardly been raised at all.

Bernstein: As you know, Rachel Maddow of MSNBC has made a career out of investigating the Russia-gate charges. She says that she has read all this material carefully, so she must have read about Flynn and Israel, but I haven't heard her on this issue at all.

Silverstein:

Even progressive journalists, who you'd think would be going after this with a vengeance, are frightened off by the fact the lobby really bites back. So, aside from outlets like the Intercept and the Electronic Intifada, there is a lot of hesitation about going after the Israel lobby. People are afraid because they know that there is a high price to be paid. It goes from being purely journalism to being a personal and political vendetta when they get you in their sights. In fact, one of the reasons I feel my blog is so important is that what I do is challenge Israeli policy and Israeli intervention in places where it doesn't belong.

Bernstein: Jared Kushner is the point man for the Trump administration on Israel. He has talked about having a "vision for peace." Do you think it is a problem that this is someone with a long, close relationship with the prime minister of Israel and, in fact, runs a foundation that invests in the building of illegal Israeli settlements? Might this be problematic?

Silverstein:

It is quite nefarious, actually. When Jared Kushner was a teenager, Netanyahu used to stay at the Kushner family home when he visited the United States. This relationship with one of the most extreme right political figures in Israel goes back decades. And it is not just Kushner himself, but all the administration personnel dealing with these so-called peace negotiations, including Jason Greenblatt and David Friedman, the ambassador. These are all orthodox Jews who tend to have very nationalist views when it comes to Israel. They all support settlements financially through foundations. These are not honest brokers.

We could talk at length about the history of US personnel who have been negotiators for Middle East peace. All of them have been favorable to Israel and answerable to the Israel lobby, including Dennis Ross and Makovsky, who served in the last administration. These people are dyed-in-the-wool ultra-nationalist supporters of [Israeli] settlements. They have no business playing any role in negotiating a peace deal.

My prediction all along has been that these peace negotiations will come to naught, even though they seem to have bought the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, which is something new in the process. The Palestinians can never accept a deal that has been negotiated by Kushner and company because it will be far too favorable to Israel and it will totally neglect the interests of the Palestinians.

Bernstein: It has been revealed that Kushner supports the building of settlements in the West Bank. Most people don't understand the politics of what is going on there, but it appears to be part of an ethnic cleansing.

Silverstein:

The settlements have always been a violation of international law, ever since Israel conquered the West Bank in 1967. The Geneva Conventions direct an occupying power to withdraw from territory that was not its own. In 1967 Israel invaded Arab states and conquered the West Bank and Gaza but this has never been recognized or accepted by any nation until now.

The fact that Kushner and his family are intimately involved in supporting settlements–as are David Friedman and Jason Greenblatt–is completely outrageous. No member of any previous US administration would have been allowed to participate with these kinds of financial investments in support of settlements. Of course, Trump doesn't understand the concept of conflict of interest because he is heavily involved in such conflicts himself. But no party in the Middle East except Israel is going to consider the US an honest broker and acceptable as a mediator.

When they announce this deal next January, no one in the Arab World is going to accept it, with the possible exception of Saudi Arabia because they have other fish to fry in terms of Iran. The next three years are going to be interesting, supposing Trump lasts out his term. My prediction is that the peace plan will fail and that it will lead to greater violence in the Middle East. It will not simply lead to a vacuum, it will lead to a deterioration in conditions there.

Bernstein: The Trump transition team was actually approached directly by the Israeli government to try to intercede at the United Nations.

Silverstein:

I'm assuming it was Netanyahu who went directly to Kushner and Trump. Now, we haven't yet found out that Trump directly knew about this but it is very hard to believe that Trump didn't endorse this. Now that we know that Mueller has access to all of the emails of the transition team, there is little doubt that they have been able to find their smoking gun. Flynn's plea meant that they basically had him dead to rights. It remains to be seen what will happen with Kushner but I would think that this would play some role in either the prosecution of Kushner or some plea deal.

Bernstein: The other big story, of course, is the decision by the Trump administration to move the US embassy from Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem. Was there any pre-election collusion in that regard and what are the implications?

Silverstein:

Well, it's a terrible decision which goes against forty to fifty years of US foreign policy. It also breaches all international understanding. All of our allies in the European Union and elsewhere are aghast at this development. There is now a campaign in the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution condemning the announcement, which we will veto, but the next step will be to go to the General Assembly, where such a resolution will pass easily.

The question is how much anger, violence and disruption this is going to cause around the world, especially in the Arab and Muslim world. This is a slow-burning fuse. It is not going to explode right now. The issue of Jerusalem is so vital that this is not something that is simply going to go away. This is going to be a festering sore in the Muslim world and among Palestinians. We have already seen attacks on Israeli soldiers and citizens and there will be many more.

As to collusion in all of this, since Trump always said during the campaign that this was what he was going to do, it might be difficult to treat this in the same way as the UN resolution. The UN resolution was never on anybody's radar and nobody knew the role that Trump was playing behind the scenes with that–as opposed to Trump saying right from the get-go that Jerusalem was going to be recognized as the capital of Jerusalem.

By doing that, they have completely abrogated any Palestinian interest in Jerusalem. This is a catastrophic decision that really excludes the United States from being an honest broker here and shows our true colors in terms of how pro-Israel we are.

Dennis J Bernstein is a host of "Flashpoints" on the Pacifica radio network and the author of Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom . You can access the audio archives at www.flashpoints.net .

Drew Hunkins , December 23, 2017 at 5:37 pm

As most regular readers of CN already know, some dynamite books on the inordinate amount of influence pro-Israel zealots have on Washington:

1.) 'The Host and the Parasite' by Greg Felton
2.) 'Power of Israel in the United States' by James Petras
3.) 'They Dare to Speak Out' by Paul Findley
4.) 'The Israel Lobby' by Mearsheimer and Walt
5.) 'Zionism, Militarism and the Decline of U.S. Power' by James Petras

I suggest that anyone relatively knew to this neglected topic peruse a few of the aforementioned titles. An inevitable backlash by the citizens of the United States is eventually forthcoming against the Zionist Power Configuration. It's crucial that this impending backlash remain democratic, non-violent, eschews anti-Semitism, and travels in a progressive in direction.

Annie , December 23, 2017 at 5:47 pm

Which one would you suggest? I already read "The Israel Lobby."

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:38 pm

Findley and Mearsheimer are certainly worthwhile. I will look for Petras.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:38 pm

If you haven't already read them, the end/footnotes in "The Israel Lobby" are more illuminating.

SocraticGadfly , December 23, 2017 at 6:10 pm

That influence is also shown, of course, by the fact that Obama waited until the midnight hours of his tenure and after the 2016 election to even start working on this resolution.

SocraticGadfly , December 23, 2017 at 6:05 pm

While I think Bibi is an idiot, I also think the Logan Act is overinvoked, overstated, probably of dubious legal value and also of dubious constitutional value.

In short, especially because Trump had been elected, though not yet inaugurated, I think he is not at all guilty of a Logan Act violation. This is nothing close to Spiro Agnew calling Anna Chenault from the airplane in August 1968.

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:41 pm

Probably true, although evidence of extreme collusion with Israel eliminates any case against Russia, with whom we have far more reasons for amity. Bringing out the Israel collusion greatly improves public understanding of political corruption. Perhaps it will awaken some to the Agnew-Chennault betrayal of the people of the US.

JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:32 am

It's ironic that Russia-gate is turning out to be Israel's effort to distract attention from its complete control over the Democratic party in 2016. From Israeli billionaires behind the scenes to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz at the helm.

The leaked emails showed the corruption plainly, and based on the ACTUAL evidence (recorded download time), most likely came from a highly disgruntled insider. The picture was starting to spill into public view. I'd estimate the real huge worry was that if this stuff came out, it could bring out other Israeli secrets, like their involvement in 9/11. That would mean actual jail time. Might be hard to buy your way out of that no matter how much money you have.

Annie , December 23, 2017 at 10:48 pm

The Logan act states that anyone who negotiates with an enemy of the US, and Israel is not defined as an enemy.

Annie , December 23, 2017 at 6:59 pm

The Logan act would not apply here, although I wish it would. I don't think anyone has been convicted based on this act, and they were part of a transition team not to mention the Logan act clearly states a private citizen who attempts to negotiate with an enemy state, and that certainly doesn't apply to Israel. In this administration their bias is so blatant that they can install Kushner as an honest broker in the Israeli-Palestine peace process while his family has a close relationship with Netanyahu, and he runs a foundation that invests in the building of illegal settlements which goes against the Geneva conventions. Hopefully Trump's blatant siding with Israel will receive a lot of backlash as did his plan to make Jerusalem the capital of Israel.

I also found that so called progressive internet sites don't cover this the way they should.

Al Pinto , December 24, 2017 at 9:16 am

@Annie

"The Logan act would not apply here, although I wish it would."

You and me both .

From the point of starting to read this article, it has been in my mind that the Logan act would not apply here. After reading most of the comments, it became clear that not many people viewed this as such. Yes, Joe Tedesky did as well

The UN is the "clearing house" for international politics, where countries freely contact each other's for getting support for their cause behind the scene. The support sought after could be voting for or against the resolution on hand. At times, as Israel did, countries reach out to perceived enemies as well, if they could not secure sufficient support for their cause. This is the normal activity of the UN diplomacy.

Knowing that the outgoing administration would not support its cause, Israel reached out to the incoming administration to delay the vote on the UN resolution. I fail to see anything wrong with Israel's action even in this case; Israel is not an enemy state to the US. As such, there has been no violation of any acts by the incoming administration, even if they tried to secure veto vote for Israel. I do not like it, but no action by Mueller in this case is correct.

People, just like the article in itself, implying that the Logan Act applies in this case are just plain wrong. Not just wrong, but their anti-Israel bias is in plain view.

Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state. Even then, Russia contacting the incoming administration is not a violation of the Logan Act. That is just normal diplomacy in the background between countries. What would be a violation is that the contacted official acted on the behalf of Russia and tried to influence the outgoing administration's decision. That is what the Mueller investigation tries to prove hopelessly

Herman , December 24, 2017 at 10:54 am

"Whether we like it or not, the former and current administration view Russia is as an enemy state." So that is how it works, the White House says it is an enemy state and therefore it is. The so called declaration is the hammer used for trying to make contact with Russia a criminal offense. We are not at war with Russia although we see our leaders doing their best to provoke Russia into one.

Annie , December 24, 2017 at 1:55 pm

Thanks for your reply. When I read the article and it referenced the Logan Act, which I am familiar with in that I've read about it before, I was surprised that Bernstein and Silverstein even brought it up because it so obviously does not apply in this case, since Israel is not considered an enemy state. Many have even referenced it as flimsy when it comes to convictions against those in Trump's transition team who had contacts with Russia. No one has ever been convicted under the Logan Act.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:41 pm

The Logan Act either should apply equally, or not apply at all. This "Russia-gate" hype seems to apply it selectively.

mrtmbrnmn , December 23, 2017 at 7:36 pm

You guys are blinded by the light. The Israel connection disclosed by the malpracticer hack Mueller in the recent Flynn-flam just made Trump bullet-proof (so to speak).

There is no doubt that Trump is Bibi's and the Saudi's ventriloquist dummy and Jared has been an Israel agent of influence since he was 12.

But half the Dementedcrat Sore Loser Brigade will withdraw from the field of battle (not to mention most of the GOP living dead too) if publically and noisily tying Israel to Trump's tail becomes the only route to his removal. Which it would have to be, as there is no there there regarding the yearlong trumped-up PutinPutinPutin waterboarding of Trump.

Immediately (if not sooner) the mighty (pro-Israel) Donor Bank of Singer (Paul), Saban (Haim), Sachs (Goldman) & Adelson (Sheldon), would change their passwords and leave these politicians/beggars with empty begging bowls. End of $ordid $tory.

alley cat , December 23, 2017 at 7:45 pm

So Mueller caught Kushner and Flynn red-handed, sabotaging the Obama administration? What of it? He can't use that evidence, because it would inculpate the Zionist neocons that are orchestrating his farcical, Stalinist witchhunt. And Mueller, being an efficient terminator bot, knows that his target is Russia, not Israel.

Mueller can use that evidence of sabotage and/or obstruction of justice to try to coerce false confessions from Kushner and Flynn. But what are the chances of that, barring short stayovers for them at some CIA black site?

So Mueller will just have to continue swamp-fishing for potential perjurers ahem witnesses, for the upcoming show trials (to further inflame public opinion against Russia and Russia sympathizers). And continue he will, because (as we all know from Schwarzenegger's flicks), the only way to stop the terminator is to terminate him/it first.

Leslie F. , December 23, 2017 at 8:28 pm

He used it, along with other info, to turn flip Flynn and possibly can use it the same way again Kusher. Not all evidence has end up in court to be useful.

JWalters , December 23, 2017 at 8:40 pm

This is an extremely important story, excellently reported. All the main "facts" Americans think they know about Israel are, amazingly, flat-out lies.

1. Israel was NOT victimized by powerful Arab armies. Israel overpowered and victimized a defenseless, civilian Arab population. Military analysts knew the Arab armies were in poor shape and would not be able to resist the zionist army.

2. Muslim "citizens" of Israel do NOT have all the same rights as Jews.

3. Israelis are NOT under threat from the indigineous Palestinians, but Palestinians are under constant threats of theft and death from the Israelis.

4. Israel does NOT share America's most fundamental values, which rest on the principle of equal human rights for all.

Maintaining such a blanket of major lies for decades requires immense power. And this power would have to be exercised "under the radar" to be effective. That requires even more power. Both Congress and the press have to be controlled. How much power does it take to turn "Progressive Rachel" into "Tel Aviv Rachel"? To turn "It Takes a Village" Hillary into "Slaughter a Village" Hillary? It takes immense power AND ruthlessness.

War profiteers have exactly this combination of immense war profits and the ruthlessness to victimize millions of people.
"War Profiteers and the Roots of the War on Terror"
http://warprofiteerstory.blogspot.com

Vast war profits easily afford to buy the mainstream media. And controlling campaign contributions for members of Congress is amazingly cheap in the big picture. Such a squalid sale of souls.

And when simple bribery is not enough, they ruin a person's life through blackmail or false character assassination. And if those don't work they use death threats, including to family members, and finally murder. Their ruthlessness is unrestrained. John Perkins has described these tactics in "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man".

For readers who haven't seen it, here is an excellent riff on the absurdly overwhelming evidence for Israel's influence compared to that of Russia, at a highly professional news and analysis website run by Jewish anti-Zionists.
"Let's talk about Russian influence"
http://mondoweiss.net/2016/08/about-russian-influence/

mike k , December 23, 2017 at 8:44 pm

Hitler and Mussolini, Trump and Netanyahoo – matches made in Hell. These characters are so obviously, blatantly evil that it is deeply disturbing that people fail to see that, and instead go to great lengths to find some complicated flaws in these monsters.

mike k , December 23, 2017 at 8:49 pm

Keep it simple folks. No need for complex analyses. Just remember that these characters as simply as evil as it gets, and proceed from there. These asinine shows that portray mobsters as complex human beings are dangerously deluding. If you want to be victimized by these types, this kind of overthinking is just the way to go.

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 9:00 pm

There is a modern theory of fiction that insists upon the portrayal of inconsistency in characters, both among the good guys and the bad guys. It is useful to show how those who do wrongs have made specific kinds of errors that make them abnormal, and that those who do right are not perfect but nonetheless did the right thing. Instead it is used by commercial writers to argue that the good are really bad, and the bad are really good, which is of course the philosophy of oligarchy-controlled mass publishers.

Sam F , December 23, 2017 at 8:54 pm

A very important article by Dennis Bernstein, and it is very appropriate that non-zionist Jews are active against the extreme zionist corruption of our federal government. I am sure that they are reviled by the zionists for interfering with the false denunciations of racism against the opponents of zionism. Indeed critics face a very nearly totalitarian power of zionism, which in league with MIC/WallSt opportunism has displaced democracy altogether in the US.

backwardsevolution , December 23, 2017 at 9:18 pm

A nice little set-up by the Obama administration. Perhaps it was entrapment? Who set it up? Flynn and Kushner should have known better to fall for it. So at the end of his Presidency, Obama suddenly gets balls and wants to slap down Israel? Yeah, right.

Nice to have leverage over people, though, isn't it? If you're lucky and play your cards right, you might even be lucky enough to land an impeachment.

Of course, I'm just being cynical. No one would want to overturn democracy, would they?

Certainly people like Comey, Brenner, Clinton, Clapper, Mueller, Rosenstein wouldn't want that, would they?

Joe Tedesky , December 23, 2017 at 10:33 pm

I just can't see any special prosecutor investigating Israel-Gate. Between what the Zionist donors donate to these creepy politicians, too what goods they have on these same mischievous politicians, I just can't see any investigation into Israel's collusion with the Trump Administration going anywhere. Netanyahu isn't Putin, and Russia isn't Israel. Plus, Israel is considered a U.S. ally, while Russia is being marked as a Washington rival. Sorry, this news regarding Israel isn't going to be ranted on about for the next 18 months, like the MSM has done with Russia, because our dear old Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, or so they tell us. So, don't get your hopes up.

JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:33 am

It's true the Israelis have America's politicians by the ears and the balls. But as this story gets better known, politicians will start getting questions at their town meetings. Increasingly the politicians will gag on what Israel is force-feeding them, until finally they reach a critical mass of vomit in Congress.

Joe Tedesky , December 24, 2017 at 11:12 am

I hope you are right JWalters. Although relying on a Zionist controlled MSM doesn't give hope for the news getting out properly. Again I hope you are right JWalters. Joe

Jeff Blankfort , December 24, 2017 at 12:18 am

Actually, Netanyahu was so desperate to have the resolution pulled and not voted on that he reached out to any country that might help him after the foreign minister of New Zealand, one of its co-sponsors refused to pull the plug after a testy phone exchange with the Israeli PM ending up threatening an Israeli boycott oturnef the KIwis.

He then turned to his buddy, Vladimir Putin, who owed him a favor for having Israel's UN delegate absent himself for the UNGA vote on sanctioning Russia after its annexation of Crimea.

Putin then called Russia's UN Ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, since deceased, and asked him to get the other UNSC ambassadors to postpone the vote until Trump took over the White House but the other ambassadors weren't buying it. Given Russia's historic public position regarding the settlements, Churkin had no choice to vote Yes with the others.

This story was reported in detail in the Israeli press but blacked out in the US which, due to Zionist influence on the media, does not want the American public to know about the close ties between Putin and Netanyahu which has led to the Israeli PM making five state visits there in the last year and a half.

Had Clinton won the White House we can assume that there would have been no US veto. That Netanyahu apparently knew in advance that the US planned to veto the resolution was, I suspect, leaked to the Israelis by US delegate Samantha Power, who was clearly unhappy at having to abstain.

Abe , December 24, 2017 at 12:39 am

The Israeli Prime Minister made five state visits to Russia in the last year and a half to make sure the Russians don't accidentally on purpose blast Israeli warplanes from the sky over Syria (like they oughtta). Putin tries not to snicker when Netanyahu bloviates ad nauseum about the purported "threat" posed by Iran.

argos , December 24, 2017 at 7:00 am

He thinks Putin is a RATS ASS like the yankee government

JWalters , December 24, 2017 at 3:34 am

"This story was reported in detail in the Israeli press but blacked out in the US"

We've just had a whole cluster of big stories involving Israel that have all been essentially blacked out in the US press. e.g.
"Dionne and Shields ignore the Adelson in the room"
http://mondoweiss.net/2017/12/jerusalem-israels-capital

This is not due to chance. There is no doubt that the US mainstream media is wholly controlled by the Israelis.

alley cat , December 24, 2017 at 4:49 am

"He [Netanyahu] then turned to his buddy, Vladimir Putin "

Jeff, that characterization of Putin and Netanyahu's relationship makes no sense, since the Russians have consistently opposed Zionism and Putin has been no exception, having spoiled Zionist plans for the destruction of Syria.

"Had Clinton won the White House we can assume that there would have been no US veto."

Not sure where you're going with that, since the US vote was up to Obama, who wanted to get some payback for all of Bibi's efforts to sabotage Obama's treaty with Iran.

For the record, Zionism has had no more rabid supporter than the Dragon Lady. If we're going to make assumptions, we could start by assuming that if she had won the White House we'd all be dead by now, thanks to her obsession (at the instigation of her Zionist/neocon sponsors) with declaring no-fly zones in Syria.

Brendan , December 24, 2017 at 6:18 am

Trump and Kushner have nothing to worry about, even if a smoking gun is found that proves their collusion with Israel. That's because the entire political and media establishment will simply ignore the Israeli connection.

Journalists and politicians will even continue to present Mike Flynn's contacts as evidence of collusion with Russia. They'll keep on repeating that "Flynn lied about his phone call to the Russian ambassador". But there will be no mention of the fact that the purpose of this contact was to support Israel and not any alleged Russian interference.

Skip Scott , December 24, 2017 at 7:59 am

I think you have it right Brendan. The MSM, Intelligence Community, and Mueller would never go down any path that popularized undue Israeli influence on US foreign policy. "Nothing to see here folks, move along."

argos , December 24, 2017 at 6:57 am

The zionist will stop at nothing to control the middle east with American taxpayers money/military equiptment its a win win for the zionist they control America lock stock and barrel a pity though it is a great country to be led by a jewish entity.

Herman , December 24, 2017 at 10:47 am

What will Israel-Palestine look like twenty years from now? Will it remain an apartheid regime, a regime without any Palestinians, or something different. The Trump decision, which the world rejects, brings the issue of "final" settlement to the fore. In a way we can go back to the thirties and the British Mandate. Jewish were fleeing Europe, many coming to Palestine. The British, on behalf of the Zionists, were delaying declaring Palestine a state with control of its own affairs. Seeing the mass immigration and chafing at British foot dragging, the Arabs rebelled, What happened then was that the British, responding to numerous pressures notably war with Germany, acted by granting independence and granting Palestine control of its borders.

With American pressure and the mass exodus of Jews from Europe, Jews defied the British resulting in Jewish resistance. What followed then was a UN plan to divide the land with a Jerusalem an international city administered by the UN. The Arabs rebelled and lost much of what the UN plan provided and Jerusalem as an international city was scrapped.

Will there be a second serious attempt to settle the issue of the land and the status of Jerusalem? Will there be a serious move toward a single state? How will the matter of Jerusalem be resolved. The two state solution has always been a fantasy and acquiescence of Palestinians to engage in this charade exposes their leaders to charges of posturing for perks. Imagined options could go on and on but will there be serious options placed before the world community or will the boots on the ground Israeli policies continue?

As I have commented before, it will most probably be the Jewish community in Israel and the world that shapes the future and if the matter is to be resolved that is fair to both parties, it will be they that starts the ball rolling.

Zachary Smith , December 24, 2017 at 1:34 pm

As I have commented before, it will most probably be the Jewish community in Israel and the world that shapes the future and if the matter is to be resolved that is fair to both parties, it will be they that starts the ball rolling.

The Nice Zionists responsible for the thefts and murders for the past 69 years along with the "Jewish Community" in the rest of the world will resolve the matter so as to be fair to both parties. This is mind-boggling fantasy.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 5:56 pm

Truly mind-boggling. Ahistorical, and as you say, fantasy.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 5:48 pm

FFS, Netanyahu aired a political commercial in Florida for Romney saying vote for this guy (against Obama)! I mean, it doesn't get any more overtly manipulative than that. Period. End of story.

$50K of Facebook ads about puppies pales in comparison to that blatant, prima facia, public manipulation. God, I hate to go all "Israel controls the media" but there it is. Not even a discussion. Just a fact.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 6:11 pm

Just for the record, Richard Silverstein blocked me on Twitter because I pointed out that he slammed someone who was suggesting that the Assad government was fighting for its (Syria's) life by fighting terrorists. Actually, more specifically, because of that he read my "Free Palestine" bio on Twitter and called me a Hamas supporter (no Hamas mentioned) and a "moron" for some seeming contradiction.

I also have to point out that he "fist pumped" Hillary Clinton at Mohammed Ali's eulogy. If he's as astute as he purports to be, he has to know that Hillary would have invaded Syria and killed a few hundred thousand more Syrians for the simple act of defiantly preserving their country. By almost any read of Ali's history, he would have been adamantly ("killing brown people") against that. But there was Silverstein using the platform to promote, arguably, perpetual war.

Silverstein is probably not a good (ie. consistent) arbiter of Israeli impact on US politics. Just sayin'.

I wish it were otherwise.

Taras 77 , December 24, 2017 at 6:35 pm

https://www.therussophile.org/virus-found-inside-dnc-server-is-linked-to-a-company-based-in-pakistan.html/

This may be a tad ot but it relates to the alleged hacking of the DNC, the role debbie wasserman schultz plays in the spy ring (awan bros) in house of rep servers: I have long suspected that mossad has their fingers in this entire mess. FWIW

Good site, BTW.

Zachary Smith , December 24, 2017 at 7:35 pm

I can't recall why I removed the Tikun Olam site from my bookmarks – it happened quite a while back. Generally I do that when I feel the blogger crossed some kind of personal red line. Something Mr. Silverstein wrote put him over that line with me.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/06/us/06leak.html?hp

In the course of a search I found that at the neocon NYT. Mr. Silverstein claims several things I find unbelievable, and from that alone I wonder about his ultimate motives. I may be excessively touchy about this, but that's how it is.

Larry Larsen , December 24, 2017 at 8:51 pm

Yeah Zachary, "wondering about ultimate motives" is probably a good way to put it/his views. He's obviously conflicted, if not deferential in some aspects of Israeli policy. He really was a hero of mine, but now I just don't get whether what he says is masking something or a true belief. He says some good stuff, but, but, but .

P. Michael Garber , December 24, 2017 at 11:54 pm

Yeah I found a couple of Silverstein's statements to be closer to neocon propaganda than reality: "Because this is Israel and because we have a conflicted relationship with the Israel lobby . . ." "Instead of going directly to the Obama administration, with which they had terrible relations, they went to Trump instead." My impression was that the whole "terrible relationship between Obama and Netanyahu" was manufactured by the Israel lobby to bully Obama. However these are small blips within an otherwise solid critique of the Israel lobby's influence.

[Dec 24, 2017] UN votes resoundingly to reject Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as capital

Dec 24, 2017 | www.theguardian.com

The United Nations general assembly has delivered a stinging rebuke to Donald Trump, voting by a huge majority to reject his unilateral recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital .

The vote came after a redoubling of threats by Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, who said that Washington would remember which countries "disrespected" America by voting against it.

Despite the warning, 128 members voted on Thursday in favour of the resolution supporting the longstanding international consensus that the status of Jerusalem – which is claimed as a capital by both Israel and the Palestinians – can only be settled as an agreed final issue in a peace deal. Countries which voted for the resolution included major recipients of US aid such as Egypt, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Although largely symbolic, the vote in emergency session of the world body had been the focus of days of furious diplomacy by both the Trump administration and Israel, including Trump's threat to cut US funding to countries that did not back the US recognition .

But only nine states – including the United States and Israel –voted against the resolution. The other countries which supported Washington were Togo, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Marshall Islands, Guatemala and Honduras.

[Dec 24, 2017] Nikki Haley's Speech to UN on Jerusalem

"Barf Alert"
Dec 24, 2017 | www.informationclearinghouse.info

Nikki Haley's Speech to UN on Jerusalem

Video and Transcript

'The United States will remember this day, in which it was singled out for attack in the General Assembly for the very act of exercising our right as a sovereign nation'

Posted December 21, 2017

https://www.youtube.com/embed/KVTQefA77Ys

To its shame, the United Nations has long been a hostile place for the state of Israel. Both the current and the previous Secretary-Generals have objected to the UN's disproportionate focus on Israel. It's a wrong that undermines the credibility of this institution, and that in turn is harmful for the entire world.

I've often wondered why, in the face of such hostility, Israel has chosen to remain a member of this body. And then I remember that Israel has chosen to remain in this institution because it's important to stand up for yourself. Israel must stand up for its own survival as a nation; but it also stands up for the ideals of freedom and human dignity that the United Nations is supposed to be about.

Standing here today, being forced to defend sovereignty and the integrity of my country – the United States of America – many of the same thoughts have come to mind. The United States is by far the single largest contributor to the United Nations and its agencies. We do this, in part, in order to advance our values and our interests. When that happens, our participation in the UN produces great good for the world. Together we feed, clothe, and educate desperate people. We nurture and sustain fragile peace in conflict areas throughout the world. And we hold outlaw regimes accountable. We do this because it represents who we are. It is our American way.

But we'll be honest with you. When we make generous contributions to the UN, we also have a legitimate expectation that our good will is recognized and respected. When a nation is singled out for attack in this organization, that nation is disrespected. What's more, that nation is asked to pay for the "privilege" of being disrespected.

In the case of the United States, we are asked to pay more than anyone else for that dubious privilege. Unlike in some UN member countries, the United States government is answerable to its people. As such, we have an obligation to acknowledge when our political and financial capital is being poorly spent.

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We have an obligation to demand more for our investment. And if our investment fails, we have an obligation to spend our resources in more productive ways. Those are the thoughts that come to mind when we consider the resolution before us today.

The arguments about the President's decision to move the American embassy to Jerusalem have already been made. They are by now well known. The decision was in accordance to U.S. law dating back to 1995, and it's position has been repeatedly endorsed by the American people ever since. The decision does not prejudge any final status issues, including Jerusalem's boundaries. The decision does not preclude a two-state solution, if the parties agree to that. The decision does nothing to harm peace efforts. Rather, the President's decision reflects the will of the American people and our right as a nation to choose the location of our embassy. There is no need to describe it further.

Instead, there is a larger point to make. The United States will remember this day in which it was singled out for attack in the General Assembly for the very act of exercising our right as a sovereign nation. We will remember it when we are called upon to once again make the world's largest contribution to the United Nations. And we will remember it when so many countries come calling on us, as they so often do, to pay even more and to use our influence for their benefit.

America will put our embassy in Jerusalem. That is what the American people want us to do, and it is the right thing to do. No vote in the United Nations will make any difference on that.

But this vote will make a difference on how Americans look at the UN and on how we look at countries who disrespect us in the UN. And this vote will be remembered.

Thank you.

machado · 2 days ago

Dump Trump, Nikki for President. If we are going to have a bullshi**er for President we might as well have the best. THe crap she spouted makes Trump sound like a novice.
Gor · 2 days ago
"Instead, there is a larger point to make. The United States will remember this day in which it was singled out for attack in the General Assembly for the very act of exercising our right as a sovereign nation."

I have lost count of how many times the US has destroyed countries, for exercising THEIR rights as a sovereign nation. Often deceitfully and cynically using the UN as it's instrument.

The hypocrisy is stunning. Fortunately it seems the rest of the world is coming to realize that the US is unhinged and that trying to deal rationally with a lunatic is pointless. Watch China and Russia make great gains globally as former US allies turn away.

jjc · 2 days ago
I suppose that any Congressional action could be said to be a reflection of "the will" of the American people since they are elected representatives, but, in reality, how many Americans were even aware of the 1995 Jerusalem embassy law? How can it be said that such law has been repeatedly "endorsed" by the American people, presumably by continuing to send people to Congress or by the re-signing of 6-month waivers to delay sending the embassy to Jerusalem, which has happened twice a year for over twenty years with absolutely zero discussion or publicity?

Haley claims to speak for the American people but she is truly speaking for the grossly powerful Israel lobby which has literally purchased its significant place at the table. Everyone knows this, so her self-righteous remarks produce scorn and disgust.

dl66 86p · 2 days ago
"Israel... stands up for the ideals of freedom and human dignity... "
Haley must be talking about a different Israel from the one in the middle east.
As for the United Nations, it's about time the organisation stands up against the tyrants and starts doing what it was created for, support global cooperation and international laws. Apply it's rules equally: not just sanction developing countries for saying no to exploitation by the rich ot for building their own national defense because rich and powerful countries use aggression to get what they want.
If the United Nations were a just organisation Palestine would have become a sovereign nation decades ago, global terrorism would not exist and no nation would develop nuclear weapons.
But, as always, money is the driver and the US/Israel blackmailing may just succeed.
InTheKeyofF 68p · 2 days ago
Hey Nikki - most of the world, and many of us here in the U.S. are sick and tired of the nation's work on behalf of some mythical "values" and those ever-present "interests." We know who you serve, and it sure as hell ain't the people of any nation. Haley is prepping for a run at the Senate, and is setting herself up quite nicely for those big checks from Adelson.
guest · 2 days ago
When we pay our dues to the UN we expect to be obeyed. "We have an obligation to demand more for our investment" - thus shrieked the incomparable Nikki Haley. If she had read Lewis Carrol (which I doubt) she might have shortened her speech by saying "Off with their heads".

If the US thinks it can buy out the world, it is getting truly delusional. BTW, are these 128 countries now going to be sanctioned? And what after that if the world still disobeys the mighty US?

guest · 2 days ago
Watch out for a blast of twitters from the USA's Twitterer-in-Chief. He will drown these 128 countries in venom and fry their Twitter accounts. The lady representing the US at the UN has carefully prepared a list of these countries - watch out all you 128 countries. Trump and the lady will go hopping mad - maybe we may get to see that routine - and then just you wait, you 128 countries, for the barrage of twitters that will be let loose upon you. Some day, the US rep at the UN may even assault the reps of other countries and spit and cuss at them. Now that would be a show worth watching!
Jack · 2 days ago
Well that's it but don't blame Trump.
UN member states have come to the conclusion that it's now safe to rebut the United States .
Trump in his clumsiness has only highlighted what the UN has been and that it is a corrupt sovereign nation bribing nation states with American aid for their votes.
Reagan did it Clinton did it Bush did it Bush Senior did it and now Trump has done it.
This is Americas international policy wake up call.
Member States do not trust America any more and they could not have expressed their views any stronger.
The British must take some blame too for riding the Tigers back for the past seventy years.
Only psychophantics will follow these nations now.
That goes for North Korea too.
Will the UN decide now not to attack North Korea and level it to the ground with horrific casualties for the second time.
The world has tired of Americas impudence of terror.
They should pull out of their military bases now around the world .
The countries that host them have had enough of their paranoid exceptionalism.
It's time to change direction and to defy US fiat money bribes.
Jack · 2 days ago
Oh and Obama did it but more covertly .
Jack · 2 days ago
Why in the name of sanity would the Marshal Islands vote with the US .
Were they bribed ?
Jerry Alatalo 95p · 2 days ago
Bizarre, surreal, unbelievable, jaw-dropping, astounding, mind-boggling, incomprehensible? ... Watching Ms. Haley - on behalf of Mr. Trump, Mr. Netanyahu and their bosses - continue digging in an already deep hole of isolation leads one to ponder if the human language even provides words sufficient for accurately describing what is occurring.
Qani Tinn · 2 days ago
with her cheap words and empty threats who does this Islamophobic American of Punjabi descent the rest of humanity are?
beanhead001 102p · 2 days ago
Puppet doesn't even cover it. Some zionazi hand is up this puppets back
1871 91p · 2 days ago
Jack
Marshall Islands - pop 53,000. In free association with USA Inc.
Nuclear test site. Most bombed country on the planet. Nuked 67 times.
Uses USD for currency.
Bikini Atoll fame. First hydrogen bomb test.
Survives on payments from uncle Sam for genocide of an island population.
Destitute and radiated with Amerikkkan values, happy Hanukka Marshall Islands
prairiedog540 90p · 2 days ago
After reading the comments on this page I just can't figure out why the American voter is always voting for the one corporate party dictatorship. Sorry to say I don't see much difference in republicans and democrats, when it comes to wars, and Israel.
tomanocu · 2 days ago
Chilling.
Quite a plastic, cold, crafting, Machiavellian reptilian hosting hybrid.
Olly · 2 days ago
Such a profound master of distortion... U.S. oligarchy will have her running for El Presidente...
2LTMorrisseau 98p · 2 days ago
There is a reason much of the world hates Israel.......and now also they hate the US.

Dennis Morrisseau
USArmy Officer [Vietnam era] ANTI-WAR

LIBERTY UNION founder
Lieutenant Morrisseau's Rebellion
FireCongress.org
Second Vermont Republic, VFM
POB 177, W. Pawlet, VT 05775
[email protected]
802 645 9727

[Dec 24, 2017] Donald Trump Prepares to Escalate Confrontation with Russia over Ukraine by Doug Bandow

Notable quotes:
"... With over 10,000 dead, the conflict in Ukraine is a humanitarian travesty but of minimal security consequence to America and Europe. Indeed, Kiev's status never was key to Europe's status. An integral part of the Soviet Union and before that the Russian Empire, Ukraine turned into an unexpected bonus for the allies by seceding from the Soviet Union, greatly diminishing the latter's population and territory. Russia's seizure of Crimea and battle in the Donbass destabilized an already semi-failed state, but did not materially alter the European balance of power. Or demonstrate anything other than Moscow's brutal yet limited ambitions. ..."
"... At the same time, transferring lethal arms would divide the U.S. from European nations, many of which oppose further confrontation with Russia, especially over Ukraine. Brussels already bridled at Congress' new sanctions legislation, which passed without consulting the Europeans and targeted European firms. If Moscow responds with escalation, Washington may find no one behind it. ..."
"... Also noteworthy is the fragility of the Ukrainian state. Kiev's self-inflicted wounds are a more important cause than Russian pressure. The government is hobbled by divisions between East and West, violent neo-fascist forces, bitter political factionalism, economic failure, and pervasive corruption. The recent specter of former Georgian President and Ukrainian Governor Mikheil Saakashvili clambering across rooftops, escaping arrest, and railing against President Petro Poroshenko epitomized Ukraine's problems. Kiev, to put it mildly, is not a reliable military partner against its nuclear-armed neighbor. ..."
"... Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and a former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan. He is the author of Foreign Follies: America's New Global Empire (Xulon). ..."
Dec 24, 2017 | nationalinterest.org

Most Americans were told Donald Trump won the presidential election last year. But his policy toward Russia looks suspiciously like what a President Hillary Clinton would have pursued. Exhibit A is the apparent decision to arm Ukraine against Russia in the proxy conflict in the Donbass. This dunderheaded move will simply encourage Moscow to retaliate not only in Ukraine but against U.S. interests elsewhere around the globe.

With over 10,000 dead, the conflict in Ukraine is a humanitarian travesty but of minimal security consequence to America and Europe. Indeed, Kiev's status never was key to Europe's status. An integral part of the Soviet Union and before that the Russian Empire, Ukraine turned into an unexpected bonus for the allies by seceding from the Soviet Union, greatly diminishing the latter's population and territory. Russia's seizure of Crimea and battle in the Donbass destabilized an already semi-failed state, but did not materially alter the European balance of power. Or demonstrate anything other than Moscow's brutal yet limited ambitions.

In fact, present allied policy makes continuation of the current conflict almost inevitable. Newly released documents demonstrate that Soviet officials reasonably believed that releasing their Warsaw Pact captives would not lead to NATO's expansion to Russia's border. Well, well. Look what actually happened -- the very dramatic increase in tensions that George F. Kennan predicted would occur. For Russia sees geographical space and buffer states as critical for its security, and none are more important than Ukraine.

Expanding NATO, disregarding Moscow's historic interests in the Balkans, dismantling onetime Slavic ally Serbia, aiding "color revolutions" that brought anti-Russian governments to power along its border, announcing the intention of inducting both Georgia and Ukraine into the alliance created to confront Moscow, and finally ostentatiously backing a street revolution against a corrupt but elected leader friendly to Russia -- going to far as to discuss who should rule after his planned ouster -- could not help but be viewed as hostile in Moscow. One can easily imagine how Washington would react to similar events in Canada or Mexico.

Russia's response was unjustified but efficient and, most important, limited. Moscow grabbed Crimea, the only part of Ukraine with a majority of Russian-speakers (who probably favored joining Russia, though the subsequent referendum occurred in what was occupied Crimea). Moscow further backed separatists in Eastern Ukraine, perhaps in hopes of grabbing territory or merely bleeding Kiev.

Some Western responses were near hysteria, imagining a blitzkrieg attack on Ukraine, conquering the country. The Baltic States saw themselves as the next targets. Poland remembered its twentieth century conflicts with Moscow. At least one observer added Finland to Moscow's potential target list. Others worried about intimidation of allied states, borders being withdrawn, and challenges to the European order. Some afflicted with war fever feared an attempt to reconstitute the Soviet Union and perhaps roll west from there.

None of which happened.

Perhaps President Vladimir Putin secretly was an Adolf Hitler-wannabe but was dissuaded by the U.S. and NATO response. However, economic sanctions and military deployments were modest. Assistance to Ukraine did not include lethal military aid. Most likely, Putin never intended to start World War III.

Instead, he opportunistically took advantage of the opportunity to snatch Crimea, the territory with the closest identification with Moscow, simultaneously safeguarding the latter's major Black Sea base, and create a frozen conflict in the Donbass, effectively preventing Ukraine's entry into NATO. Russia's activity there also gives him an opportunity to create additional trouble for the U.S.

Moscow's policy is unpleasant for America and Europe, but only prevents the allies from doing that which is not in their interest: inducting a security black hole into NATO. Even before 2014, Ukraine was a political and economic mess. While independent it mattered little for Western security, in NATO it would bring along all of its disputes and potential conflicts with Russia, a touchy, nationalistic nuclear power.

What State Department called "enhanced defensive capabilities," which require congressional approval, aren't likely to raise the price of the conflict enough to force Russia to back down. The Putin regime has far more at stake in preserving its gains than the U.S. does in reversing them. Moscow also is better able to escalate and is likely to consistently outbid the West: Putin's advantages include greater interests, geographic closeness, and popular support. For Ukraine more weapons would at most mean more fighting, with little additional advantage.

Indeed, the plan to arm Kiev with weapons, especially if anti-tank missiles are included, as news reports indicate, would risk turning the Donbass conflict from cool to warm--and perhaps more. Ukraine already joins Russia in failing to implement the Minsk Agreement. Kiev would not only be better armed, but might believe that it enjoyed an implicit guarantee from Washington, which in turn would have more at stake and thus be less inclined to abandon its new "investment." Then what if Moscow escalated? In 2014 the Putin government deployed Russian military units to counter Ukrainian gains. Would Washington do likewise in response to Moscow?

At the same time, transferring lethal arms would divide the U.S. from European nations, many of which oppose further confrontation with Russia, especially over Ukraine. Brussels already bridled at Congress' new sanctions legislation, which passed without consulting the Europeans and targeted European firms. If Moscow responds with escalation, Washington may find no one behind it.

Providing lethal weapons would almost certainly encourage the Ukrainians to press for even heavier arms and escalate the fighting, as well as discourage them from negotiating a settlement. U.S. officials refer to the weapons as defensive, but their capabilities are not so easily compartmentalized. Said Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said the "ability to stop armored vehicles would be essential for them to protect themselves." True, but the ability to disable tanks is useful on offense as well as defense. There has been little movement in the battle line over the last couple of years. New U.S. weapons aren't necessary to preserve the status quo. Rather, they would most help Ukraine press harder for a military solution.

Does Kiev want to accept a compromise peace or fight on? Obama Pentagon official Michael Carpenter said providing weapons "will be a huge boost of support to Ukraine." Moscow is not concerned about Kiev's military potential. Russia is concerned that the U.S. and Europe say they intend to induct Ukraine into NATO. The closer the military ties grow between America and Ukraine, the greater Moscow's incentive to keep the conflict going. Russia also has opportunities to retaliate against American interests elsewhere. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said: "The United States crossed the line in a sense" and "may lead to new victims in a country that is neighboring us." America, he added, was an "accomplice in fueling war."

That might be just talk, but Russia can provide aid, sell arms, offer political backing, and give economic assistance in ways that hamper U.S. activities. Afghanistan, Cuba, Egypt, Iran, North Korea, Syria, and Venezuela all provide opportunities for Russian mischief. Moscow could refuse to back additional sanctions on Pyongyang or even provide the latter with S-400 anti-aircraft missiles.

Although limited resources constrain Moscow, politics encourages a tough response. Putin is running for reelection but has lost support because of the Russian Federation's economic weakness. Nationalism remains one of his strongest issues; an assault by America on Russian interests would offer him a means to rally public support.

Also noteworthy is the fragility of the Ukrainian state. Kiev's self-inflicted wounds are a more important cause than Russian pressure. The government is hobbled by divisions between East and West, violent neo-fascist forces, bitter political factionalism, economic failure, and pervasive corruption. The recent specter of former Georgian President and Ukrainian Governor Mikheil Saakashvili clambering across rooftops, escaping arrest, and railing against President Petro Poroshenko epitomized Ukraine's problems. Kiev, to put it mildly, is not a reliable military partner against its nuclear-armed neighbor.

A better approach would be to negotiate for Russian de-escalation by offering to take NATO membership for Ukraine (and Georgia) off the table. In fact, expanding the alliance is not in America's interest: the U.S., not, say, Luxembourg, is the country expected to back up NATO's defense promises. And neither Kiev nor Tbilisi warrants the risk of war with a great power, especially one armed with nukes. Eliminating that possibility would reduce Moscow's incentive to maintain a frozen conflict in the Donbass. Backing away also would create the possibility of reversing military build-ups by both sides elsewhere, especially around Poland and the Baltic States.

Washington and Moscow have no core security interests in conflict with each other, especially in Ukraine. Instead of turning a peripheral security issue into a potential military clash with Moscow, Washington should seek to trade military disengagement from Ukraine for Russian acceptance of that nation's territorial integrity. Moscow might not agree, but the Trump administration won't know unless it makes the offer. Right now, it doesn't seem to care to even try. Quite the contrary.

Doug Bandow is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute and a former Special Assistant to President Ronald Reagan. He is the author of Foreign Follies: America's New Global Empire (Xulon).

[Dec 23, 2017] What we witnessed here in the Security Council is an insult. It won't be forgotten," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said after the vote, adding that it was the first veto cast by the United States in more than six years.

Dec 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Patient Observer , December 18, 2017 at 8:05 pm

One can only be dumbstruck by the breathtaking arrogance and stupidity of this woman:

"What we witnessed here in the Security Council is an insult. It won't be forgotten," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said after the vote, adding that it was the first veto cast by the United States in more than six years.

"The fact that this veto is being done in defence of American sovereignty and in defence of America's role in the Middle East peace process is not a source of embarrassment for us; it should be an embarrassment to the remainder of the Security Council," Haley said.

Yup, she's taking names.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/israel-believes-u-veto-u-n-resolution-jerusalem-170400201.html

marknesop , December 18, 2017 at 9:50 pm
Oh, dear; America is isolated! How did this happen?

The Trump administration must have had a feeling it would go badly, and Haley must have prepared a response to go with using the American veto; she's just not that good at thinking on her feet. Politics One-Oh-One: never ask a question to which you do not already know the answer.

Keep it up, America. You are pissing off Europe to the point it is asking itself, why are we friends with this jerk? We're not there yet – the USA still has lots of money, and too many European leaders perceive that the bloc could not survive without lovely American money. But the progress is incrementally in that direction.

Jen , December 18, 2017 at 9:50 pm
I'd like to see her taking all fourteen names – she'll probably need a lifetime taking them.
marknesop , December 18, 2017 at 10:30 pm
Unless she's wearing open-toe sandals; unlikely, this time of year.
yalensis , December 19, 2017 at 2:52 am
Nikki is a modern-day Margaret Dumont defending her beloved Freedonia:

[Dec 23, 2017] Nikki Haley is the most honest UN rep America has had in a long time. Look at the exact words. The clear meaning is that the UN (and associated international law) is, in the American view, most emphatically not an association of equal nations bound by common rules. It's a protection racket where little countries can be bullied by big ones

Dec 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Ryan Ward , December 20, 2017 at 7:04 am

I'm really happy about this. The reason being that the mask is completely off. Nikki Haley is the most honest UN rep America has had in a long time. Look at the exact words. The clear meaning is that the UN (and associated international law) is, in the American view, most emphatically not an association of equal nations bound by common rules. It's a protection racket where little countries can be bullied by big ones, but big ones (most especially the US) are accountable to no one. And it's an insult to even suggest that the UN might have standing to criticize the US the same way it criticizes smaller countries. Everyone knew all this before, but it's refreshing to see it expressed so honestly.
marknesop , December 20, 2017 at 5:36 pm
I absolutely agree, and the more America shits itself right in front of everyone, the better I like it. Because it is burning all its soft-power bridges; carrots are out and the stick is in. But quite a few countries don't care for that sort of threatening, and some among those might even say "Or what? Like, what will you do? Impose sanctions against us? Because you are running out of trading partners already, fuck-stick, so just keep it up and you won't have any".
Patient Observer , December 20, 2017 at 6:59 pm
Me too.
kirill , December 20, 2017 at 9:57 pm
Don't be too quick. Here the OP is happy that US exceptionalism is being forced down the world's throat. It is clear that the UN and most other "international organizations" such as WADA, IOP, etc, are US puppets. For some reason, such organizations were trying to act impartial during the previous cold war. During the current cold war they have no impartiality whatsoever. So some pancake house waitress can spew all sorts of "refreshing" BS and the "united nothings" are supposed to eat it with a smile.

I recall lots of wailing in the NATzO media before 1990 how the UN was "ineffective". They must be all wet with glee that the current UN is nothing more than Washington's tool.

[Dec 23, 2017] Haley has completed the transformation of diplomacy at the the UN into a farce. Its her party and she can cry if she wants to. All food will be kosher.

Dec 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Patient Observer , December 22, 2017 at 1:11 pm

Haley has completed the transformation of diplomacy at the the UN into a farce. Its her party and she can cry if she wants to.

The 64 nations that voted 'no,' abstained, or were not present during the UN General Assembly's diplomatic spanking of Washington's Jerusalem move will get a "thank you" reception from US envoy Nikki Haley.

https://www.rt.com/usa/414008-nikki-haley-un-party-jerusalem/

All food will be kosher.

Perhaps those unwanted miserably losers (e.g. China, Russia, most of Europe, etc.) can have their version of the deploraball featuring sumptuous Middle East cuisine (no joke, that would be good eatin').

[Dec 23, 2017] For the American UN rep to be a warmongering psycho POS has a certain Deja Vu feel to it

Dec 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Northern Star , December 22, 2017 at 1:37 pm

For the American UN rep to be a warmongering psycho POS has a certain Deja Vu feel to it..does it not??

http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/5689320359001/?#sp=show-clips

Hmmm..who were the reps under Obongo??

Well there you have it !!!

[Dec 23, 2017] Slovenia is among the Coalition of the 128 NOT willing to be punked by USA. Melania better keep a low profile around Trump and Nikki

Dec 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Northern Star , , December 21, 2017 at 1:13 pm

Uh Oh Slovenia is among the Coalition of the 128 NOT willing to be punked by USA..

Maybe some panic stricken late night 911 DV calls from the WH??

Melania better keep a low profile around Trump and Nikki !!!!!! LOL!!

Jen , December 21, 2017 at 2:48 pm
India was naughty as well and Nimrata Nikki Randhawa Haley ought to have taken the Indian ambassador's name down as well. Maybe she'll even declare she won't ever set foot in India again. Her relatives there will breathe sighs of relief!
Cortes , December 21, 2017 at 4:27 pm
She's made herself untouchable.
Jen , December 21, 2017 at 8:03 pm
Ha ha!
Moscow Exile , December 21, 2017 at 8:41 pm
She makes me Sikh

[Dec 23, 2017] Neocons and Neoliberals -- Two Masks, One Face by WashingtonsBlog

Notable quotes:
"... Trotsky communism ..."
Nov 10, 2008 | www.washingtonsblog.com

Obama might very well be classified as a "neoliberal". He appears to be appointing leading neoliberals to key positions in his administration .

If you're a liberal, you might think this is great. Instead of the Neoconservatives who have been in power for the last 8 years, we'll now have neoliberals. You may assume that "neoliberals" are new, smarter liberals -- with liberal social policies, but with a stronger, more realistic outlook.

Nope.

In reality, neoliberalism is as dissimilar to true progressive liberal politics as neo-conservatism is to true conservative politics (if you don't know it, most leading neoconservatives are former followers of Trotsky communism -- not very conservative, huh?)

For example, did you know that Ronald Reagan was a leading neoliberal ? In the U.S., of course, he is described as the quintessential conservative. But internationally, people understand that he really pushed neoliberal economic policies.

As former CIA counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer Philip Giraldi writes :

Neoconservatives and neoliberals are really quite similar, so it doesn't matter who gets elected in 2008. The American public, weary of preemptive attacks, democracy-promotion, and nation-building, will still get war either way.

And leading neo-conservative strategist Robert Kagan recently said :

Until now the liberal West's strategy has been to try to integrate these two powers into the international liberal order, to tame them and make them safe for liberalism."

So neoconservatives are not really conservative and neoliberals are not really liberal. But neocons and neoliberals are very similar to each other . Neocons are a lot more similar to neoliberals than to true conservatives; neoliberass are more similar to neocons than to real liberals.

Do you get it? Both the Republican and Democratic party are now run by people with identical agendas: make the big corporations richer and expand the American empire.

There is only one party, which simply puts on different faces depending on which "branch" of the party is in power. If its the Democratic branch, there is a slightly liberal social veneer to the mask: a little more funding for social programs, a little more nice guy talk, a little more of a laissez faire attitude towards gays and minorities, and a little more patient push towards military conquest and empire.

If its the Republican branch, there's a little more tough guy talk, quicker moves towards military empire, a little more mention of religion, and a tad more centralization of power in the president.

But there is only a single face behind both masks: the face of raw corporatism, greed and yearning for power and empire.

Until Americans stop getting distracted by the Republican versus Democratic melodrama, America will move steadily forward towards war, empire and -- inevitably as with any country which extends too far -- collapse.

Neoliberalism is neither "new" or liberal. Neoconservativism is neither new or conservative. They are just new labels for a very old agenda: serving the powers-that-be, consolidating power, controlling resources. Whether the iron fist has a velvet glove on it or not, it is still an iron fist.

A true opposition party is needed to counter the never-changing American agenda for military and corporate empire.

https://lockerdome.com/lad/9498954186704486?pubid=ld-6193-3093&pubo=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonsblog.com&width=747

J R Thompson , September 19, 2012 10:33 PM

This article does much to confuse and disinform. NeoCons are essential modern day Fascists. If you don't recall your politics, Fascists are to the right of Conservatives on the political spectrum. They have nothing to do with Communists who are far to the left. During the 1930s Nazis were the NeoCons. They were Fascists, and they also had the overwhelming support of Muslims, who are also Fascists. Today's NeoLiberals are basically Right Wing and hardly middle of the fence. There is virtually no politics to the left of centre and this is the catalyst for massive economic stagnation, economic collapse, rapidly growing global instability, indemic poverty, and an ongoing threat of pandemic disease and general global conflict. Until we have some form of political balance, we're on the brink of catastrophe, and will probably end up with an enormous mess to clean up.

Guest J R Thompson , June 18, 2014 8:12 PM

The Wiki page disagrees with you.

It says that Neo-Conservatives descend from Trotskeyism.

Grey Winters J R Thompson , June 23, 2014 4:28 PM

Fascism is statism and nothing represents the ultimate power of the state then the liberal. No liberal supports our constitution or a smaller government . But it's innately typical of a liberal to project their agenda onto others.

Malcolm Scott J R Thompson , November 4, 2016 9:18 PM

Fascism, Communism are just different faces of Totalitarianism or Statism. Fascism gives "private" owners (oligarchs) the illusion of freedom.

MisterReason J R Thompson , November 8, 2015 6:27 AM

Your communist professor lied to you.

Communism and Fascism are one degree apart. In Fascism, instead of the elite being part of the government, they are part of the private sector. That is the only difference. They are both mainly concerned with consolidation of power and shaping the culture though control of information. Internationally they operate the same as well, expanding their influence through wars of occupation.

Adnihilo , November 11, 2008 7:16 PM

Thank you for this article! As an author you always seem to be one step ahead of me in articles I've been planning to write! I too have been asserting [in comments mostly at OpedNews] that the economic right political 'values' found in NeoLibs, [short for both NeoLibertarians and Neoliberals] NeoCons, and TheoCons are predominantly the same for months now ever since these corporate bailouts started. This author has a firm grasp on political ideologies as evidenced in his other articles correctly identifying the now $2 trillion in US corporate bailouts as the economic policy of Fascism.

The TheoCons-NeoCons-NeoLibs have taken the country so far to the economic right and up in to an authoritarian level since 2000 that most all in the democratic party, excluding a few like Kucinich and Sanders, have moved from a 'centrist' political ideology to an authoritarian right and moderate conservative political ideology.

Like Anna here more fully displays, the overwhelming majority of Americans just do not have a realistic grasp on global political ideologies, much less their own personal political values. Political party indoctrination and mud slinging has the population wrongly convinced democratic politicians are for the most part 'liberals' when they're economic right NeoLiberals and moderate conservatives while republicans calling themselves 'conservative' are instead radically authoritarian and economic right TheoCons and NeoCons.

When Americans don't understand their own political values, much less those of the candidate they vote for, they will continue to make the wrong choices. This would seem to be exactly what the '1' party corporatist system wants so Americans will only continue making the wrong choices from choosing between 'moderate conservative' Democrats like Obama-Biden, and NeoCon/TheoCon republicans like McCain-Palin. Who better to assert this 1 party economic right NeoLiberal reality than one of the most renown liberal authors and intellectuals than Chomsky in his recent article the Anti-Democratic Nature of US Capitalism is Being Exposed.

Chomsky cites America as a "one-party system, the business party, with two factions, Republicans and Democrats" while putting the blame on this economic crisis where it belongs on the very people who created it, America's NeoLiberals. Anna, if you need more proof I suggest you take a trip to the non partisan web site created by a group of doctorate degreed political ideology professors, political experts and sociologists called Political Compass. I guarantee you these experts are far more learned than you are about political ideologies and political values not just in the US, but around the globe. It will surely shock you to learn based on speeches, public statements and most crucially voting records that Obama is firmly in the authoritarian right quadrant as a moderate conservative.

There you'll see their reasons for this based on his voting record and speeches briefly cited in "While Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader are depicted on the extreme left in an American context, they would simply be mainstream social democrats within the wider political landscape of Europe.

Similarly, Obama is popularly perceived as a leftist in the United States while elsewhere in the west his record is that of a moderate conservative. For example, in the case of the death penalty he is not an uncompromising abolitionist, while mainstream conservatives in all other western democracies are deeply opposed to capital punishment. The Democratic party's presidential candidate also reneged on his commitment to oppose the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He sided with the ultra conservative bloc in the Supreme Court against the Washington DC handgun ban and for capital punishment in child rape cases. He supports President Bush's faith-based initiatives and is reported in Fortune to have said that NAFTA isn't so bad."A way to realistically determine if the candidate you vote for actually represents your own political values is to take the political values test found at political compass here and afterward learn about the inadequacies inherent in the limited age-old traditional left-right economic view of political ideologies.

Then you Anna, along with a host of others, may actually start voting in support of candidates that factually represent your own political values. Or you may find you really aren't this liberal you think you are after all. Regardless, only by learning more about ones' own political values and those of the candidates Americans support will they get the political leaders, type of leadership, and government they actually want....

Alejandro Moreno Adnihilo , July 21, 2016 2:07 PM

Written 8 years ago and yet STILL true, Sanders and Kucinich are still of, by and for the people.

Dave , December 8, 2012 11:06 AM

Libertarian Party. http://www.lp.org

SuperTech86 Dave , November 11, 2015 3:20 AM

Doesn't do anything to stop the advance of corporatism which ultimately leads to tyranny and fascism.

Ian SuperTech86 , September 5, 2016 6:28 PM

Its debatable. Corporations won't be near as interested in a small government that is less willing to do favors for them. What do you suggest as a solution to stop the advancement of corporatism? If your answer is to tax the rich more and grow the government you would just get tyranny. Currently with big government we have both tyranny and fascism.

bosunj , November 10, 2008 5:59 PM

Indeed. One Party. The Corporate party. GOP-DEM are little different than Sunni and Shia! GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!!

anon bosunj , November 17, 2013 9:43 PM

This is just ignorance -- the Republicans and Democrats are the same, but Sunni and Shia Islam are not just arbitrary branches of some terrorist collective called Islam. I suggest you read more about Islam, it's extraordinarily misunderstood AND--I might add--misinforming people about Islam is an integral part of the agenda of the corporate GOP-DEM elite. I'm not a Muslim, for the record.

Mike , November 10, 2008 6:31 PM

You are confusing the issue. The work neoliberal applies to an economic philosophy which is also sometimes called the Chicago School or the Washington Consensus. It is related to what we often call globalization, and it has to to with "liberalization" of economies, in other words privatization of publicly held industries etc. Liberal in the American political sense it totally unrelated to neoliberal. Neoconservatism is a political philosophy that espouses vanguardism and militant foreign policy. They are related in that their goals dove tail, kind of like apples and oranges are similar in that they are both edible.

[Dec 23, 2017] Israel lobby in the United States

Dec 23, 2017 | en.wikipedia.org

The formal component of the Israel lobby consists of organized lobby groups , political action committees (PACs), think tanks and media watchdog groups . The Center for Responsive Politics , which tracks all lobbies and PACs, describes the 'background' of those 'Pro-Israel' as, "A nationwide network of local political action committees, generally named after the region their donors come from, supplies much of the pro-Israel money in US politics . Additional funds also come from individuals who bundle contributions to candidates favored by the PACs. The donors' unified goal is to build stronger US-Israel relations and to support Israel in its negotiations and armed conflicts with its Arab neighbors." [24]

According to Mitchell Bard, there are, three key formal lobbying groups:

... ... ...

A summary of pro-Israel campaign donations for the period of 1990–2008 collected by Center for Responsive Politics indicates current totals and a general increase in proportional donations to the US Republican party since 1996. [46] The Center for Responsive Politics' 1990–2006 data shows that "pro-Israel interests have contributed $56.8 million in individual, group and soft money donations to federal candidates and party committees since 1990." [47] In contrast, Arab-Americans and Muslim PACs contributed slightly less than $800,000 during the same (1990–2006) period. [48] In 2006, 60% of the Democratic Party 's fundraising and 25% of that for the Republican Party's fundraising came from Jewish-funded PACs. According to a Washington Post estimate, Democratic presidential candidates depend on Jewish sources for as much as 60% of money raised from private sources. [49]

... ... ...

AIPAC does not give donations directly to candidates, but those who donate to AIPAC are often important political contributors in their own right. In addition, AIPAC helps connect donors with candidates, especially to the network of pro-Israel political action committees. AIPAC president Howard Friedman says "AIPAC meets with every candidate running for Congress. These candidates receive in-depth briefings to help them completely understand the complexities of Israel's predicament and that of the Middle East as a whole. We even ask each candidate to author a 'position paper' on their views of the US-Israel relationship – so it's clear where they stand on the subject."[43]

.... ... ...

Mearsheimer and Walt state that "pro-Israel figures have established a commanding presence at the American Enterprise Institute, the Center for Security Policy, the Foreign Policy Research Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Hudson Institute, the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA). These think tanks are all decidedly pro-Israel and include few, if any, critics of US support for the Jewish state."[50]

... ... ...

In 2006 former U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq Scott Ritter published "Target Iran: The Truth About the White House's Plans for Regime Change" ( ISBN 978-1-56025-936-7 ). In his book he stated that certain Israelis and pro-Israel elements in the United States were trying to push the Bush administration into war with Iran. [124] He also accuses the U.S. pro-Israel lobby of dual loyalty and outright espionage (see Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal ). [125]

[Dec 23, 2017] The State Department has approved the delivery to the Ukrainian army of modified 50 calibre Barrett sniper rifles, "Model M107A"

Dec 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Moscow Exile , December 21, 2017 at 10:55 am

Oh look at what I just got given me!

https://icdn.lenta.ru/images/2017/12/21/12/20171221122514922/brief_f8fe6380f3186e74c06a46d665607174.jpg

The state Department has approved the delivery to the Ukrainian army of modified 50 calibre Barrett sniper rifles, "Model M107A"

It may be related to the Model 82A1®/M107®, but the M107A1 is far from a simple evolution. Driven by the demands of combat, every component was re-engineered to be lighter yet stronger. Designed to be used with a suppressor, this rifle allows you to combine signature reduction capabilities with the flawless reliability of the original Barrett M107, but with a weight reduction of 5 pounds. Advanced design and manufacturing make the M107A1 more precise than ever.

See: BarrrrettM107A1

[Dec 22, 2017] When Sanity Fails - The Mindset of the Ideological Drone by The Saker

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... North Korea's air defenses are so weak that we had to notify them we were flying B1 bombers near their airspace–they didn't even know our aircraft were coming. This reminds me of the "fearsome" Republican Guard that Saddam had in the Persian Gulf. Turns out we had total air superiority and just bombed the crap out of them and they surrendered in droves. ..."
"... We have already seen what happens when an army has huge amounts of outdated Soviet weaponry versus the most technologically advanced force in the world. It's a slaughter. Also, there has to be weaponry up the USA's sleeve that would be used in the event of an attack. Don't forget our cyber warfare abilities that would undoubtedly be implemented as well. This writer seems to always hype Russia's capabilities and denigrate the US's capabilities. Sure, Russia has the capacity to nuke the US into smithereens, and vice versa. But if its a head to head shooting war, the US and NATO would dominate. FACT. ..."
"... Commander's intent: ..."
"... Decapitate the top leadership and remove retaliatory capability. ..."
"... Massive missile/bombing campaign (including carpet) of top leadership locations, tactical missile locations and DMZ artillery belt. Destruction of surface fleet and air force. ..."
"... Advance into DMZ artillery belt up to a range of 240 mm cannon. Not further (local tactical considerations taken into account of course). ..."
"... Phase three: "break the enemy's will to fight" and destroy the "regime support infrastructure" ..."
"... I guess an American attack on North Korea would consist of preemptive strategic nuking to destroy the entire country before it can do anything. Since North Korea itself contributes essentially nothing to the world economy, no one would lose money. ..."
"... These examples perfectly illustrate the kind of mindset induced by what Professor John Marciano called "Empire as a way of life" [1] which is characterized by a set of basic characteristics: ..."
"... there has to be ..."
"... would undoubtedly ..."
"... the act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts ..."
"... A perfect illustration of that is the famous quote " it became necessary to destroy the town to save it ..."
"... I watch CNN, but I'm not sure I can tell you, the difference in Iraq and Iran, but I know Jesus and I talk to God ..."
"... this applies to the vast majority of US politicians, decision-makers and elected officials, hence Putin's remark that " It's difficult to talk with people who confuse Austria and Australia ". ..."
"... As a result, there is no more discernible US diplomacy left: all the State Department does is deliver threats, ultimatums and condemnations. Meaningful *negotiations* have basically been removed form the US foreign policy toolkit. ..."
"... That belief is also the standard cop out in any conversation of morality, ethnics, or even the notions of right and wrong. An anti-religious view par excellence . ..."
"... The US policies towards Russia, China and Iran all have the potential of resulting in a disaster of major magnitude. The world is dealing with situation in which a completely delusional regime is threatening everybody with various degrees of confrontation. This is like being in the same room with a monkey playing with a hand grenade. Except for that hand grenade is nuclear. ..."
"... This situation places a special burden of responsibility on all other nations, especially those currently in Uncle Sam's cross-hairs, to act with restraint and utmost restraint. That is not fair, but life rarely is. It is all very well and easy to declare that force must be met by force and that the Empire interprets restraint as weakness until you realize that any miscalculation can result in the death of millions of people. I am therefore very happy that the DPRK is the only country which chose to resort to a policy of hyperbolic threats while Iran, Russia and China acted, and are still acting, with the utmost restraint. ..."
"... they plan, and Allah plans. And Allah is the best of planners ..."
"... If the U.S. attacks North Korea or Iran we will become a pariah among nations (especially once the pictures start pouring in). We will be loathed. Countries may very well decide that we are not worthy of having the world's reserve currency. In that case the dollar will collapse as will our economy. ..."
"... Maybe it's just me, but it seems that NK is just another tyranny in a long list of tyrannies throughout millennia, and like all of them it will just implode on its own. Therefore, the best thing you can do is simply to ignore it (thus denying the tyrant an external threat to rally the populace) and wait for the NK people to say enough is enough. ..."
"... I agree with the logic that as Americans become dumber the ability to have a powerful military also degrades, however an increasingly declining America also makes it more dangerous. As ever more ideologues rule the corridors of power and the generally stupid population that will consent to everything they are told, America will start involving itself in ever more reckless conflicts. This means they despite being a near idiocracy, the nuclear weapons and military bases all over world make America an ever greater threat for the world ..."
Dec 22, 2017 | www.unz.com

My recent analysis of the potential consequences of a US attack on the DPRK has elicited a wide range of reactions. There is one type of reaction which I find particularly interesting and most important and I would like to focus on it today: the ones which entirely dismissed my whole argument. The following is a selection of some of the most telling reactions of this kind:

Example 1:

North Korea's air defenses are so weak that we had to notify them we were flying B1 bombers near their airspace–they didn't even know our aircraft were coming. This reminds me of the "fearsome" Republican Guard that Saddam had in the Persian Gulf. Turns out we had total air superiority and just bombed the crap out of them and they surrendered in droves.

We have already seen what happens when an army has huge amounts of outdated Soviet weaponry versus the most technologically advanced force in the world. It's a slaughter. Also, there has to be weaponry up the USA's sleeve that would be used in the event of an attack. Don't forget our cyber warfare abilities that would undoubtedly be implemented as well. This writer seems to always hype Russia's capabilities and denigrate the US's capabilities. Sure, Russia has the capacity to nuke the US into smithereens, and vice versa. But if its a head to head shooting war, the US and NATO would dominate. FACT.

Example 2:

Commander's intent:

Decapitate the top leadership and remove retaliatory capability.

Execution:

Phase one:

Massive missile/bombing campaign (including carpet) of top leadership locations, tactical missile locations and DMZ artillery belt. Destruction of surface fleet and air force.

Phase two:

Advance into DMZ artillery belt up to a range of 240 mm cannon. Not further (local tactical considerations taken into account of course).

Phase three: "break the enemy's will to fight" and destroy the "regime support infrastructure"

Phase four: Regime change.

There you go .

Example 3:

I guess an American attack on North Korea would consist of preemptive strategic nuking to destroy the entire country before it can do anything. Since North Korea itself contributes essentially nothing to the world economy, no one would lose money.

These examples perfectly illustrate the kind of mindset induced by what Professor John Marciano called "Empire as a way of life" [1] which is characterized by a set of basic characteristics:

First foremost, simple, very simple one-sentence "arguments" . Gone are the days when argument were built in some logical sequence, when facts were established, then evaluated for their accuracy and relevance, then analyzed and then conclusions presented. Where in the past one argument per page or paragraph constituted the norm, we now have tweet-like 140 character statements which are more akin to shouted slogans than to arguments (no wonder that tweeting is something a bird does – hence the expression "bird brain"). You will see that kind of person writing what initially appears to be a paragraph, but when you look closer you realize that the paragraph is really little more than a sequence of independent statements and not really an argument of any type. A quasi-religious belief in one's superiority which is accepted as axiomatic .

Nothing new here: the Communists considered themselves as the superior for class reasons, the Nazis by reason of racial superiority, the US Americans just "because" – no explanation offered (I am not sure that this constitutes of form of progress). In the US case, that superiority is cultural, political, financial and, sometimes but not always, racial. This superiority is also technological, hence the " there has to be " or the " would undoubtedly " in the example #1 above. This is pure faith and not something which can be challenged by fact or logic. Contempt for all others . This really flows from #2 above. Example 3 basically declares all of North Korea (including its people) as worthless. This is where all the expressions like "sand niggers" "hadjis" and other "gooks" come from: the dehumanization of the "others" as a preparation for their for mass slaughter. Notice how in the example #2 the DPRK leaders are assumed to be totally impotent, dull and, above all, passive.

The notion that they might do something unexpected is never even considered (a classical recipe for military disaster, but more about that later). Contempt for rules, norms and laws . This notion is well expressed by the famous US 19th century slogan of " my country, right or wrong " but goes far beyond that as it also includes the belief that the USA has God-given (or equivalent) right to ignore international law, the public opinion of the rest of the planet or even the values underlying the documents which founded the USA. In fact, in the logic of such imperial drone the belief in US superiority actually serves as a premise to the conclusion that the USA has a "mission" or a "responsibility" to rule the world. This is "might makes right" elevated to the rank of dogma and, therefore, never challenged. A very high reliance on doublethink . Doublethink defined by Wikipedia as " the act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts ".

A perfect illustration of that is the famous quote " it became necessary to destroy the town to save it ". Most US Americans are aware of the fact that US policies have resulted in them being hated worldwide, even amongst putatively allied or "protected" countries such as South Korea, Israel, Germany or Japan. Yet at the very same time, they continue to think that the USA should "defend" "allies", even if the latter can't wait for Uncle Sam's soldiers to pack and leave. Doublethink is also what makes it possible for ideological drones to be aware of the fact that the US has become a subservient Israeli colony while, at the same time, arguing for the support and financing of Israel.

A glorification of ignorance which is transformed into a sign of manliness and honesty. This is powerfully illustrated in the famous song " Where were you when the world stopped turning " whoso lyrics include the following words " I watch CNN, but I'm not sure I can tell you, the difference in Iraq and Iran, but I know Jesus and I talk to God " (notice how the title of the song suggests that New York is the center of the world, when when get hit, the world stops turning; also, no connection is made between watching CNN and not being able to tell two completely different countries apart). If this were limited to singers, then it would not be a problem, but this applies to the vast majority of US politicians, decision-makers and elected officials, hence Putin's remark that " It's difficult to talk with people who confuse Austria and Australia ".

As a result, there is no more discernible US diplomacy left: all the State Department does is deliver threats, ultimatums and condemnations. Meaningful *negotiations* have basically been removed form the US foreign policy toolkit.

A totally uncritical acceptance of ideologically correct narratives even when they are self-evidently nonsensical to an even superficial critical analysis. An great example of this kind of self-evidently stupid stories is all the nonsense about the Russians trying to meddle in US elections or the latest hysteria about relatively small-size military exercises in Russia .

The acceptance of the official 9/11 narrative is a perfect example of that. Something repeated by the "respectable" Ziomedia is accepted as dogma, no matter how self-evidently stupid. A profound belief that everything is measured in dollars . From this flow a number of corollary beliefs such as "US weapons are most expensive, they are therefore superior" or "everybody has his price" [aka "whom we can't kill we will simply buy"]. In my experience folks like these are absolutely unable to even imagine that some people might not motivated by greed or other egoistic interests: ideological drones project their own primitive motives unto everybody else with total confidence.

That belief is also the standard cop out in any conversation of morality, ethnics, or even the notions of right and wrong. An anti-religious view par excellence .

Notice the total absence of any more complex consideration which might require some degree of knowledge or expertise: the imperial mindset is not only ignoramus-compatible, it is ignoramus based . This is what Orwell was referring to in his famous book 1984 with the slogan "Ignorance is Strength". However, it goes way beyond simple ignorance of facts and includes the ability to "think in slogans" (example #2 is a prefect example of this).

There are, of course, many more psychological characteristics for the perfect "ideological drone", but the ones above already paint a pretty decent picture of the kind of person I am sure we all have seen many times over. What is crucial to understand about them is that even though they are far from being a majority, they compensate for that with a tremendous motivational drive. It might be due to a need to repeatedly reassert their certitudes or a way to cope with some deep-seated cognitive dissonance, but in my experience folks like that have energy levels that many sane people would envy. This is absolutely crucial to how the Empire, and any other oppressive regime, works: by repressing those who can understand a complex argument by means of those who cannot. Let me explain:

Unless there are mechanisms set in to prevent that, in a debate/dispute between an educated and intelligent person and an ideological drone the latter will always prevail because of the immense advantage the latter has over the former. Indeed, while the educated and intelligent person will be able to immediately identify numerous factual and logical gaps in his opponent's arguments, he will always need far more "space" to debunk the nonsense spewed by the drone than the drone who will simply dismiss every argument with one or several slogans. This is why I personally never debate or even talk with such people: it is utterly pointless.

As a result, a fact-based and logical argument now gets the same consideration and treatment as a collection of nonsensical slogans (political correctness mercilessly enforces that principle: you can't call an idiot and idiot any more). Falling education standards have resulted in a dramatic degradation of the public debate: to be well-educated, well-read, well-traveled, to speak several languages and feel comfortable in different cultures used to be considered a prerequisite to expressing an opinion, now they are all treated as superfluous and even useless characteristics. Actual, formal, expertise in a topic is now becoming extremely rare. A most interesting kind of illustration of this point can be found in this truly amazing video posted by Peter Schiff:

One could be tempted to conclude that this kind of 'debating' is a Black issue. It is not. The three quotes given at the beginning of this article are a good reminder of this (unless, of course, they were all written by Blacks, which we have no reason to believe).

Twitter might have done to minds what MTV has done to rock music: laid total waste to it.

Consequences:

There are a number of important consequences from the presence of such ideological drones in any society. The first one is that any ideology-based regime will always and easily find numerous spontaneous supporters who willingly collaborate with it. Combined with a completely subservient media, such drones form the rontline force of any ideological debate. For instance, a journalist can always be certain to easily find a done to interview, just as a politician can count on them to support him during a public speech or debate. The truth is that, unfortunately, we live in a society that places much more emphasis on the right to have an opinion than on the actual ability to form one .

By the way, the intellectually challenged always find a natural ally in the coward and the "follower" (as opposed to "leader types") because it is always much easier and safer to follow the herd and support the regime in power than to oppose it. You will always see "stupid drones" backed by "coward drones". As for the politicians , they naturally cater to all types of drones since they always provide a much bigger "bang for the buck" than those inclined to critical thinking whose loyalty to whatever "cause" is always dubious.

The drone-type of mindset also comes with some major weaknesses including a very high degree of predictability, an inability to learn from past mistakes, an inability to imagine somebody operating with a completely different set of motives and many others. One of the most interesting ones for those who actively resist the AngloZionist Empire is that the ideological drone has very little staying power because as soon as the real world, in all its beauty and complexity, comes crashing through the door of the drone's delusional and narrow imagination his cocky arrogance is almost instantaneously replaced by a total sense of panic and despair. I have had the chance to speak Russian officers who were present during the initial interrogation of US POWs in Iraq and they were absolutely amazed at how terrified and broken the US POWs immediately became (even though they were not mistreated in any way). It was as if they had no sense of risk at all, until it was too late and they were captured, at which point they inner strength instantly gave way abject terror. This is one of the reasons that the Empire cannot afford a protracted war: not because of casualty aversion as some suggest, but to keep the imperial delusions/illusions unchallenged by reality . As long as the defeat can be hidden or explained away, the Empire can fight on, but as soon as it becomes impossible to obfuscate the disaster the Empire has to simply declare victory and leave.

Thus we have a paradox here: the US military is superbly skilled at killing people in large numbers, but but not at winning wars . And yet, because this latter fact is easily dismissed on grounds #2 #5 and #7 above (all of them, really), failing to actually win wars does not really affect the US determination to initiate new wars, even potentially very dangerous ones. I would even argue that each defeat even strengthens the Empire's desire to show it power by hoping to finally identify one victim small enough to be convincingly defeated. The perfect example of that was Ronald Reagan's decision to invade Grenada right after the US Marines barracks bombing in Beirut. The fact that the invasion of Grenada was one of the worst military operations in world history did not prevent the US government from handing out more medals for it than the total number of people involved – such is the power of the drone-mindset!

We have another paradox here: history shows that if the US gets entangled in a military conflict it is most likely to end up defeated (if "not winning" is accepted as a euphemism for "losing"). And yet, the United States are also extremely hard to deter. This is not just a case of " Fools rush in where angels fear to tread " but the direct result of a form of conditioning which begins in grade schools. From the point of view of an empire, repeated but successfully concealed defeats are much preferable to the kind of mental paralysis induced in drone populations, at least temporarily, by well-publicized defeats . Likewise, when the loss of face is seen as a calamity much worse than body bags, lessons from the past are learned by academics and specialists, but not by the nation as a whole (there are numerous US academics and officers who have always known all of what I describe above, in fact – they were the ones who first taught me about it!).

If this was only limited to low-IQ drones this would not be as dangerous, but the problem is that words have their own power and that politicians and ideological drones jointly form a self-feeding positive feedback loop when the former lie to the latter only to then be bound by what they said which, in turn, brings them to join the ideological drones in a self-enclosed pseudo-reality of their own.

What all this means for North Korea and the rest of us

I hate to admit it, but I have to concede that there is a good argument to be made that all the over-the-top grandstanding and threatening by the North Koreans does make sense, at least to some degree. While for an educated and intelligent person threatening the continental United States with nuclear strikes might appear as the epitome of irresponsibility, this might well be the only way to warn the ideological drone types of the potential consequences of a US attack on the DPRK. Think of it: if you had to deter somebody with the set of beliefs outlined in #1 through #8 above, would you rather explain that a war on the Korean Peninsula would immediately involve the entire region or simple say "them crazy gook guys might just nuke the shit out of you!"? I think that the North Koreans might be forgiven for thinking that an ideological drone can only be deterred by primitive and vastly exaggerated threats.

Still, my strictly personal conclusion is that ideological drones are pretty much "argument proof" and that they cannot be swayed neither by primitive nor by sophisticated arguments. This is why I personally never directly engage them. But this is hardly an option for a country desperate to avoid a devastating war (the North Koreans have no illusions on that account as they, unlike most US Americans, remember the previous war in Korea).

But here is the worst aspect of it all: this is not only a North Korean problem

The US policies towards Russia, China and Iran all have the potential of resulting in a disaster of major magnitude. The world is dealing with situation in which a completely delusional regime is threatening everybody with various degrees of confrontation. This is like being in the same room with a monkey playing with a hand grenade. Except for that hand grenade is nuclear.

This situation places a special burden of responsibility on all other nations, especially those currently in Uncle Sam's cross-hairs, to act with restraint and utmost restraint. That is not fair, but life rarely is. It is all very well and easy to declare that force must be met by force and that the Empire interprets restraint as weakness until you realize that any miscalculation can result in the death of millions of people. I am therefore very happy that the DPRK is the only country which chose to resort to a policy of hyperbolic threats while Iran, Russia and China acted, and are still acting, with the utmost restraint.

In practical terms, there is no way for the rest of the planet to disarm the monkey. The only option is therefore to incapacitate the monkey itself or, alternatively, to create the conditions in which the monkey will be too busy with something else to pay attention to his grenade. An internal political crisis triggered by an external military defeat remains, I believe, the most likely and desirable scenario (see here if that topic is of interest to you). Still, the future is impossible to predict and, as the Quran says, " they plan, and Allah plans. And Allah is the best of planners ". All we can do is try to mitigate the impact of the ideological drones on our society as much as we can, primarily by *not* engaging them and limiting our interaction with those still capable of critical thought. It is by excluding ideological drones from the debate about the future of our world that we can create a better environment for those truly seeking solutions to our current predicament.

-- -- -

1. If you have not listened to his lectures on this topic, which I highly recommend, you can find them here:

Paul b , December 22, 2017 at 12:28 pm GMT

If the U.S. attacks North Korea or Iran we will become a pariah among nations (especially once the pictures start pouring in). We will be loathed. Countries may very well decide that we are not worthy of having the world's reserve currency. In that case the dollar will collapse as will our economy.
Third world nationalist , December 22, 2017 at 12:36 pm GMT
North Korea is a nationalistic country that traces their race back to antiquity. America on the other hand is a degenerated country that is ruled over by Jews. The flag waving American s may call the Koreans gooks but if we apply the American racial ideology on themselves, the Americans are the the 56percent Untermensch. While the north Koreans are superior for having rejected modern degeneracy.
Andrei Martyanov , Website December 22, 2017 at 2:08 pm GMT

that the Empire interprets restraint as weakness

A key point, which signifies a serious cultural degeneration from values of chivalry and honoring the opposite side to a very Asiatic MO which absolutely rules current US establishment. This, and, of course, complete detachment from the realities of the warfare.

Sean , December 22, 2017 at 2:48 pm GMT
It is all talk, because China makes them invulnerable to sanctions and NK has nukes. The US will have to go to China to deal with NK and China will want to continue economically raping the US in exchange. That is why China gave NK an H bomb and ICBM tech ( it's known to have gave those same things to Pakistan). The real action will be in the Middle East. The Saudi are counting on the US giving them CO2 fracking in the future, and Iran being toppled soon. William S. Lind says Iran will be hit by Trump and Israel will use the ensuing chaos to expel the West Bank Palestinians (back to the country whose passports they travel on).
VICB3 , December 22, 2017 at 4:49 pm GMT

Maybe it's just me, but it seems that NK is just another tyranny in a long list of tyrannies throughout millennia, and like all of them it will just implode on its own. Therefore, the best thing you can do is simply to ignore it (thus denying the tyrant an external threat to rally the populace) and wait for the NK people to say enough is enough.

Don't think that would ever happen? Reference 'How Tyrannies Implode' by Richard Fernandez: https://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2016/02/27/how-tyrannies-implode/?print=true&singlepage=true

There's no doubt in my mind that Kim will end up like Nikolae Ceaușescu in Romania, put up against a wall by his own military and shot on TV. All anyone has to do is be patient and not drink the Rah-Rah Kool-Aid.*

Just a thought.

VicB3

*Was talking with a 82nd Major at the Starbucks, and mentioned NK, Ceausecu, sitting tight, etc. (Mentioned we might help things along by blanketing the whole country with netbooks, wi-fi, and even small arms.) Got the careerist ladder- climber standard response of how advanced our weapons are, the people in charge know what they're doing, blah blah blah. Wouldn't even consider an alternative view (and didn't know or understand half of what I was talking about). It was the same response I got from an Air Force Colonel before the U.S. went into Afghanistan and Iraq and I told him the whole thing was/would be insanely stupid.

His party-line team-player response was when I knew for certain that any action in NK would/will fail spectacularly for the U.S., possibly even resulting in and economic collapse and civil war/revolution on this end.

Wish I didn't think that, but I do.

pyrrhus , December 22, 2017 at 5:03 pm GMT
Excellent post. But the US public education "system", while awful, is not the main reason that America is increasingly packed with drones and idiots. IQ is decreasing rapidly, as revealed in the College Board's data on SAT scores over the last 60 years .In addition, Dr. James Thompson has a Dec.15 post on Unz that shows a shocking decline in the ability of UK children to understand basic principles of physics, which are usually acquired on a developmental curve. Mike Judge's movie 'Idiocracy' appears to have been set unrealistically far in the future ..
In short, the current situation can and will get a lot worse in America. On the other hand, America's armed forces will be deteriorating apace, so they are becoming less dangerous to the rest of the world.
anonymous , Disclaimer December 22, 2017 at 6:10 pm GMT
The good thing about democracy is that anyone can express an opinion. The bad thing about democracy is that anyone can express an opinion. I have to laugh at all the internet commandos and wannabe Napoleons that roost on the internet giving us their advice. It's easy to cherrypick opinions that range from uninformed to downright stupid and bizarre. Those people don't actually run anything though, fortunately. Keep in mind that half the population is mentally average or below average and that average is quite mediocre. Throw in a few degrees above mediocre and you've got a majority, a majority that can and is regularly bamboozled. The majority of the population is just there to pay taxes and provide cannon fodder, that's all, like a farmer's herd of cows provides for his support. Ideological drones are desired in this case. It's my suspicion that the educational system is geared towards producing such a product as well as all other aspects of popular culture also induce stupefying effects. Insofar as American policy goes, look at what it actually does rather than what it says, the latter being a form of show biz playing to a domestic audience. I just skip the more obnoxious commenters since they're just annoying and add nothing but confusion to any discussion.
Randal , December 22, 2017 at 6:41 pm GMT
@VICB3

but it seems that NK is just another tyranny in a long list of tyrannies throughout millennia, and like all of them it will just implode on its own
.
There's no doubt in my mind that Kim will end up like Nikolae Ceaușescu in Romania, put up against a wall by his own military and shot on TV.

All things come to an end eventually, and I agree with you that the best course of action for the US over NK would be to leave it alone (and stop poking it), but this idea that "tyrannies always collapse" seems pretty unsupported by reality.

Off the top of my head all of the following autocrats died more or less peacefully in office and handed their "tyranny" on intact to a successor, just in the past few decades: Mao, Castro, Franco, Stalin, Assad senior, two successive Kims (so much for the assumption that the latest Kim will necessarily end up like Ceausescu). In the past, if a tyrant and his tyranny lasted long enough and arranged a good succession, it often came to be remembered as a golden age, as with the Roman, Augustus.

I suspect it might be a matter of you having a rather selective idea of what counts as a tyranny (I wouldn't count Franco in that list, myself, but establishment opinion is against me there, I think). You might be selectively remembering only the tyrannies that came to a bad end.

neutral , December 22, 2017 at 7:24 pm GMT
@pyrrhus

so they are becoming less dangerous to the rest of the world

I agree with the logic that as Americans become dumber the ability to have a powerful military also degrades, however an increasingly declining America also makes it more dangerous. As ever more ideologues rule the corridors of power and the generally stupid population that will consent to everything they are told, America will start involving itself in ever more reckless conflicts. This means they despite being a near idiocracy, the nuclear weapons and military bases all over world make America an ever greater threat for the world.

neutral , December 22, 2017 at 7:35 pm GMT

The good thing about democracy is that anyone can express an opinion.

Not sure if this is a joke or not. In case you are serious, you clearly have not been following the news, from USA to Germany all these so called democracies have been undertaking massive censorship operations. From jailing people to shutting down online conversations to ordering news to not report on things that threaten their power.

Dana Thompson , December 22, 2017 at 9:37 pm GMT
A bizarre posting utterly detached from reality. Don't you understand that if a blustering lunatic presses a megaton-pistol against our collective foreheads and threatens to pull the trigger, it represents a very disquieting situation? And if we contemplate actions that would cause a million utterly harmless and innocent Koreans to be incinerated, to prevent a million of our own brains from being blown out, aren't we allowed to do so without being accused of being vile bigots that think yellow gook lives are worthless? Aren't we entitled to any instinct of self preservation at all?
What the Korean situation obviously entails is a high-stakes experiment in human psychology. All that attention-seeking little freak probably wants is to be treated with respect, and like somebody important. Trump started out in a sensible way, by treating Kim courteously, but for that he was pilloried by the insanely-partisan opposition within his own party – McCain I'm mainly thinking of. That's the true obstacle to a sane resolution of the problem. I say if the twerp would feel good if we gave him a tickertape parade down Fifth Avenue and a day pass to Disneyland, we should do so – it's small enough a concession in view of what's at stake. But if rabid congress-critters obstruct propitiation, then intimidation and even preemptive megadeath may be all that's left.
peterAUS , December 22, 2017 at 10:37 pm GMT
@Dana Thompson

Agree.

I suspect the true conversation about the topic will start when all that becomes really serious. I mean more serious than posting the latest selfie on a Facebook. Hangs around that warhead miniaturization/hardening timetable, IMHO. Maybe too late then.

VICB3 , December 23, 2017 at 12:07 am GMT
@Randal

Just be patient.

Also, one man's tyranny is another mans return to stability. For better or worse, Mao got rid of the Warlords. Franco got rid of the Communists and kept Spain out of WWII. The Assads are Baath Party and both secular and modernizers.

Stalin? Depends on who you talk to, but the Russians do like a strong hand.

Kim? His people only have to look West to China and Russia, or def. to the South, to know that things could be much better. And more and more he can't control the flow of information. That, and the rank and file of his army have roundworms. And guns.

At some point, the light comes on. And that same rank and file with guns tells itself "You know, we could be doing better."

And then it's "Live on TV Time!"

Hope this helps.

Just a thought.

VicB3

Santoculto , December 23, 2017 at 12:27 am GMT
Double think is not just a question of ignorance or self contradiction because often it's important to make people embrace COMPLEXITY instead CONFUSION believing the late it's basically the first

METWO#

Erebus , December 23, 2017 at 12:59 am GMT
@peterAUS

Saker and his legion of fanboys here didn't "attack" the text but the writer.

In the first place, there's nothing in the text to "attack". It's a laundry list of disconnected slogans and so is not a different point of view at all. Released from the confines of the author's gamer world, it evaporates into nothing. I pointed this out to you at some length elsewhere.

In the second, it appears you missed the point of the article. Hint: it's stated in the title. The article's about the mindsets of the authors of such "texts", and not about the texts themselves.

It appears that I am sort of a "dissident" here.

You flatter yourself. To be a dissident requires, at the very least, comprehension of the argument one is disagreeing with. Your "texts" are the equivalent of shouting slogans and waving placards. It may work for a street protest, but is totally out of place on a webzine discussion forum. Hence your screeds here do not constitute real dissension, but trolling.

Simple, really.

[Dec 22, 2017] Nikki Haley Holds Friendship Party For Countries That Supported US In UN Israel Vote Zero Hedge

Dec 22, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com

Thursday's UN General Assembly vote on the Jerusalem resolution to a "friendship" party.

Hours after Haley tweeted "We appreciate these countries for not falling to the irresponsible ways of the UN," Voice of America's UN correspondent Margaret Besheer posted an electronic version of the invitation to twitter, which reads "Save the Date: The Honorable Nikki R. Haley, Permanent Representative United States Mission to the United Nations invites you to a reception to thank you for your friendship to the United States, Wednesday, January 3, 2018 6:00-8:00p.m. Formal Invitation to Follow."


US Ambassador Nikki Haley invites the 64 countries who voted 'no', abstained or didn't show up for UNGA Jerusalem resolution to "friendship" party.

Naturally our first thought is that it sounds like it's going to be a pretty sad and deeply awkward party. After all only 9 actually voted with the United States, and 35 were absentions, leaving all the rest as no-shows. So even the majority of the 64 "friends" on the invitation list were a bit too embarrassed to fully step up for their "friend" the first time around - why would they then attend what sounds like a literal pity party for the losing side?

Perhaps the absentions will quietly show up trying to fit in at the "cool party" for the winning team, wherever that may be. Newsweek has likened the invitation for making into the 'nice' column of the White House's "naughty or nice" list .

And concerning what could very well comprise the "VIP part" of the invitation list - only Israel, Honduras, Togo, U.S., Palau, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Guatemala voted against the Jerusalem resolution to condemn the US move to recognize the city as the capital of Israel and relocate the American embassy there. Two-thirds of UN member states including Germany, France, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Spain and Greece voted in favor of the resolution.

Notably, Canada abstained, which is sure going to make the "friendship to the United States" party extra stiff and awkward the moment the Canadian delegation walks through the door.

Sad little party. pic.twitter.com/ClBzvn9xHM

-- Stephanie Lamy (@WCM_JustSocial) December 21, 2017

And who knows, perhaps a few of those countries that did vote 'no' alongside the US did so because prior to the vote both President Trump and Nikki Haley threatened to cut aid to countries failing to support the controversial US decision (well actually many are sparsely populated micronations who have long essentially been dependencies of the US government).

Haley's parting speech after the vote took on a threatening tone as well, as despite being isolated by virtually the entire international community, she warned the international body that the U.S. would remember the vote as a betrayal by the U.N., and that the vote would do nothing to affect the Trump administration's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital and move its embassy there.

Haley reminded UN members of the US' generous contributions to the organization and said that the United States expects its will to be respected in return. "When we make a generous contributions to the UN, we also have a legitimate expectation that our goodwill is recognized and respected," Haley said, adding that the vote will be "remembered" by the US and "make a difference on how the Americans look at the UN."

And with all that parting drama, regarding Nikki's upcoming "friendship" party, it would be great to be a fly on the wall for the event... or, perhaps it'll be too awkward even for the flies.

BennyBoy -> Give_me_liberty_or , Dec 22, 2017 6:09 AM

That "Bribeship Party" requires a very, very, very small room.

Give_me_liberty_or -> BennyBoy , Dec 22, 2017 6:11 AM

this is yet another divide and conquer wedge issue. If you are against it they will label you "unpatriotic anti-trump muslim-loving commie bolshevik." The cognitive dissonance is so dense it's creating a vortex.

Haus-Targaryen -> Give_me_liberty_or , Dec 22, 2017 6:27 AM

The propaganda coming from Hailey is the most obvious/egregious out there.

old naughty -> Haus-Targaryen , Dec 22, 2017 6:28 AM

do we have a full list of the members abstained and no show?

Shemp 4 Victory -> Haus-Targaryen , Dec 22, 2017 6:33 AM

So is there some kind of unwritten rule that the US envoy to the UN must be a self-righteous raving lunatic?

Go back to Waffle House where you belong, Nikki.

Latina Lover -> Give_me_liberty_or , Dec 22, 2017 6:28 AM

Too bad we can't move Washington to Jerusalem? At least this way everyone knows for sure who controls the USA.

ludwigvmises , Dec 22, 2017 6:15 AM

What a pathetic joke we've become on the international circuit. I loved the idea of #MAGA and America first. But this? We're the laughing stock of international diplomacy.

JailBank -> ludwigvmises , Dec 22, 2017 6:22 AM

U.S. Gives Financial Aid to 96% of All Countries. According to the federal government, for fiscal year 2012, "The United States remained the world's largest bilateral donor, obligating approximately $48.4 billion -- $31.2 billion in economic assistance and $17.2 billion in military assistance." Oct 15, 2014

Merry Christmas we have decided to split $50 billion bewtween you 64.

ludwigvmises -> JailBank , Dec 22, 2017 6:27 AM

You forgot it was the United State sand NO ONE ELSE who was pressing for the creation of the United Nations. It is and always was an instrument for US control of it's mercantilist policies. We gave money to South America and Africa and the Middel East out of the goodness of our heart or in order to install regimes that allowed us to exploit their natural resources?

ludwigvmises -> JailBank , Dec 22, 2017 6:27 AM

You forgot it was the United State and NO ONE ELSE who was pressing for the creation of the United Nations. It is and always was an instrument for US control of it's mercantilist policies. We gave money to South America and Africa and the Middel East out of the goodness of our heart or in order to install regimes that allowed us to exploit their natural resources?

kochevnik -> JailBank , Dec 22, 2017 7:41 AM

USA a corporation not a nation

Expat -> Jethro , Dec 22, 2017 8:24 AM

And no UN success stories? None?

Smallpox?

Cyprus? India-Pakistan? Haiti?

Astonishing reduction in death from famine versus previous centuries?

Education programs worldwide.

Population control programs.

I have worked many times with the UN in my career so I know what a sham it can be. But it is an international institution that has prevented a major world or regional war since its inception. You might be too young to know the seventies and eighties, but the UN served a very useful purpose in giving a forum to argue between the world powers.

Trumpeteers call the UN a sham because the UN is not a US department. That is the entire point. If you want war and to continue building the empire, just quit the UN. Cast off the sheep's clothing and admit that the US is a violent, expansionist nation of thugs and xenophobes.

I think what bothers Trumpeteers and right wing Americans the most about the UN is that it costs money but the benefits are hard to measure. And Americans have no interest any more in spending money to help people. Charity starts at home! Jesus was a white man. Death to unbelievers. Fuck the poor and downtrodden. All of this is American zeitgeist. For years Americans thought these things but did not dare to shout them out loud. Now Trump. a man with no mental control over his words, shouts these things and Americans feel empowered. So fuck the UN and all the money-grubbing poor people. Let them starve. And if they dare turn to China or Russia we will bomb the shit out of them...in the name of democracy.

you can spout "MAGA" and "The UN sucks", but until you actually provide facts and acknowledge facts, you look like any of the other mullet-headed, ignorant fuckheads here on ZH.

Robert Trip , Dec 22, 2017 7:06 AM

The U.S. embassy to be built in Jewrusalem will resemble one of the larger German fortification bunkers built along the Atlantic Wall.

9 stories tall with 8' thick reinforced steel concrete walls, the latest surveillance and defensive equipment installed should make it a winner.

No moat around this one though.

Robert Trip , Dec 22, 2017 7:21 AM

There should be a major shakeup in the Trump team coming up imminently.

Those that put the bug in the President's ear concerning this fiasco creating move of our embassy to Jewrusalem or on the other hand those that failed to stop him if he was set on doing it.

We look like fools on the international stage

An interesting aside is the reaction of our main stream media to this whole affair.

100% positive to the move and recognition.

I wonder why?

GPW , Dec 22, 2017 7:21 AM

She is a national embarassment. What the hell was Trump thinking in appointing her?

J J Pettigrew , Dec 22, 2017 7:40 AM

Compare Nikki to Samantha Powers....nuff said...

Shemp 4 Victory -> J J Pettigrew , Dec 22, 2017 9:15 AM

Compare Nikki to Samantha Powers....

Nikki Haley, Samantha Power, John Bolton: defiant deniers of reality, raving and drooling warmongers, eager fellators of Netanyahoo...

nuff said...

Yeah, I see your point.

Laughing.Man , Dec 22, 2017 7:51 AM

SMH Juvenile behavior. I'm hoping someone is brave enough to snap a few pics of this " Friendship Party ".

rejected , Dec 22, 2017 7:55 AM

The Donald trying to squeeze the UN. Vote our way or take the well known highway. Not bad coming from the exceptional demockracy,,, the indispensable nation,,, leader of the Fee world. Haley in an embarrassment to the US and to the species.

Worse,,, Many Americans have no problem with it. Hell, they screw each other on a daily basis. In fact it's about the only way to make a buck these days,,, Ask the stooges at Ebay or Amazon selling imported junk or any lawyer or MD. The sickness just never ends.

rejected , Dec 22, 2017 7:55 AM

The Donald trying to squeeze the UN. Vote our way or take the well known highway. Not bad coming from the exceptional demockracy,,, the indispensable nation,,, leader of the Fee world. Haley in an embarrassment to the US and to the species.

Worse,,, Many Americans have no problem with it. Hell, they screw each other on a daily basis. In fact it's about the only way to make a buck these days,,, Ask the stooges at Ebay or Amazon selling imported junk or any lawyer or MD. The sickness just never ends.

Fake Trump , Dec 22, 2017 7:57 AM

What fucking party when 128 countries condemn Trump.

africoman , Dec 22, 2017 8:02 AM

128-9 vote result

The seven countries that sided Thursday with the United States and Israel on a U.N. General Assembly resolution declaring "null and void" of Trump's Jerusalem Israel capital

1. Guatemala

2. Honduras

3. Marshall Islands

4. Micronesia

5. Nauru

6. Palau

7. Togo

35 creepy abstenshines.

Add U$A and I$$rahell to the seven comes 9 countries in fevour of.

Hellish repeatedly claimed that the move<<<for them to move the capital to Jerusalem>>> was because of the will of Americans!

Question:

is Americans=Zionist/deep-state/

or

name exactly just one citizenry who happen beg Niki/Orange to trouble themselves.

Motherfuckers, they even said irrespective of the

UN votes resounding rejection, they gonna just ignore and move the USA embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv.

And not surprisingly the bibi whore played guilty trip and claimed the rejection was disrespecting to the USA.

Lying , pricks super Psychopath.Bibi also confirmed he doesn't care the vote,implying they gonna punish UN by pulling out U$A $$$$ supply?

How the world gonna see these outragious move? Silently ?

Raul44 , Dec 22, 2017 8:28 AM

For those who dont understand, this is psychological warfare they will now try to run for a while. Most of this will be actually happening in private talks between 2, kind of "you can be part of us and benefit, rather than be on your own where we cannot guarantee your country's future" - type of talk. When you see sometimes in the future significant number of UN's reversal on this stance, you will know what I was talking about. Probably terms like "surprise" will be used in the news headlines.

Shemp 4 Victory -> dogismycopilot , Dec 22, 2017 9:25 AM

he can turn off the US Foreign Aid spigot

He wouldn't dare. Most US foreign aid consists of gift cards for shopping at Uncle Sam's Arms Emporium . The rest, like food and medical aid, are just cover ops for the CIA station chiefs. You think he's going to go against the MIC/CIA?

[Dec 22, 2017] At one point inhistory Ru>ssians were americanophiles. No longer by Anatoly Karlin

Notable quotes:
"... the numbers of America fans have plummeted, while the percentage of Russians with actively negative views emerged essentially out of nowhere to constitute majority opinion. ..."
"... For their part, Americans would have to acknowledge that Russians do not have a kneejerk hatred of America, and that the "loss of Russia" was largely of their own doing. ..."
"... The arrogant refusal to take into account Russian interests after the Cold War, instead bombing their allies, expanding NATO to Russian borders in contravention of verbal commitments made to the USSR, and for all intents and purposes treating it as a defeated Power, may have made sense when it seemed that the US would be the world's dominant hyperpower for the foreseeable future and Russia was doomed to die anyway – as was conventional wisdom by the late 1990s. ..."
Dec 22, 2017 | www.unz.com

When Russians Were Americanophiles Anatoly Karlin December 18, 2017 700 Words 298 Comments Reply

At the tail end of the Cold War, there was an incredible atmosphere of Americanophilia throughout the USSR, including amongst Russians.

Blue – approve of USA; orange – disapprove.

Around 75%-80% of Russians approved of the United States around 1990, versus <10% disapproval.

By modern standards , this would have put Russia into the top leagues of America fans , such as Poland, Israel, and the United Kingdom. It was also around 10%-15% points higher than contemporary US approval of Russia.

The blogger genby dug up a VCIOM poll from 1990 asking Russians – that is, Russians within the RSFSR, i.e. the territory of the modern day Russian Federation – what they thought about Americans.

The poll was redone in 2015, keeping the same questions, which allows a direct comparison between the two dates.

What in your opinion characterizes the United States? 1990 2015
High criminality and moral degradation 1 15
No warmth in people's relations 1 15
High living standards 35 12
Large gap between rich and poor 5 11
Racial discrimination 1 9
Highly developed science and technology 15 7
Success depends on personal effort 20 7
Free society 13 5
Other . 6
Can't say for sure 10 12

I would wager Russian opinions on America were more positive c.1990 than the opinions of the average American on his own country today!

Is US government friendly or hostile to Russia? 1990 2015
Friendly 35 3
Not very friendly 40 32
Hostile 2 59
Can't say 23 6

These results speak for themselves and hardly need more commentary.

Nowadays, of course, things are rather different. Suffice to say the numbers of America fans have plummeted, while the percentage of Russians with actively negative views emerged essentially out of nowhere to constitute majority opinion.

According to other polls, Russian approval of the US rarely breaks above 30% , and the sentiments are quite mutual . Just 1% (that's one percent) of Russians approved of US leadership by 2016 . Although there were hopes that this trend would turn around after Trump, which seemed plausible in early 2017 and indeed seemed to be happening , this was in the end not to be.

What I think is more significant is that nobody likes to talk about it now, because it reflects badly on pretty much everyone.

Russians would have to acknowledge that they were naive idiots who threw away an empire centuries in the making to end up within the borders of old Muscovy in exchange for jeans and "common human values."

These figures testify to the complete and utter failure of Soviet propaganda, which spent decades spinning tales about American criminality, unemployment, and lynched Negroes only to end up with a society with some of the most Americanophile sentiments in the entire world.

It also makes it much harder to scapegoat Gorbachev, or the mythical saboteurs and CIA agents in power that feature prominently in sovok conspiracy theories, for unraveling the Soviet Union, when ordinary Soviets themselves considered America the next best thing since Lenin and the US government to be their friend.

For their part, Americans would have to acknowledge that Russians do not have a kneejerk hatred of America, and that the "loss of Russia" was largely of their own doing.

The arrogant refusal to take into account Russian interests after the Cold War, instead bombing their allies, expanding NATO to Russian borders in contravention of verbal commitments made to the USSR, and for all intents and purposes treating it as a defeated Power, may have made sense when it seemed that the US would be the world's dominant hyperpower for the foreseeable future and Russia was doomed to die anyway – as was conventional wisdom by the late 1990s. And from a purely Realpolitik perspective, the results have hardly been catastrophic; the US gained a geopolitical foothold in Eastern Europe, tied up further European integration into an Atlantic framework, and closed off the possibility of the "Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok" envisaged by Charles de Gaulle. On the other hand, in a world where China is fast becoming a peer competitor – with the implicit backing of a resentful Russia – this may, in retrospect, not have been the best long-term play.

Anon , Disclaimer December 18, 2017 at 2:10 pm GMT

Well, this Americanophobia plays well for Americans, who afford a new arms race. Yes, you may think that America is deep in debt, but its creditors see it as an investment. When the Exxons of the West will milk the Siberian mineral riches, America will pay everything back. The alternative, a world where they would invest in Rosneft in order to get a share of the plunder of, idk, Gulf of Mexico, is silly. As we saw in the 80′s, the best form of war against Russia is not to bomb and starve Moscow. That won't scare the locals. Let Kremlin do it instead.

If Putin is not careful, if he doesn't go low tech, low cost, the Americans will win the long game.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 2:32 pm GMT
Russians would have to acknowledge that they were naive idiots who threw away an empire centuries in the making to end up within the borders of old Muscovy in exchange for jeans and "common human values."

Your 'empire' fell to pieces as rapidly as the Hapsburgs' in 1918 and you had to expend handsome sums in an attempt just to hold onto Chechenya (populaiton 1.1 million). You have 150 million people as is and can do without having to stomp on recalcitrant minorities and to craft institutions which function in multilingual environments. You never had much of a constituency in Austria for attempting to reassemble the Hapsburg dominions and Hungary's ambitions haven't in the last century gone beyond attempting to capture Magyar exclaves.

Look at the other principals in the 1st world war: overseas dependencies retained by them consist of a portfolio of insular territories which prefer their current status and whose total population hardly exceeds that of Switzerland. The only one which has retained contiguous peripheral provinces predominantly populated by minorities would be Turkey. You're not injured for the loss of an opportunity to replicate the Turkish experience with ethnic cleansing (of Greeks and Armenians) conjoined to abuse (of Kurds). Everyone lost their empire, and they're not generally the worse for it.

You have a large national state. Kvetching that you don't have Azerbaijan or Estonia is inconsistent with good sense.

Randal , December 18, 2017 at 2:37 pm GMT

Russians would have to acknowledge that they were naive idiots who threw away an empire centuries in the making

What's remarkable to me about that graph of opinion over time is how pig-headedly resilient Russian naivety about the US has been. Time after time it appears the scales would fall from Russians' eyes after the US regime disgraced itself particularly egregiously (Kosovo, Iraq, Georgia), and within a few months approval would be back up to 50% or above. It took the interference in the Ukraine in 2014 to finally make the truth stick.

Randal , December 18, 2017 at 2:56 pm GMT
@Art Deco

There are no disgraces incorporated into any of these events

That might be your opinion, but Kosovo and Iraq were openly illegal wars of aggression in which the US shamelessly flouted its own treaty commitments, and supporting Georgia was, like NATO expansion in general and numerous other consistently provocative US foreign policy measures directed against post-Soviet Russia, a literally stupid matter of turning a potential ally against the real rival China into an enemy and ally of said rival.

You are perfectly entitled to endorse mere stupidity on the part of your rulers, but the fact that you so shamelessly approve of waging illegal wars counter to treaty commitments discredits any opinions you might have on such matters.

Verymuchalive , December 18, 2017 at 3:17 pm GMT

Russians would have to acknowledge that they were naive idiots who threw away an empire centuries in the making to end up within the borders of old Muscovy

Actually, present Russian borders are more those of Peter the Great, circa 1717, than Old Muscovy. Russia, unlike nearly all the Great Powers of the C20th, has retained its Empire – Siberia, the Russian Far East, Kamchatka, South Russia and the Crimea ( first acquired as recently as 1783 ).
Once those dim-witted Ukies finally implode the Ukrainian economy, Russia will be able to gobble up the rest of southern and eastern Ukraine – all the way to Odessa.

The places that seceded from the Soviet Union are places that Russians don't want ( Northern Kazakhstan excepted ) and are urgently required to receive all those Central Asian immigrants who will be deported by sensible Russian governments in the near future. ( I exclude Armenians from the last clause )

inertial , December 18, 2017 at 3:26 pm GMT
Yes, US had squandered a lot of good will in exchange for extremely valuable "geopolitical foothold in Eastern Europe."

Incidentally, Soviet propaganda was never anti-American. It was anti-capitalist, an important distinction. Whereas in America, anti-Russian propaganda has always been anti- Russian .

Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 3:35 pm GMT

the US gained a geopolitical foothold in Eastern Europe, tied up further European integration into an Atlantic framework,

Washington could get both by integrating and not alienating americanophile Russia.

closed off the possibility of the "Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok" envisaged by Charles de Gaulle.

It also closed off the possibility of an American-led Global North.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 4:46 pm GMT
@Randal That might be your opinion, but Kosovo and Iraq were openly illegal wars of aggression in which the US shamelessly flouted its own treaty commitments,

We had no treaty commitments with either Serbia or Iraq and both places had it coming.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:01 pm GMT
@Art Deco

You have a large national state.

Correction: Russian Federation is not a nation state. It is a rump state . Its Western borders are artificial, drawn by the Communists in the 20th century, they exclude those parts of Russia, which the Communists decided to incorporate into separate republics of Belarus and Ukraine.

I don't know of any Russian nationalist, who wants Azerbaijan back, but reclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' – an actual Russian nation-state. Again, what really matters here is not the size of the country, it's that all the land that's historically Russian should be fully within the borders of this country.

PS: just because we had trouble holding onto Chechnya doesn't mean that annexing Belarus will be hard. Sure, we can expect blowback in the form of Western sanctions, but I don't anticipate much resistance from inside Belarus.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:12 pm GMT
@Art Deco With that kind of thinking I don't see how you can criticise Russia's incursions into the Ukraine. At least Russia has an actual reason to fight a war in the Ukraine. US invaded and destroyed Iraqi state for no reason whatsoever. US interests suffered as a result of its ill-advised aggression, they ended up empowering their avowed enemy – Iran.
Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 5:50 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich With that kind of thinking I don't see how you can criticise Russia's incursions into the Ukraine. At least Russia has an actual reason to fight a war in the Ukraine.

They dissed you. La di dah. My own countrymen have put up with that from an array of Eurotrash and 3d world kleptocrats every time we open the newspaper.

US invaded and destroyed Iraqi state for no reason whatsoever.

No, we did so because that was the best alternative. The other alternative was a sanctions regime which Big Consciences were assuring the world was causing a six-digit population of excess deaths each year or taking the sanctions off and letting Saddam and the other Tikritis to follow their Id. Iraq was a charnel house, and the world is well rid of the Tikriti regime, especially Iraq's Kurdish and Shia provinces, which have been quiet for a decade. You don't take an interest in the ocean of blood for which the Ba'ath Party was responsible, but you're terribly butthurt that politicians in Kiev don't take orders from Moscow. Felix, I can taste teh Crazy.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:58 pm GMT
@Art Deco

Your 'rump state' extends over 6.6 million sq miles and has a population of 152 million.

Exactly, and you're missing the point. Re-read my previous comment again:

I don't know of any Russian nationalist, who wants Azerbaijan back, but reclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' – an actual Russian nation-state. Again, what really matters here is not the size of the country, it's that all the land that's historically Russian should be fully within the borders of this country.

Russians know more about these things than you do. The vast majority of us do not regard Belarus and Ukraine as part of "заграница" – foreign countries. Ukrainians and in particular Belorussians are simply variants of us, just like regional differences exist between the Russians in Siberia and Kuban'.

http://russialist.org/belarusians-want-to-join-eu-rather-than-russia-poll-shows/

I don't care, because this isn't a popularity contest. There were similar polls in Crimea showing majority support for the EU, just before the peninsula voted overwhelmingly to rejoin Russia. LOL

The question that matters to me is will there be a vast resistance movement inside Belarus following the annexation, and to be honest I don't expect one.

[Dec 22, 2017] When Sanity Fails - The Mindset of the Ideological Drone by The Saker

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... North Korea's air defenses are so weak that we had to notify them we were flying B1 bombers near their airspace–they didn't even know our aircraft were coming. This reminds me of the "fearsome" Republican Guard that Saddam had in the Persian Gulf. Turns out we had total air superiority and just bombed the crap out of them and they surrendered in droves. ..."
"... We have already seen what happens when an army has huge amounts of outdated Soviet weaponry versus the most technologically advanced force in the world. It's a slaughter. Also, there has to be weaponry up the USA's sleeve that would be used in the event of an attack. Don't forget our cyber warfare abilities that would undoubtedly be implemented as well. This writer seems to always hype Russia's capabilities and denigrate the US's capabilities. Sure, Russia has the capacity to nuke the US into smithereens, and vice versa. But if its a head to head shooting war, the US and NATO would dominate. FACT. ..."
"... Commander's intent: ..."
"... Decapitate the top leadership and remove retaliatory capability. ..."
"... Massive missile/bombing campaign (including carpet) of top leadership locations, tactical missile locations and DMZ artillery belt. Destruction of surface fleet and air force. ..."
"... Advance into DMZ artillery belt up to a range of 240 mm cannon. Not further (local tactical considerations taken into account of course). ..."
"... Phase three: "break the enemy's will to fight" and destroy the "regime support infrastructure" ..."
"... I guess an American attack on North Korea would consist of preemptive strategic nuking to destroy the entire country before it can do anything. Since North Korea itself contributes essentially nothing to the world economy, no one would lose money. ..."
"... These examples perfectly illustrate the kind of mindset induced by what Professor John Marciano called "Empire as a way of life" [1] which is characterized by a set of basic characteristics: ..."
"... there has to be ..."
"... would undoubtedly ..."
"... the act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts ..."
"... A perfect illustration of that is the famous quote " it became necessary to destroy the town to save it ..."
"... I watch CNN, but I'm not sure I can tell you, the difference in Iraq and Iran, but I know Jesus and I talk to God ..."
"... this applies to the vast majority of US politicians, decision-makers and elected officials, hence Putin's remark that " It's difficult to talk with people who confuse Austria and Australia ". ..."
"... As a result, there is no more discernible US diplomacy left: all the State Department does is deliver threats, ultimatums and condemnations. Meaningful *negotiations* have basically been removed form the US foreign policy toolkit. ..."
"... That belief is also the standard cop out in any conversation of morality, ethnics, or even the notions of right and wrong. An anti-religious view par excellence . ..."
"... The US policies towards Russia, China and Iran all have the potential of resulting in a disaster of major magnitude. The world is dealing with situation in which a completely delusional regime is threatening everybody with various degrees of confrontation. This is like being in the same room with a monkey playing with a hand grenade. Except for that hand grenade is nuclear. ..."
"... This situation places a special burden of responsibility on all other nations, especially those currently in Uncle Sam's cross-hairs, to act with restraint and utmost restraint. That is not fair, but life rarely is. It is all very well and easy to declare that force must be met by force and that the Empire interprets restraint as weakness until you realize that any miscalculation can result in the death of millions of people. I am therefore very happy that the DPRK is the only country which chose to resort to a policy of hyperbolic threats while Iran, Russia and China acted, and are still acting, with the utmost restraint. ..."
"... they plan, and Allah plans. And Allah is the best of planners ..."
"... If the U.S. attacks North Korea or Iran we will become a pariah among nations (especially once the pictures start pouring in). We will be loathed. Countries may very well decide that we are not worthy of having the world's reserve currency. In that case the dollar will collapse as will our economy. ..."
"... Maybe it's just me, but it seems that NK is just another tyranny in a long list of tyrannies throughout millennia, and like all of them it will just implode on its own. Therefore, the best thing you can do is simply to ignore it (thus denying the tyrant an external threat to rally the populace) and wait for the NK people to say enough is enough. ..."
"... I agree with the logic that as Americans become dumber the ability to have a powerful military also degrades, however an increasingly declining America also makes it more dangerous. As ever more ideologues rule the corridors of power and the generally stupid population that will consent to everything they are told, America will start involving itself in ever more reckless conflicts. This means they despite being a near idiocracy, the nuclear weapons and military bases all over world make America an ever greater threat for the world ..."
Dec 22, 2017 | www.unz.com

My recent analysis of the potential consequences of a US attack on the DPRK has elicited a wide range of reactions. There is one type of reaction which I find particularly interesting and most important and I would like to focus on it today: the ones which entirely dismissed my whole argument. The following is a selection of some of the most telling reactions of this kind:

Example 1:

North Korea's air defenses are so weak that we had to notify them we were flying B1 bombers near their airspace–they didn't even know our aircraft were coming. This reminds me of the "fearsome" Republican Guard that Saddam had in the Persian Gulf. Turns out we had total air superiority and just bombed the crap out of them and they surrendered in droves.

We have already seen what happens when an army has huge amounts of outdated Soviet weaponry versus the most technologically advanced force in the world. It's a slaughter. Also, there has to be weaponry up the USA's sleeve that would be used in the event of an attack. Don't forget our cyber warfare abilities that would undoubtedly be implemented as well. This writer seems to always hype Russia's capabilities and denigrate the US's capabilities. Sure, Russia has the capacity to nuke the US into smithereens, and vice versa. But if its a head to head shooting war, the US and NATO would dominate. FACT.

Example 2:

Commander's intent:

Decapitate the top leadership and remove retaliatory capability.

Execution:

Phase one:

Massive missile/bombing campaign (including carpet) of top leadership locations, tactical missile locations and DMZ artillery belt. Destruction of surface fleet and air force.

Phase two:

Advance into DMZ artillery belt up to a range of 240 mm cannon. Not further (local tactical considerations taken into account of course).

Phase three: "break the enemy's will to fight" and destroy the "regime support infrastructure"

Phase four: Regime change.

There you go .

Example 3:

I guess an American attack on North Korea would consist of preemptive strategic nuking to destroy the entire country before it can do anything. Since North Korea itself contributes essentially nothing to the world economy, no one would lose money.

These examples perfectly illustrate the kind of mindset induced by what Professor John Marciano called "Empire as a way of life" [1] which is characterized by a set of basic characteristics:

First foremost, simple, very simple one-sentence "arguments" . Gone are the days when argument were built in some logical sequence, when facts were established, then evaluated for their accuracy and relevance, then analyzed and then conclusions presented. Where in the past one argument per page or paragraph constituted the norm, we now have tweet-like 140 character statements which are more akin to shouted slogans than to arguments (no wonder that tweeting is something a bird does – hence the expression "bird brain"). You will see that kind of person writing what initially appears to be a paragraph, but when you look closer you realize that the paragraph is really little more than a sequence of independent statements and not really an argument of any type. A quasi-religious belief in one's superiority which is accepted as axiomatic .

Nothing new here: the Communists considered themselves as the superior for class reasons, the Nazis by reason of racial superiority, the US Americans just "because" – no explanation offered (I am not sure that this constitutes of form of progress). In the US case, that superiority is cultural, political, financial and, sometimes but not always, racial. This superiority is also technological, hence the " there has to be " or the " would undoubtedly " in the example #1 above. This is pure faith and not something which can be challenged by fact or logic. Contempt for all others . This really flows from #2 above. Example 3 basically declares all of North Korea (including its people) as worthless. This is where all the expressions like "sand niggers" "hadjis" and other "gooks" come from: the dehumanization of the "others" as a preparation for their for mass slaughter. Notice how in the example #2 the DPRK leaders are assumed to be totally impotent, dull and, above all, passive.

The notion that they might do something unexpected is never even considered (a classical recipe for military disaster, but more about that later). Contempt for rules, norms and laws . This notion is well expressed by the famous US 19th century slogan of " my country, right or wrong " but goes far beyond that as it also includes the belief that the USA has God-given (or equivalent) right to ignore international law, the public opinion of the rest of the planet or even the values underlying the documents which founded the USA. In fact, in the logic of such imperial drone the belief in US superiority actually serves as a premise to the conclusion that the USA has a "mission" or a "responsibility" to rule the world. This is "might makes right" elevated to the rank of dogma and, therefore, never challenged. A very high reliance on doublethink . Doublethink defined by Wikipedia as " the act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts ".

A perfect illustration of that is the famous quote " it became necessary to destroy the town to save it ". Most US Americans are aware of the fact that US policies have resulted in them being hated worldwide, even amongst putatively allied or "protected" countries such as South Korea, Israel, Germany or Japan. Yet at the very same time, they continue to think that the USA should "defend" "allies", even if the latter can't wait for Uncle Sam's soldiers to pack and leave. Doublethink is also what makes it possible for ideological drones to be aware of the fact that the US has become a subservient Israeli colony while, at the same time, arguing for the support and financing of Israel.

A glorification of ignorance which is transformed into a sign of manliness and honesty. This is powerfully illustrated in the famous song " Where were you when the world stopped turning " whoso lyrics include the following words " I watch CNN, but I'm not sure I can tell you, the difference in Iraq and Iran, but I know Jesus and I talk to God " (notice how the title of the song suggests that New York is the center of the world, when when get hit, the world stops turning; also, no connection is made between watching CNN and not being able to tell two completely different countries apart). If this were limited to singers, then it would not be a problem, but this applies to the vast majority of US politicians, decision-makers and elected officials, hence Putin's remark that " It's difficult to talk with people who confuse Austria and Australia ".

As a result, there is no more discernible US diplomacy left: all the State Department does is deliver threats, ultimatums and condemnations. Meaningful *negotiations* have basically been removed form the US foreign policy toolkit.

A totally uncritical acceptance of ideologically correct narratives even when they are self-evidently nonsensical to an even superficial critical analysis. An great example of this kind of self-evidently stupid stories is all the nonsense about the Russians trying to meddle in US elections or the latest hysteria about relatively small-size military exercises in Russia .

The acceptance of the official 9/11 narrative is a perfect example of that. Something repeated by the "respectable" Ziomedia is accepted as dogma, no matter how self-evidently stupid. A profound belief that everything is measured in dollars . From this flow a number of corollary beliefs such as "US weapons are most expensive, they are therefore superior" or "everybody has his price" [aka "whom we can't kill we will simply buy"]. In my experience folks like these are absolutely unable to even imagine that some people might not motivated by greed or other egoistic interests: ideological drones project their own primitive motives unto everybody else with total confidence.

That belief is also the standard cop out in any conversation of morality, ethnics, or even the notions of right and wrong. An anti-religious view par excellence .

Notice the total absence of any more complex consideration which might require some degree of knowledge or expertise: the imperial mindset is not only ignoramus-compatible, it is ignoramus based . This is what Orwell was referring to in his famous book 1984 with the slogan "Ignorance is Strength". However, it goes way beyond simple ignorance of facts and includes the ability to "think in slogans" (example #2 is a prefect example of this).

There are, of course, many more psychological characteristics for the perfect "ideological drone", but the ones above already paint a pretty decent picture of the kind of person I am sure we all have seen many times over. What is crucial to understand about them is that even though they are far from being a majority, they compensate for that with a tremendous motivational drive. It might be due to a need to repeatedly reassert their certitudes or a way to cope with some deep-seated cognitive dissonance, but in my experience folks like that have energy levels that many sane people would envy. This is absolutely crucial to how the Empire, and any other oppressive regime, works: by repressing those who can understand a complex argument by means of those who cannot. Let me explain:

Unless there are mechanisms set in to prevent that, in a debate/dispute between an educated and intelligent person and an ideological drone the latter will always prevail because of the immense advantage the latter has over the former. Indeed, while the educated and intelligent person will be able to immediately identify numerous factual and logical gaps in his opponent's arguments, he will always need far more "space" to debunk the nonsense spewed by the drone than the drone who will simply dismiss every argument with one or several slogans. This is why I personally never debate or even talk with such people: it is utterly pointless.

As a result, a fact-based and logical argument now gets the same consideration and treatment as a collection of nonsensical slogans (political correctness mercilessly enforces that principle: you can't call an idiot and idiot any more). Falling education standards have resulted in a dramatic degradation of the public debate: to be well-educated, well-read, well-traveled, to speak several languages and feel comfortable in different cultures used to be considered a prerequisite to expressing an opinion, now they are all treated as superfluous and even useless characteristics. Actual, formal, expertise in a topic is now becoming extremely rare. A most interesting kind of illustration of this point can be found in this truly amazing video posted by Peter Schiff:

One could be tempted to conclude that this kind of 'debating' is a Black issue. It is not. The three quotes given at the beginning of this article are a good reminder of this (unless, of course, they were all written by Blacks, which we have no reason to believe).

Twitter might have done to minds what MTV has done to rock music: laid total waste to it.

Consequences:

There are a number of important consequences from the presence of such ideological drones in any society. The first one is that any ideology-based regime will always and easily find numerous spontaneous supporters who willingly collaborate with it. Combined with a completely subservient media, such drones form the rontline force of any ideological debate. For instance, a journalist can always be certain to easily find a done to interview, just as a politician can count on them to support him during a public speech or debate. The truth is that, unfortunately, we live in a society that places much more emphasis on the right to have an opinion than on the actual ability to form one .

By the way, the intellectually challenged always find a natural ally in the coward and the "follower" (as opposed to "leader types") because it is always much easier and safer to follow the herd and support the regime in power than to oppose it. You will always see "stupid drones" backed by "coward drones". As for the politicians , they naturally cater to all types of drones since they always provide a much bigger "bang for the buck" than those inclined to critical thinking whose loyalty to whatever "cause" is always dubious.

The drone-type of mindset also comes with some major weaknesses including a very high degree of predictability, an inability to learn from past mistakes, an inability to imagine somebody operating with a completely different set of motives and many others. One of the most interesting ones for those who actively resist the AngloZionist Empire is that the ideological drone has very little staying power because as soon as the real world, in all its beauty and complexity, comes crashing through the door of the drone's delusional and narrow imagination his cocky arrogance is almost instantaneously replaced by a total sense of panic and despair. I have had the chance to speak Russian officers who were present during the initial interrogation of US POWs in Iraq and they were absolutely amazed at how terrified and broken the US POWs immediately became (even though they were not mistreated in any way). It was as if they had no sense of risk at all, until it was too late and they were captured, at which point they inner strength instantly gave way abject terror. This is one of the reasons that the Empire cannot afford a protracted war: not because of casualty aversion as some suggest, but to keep the imperial delusions/illusions unchallenged by reality . As long as the defeat can be hidden or explained away, the Empire can fight on, but as soon as it becomes impossible to obfuscate the disaster the Empire has to simply declare victory and leave.

Thus we have a paradox here: the US military is superbly skilled at killing people in large numbers, but but not at winning wars . And yet, because this latter fact is easily dismissed on grounds #2 #5 and #7 above (all of them, really), failing to actually win wars does not really affect the US determination to initiate new wars, even potentially very dangerous ones. I would even argue that each defeat even strengthens the Empire's desire to show it power by hoping to finally identify one victim small enough to be convincingly defeated. The perfect example of that was Ronald Reagan's decision to invade Grenada right after the US Marines barracks bombing in Beirut. The fact that the invasion of Grenada was one of the worst military operations in world history did not prevent the US government from handing out more medals for it than the total number of people involved – such is the power of the drone-mindset!

We have another paradox here: history shows that if the US gets entangled in a military conflict it is most likely to end up defeated (if "not winning" is accepted as a euphemism for "losing"). And yet, the United States are also extremely hard to deter. This is not just a case of " Fools rush in where angels fear to tread " but the direct result of a form of conditioning which begins in grade schools. From the point of view of an empire, repeated but successfully concealed defeats are much preferable to the kind of mental paralysis induced in drone populations, at least temporarily, by well-publicized defeats . Likewise, when the loss of face is seen as a calamity much worse than body bags, lessons from the past are learned by academics and specialists, but not by the nation as a whole (there are numerous US academics and officers who have always known all of what I describe above, in fact – they were the ones who first taught me about it!).

If this was only limited to low-IQ drones this would not be as dangerous, but the problem is that words have their own power and that politicians and ideological drones jointly form a self-feeding positive feedback loop when the former lie to the latter only to then be bound by what they said which, in turn, brings them to join the ideological drones in a self-enclosed pseudo-reality of their own.

What all this means for North Korea and the rest of us

I hate to admit it, but I have to concede that there is a good argument to be made that all the over-the-top grandstanding and threatening by the North Koreans does make sense, at least to some degree. While for an educated and intelligent person threatening the continental United States with nuclear strikes might appear as the epitome of irresponsibility, this might well be the only way to warn the ideological drone types of the potential consequences of a US attack on the DPRK. Think of it: if you had to deter somebody with the set of beliefs outlined in #1 through #8 above, would you rather explain that a war on the Korean Peninsula would immediately involve the entire region or simple say "them crazy gook guys might just nuke the shit out of you!"? I think that the North Koreans might be forgiven for thinking that an ideological drone can only be deterred by primitive and vastly exaggerated threats.

Still, my strictly personal conclusion is that ideological drones are pretty much "argument proof" and that they cannot be swayed neither by primitive nor by sophisticated arguments. This is why I personally never directly engage them. But this is hardly an option for a country desperate to avoid a devastating war (the North Koreans have no illusions on that account as they, unlike most US Americans, remember the previous war in Korea).

But here is the worst aspect of it all: this is not only a North Korean problem

The US policies towards Russia, China and Iran all have the potential of resulting in a disaster of major magnitude. The world is dealing with situation in which a completely delusional regime is threatening everybody with various degrees of confrontation. This is like being in the same room with a monkey playing with a hand grenade. Except for that hand grenade is nuclear.

This situation places a special burden of responsibility on all other nations, especially those currently in Uncle Sam's cross-hairs, to act with restraint and utmost restraint. That is not fair, but life rarely is. It is all very well and easy to declare that force must be met by force and that the Empire interprets restraint as weakness until you realize that any miscalculation can result in the death of millions of people. I am therefore very happy that the DPRK is the only country which chose to resort to a policy of hyperbolic threats while Iran, Russia and China acted, and are still acting, with the utmost restraint.

In practical terms, there is no way for the rest of the planet to disarm the monkey. The only option is therefore to incapacitate the monkey itself or, alternatively, to create the conditions in which the monkey will be too busy with something else to pay attention to his grenade. An internal political crisis triggered by an external military defeat remains, I believe, the most likely and desirable scenario (see here if that topic is of interest to you). Still, the future is impossible to predict and, as the Quran says, " they plan, and Allah plans. And Allah is the best of planners ". All we can do is try to mitigate the impact of the ideological drones on our society as much as we can, primarily by *not* engaging them and limiting our interaction with those still capable of critical thought. It is by excluding ideological drones from the debate about the future of our world that we can create a better environment for those truly seeking solutions to our current predicament.

-- -- -

1. If you have not listened to his lectures on this topic, which I highly recommend, you can find them here:

Paul b , December 22, 2017 at 12:28 pm GMT

If the U.S. attacks North Korea or Iran we will become a pariah among nations (especially once the pictures start pouring in). We will be loathed. Countries may very well decide that we are not worthy of having the world's reserve currency. In that case the dollar will collapse as will our economy.
Third world nationalist , December 22, 2017 at 12:36 pm GMT
North Korea is a nationalistic country that traces their race back to antiquity. America on the other hand is a degenerated country that is ruled over by Jews. The flag waving American s may call the Koreans gooks but if we apply the American racial ideology on themselves, the Americans are the the 56percent Untermensch. While the north Koreans are superior for having rejected modern degeneracy.
Andrei Martyanov , Website December 22, 2017 at 2:08 pm GMT

that the Empire interprets restraint as weakness

A key point, which signifies a serious cultural degeneration from values of chivalry and honoring the opposite side to a very Asiatic MO which absolutely rules current US establishment. This, and, of course, complete detachment from the realities of the warfare.

Sean , December 22, 2017 at 2:48 pm GMT
It is all talk, because China makes them invulnerable to sanctions and NK has nukes. The US will have to go to China to deal with NK and China will want to continue economically raping the US in exchange. That is why China gave NK an H bomb and ICBM tech ( it's known to have gave those same things to Pakistan). The real action will be in the Middle East. The Saudi are counting on the US giving them CO2 fracking in the future, and Iran being toppled soon. William S. Lind says Iran will be hit by Trump and Israel will use the ensuing chaos to expel the West Bank Palestinians (back to the country whose passports they travel on).
VICB3 , December 22, 2017 at 4:49 pm GMT

Maybe it's just me, but it seems that NK is just another tyranny in a long list of tyrannies throughout millennia, and like all of them it will just implode on its own. Therefore, the best thing you can do is simply to ignore it (thus denying the tyrant an external threat to rally the populace) and wait for the NK people to say enough is enough.

Don't think that would ever happen? Reference 'How Tyrannies Implode' by Richard Fernandez: https://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2016/02/27/how-tyrannies-implode/?print=true&singlepage=true

There's no doubt in my mind that Kim will end up like Nikolae Ceaușescu in Romania, put up against a wall by his own military and shot on TV. All anyone has to do is be patient and not drink the Rah-Rah Kool-Aid.*

Just a thought.

VicB3

*Was talking with a 82nd Major at the Starbucks, and mentioned NK, Ceausecu, sitting tight, etc. (Mentioned we might help things along by blanketing the whole country with netbooks, wi-fi, and even small arms.) Got the careerist ladder- climber standard response of how advanced our weapons are, the people in charge know what they're doing, blah blah blah. Wouldn't even consider an alternative view (and didn't know or understand half of what I was talking about). It was the same response I got from an Air Force Colonel before the U.S. went into Afghanistan and Iraq and I told him the whole thing was/would be insanely stupid.

His party-line team-player response was when I knew for certain that any action in NK would/will fail spectacularly for the U.S., possibly even resulting in and economic collapse and civil war/revolution on this end.

Wish I didn't think that, but I do.

pyrrhus , December 22, 2017 at 5:03 pm GMT
Excellent post. But the US public education "system", while awful, is not the main reason that America is increasingly packed with drones and idiots. IQ is decreasing rapidly, as revealed in the College Board's data on SAT scores over the last 60 years .In addition, Dr. James Thompson has a Dec.15 post on Unz that shows a shocking decline in the ability of UK children to understand basic principles of physics, which are usually acquired on a developmental curve. Mike Judge's movie 'Idiocracy' appears to have been set unrealistically far in the future ..
In short, the current situation can and will get a lot worse in America. On the other hand, America's armed forces will be deteriorating apace, so they are becoming less dangerous to the rest of the world.
anonymous , Disclaimer December 22, 2017 at 6:10 pm GMT
The good thing about democracy is that anyone can express an opinion. The bad thing about democracy is that anyone can express an opinion. I have to laugh at all the internet commandos and wannabe Napoleons that roost on the internet giving us their advice. It's easy to cherrypick opinions that range from uninformed to downright stupid and bizarre. Those people don't actually run anything though, fortunately. Keep in mind that half the population is mentally average or below average and that average is quite mediocre. Throw in a few degrees above mediocre and you've got a majority, a majority that can and is regularly bamboozled. The majority of the population is just there to pay taxes and provide cannon fodder, that's all, like a farmer's herd of cows provides for his support. Ideological drones are desired in this case. It's my suspicion that the educational system is geared towards producing such a product as well as all other aspects of popular culture also induce stupefying effects. Insofar as American policy goes, look at what it actually does rather than what it says, the latter being a form of show biz playing to a domestic audience. I just skip the more obnoxious commenters since they're just annoying and add nothing but confusion to any discussion.
Randal , December 22, 2017 at 6:41 pm GMT
@VICB3

but it seems that NK is just another tyranny in a long list of tyrannies throughout millennia, and like all of them it will just implode on its own
.
There's no doubt in my mind that Kim will end up like Nikolae Ceaușescu in Romania, put up against a wall by his own military and shot on TV.

All things come to an end eventually, and I agree with you that the best course of action for the US over NK would be to leave it alone (and stop poking it), but this idea that "tyrannies always collapse" seems pretty unsupported by reality.

Off the top of my head all of the following autocrats died more or less peacefully in office and handed their "tyranny" on intact to a successor, just in the past few decades: Mao, Castro, Franco, Stalin, Assad senior, two successive Kims (so much for the assumption that the latest Kim will necessarily end up like Ceausescu). In the past, if a tyrant and his tyranny lasted long enough and arranged a good succession, it often came to be remembered as a golden age, as with the Roman, Augustus.

I suspect it might be a matter of you having a rather selective idea of what counts as a tyranny (I wouldn't count Franco in that list, myself, but establishment opinion is against me there, I think). You might be selectively remembering only the tyrannies that came to a bad end.

neutral , December 22, 2017 at 7:24 pm GMT
@pyrrhus

so they are becoming less dangerous to the rest of the world

I agree with the logic that as Americans become dumber the ability to have a powerful military also degrades, however an increasingly declining America also makes it more dangerous. As ever more ideologues rule the corridors of power and the generally stupid population that will consent to everything they are told, America will start involving itself in ever more reckless conflicts. This means they despite being a near idiocracy, the nuclear weapons and military bases all over world make America an ever greater threat for the world.

neutral , December 22, 2017 at 7:35 pm GMT

The good thing about democracy is that anyone can express an opinion.

Not sure if this is a joke or not. In case you are serious, you clearly have not been following the news, from USA to Germany all these so called democracies have been undertaking massive censorship operations. From jailing people to shutting down online conversations to ordering news to not report on things that threaten their power.

Dana Thompson , December 22, 2017 at 9:37 pm GMT
A bizarre posting utterly detached from reality. Don't you understand that if a blustering lunatic presses a megaton-pistol against our collective foreheads and threatens to pull the trigger, it represents a very disquieting situation? And if we contemplate actions that would cause a million utterly harmless and innocent Koreans to be incinerated, to prevent a million of our own brains from being blown out, aren't we allowed to do so without being accused of being vile bigots that think yellow gook lives are worthless? Aren't we entitled to any instinct of self preservation at all?
What the Korean situation obviously entails is a high-stakes experiment in human psychology. All that attention-seeking little freak probably wants is to be treated with respect, and like somebody important. Trump started out in a sensible way, by treating Kim courteously, but for that he was pilloried by the insanely-partisan opposition within his own party – McCain I'm mainly thinking of. That's the true obstacle to a sane resolution of the problem. I say if the twerp would feel good if we gave him a tickertape parade down Fifth Avenue and a day pass to Disneyland, we should do so – it's small enough a concession in view of what's at stake. But if rabid congress-critters obstruct propitiation, then intimidation and even preemptive megadeath may be all that's left.
peterAUS , December 22, 2017 at 10:37 pm GMT
@Dana Thompson

Agree.

I suspect the true conversation about the topic will start when all that becomes really serious. I mean more serious than posting the latest selfie on a Facebook. Hangs around that warhead miniaturization/hardening timetable, IMHO. Maybe too late then.

VICB3 , December 23, 2017 at 12:07 am GMT
@Randal

Just be patient.

Also, one man's tyranny is another mans return to stability. For better or worse, Mao got rid of the Warlords. Franco got rid of the Communists and kept Spain out of WWII. The Assads are Baath Party and both secular and modernizers.

Stalin? Depends on who you talk to, but the Russians do like a strong hand.

Kim? His people only have to look West to China and Russia, or def. to the South, to know that things could be much better. And more and more he can't control the flow of information. That, and the rank and file of his army have roundworms. And guns.

At some point, the light comes on. And that same rank and file with guns tells itself "You know, we could be doing better."

And then it's "Live on TV Time!"

Hope this helps.

Just a thought.

VicB3

Santoculto , December 23, 2017 at 12:27 am GMT
Double think is not just a question of ignorance or self contradiction because often it's important to make people embrace COMPLEXITY instead CONFUSION believing the late it's basically the first

METWO#

Erebus , December 23, 2017 at 12:59 am GMT
@peterAUS

Saker and his legion of fanboys here didn't "attack" the text but the writer.

In the first place, there's nothing in the text to "attack". It's a laundry list of disconnected slogans and so is not a different point of view at all. Released from the confines of the author's gamer world, it evaporates into nothing. I pointed this out to you at some length elsewhere.

In the second, it appears you missed the point of the article. Hint: it's stated in the title. The article's about the mindsets of the authors of such "texts", and not about the texts themselves.

It appears that I am sort of a "dissident" here.

You flatter yourself. To be a dissident requires, at the very least, comprehension of the argument one is disagreeing with. Your "texts" are the equivalent of shouting slogans and waving placards. It may work for a street protest, but is totally out of place on a webzine discussion forum. Hence your screeds here do not constitute real dissension, but trolling.

Simple, really.

[Dec 22, 2017] If You Are Looking for Consistency, Trump Ain't Your Man by Publius Tacitus

Dec 22, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Christmas came early for Donald Trump. He signed a historic tax cut, kept the Government funded and operating and, to the delight of many in his base, used UN Ambassador Nikki Haley as a mouthpiece to tell the rest of the world to go pound sand. He is feeling groovy. But Donald Trump is still his own worst enemy. And his Presidency will be fatally harmed if he continues with his erratic foreign policy and his empty talk on dealing with the opioid plague.

Let's start with his wildly fluctuating foreign policy. There is no consistency nor is their a theme. When he announced that he was recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, many assumed he was on the Israeli leash and was behaving as any obedient dog would. Perhaps.

How then do you explain yesterday's (Thursday) decision to arm Ukraine as a show of force to Russia :

The Trump administration has approved the largest U.S. commercial sale of lethal defensive weapons to Ukraine since 2014. . . . Administration officials confirmed that the State Department this month approved a commercial license authorizing the export of Model M107A1 Sniper Systems, ammunition, and associated parts and accessories to Ukraine, a sale valued at $41.5 million. These weapons address a specific vulnerability of Ukrainian forces fighting a Russian-backed separatist movement in two eastern provinces.

The people we are arming in the Ukraine are the actual and intellectual descendants of the Nazi sympathizers who helped the Einsatzgruppen murder more than a million Jews after Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. Scholar Richard Sakwa provides the horrifying details on the pro-Nazi ideological foundation of the key Ukrainian political groups we are backing:

"The Orange revolution, like the later Euromaidan events, was democratic in intent but gave an impetus 'to the revival of the radical versions of [the] Ukrainian national movement that first appeared on the historical scene in the course of World War II and a national discourse focused on fighting against the enemy'.41 " . . . .

"In Dnepropetrovsk, for example, instead of the anticipated 60 street-name changes, 350 were planned. Everywhere 'Lenin Streets' became 'Bandera Avenues' as everything Russian was purged. One set of mass murderers was changed for another. Just as the Soviet regime had changed toponyms to inscribe its power into the physical environment, so now the Euromaidan revolution seeks to remould daily life. In Germany today the names of Nazis and their collaborators are anathema, whereas in Ukraine they are glorified."

Excerpt From: Richard Sakwa. "Frontline Ukraine : Crisis in the Borderlands." from the Afterward

At the very moment we are signaling our support for Israel, the country founded largely because of the horror over the Shoah, we are also giving weapons to political groups whose parents and grand parents helped carry out the Shoah. Oh yeah, in the process of doing this we are providing a tangible threat to Russia. Imagine what our reaction would be if Russia decided to step up its weapons supplies to Cuba.

Then we have Trump's tough talk on the opioid slaughter taking place across America. Let me be clear. He is not responsible for the start of this plague. The Obama Administration carries a heavy burden on that front. CBS 60 Minutes has done a magnificent job in exposing the role that the Obama Justice Department refused to play in going after the major corporate opiate drug pusher--i.e., the McKesson Corporation :

In October, we joined forces with the Washington Post and reported a disturbing story of Washington at its worst - about an act of Congress that crippled the DEA's ability to fight the worst drug crisis in American history - the opioid addiction crisis. Now, a new front of that joint investigation. It is also disturbing. It's the inside story of the biggest case the DEA ever built against a drug company: the McKesson Corporation, the country's largest drug distributor. It's also the story of a company too big to prosecute.

In 2014, after two years of painstaking inquiry by nine DEA field divisions and 12 U.S. Attorneys, investigators built a powerful case against McKesson for the company's role in the opioid crisis.

[According to DEA Agent Schiller] This is the best case we've ever had against a major distributor in the history of the Drug Enforcement Administration. How do we not go after the number one organization? In the height of the epidemic, when people are dying everywhere, doesn't somebody have to be held accountable? McKesson needs to be held accountable.

Holding McKesson accountable meant going after the 5th largest corporation in the country. Headquartered in San Francisco, McKesson has 76,000 employees and earns almost $200 billion a year in revenues, about the same as Exxon Mobil. Since the 1990s, McKesson has made billions from the distribution of addictive opioids.

So what has Donald Trump done? That is the wrong question. What has he failed to do? We are approaching the one year anniversary of his Presidency and Trump has failed to nominate a Director for the Drug Enforcement Administration, a Director for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, a Director for the National Institute of Justice and an Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs . In other words, none of the people who would be on the policy frontline putting the President's tough words into action have been nominated. Not one. And those agencies and departments are drifting like a rudderless ship on stormy seas.

Another problem for Trump is his mixed signals on getting entangled in foreign wars. During the campaign he made a point of ridiculing those candidates who wanted to go to war in Syria. Now that he is in office, Trump, along with several members of his cabinet, are threatening Iran on almost a daily basis. The Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity just put out a memo on this very subject (which, I'm happy to note, reflects some of the themes I've written about previously):

Iran has come out ahead in Iraq and, with the 2015 nuclear agreement in place, Iran's commercial and other ties have improved with key NATO allies and the other major world players -- Russia and China in particular.

Official pronouncements on critical national security matters need to be based on facts. Hyperbole in describing Iran's terrorist activities can be counterproductive. For this reason, we call attention to Ambassador Nikki Haley's recent statement that it is hard to find a "terrorist group in the Middle East that does not have Iran's fingerprints all over it." The truth is quite different. The majority of terrorist groups in the region are neither creatures nor puppets of Iran. ISIS, Al-Qaeda and Al-Nusra are three of the more prominent that come to mind.

You have presented yourself as someone willing to speak hard truths in the face of establishment pressure and not to accept the status quo. You spoke out during the campaign against the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq as a historic mistake of epic proportions. You also correctly captured the mood of many Americans fatigued from constant war in far away lands. Yet the torrent of warnings from Washington about the dangers supposedly posed by Iran and the need to confront them are being widely perceived as steps toward reversing your pledge not to get embroiled in new wars.

We encourage you to reflect on the warning we raised with President George W. Bush almost 15 years ago, at a similar historic juncture:

"after watching Secretary Powell today, we are convinced that you would be well served if you widened the discussion beyond the circle of those advisers clearly bent on a war for which we see no compelling reason and from which we believe the unintended consequences are likely to be catastrophic."

Finally, there is the recognition of Jerusalem as the Capital of Israel. I defer to Colonel Lang on this. He believes that this single decision has planted an odious seed that will sprout into a global anti-U.S. sentiment that will reduce our global influence and tangibly damage our leadership on the world stage. While I suppose there always is a chance for a different kind of outcome, I learned long ago not to bet against the old warrior on matters like this.

Taking all of this together I think we are looking at a 2018 where U.S. foreign policy will continue to careen around the globe devoid of a strategic vision.

catherine , 22 December 2017 at 07:20 PM

'' The people we are arming in the Ukraine are the actual and intellectual descendants of the Nazi sympathizers who helped the Einsatzgruppen murder more than a million Jews after Hitler invaded the Soviet Union''

They are also the descendants of the Ukrainians who were starved to death by the Bolsheviks plundering of their crops first then starved again by Stalin.
That Jews figured large in the Bolsheviks is a fact and noted:..then and later.

A collection of reports on Bolshevism in Russia
by Great Britain. Foreign Office

https://www.archive.org/stream/collectionofrepo00greaiala/collectionofrepo00greaiala_djvu.txt

''..anti-Semitism is growing, probably because the food supply committees are entirely in the hands of Jews and voices can be heard sometimes calling for a " pogrom."

So I am giving Ukraine a pass on their so called threat to the Chosen.

Babak Makkinejad -> mongo... , 22 December 2017 at 07:32 PM
Yup, every one and everything under the sun bears some responsibility except the poor, abused, manipulated, down-trodden users.
Publius Tacitus -> catherine... , 22 December 2017 at 07:32 PM
You make my point. The NAZIS came up with lots of nifty reasons to justify exterminating Jews. Starvation by Stalin, therefore kill the Jews. Yeah, that makes sense (sarcasm fully intended).

[Dec 22, 2017] When Russians Were Americanophiles, by Anatoly Karlin

Notable quotes:
"... And if anything Americans make their own shamelessness worse when they fabricate imaginary pretexts for weaselling out of their country's commitment, such as a wholly imaginary entitlement for them to decide for themselves when there is a "humanitarian" justification for doing so, or make up wholesale fantasy allegations about "weapons of mass destruction" that even if true wouldn't justify war. ..."
"... r Correction. It's the elites that don't want to join Russia. And the reason they don't is because the West gives them goodies for being anti-Russian. This kind of strategy worked pretty well so far (for the West) in Eastern Europe and it will continue to work for some time yet. But not forever, not in Ukraine and Belorussia. ..."
"... They are indeed, but my assumption is that Russia's present elite is, for the most part, corruptible. Putin will be gone before 2024, and his successor will be under immense pressure -- carrot and stick -- to deregulate Russia's media landscape, which will make foreign money pour into Russian media outlets, which will in turn lead to more positive coverage and more positive views of the West. Only a few days ago, we learnt that Washington ruled out signing a non-interference agreement with Moscow since it would preclude Washington from meddling in Russia's internal affairs. What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia? ..."
"... The 1996 Presidential Election campaign suggests that the Russian public is no less suggestible, and so does Russian (and Ukrainian) opinions on the crisis in the Donbass. ..."
"... Soviets and Soviet Union were always in awe of America. You could see it in "between-the-lines" of the texts of the so-called anti-imperialist, anti-American Soviet propaganda. It was about catching up with American in steel production and TV sets ownership and so on. American was the ultimate goal and people did not think of American as an enemy. ..."
"... Then there is the fact that Bolsheviks and Soviet Union owed a lot to America though this knowledge was not commonly known. Perhaps one should take look at these hidden connections to see what was the real mechanism bending the plug being pulled off the USSR. There might be even an analogy to South Africa but that is another story. ..."
"... Moreover, post-democratic post-Yanukovich Ukraine is clearly inferior to its predecessor. For one thing, under Yanukovich, Sevastopol was still Ukrainian ..."
"... There is no pro-Ukrainian insurgency in Crimea or inside the republics in Donbass, and it's not due to the lack of local football hooligans. ..."
"... Even among Svoboda voters, I suspect only a small minority of them are the militant types. We should be to contain them through the use of local proxies. The armies of Donbass republics currently number some 40-60 thousand men according to Cassad blog, which compares with the size of the entire Ukrainian army. ..."
"... Official Ukrainian propaganda worked overtime, and still works today, to hammer this into people's heads. And it's an attractive vision. An office dweller in Kiev wants to live in a shiny European capital, not in a bleak provincial city of a corrupt Asian empire. The problem is, it's ain't working. For a while Ukraine managed to get Russia to subsidize Ukrainian European dream. Now this is over. The vision is starting to fail even harder. ..."
"... Unfortunately, the Ukraine has been spending 5%* of its GDP on the military since c.2015 (versus close to 1% before 2014). ..."
"... Doesn't really matter if tons of money continues to be stolen, or even the recession – with that kind of raw increase, a major enhancement in capabilities is inevitable. ..."
"... I have read a article mentioned something like Putin said, to annexed whole Ukraine means to share the enormous resource wealth of vast Russia land with them, which make no economic sense. If Russia is worst than Ukraine, then there won't be million of Ukrainian migrating over after the Maidan coup. ..."
"... So are all those Baltic states. Russia don't want these countries as it burden, it is probably only interested in selected strategic areas like the Eastern Ukraine industrial belt and military important Crimea warm water deep seaport, and skilled migrants. Ukraine has one of lowest per capital income now, with extreme corrupted politicians controlled by USNato waging foolish civil war killing own people resulting in collapsing economic and exudes of skilled people. ..."
"... Agreed, and he happens to be in the right here. Russia actually has a good hand in Ukraine, if only she keeps her cool. More military adventurism is foolish for at least three reasons ..."
"... The return of Crimea to Russia alone has been a dramatic improvement in the inherent stability of the region. A proper division of the territory currently forming the Ukraine into a genuine Ukrainian nation in the west and an eastern half returned to Russia would be the ideal long term outcome, but Russia can surely live with a neutralised Ukraine. ..."
"... You realise that Ukraine's GDP declined in dollar terms by a factor of 2-3 times, right? A bigger share of a smaller economy translates into the same paltry sum. It is still under $5 billion. ..."
"... Futhermore an army that's actively deployed and engaged in fighting spends more money than during peacetime. A lot of this money goes to fuel, repairs, providing for soldiers and their wages rather than qualitatively improving capabilities of the army. ..."
"... The bottom-line is Ukraine spent the last 3,5 years preparing to fight a war against the People's Republic of Donetsk. I'll admit Ukrainian army can hold its own against the People's Republic of Donetsk. Yet it remains hopelessly outmatched in a potential clash with Russia. A short, but brutal bombing campaign can whipe out Ukrainian command and control, will make it impossible to mount any kind of effective defence. Ukrainian conscripts have no experience in urban warfare, and their national loyalties are unclear. ..."
"... Most ukrops even admit that Kharkov could easily have gone in 2014, if Russia had wanted it/feasible ..."
Dec 22, 2017 | www.unz.com
Randal , December 18, 2017 at 2:37 pm GMT

Russians would have to acknowledge that they were naive idiots who threw away an empire centuries in the making

What's remarkable to me about that graph of opinion over time is how pig-headedly resilient Russian naivety about the US has been. Time after time it appears the scales would fall from Russians' eyes after the US regime disgraced itself particularly egregiously (Kosovo, Iraq, Georgia), and within a few months approval would be back up to 50% or above. It took the interference in the Ukraine in 2014 to finally make the truth stick.

Randal , December 18, 2017 at 2:56 pm GMT
@Art Deco

There are no disgraces incorporated into any of these events

That might be your opinion, but Kosovo and Iraq were openly illegal wars of aggression in which the US shamelessly flouted its own treaty commitments, and supporting Georgia was, like NATO expansion in general and numerous other consistently provocative US foreign policy measures directed against post-Soviet Russia, a literally stupid matter of turning a potential ally against the real rival China into an enemy and ally of said rival.

You are perfectly entitled to endorse mere stupidity on the part of your rulers, but the fact that you so shamelessly approve of waging illegal wars counter to treaty commitments discredits any opinions you might have on such matters.

Verymuchalive , December 18, 2017 at 3:17 pm GMT

Russians would have to acknowledge that they were naive idiots who threw away an empire centuries in the making to end up within the borders of old Muscovy

Actually, present Russian borders are more those of Peter the Great, circa 1717, than Old Muscovy. Russia, unlike nearly all the Great Powers of the C20th, has retained its Empire – Siberia, the Russian Far East, Kamchatka, South Russia and the Crimea ( first acquired as recently as 1783 ).

Once those dim-witted Ukies finally implode the Ukrainian economy, Russia will be able to gobble up the rest of southern and eastern Ukraine – all the way to Odessa.

The places that seceded from the Soviet Union are places that Russians don't want ( Northern Kazakhstan excepted ) and are urgently required to receive all those Central Asian immigrants who will be deported by sensible Russian governments in the near future. ( I exclude Armenians from the last clause )

inertial , December 18, 2017 at 3:26 pm GMT
Yes, US had squandered a lot of good will in exchange for extremely valuable "geopolitical foothold in Eastern Europe." Incidentally, Soviet propaganda was never anti-American. It was anti-capitalist, an important distinction. Whereas in America, anti-Russian propaganda has always been anti- Russian .
Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 3:35 pm GMT

the US gained a geopolitical foothold in Eastern Europe, tied up further European integration into an Atlantic framework,

Washington could get both by integrating and not alienating americanophile Russia.

closed off the possibility of the "Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok" envisaged by Charles de Gaulle.

It also closed off the possibility of an American-led Global North.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 4:46 pm GMT
@Randal That might be your opinion, but Kosovo and Iraq were openly illegal wars of aggression in which the US shamelessly flouted its own treaty commitments,

We had no treaty commitments with either Serbia or Iraq and both places had it coming.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:01 pm GMT
@Art Deco

You have a large national state.

Correction: Russian Federation is not a nation state. It is a rump state . Its Western borders are artificial, drawn by the Communists in the 20th century, they exclude those parts of Russia, which the Communists decided to incorporate into separate republics of Belarus and Ukraine.

I don't know of any Russian nationalist, who wants Azerbaijan back, but reclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' – an actual Russian nation-state. Again, what really matters here is not the size of the country, it's that all the land that's historically Russian should be fully within the borders of this country.

PS: just because we had trouble holding onto Chechnya doesn't mean that annexing Belarus will be hard. Sure, we can expect blowback in the form of Western sanctions, but I don't anticipate much resistance from inside Belarus.

Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 5:06 pm GMT
@Randal

It took the interference in the Ukraine in 2014 to finally make the truth stick.

Another possibility is that the change since 2014 is rather the result of more anti-American reporting in Russia's state-owned media. This would mean, as I suspect, that the pendulum will swing back once the Kremlin loosens its tight grip of the media.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:12 pm GMT
@Art Deco With that kind of thinking I don't see how you can criticise Russia's incursions into the Ukraine. At least Russia has an actual reason to fight a war in the Ukraine. US invaded and destroyed Iraqi state for no reason whatsoever. US interests suffered as a result of its ill-advised agression, they ended up empowering their avowed enemy – Iran.
Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:18 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

This would mean, as I suspect, that the pendulum will swing back once the Kremlin loosens its tight grip of the media.

How do you see this happening? Why would the Kremlin give up its control of the media? These people are smart enough to understand that whoever controls the media controls public opinion.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 5:42 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich Correction: Russian Federation is not a nation state. It is a rump state.

Your 'rump state' extends over 6.6 million sq miles and has a population of 152 million.

Its Western borders are artificial, drawn by the Communists in the 20th century, they exclude those parts of Russia, which the Communists decided to incorporate into separate republics of Belarus and Ukraine.

It's western borders are no more artificial than that of any other country not bounded by mountains or water.

I don't know of any Russian nationalist, who wants Azerbaijan back, but reclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' –

'Essential'? You just can't get through the day without Minsk?

As for White Russia, your constituency there has in its dimensions fallen by half in the last 20 years.

http://russialist.org/belarusians-want-to-join-eu-rather-than-russia-poll-shows/

As for the Ukraine, you've no discernable constituency for reunification. The constituency for a Russophile foreign policy weighs in there at about 12% of the public. VP's three-dimensional chess game is going swimmingly.

My own forebears discovered in 1813 that the residue of British North America was quite content with gracious George III, and our boys got their assess handed to them by them Cannucks. We got over it and so can you. Miss Ukraine is just not that into you. Best not to play the stalker.

inertial , December 18, 2017 at 5:46 pm GMT
@Art Deco As for the Ukraine, you've no discernable constituency for reunification.

You don't know much about Ukraine.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 5:50 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich With that kind of thinking I don't see how you can criticise Russia's incursions into the Ukraine. At least Russia has an actual reason to fight a war in the Ukraine.

They dissed you. La di dah. My own countrymen have put up with that from an array of Eurotrash and 3d world kleptocrats every time we open the newspaper.

US invaded and destroyed Iraqi state for no reason whatsoever.

No, we did so because that was the best alternative. The other alternative was a sanctions regime which Big Consciences were assuring the world was causing a six-digit population of excess deaths each year or taking the sanctions off and letting Saddam and the other Tikritis to follow their Id. Iraq was a charnel house, and the world is well rid of the Tikriti regime, especially Iraq's Kurdish and Shia provinces, which have been quiet for a decade. You don't take an interest in the ocean of blood for which the Ba'ath Party was responsible, but you're terribly butthurt that politicians in Kiev don't take orders from Moscow. Felix, I can taste teh Crazy.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 5:58 pm GMT
@Art Deco

Your 'rump state' extends over 6.6 million sq miles and has a population of 152 million.

Exactly, and you're missing the point. Re-read my previous comment again:
I don't know of any Russian nationalist, who wants Azerbaijan back, but reclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' – an actual Russian nation-state. Again, what really matters here is not the size of the country, it's that all the land that's historically Russian should be fully within the borders of this country.

Russians know more about these things than you do. The vast majority of us do not regard Belarus and Ukraine as part of "заграница" – foreign countries. Ukrainians and in particular Belorussians are simply variants of us, just like regional differences exist between the Russians in Siberia and Kuban'.

http://russialist.org/belarusians-want-to-join-eu-rather-than-russia-poll-shows/

I don't care, because this isn't a popularity contest. There were similar polls in Crimea showing majority support for the EU, just before the peninsula voted overwhelmingly to rejoin Russia. LOL

The question that matters to me is will there be a vast resistance movement inside Belarus following the annexation, and to be honest I don't expect one.

reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 6:06 pm GMT
@Art Deco

We had no treaty commitments with either Serbia or Iraq

Except the UN Charter and the Helsinki Accords. The latter only with Serbia.

reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 6:11 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich Neither the Ukrainians nor probably the Byelorussians want to join Russia. Get over it. You still have a big enough country.
Randal , December 18, 2017 at 6:13 pm GMT
@Art Deco

We had no treaty commitments with either Serbia or Iraq

The treaty commitment in question was with almost the entire rest of the world, namely when your country entirely voluntarily signed up to a commitment to "refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state". If your country had retained the slightest trace of integrity and self-respect it would at least have had the decency to withdraw from membership of the the UN when it chose to breach those treaty commitments.

And if anything Americans make their own shamelessness worse when they fabricate imaginary pretexts for weaselling out of their country's commitment, such as a wholly imaginary entitlement for them to decide for themselves when there is a "humanitarian" justification for doing so, or make up wholesale fantasy allegations about "weapons of mass destruction" that even if true wouldn't justify war.

An entire nation state behaving like a lying '60s hippy or a shamelessly dishonest aggressor.

I'm sure you're proud.

and both places had it coming.

A straightforward confession of lawless rogue state behaviour, basically.

Do you actually think somehow you are improving your country's position with such arguments? Better for a real American patriot to just stop digging and keep sheepishly quiet about the past three decades of foreign policy.

inertial , December 18, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMT
@reiner Tor Correction. It's the elites that don't want to join Russia. And the reason they don't is because the West gives them goodies for being anti-Russian. This kind of strategy worked pretty well so far (for the West) in Eastern Europe and it will continue to work for some time yet. But not forever, not in Ukraine and Belorussia.

That's because the population of these places is Russian (no matter what they were taught to call themselves by the Commies.) Their culture is Russian. The rulers of Ukraine and, to a much lesser degree, Belorussia are trying to erect cultural barriers between themselves and Russia. Good luck with that, in the 21st century. It's more likely the culture will further homogenize, as is the trend anywhere in the world. Eventually it will tell.

Now, the question is if Russians will even want Ukraine back. This is not so clear.

Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 6:47 pm GMT
@Mr. XYZ

Would Russia have been interested in joining both the E.U. and NATO?

Integration into West is what Russians wanted. An example

IF RUSSIA HAD THE CHANCE TO BECOME A FULL MEMBER OF THE EUROPEAN UNION NOW, WOULD YOU BE FOR OR AGAINST THIS? (N=800)

08/2009:
For: 53%
Against: 21%
Difficult to say: 27%

https://www.levada.ru/en/2016/06/10/russia-s-friends-and-enemies-2/

Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 6:56 pm GMT
@Randal

What needs to be explained is not the sustained low opinion after 2014 but rather the remarkable recoveries after 1999, 2003 and 2008.

Yugoslavia and Iraq were not that close to Russia and Russian elite was still pushing for Integration into West at that time. After 2008, "Reset" and Obama happened.

It seems unlikely the Russian media would have been as sycophantically pro-Obama merely for his blackness and Democrat-ness, though, and of course he wasn't around anyway in 2000 and in 2004.

Keep in mind that Obama's opponent in 2008 was McCain, that McCain. Just like Trump, Obama seemed like the lesser evil and not to blame for previous conflicts.

Darin , December 18, 2017 at 7:53 pm GMT
@inertial

That's because the population of these places is Russian (no matter what they were taught to call themselves by the Commies.) Their culture is Russian.

This is for them to decide, not for you.

It's more likely the culture will further homogenize, as is the trend anywhere in the world.

Yeah, the culture homogenizes around the world, into global Hollywood corporate culture. In the long there, "traditional Russian culture" is as doomed as "traditional Ukrainian culture" and "traditional American culture" if there is anything left of it.

AP , December 18, 2017 at 7:56 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

The fact is neither did Crimeans really want to join Russia (polls didn't show that)

Nonsense, Mr. Clueless-About-Ukraine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_status_referendum,_2014#Polling

Polling by the Razumkov Centre in 2008 found that 63.8% of Crimeans (76% of Russians, 55% of Ukrainians, and 14% of Crimean Tatars, respectively) would like Crimea to secede from Ukraine and join Russia and 53.8% would like to preserve its current status, but with expanded powers and rights . A poll by the International Republican Institute in May 2013 found that 53% wanted "Autonomy in Ukraine (as today)", 12% were for "Crimean Tatar autonomy within Ukraine", 2% for "Common oblast of Ukraine" and 23% voted for "Crimea should be separated and given to Russia".

The takeaway is that Crimeans were satisfied being part of Ukraine as long as Ukraine had an ethnic Russian, generally pro-Russian president like Yanukovich in charge (2013 poll), but preferred being part of Russia to being part of a Ukrainian state run by Ukrainians (2008 poll, post-Maidan).

AP , December 18, 2017 at 7:59 pm GMT
@inertial

That's because the population of these places is Russian (no matter what they were taught to call themselves by the Commies.) Their culture is Russian.

Believer of Russian nationalist fairytales tells Russian nationalist fairytales. You managed to fit 3 of them into 2 sentences, good job.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:07 pm GMT
@AP I was referring specifically to Russian attitudes about Ukrainians. I know that among Ukrainians themselves, there is quite the confusion on this subject.
Randal , December 18, 2017 at 8:15 pm GMT
@Mitleser Fair points, though you seem to concede to the Russian elites a significant degree of competence at managing public opinion, in 2000 and in 2004.

I was under the impression that Putin personally was still quite naïve about the US even after Kosovo, which partly accounts for his rather desperately helpful approach after 9/11, though not so much after Iraq.

But I have been told by Russians who ought to have some knowledge of these things that Putin and the wider regime were not so naïve even back in the late 1990s, so the case can be made both ways.

AP , December 18, 2017 at 8:16 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

reclaiming Belarus and Ukraine is absolutely essential to have a country, we could all proudly call 'home' – an actual Russian nation-state.

In which 25 million or so Ukrainians actively resist you, and another 5 million or so Ukrainians plus a few million Belarusians nonviolently resent your rule. You will reduce the cities or parts of them to something like Aleppo, and rebuild them (perhaps with coerced local labor) while under a sanctions regime. Obviously there will have to be a militarized occupation regime and prison camps and a network of informants. A proud home.

Again, what really matters here is not the size of the country, it's that all the land that's historically Russian should be fully within the borders of this country.

Baltics were Russian longer than Ukraine. Central Poland became Russian at the same time as did half of Ukraine. According to the 1897 census, there were about as many Great Russian speakers in Kiev governate as in Warsaw. Take the Baltics and Warsaw back too?

inertial , December 18, 2017 at 8:20 pm GMT
@Darin This is for them to decide, not for you.

Yes, of course. Just don't assume they will decide the way you think.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:21 pm GMT
@AP These polls vary greatly from time to time and depending on the group conducting them. These polls are meaningless : most ordinary people go about their daily lives never thinking about that kind of issues, when suddenly prompted by a pollster they give a meaningless answer.

I'm sure, support for reunification will go up in Belarus, if the Kremlin shows some leadership on this issue. We will find enough people willing to work with us, the rest will just have to accept the new reality and go about their daily lifes as usual.

The situation in Ukraine is different, it differs wildly by region and will require us to modify our approach.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 8:24 pm GMT
@German_reader US started in a demented attempt at reshaping the region according to its own preferences.

It did nothing of the kind. It ejected two governments for reasons of state. One we'd been a state of belligerency with for 12 years, the other was responsible for a gruesome casus belli. Now, having done that, we needed to put in place a new government. There was no better alternative means of so doing than electoral contests.

Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

How do you see this happening? Why would the Kremlin give up its control of the media? These people are smart enough to understand that whoever controls the media controls public opinion.

They are indeed, but my assumption is that Russia's present elite is, for the most part, corruptible. Putin will be gone before 2024, and his successor will be under immense pressure -- carrot and stick -- to deregulate Russia's media landscape, which will make foreign money pour into Russian media outlets, which will in turn lead to more positive coverage and more positive views of the West. Only a few days ago, we learnt that Washington ruled out signing a non-interference agreement with Moscow since it would preclude Washington from meddling in Russia's internal affairs. What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia?

melanf , December 18, 2017 at 8:32 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

Another possibility is that the change since 2014 is rather the result of more anti-American reporting in Russia's state-owned media. This would mean, as I suspect, that the pendulum will swing back once the Kremlin loosens its tight grip of the media.

Definitely no. American propaganda (itself without the help of Putin) were able to convince the Russians that America is the enemy. Propaganda of Putin to this could add almost nothing.

Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 8:42 pm GMT
@Randal

Fair points, though you seem to concede to the Russian elites a significant degree of competence at managing public opinion, in 2000 and in 2004.

I am just taking into account that the early 00s were right after the 1990s when pro-Americanism was at its peak in Russia. Yugoslavia and Iraq were too distant too alienate the majority permanently.

I was under the impression that Putin personally was still quite naïve about the US even after Kosovo, which partly accounts for his rather desperately helpful approach after 9/11, though not so much after Iraq.

Why do you think did he suggest joining NATO as an option? Not because NATO are "good guys", but because it would ensure that Russia has a voice that cannot be ignored. After all, the Kosovo War showed the limits of the UNSC and by extension of Russia's voice in the unipolar world.

melanf , December 18, 2017 at 8:43 pm GMT
@Mitleser

Integration into West is what Russians wanted.
An example
08/2009:

Since then, everything has changed

Mitleser , December 18, 2017 at 8:51 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

Putin will be gone before 2024, and his successor will be under immense pressure -- carrot and stick -- to deregulate Russia's media landscape, which will make foreign money pour into Russian media outlets, which will in turn lead to more positive coverage and more positive views of the West.

There is no reason to assume that West will offer the Russian elite enough carrot to deregulate the Russian media order and the stick is just more reason not to do it and to retain control.

What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia?

And you think that people in Russian elite are not aware of it?

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 8:52 pm GMT
@AP

In which 25 million or so Ukrainians actively resist you, and another 5 million or so Ukrainians plus a few million Belarusians nonviolently resent your rule. You will reduce the cities or parts of them to something like Aleppo, and rebuild them (perhaps with coerced local labor) while under a sanctions regime.

This is a fantasy. Look, the effective size of Ukrainian army right now is around 70.000 – does this look like a strong, united nation willing and able to defend itself?

On the left side of the Dnieper truly crazy svidomy types is a small minority – they stand out from the crowd, can be easily identified and neutralised just like in Donbass. A typical Ukrainian nationalist east of Dnieper is a business owner, university educated white collar professional, a student, a journalist, "human rights activist" – these are not the kind of individuals, who will engage in guerilla warfare, they will just flee (like they already fled from Donbass).

Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 8:59 pm GMT
@Randal

In the west, opinion of the US was managed upwards with the Obama presidency because he fitted so well with US sphere establishment antiracist and leftist dogmas that he had almost universally positive (even hagiographic) mainstream media coverage throughout the US sphere, but with Trump opinions of the US are mostly back down where Bush II left them.

I agree with most of this, but you leave out precisely why public opinion shifts. My, rather cynical, view is that media is by far the main driver in shifting public views, and so whoever gives the media marching orders is the Pied Piper here.

An example close to home was the consternation among some of my conservative friends over the events Charlottesville. They knew nothing about the American alt-right, and still less about the context of what happened that day, yet they still spoke of what a disgrace it was for Trump not to distance himself from these deplorables. This was, of course, fully the making of Swedish media.

The 1996 Presidential Election campaign suggests that the Russian public is no less suggestible, and so does Russian (and Ukrainian) opinions on the crisis in the Donbass.

Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:03 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

ruled out signing a non-interference agreement with Moscow since it would preclude Washington from meddling in Russia's internal affairs. What does this tell you about the Western elite's plan for Russia?

It tells me the reporters are confused or you are. There is no 'agreement' that will prevent 'Russia' from 'meddling' in American political life or the converse. The utility of agreements is that they make understandings between nations more precise and incorporate triggers which provide signals to one party or the other as to when the deal is off.

utu , December 18, 2017 at 9:07 pm GMT
@inertial

Soviets and Soviet Union were always in awe of America. You could see it in "between-the-lines" of the texts of the so-called anti-imperialist, anti-American Soviet propaganda. It was about catching up with American in steel production and TV sets ownership and so on. American was the ultimate goal and people did not think of American as an enemy.

Then there is the fact that Bolsheviks and Soviet Union owed a lot to America though this knowledge was not commonly known. Perhaps one should take look at these hidden connections to see what was the real mechanism bending the plug being pulled off the USSR. There might be even an analogy to South Africa but that is another story.

Sean , December 18, 2017 at 9:12 pm GMT
Two powerful countries beside one another are natural enemies, they can never be friends until one has been relegated by defeat. Britain and France were enemies until France became too weak to present a threat, then Britain's enemy was Germany (it still is, Brexit is another Dunkirk with the UK realizing it cannot compete with Germany on the continent).

Russia cannot be a friend of China against the US until Russia has been relegated in the way France has been. France has irrecoverably given up control of its currency, they are relegated to Germany's sidekick.

China is like Bitcoin. The smart money (Google) is going there. Received wisdom in the US keeps expecting China's economic growth to slow down but it isn't going to happen. When it becomes clear that the US is going to be overtaken, America will try and slow down China's economic growth, that will be Russia's opportunity.

Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 9:19 pm GMT
@melanf

American propaganda (itself without the help of Putin) were able to convince the Russians that America is the enemy. Propaganda of Putin to this could add almost nothing.

Being Russian, you would be in a better position than I am to comment on this, but the obvious counter to that line is who channeled this American propaganda to the Russian public and for what purpose? This article might hold the answer:

http://www.unz.com/tsaker/re-visiting-russian-counter-propaganda-methods/

reiner Tor , December 18, 2017 at 9:20 pm GMT
@Art Deco Well, they can now send troops to Syria on land.
Art Deco , December 18, 2017 at 9:25 pm GMT
@German_reader Calling me "Eurotrash"

I didn't have you in particular in mind.

oh well, I get it, US nationalists like you think you're the responsible adults dealing with a dangerous world, while ungrateful European pussies favor appeasement, are free riders on US benevolent hegemony etc. I've heard and read all that a thousand times before, it's all very unoriginal by now.

No, I'm a fat middle aged man who thinks most of what people say on political topics is some species of self-congratulation. And a great deal of it is perverse. The two phenomena are symbiotic. And, of course, I'm unimpressed with kvetching foreigners. Kvetching Europeans might ask where is the evidence that they with their own skills and resources can improve some situation using methods which differ from those we have applied and kvetching Latin Americans can quit sticking the bill for their unhappy histories with Uncle Sam, and kvetching Arabs can at least take responsibility for something rather than projecting it on some wire-pulling other (Jews, Americans, conspiracy x).

Randal , December 18, 2017 at 9:26 pm GMT
@Art Deco

Do they have one more soldier at their command and one more piece of equipment because we had troops in Iraq?

Well, according to the likes of Mattis they certainly do. Have you never heard of the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMU), a large faction of which reportedly swear allegiance directly to Khamenei.

Is that "victory" for you?

An of course they now have a direct land route to Hezbollah, to make it easier for them to assist that national defence militia to deter further Israeli attacks. That's something they never could have had when Saddam was in charge of Iraq.

Is that "victory" for you?

And they don't have to worry about their western neighbour invading them with US backing again.

Is that "victory" for you?

AP , December 18, 2017 at 9:28 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

These polls vary greatly from time to time and depending on the group conducting them. These polls are meaningless: most ordinary people go about their daily lives never thinking about that kind of issues, when suddenly prompted by a pollster they give a meaningless answer.

So according to you when hundreds or thousands of people are asked a question they are not prepared for, their collective answer is meaningless and does not indicate their preference?

So it's a total coincidence that when Ukraine was ruled by Ukrainians most Crimeans preferred to join Russia, when Ukraine was ruled by a Russian, Crimeans were satisfied within Ukraine but when Ukrainian nationalists came to power Crimeans again preferred being part of Russia?

Are all political polls also meaningless according to you, or just ones that contradict your idealistic views?

Swedish Family , December 18, 2017 at 9:31 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

This is a fantasy. Look, the effective size of Ukrainian army right now is around 70.000 – does this look like a strong, united nation willing and able to defend itself?

In fairness, the young Ukrainians I have spoken to avoid the "draft" mainly out of fear that they will be underequipped and used as cannon fodder. (I'm not sure "draft" is the word I'm looking for. My understanding is that they are temporarily exempt from military service if they study at university or have good jobs.)

melanf , December 18, 2017 at 9:46 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

but the obvious counter to that line is who channeled this American propaganda to the Russian public and for what purpose?

It is known – the minions of Putin translated into Russian language American (and European) propaganda, and putting it on the website http://inosmi.ru/ .
The Americans also try: there is a special "Radio Liberty" that 24-hour broadcasts (in Russian) hate speech against the Russian.
But it only speeds up the process (which will happen anyway) .

AP , December 18, 2017 at 10:12 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

This is a fantasy. Look, the effective size of Ukrainian army right now is around 70.000 – does this look like a strong, united nation willing and able to defend itself?

It was about 50,000 in 2014, about 200,000-250,000 now.

Polish military has 105,000 personnel. Poland also not united or willing to defend itself?

On the left side of the Dnieper truly crazy svidomy types is a small minority – they stand out from the crowd, can be easily identified and neutralised just like in Donbass

Avakov, Poroshenko's interior minister and sponsor of the neo-Nazi Azov battalion, in 2010 got 48% of the vote in Kharkiv's mayoral race in 2010 when he ran as the "Orange" candidate. In 2012 election about 30% of Kharkiv oblast voters chose nationalist candidates, vs. about 10% in Donetsk oblast. Vkontakte, a good source for judging youth attitudes, was split 50/50 between pro-Maidan and anti-Maidan in Kharkiv (IIRC it was 80/20 anti-Maidan winning in Donetsk). Kharkiv is just like Donbas, right?

A typical Ukrainian nationalist east of Dnieper is a business owner, university educated white collar professional, a student, a journalist, "human rights activist"

Football hooligans in these places are also Ukrainian nationalists. Azov battalion and Right Sector are both based in Eastern Ukraine.

Here is how Azov started:

The Azov Battalion has its roots in a group of Ultras of FC Metalist Kharkiv named "Sect 82″ (1982 is the year of the founding of the group).[18] "Sect 82″ was (at least until September 2013) allied with FC Spartak Moscow Ultras.[18] Late February 2014, during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine when a separatist movement was active in Kharkiv, "Sect 82″ occupied the Kharkiv Oblast regional administration building in Kharkiv and served as a local "self-defense"-force.[18] Soon, on the basis of "Sect 82″ there was formed a volunteer militia called "Eastern Corps".[18]

Here is Azov battalion commander-turned-Kiev oblast police chief, Kharkiv native Vadim Troyan:

Does he look like an intellectual to you? Before Maidan he was a cop.

these are not the kind of individuals, who will engage in guerilla warfare,

On the contrary, they will probably dig in while seeking cover in urban areas that they know well, where they have some significant support (as Donbas rebels did in Donetsk), forcing the Russian invaders to fight house to house and causing massive damage while fighting native boys such as Azov. About 1/3 of Kharkiv overall and 1/2 of its youth are nationalists. I wouldn't expect mass resistance by the Kharkiv population itself, but passive support for the rebels by many. Russia will then end up rebuilding a large city full of a resentful population that will remember its dead (same problem Kiev will face if it gets Donbas back). This scenario can be repeated for Odessa. Dnipropetrovsk, the home base of Right Sector, is actually much more nationalistic than either Odessa or Kharkiv. And Kiev is a different world again. Bitter urban warfare in a city of 3 million (officially, most likely about 4 million) followed by massive reconstruction and maintenance of a repression regime while under international sanctions.

Russia's government has adequate intelligence services who know better what Ukraine is actually like, than you do. There is a reason why they limited their support to Crimea and Donbas.

Your wishful thinking about Ukraine would be charming and harmless if not for the fact that such wishful thinking often leads to tragic actions that harm both the invader and the invaded. Remember the Iraqis were supposed to welcome the American liberators with flowers after their cakewalk.

AP , December 18, 2017 at 10:22 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

In fairness, the young Ukrainians I have spoken to avoid the "draft" mainly out of fear that they will be underequipped and used as cannon fodder.

Correct. The thinking often was – "the corrupt officers will screw up and get us killed, or sell out our positions to the Russians for money, if the Russians came to our city I'd fight them but I don't wanna go to Donbas.." This is very different from avoiding the draft because one wouldn't mind if Russia annexed Ukraine. Indeed, Dnipropetrovsk in the East has contributed a lot to Ukraine's war effort, primarily because it borders Donbas – ones hears from people there that if they don't fight in Donbas and keep the rebels contained there, they'd have to fight at home.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 10:39 pm GMT
@AP LMAO, Ukrainians are nothing like Arabs. They are soft Eastern-European types. And in Eastern regions like Kharkov most of them will be on our side.

The best thing about Ukrainian neo-Nazis such as Azov battalion is that there is very few of them – no more than 10.000 in the entire country. I assume Russian security services know all of them by name.

To deal with Ukronazi problem, I would first take out their leaders, then target their HQs, arms depots and training camps. I would kill or intimidate their sponsors. Ukronazis would be left decapitated, without resources, undermanned and demoralised, trying to fight an insurgency amongst the population that hates and despises them. It will be a short lived insurgency.

AP , December 18, 2017 at 10:58 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

LMAO, Ukrainians are nothing like Arabs. They are soft Eastern-European types.

And Russians and Poles were also soft when someone invaded their country? Ukrainians are not modern western Euros.

And in Eastern regions like Kharkov most of them will be on our side.

Most pensioners. It will be about 50/50 among young fighting-age people.

The best thing about Ukrainian neo-Nazis such as Azov battalion is that there is very few of them – no more than 10.000 in the entire country

Maybe. Ukrainian government claims 46,000 in volunteer self-defense battalions (including Azov) but this is probably an exaggeration.

OTOH there are a couple 100,000 demobilized young people with combat experience who would be willing to fight if their homeland were attacked, who are not neo-Nazis in Azov. Plus a military of 200,000-250,000 people, many of whom would imitate the Donbas rebels and probably redeploy in places like Kharkiv where they have cover. Good look fighting it out block by block.

trying to fight an insurgency amongst the population that hates and despises them

In 2010, 48% of Kharkiv voters chose a nationalist for their mayor. In 2012 about 30% voted for nationalist parties. Judging by pro vs, anti-Maidan, the youth are evenly split although in 2014 the Ukrainian nationalist youths ended up controlling the streets, not the Russian nationalist ones as in Donbas. This is in the most pro-Russian part of Ukraine.

Suuure, the population of Kharkiv will despise their kids, grandkids, nephews, classmates etc,. but will welcome the invaders from Russia who will be bombing their city. Such idealism and optimism in Russia!

It will be a short lived insurgency.

And Iraq was supposed to be a cakewalk.

Felix Keverich , December 18, 2017 at 11:15 pm GMT
@AP Again, supporting Maidan doesn't mean you're ready to take up Kalashnikov and go fight. Ukrainian youth is dodging draft en masse. It's a fact.

This is what typical Maidanist Ukrainian youths look like; these people certainly don't look like they have a lot of fight in them: They remind me of Navalny supporters in Russia. These kind of people can throw a tantrum, but they are fundamentally weak people, who are easily crushed.

Cato , December 19, 2017 at 3:43 am GMT
@Felix Keverich Northern Kazakhstan is/was ethnically Russian, since the 1700s. This should have been folded into Russia; the North Caucasus should have been cut loose. My opinion.
AP , December 19, 2017 at 3:53 am GMT
@Felix Keverich Typical Russian mistakes regarding Ukraine: weak student-types in Russia are the main supporters of Ukraine in Russia, thus the same type must be the main pro-Maidan people in Ukraine. Because Ukraine = Russia. This silly dream of Ukraine being just like Russia leads to ridiculous ideas and hopes.

As I already said, the Azov battalion grew out of brawling football ultras in Kharkiv. Maidan itself was a cross-section – of students, yes, but also plenty of Afghan war vets, workers, far right brawlers, professionals, etc. It's wasn't simply "weak" students, nor was it simply far-right fascists (another claim by Russia) but a mass effort of the western half of the country.

Here are Afghan war vets at Maidan:

Look at those weak Maidan people running away from the enemy:

Azov people in their native Kharkiv:

Kharkiv kids:

Ukrainian youth is dodging draft en masse. It's a fact.

Dodging the draft in order to avoid fighting in Donbas, where you are not wanted by the locals, is very different from dodging the draft to avoid fighting when your own town is being invaded.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:10 am GMT
@AP Summer camp was in Kiev, but there is another outside Kharkiv.

To be clear, most Ukrainians fighting against Russia are not these unsavory types, though they make for dramatic video. Point is that pro-Maidan types in Ukraine are far from being exclusively liberal student-types.

jimbojones , December 19, 2017 at 8:01 am GMT
A few points:

- The Russians ALWAYS were Americanophiles – ever since the Revolution. Russia has been an American ally most often explicit but occasionally tacit – in EVERY major American conflict, including the War on Terror and excluding Korea and Vietnam (both not major compared to the Civil War or WW2). The only comparable Great Power US ally is France. Russia and the US are natural allies.

- Russians are Americanophiles – they like Hollywood movies, American music, American idealism, American video games, American fashion, American inventions, American support in WW2, American can-do-aittude, American badassery and Americana in general.

- There are two Ukraines. One is essentially a part of Russia, and a chunk of it was repatriated in 2014. The other was historically Polish and Habsburg. It is a strange entity that is not Russian.

- The Maidan was a foreign-backed putsch against a democratically elected government. Yanukovich was certainly a corrupt scoundrel. But he was a democratically elected corrupt scoundrel. To claim Russian intervention in his election is a joke in light of the CIA-backed 2004 and 2014 coups.

Moreover, post-democratic post-Yanukovich Ukraine is clearly inferior to its predecessor. For one thing, under Yanukovich, Sevastopol was still Ukrainian

Anatoly Karlin , Website December 19, 2017 at 1:35 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich I think this poll is the most relevant for assessing the question, since it covered different regions and used the same methodology.

Takeaway:

1. Support for uniting into a single state with Russia at 41% in Crimea at a time when it was becoming quite clear the Yanukovych regime was doomed.

2. Now translates into ~90% support (according to both Russian and international polls) in Crimea. I.e., a more than a standard deviation shift in "Russophile" sentiment on this matter.

3. Assuming a similar shift in other regions, Novorossiya would be quite fine being with Russia post facto . Though there would be significant discontent in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson (e.g., probably on the scale of Donbass unhappiness with the Ukraine before 2014).

4. Central and West Ukraine would not be, which is why their reintegration would be far more difficult – and probably best left for sometime in the future.

5. What we have instead seen is a one standard deviation shift in "Ukrainophile" sentiment within all those regions that remained in the Ukraine. If this change is "deep," then AP is quite correct that their assimilation into Russia has been made impossible by Putin's vacillations in 2014.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 2:18 pm GMT
@jimbojones

The Maidan was a foreign-backed putsch against a democratically elected government

Typical Russian nationalist half-truth about Ukraine.

To be clear – Yanukovich was democratically elected in 2010, into a position where his powers were limited and where he was faced with a hostile parliament. His post-election accumulation of powers (overthrowing the Opposition parliament, granting himself additional powers, stacking the court with local judges from his hometown) was not democratic. None of these actions enjoyed popular support, none were made through democratic processes such as referendums or popular elections. Had that been the case, he would not have been overthrown in what was a popular mass revolt by half the country.

There are two Ukraines. One is essentially a part of Russia, and a chunk of it was repatriated in 2014. The other was historically Polish and Habsburg. It is a strange entity that is not Russian.

A bit closer to the truth, but much too simplistic in a way that favors Russian idealism. Crimea (60% Russian) was simply not Ukraine, so lumping it in together with a place such as Kharkiv (oblast 70% Ukrainian) and saying that Russia took one part of this uniformly "Russian Ukraine" is not accurate.

You are correct that the western half of the country are a non-Russian Polish-but-not Habsburg central Ukraine/Volynia, and Polish-and-Habsburg Galicia.

But the other half consisted of two parts: ethnic Russian Crimea (60% Russian) and largely ethniuc-Russian urban Donbas (about 45% Russian, 50% Ukrainian), and a heavily Russified but ethnic Ukrainian Kharkiv oblast (70% Ukrainian, 26% Russian), Dnipropetrovsk (80% Ukrainian, 20% Russian), Kherson (82% Ukrainian, 14% Russian), and Odessa oblast (63% Ukrainian, 21% Russian).

The former group (Crimea definitely, and urban Donbas less strongly) like being part of Russia. The latter group, on the other hand, preferred that Ukraine and Russia have friendly ties, preferred Russian as a legal language, preferred economic union with Russia, but did not favor loss of independence. Think of them as pro-NAFTA American-phile Canadians who would nevertheless be opposed to annexation by the USA and would be angered if the USA grabbed a chunk of Canada. In grabbing a chunk of Ukraine and supporting a rebellion in which Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk kids are being shot by Russian-trained fighters using Russian-supplied bullets, Putin has turned these people off the Russian state.

Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 2:35 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin

3. Assuming a similar shift in other regions, Novorossiya would be quite fine being with Russia post facto. Though there would be significant discontent in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson (e.g., probably on the scale of Donbass unhappiness with the Ukraine before 2014).

'Asumptions' like this are what provide Swiss cheese the airy substance that makes it less caloric! Looks like only the retired sovok population in the countryside is up to supporting your mythical 'NovoRosija' while the more populated city dwellers would be opposed, even by your own admission (and even this is questionable). I'm surprised that the dutifully loyal and most astute opposition (AP) has let this blooper pass without any comment?

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 2:41 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin I think when answering this question, most people simple give what they consider to be the socially acceptable answer, especially in contemporary Ukraine, where you will go to prison for displaying Russian flag – who wants to be seen as a "separatist"?

In Crimea it has become more socially acceptable to identify with Russia following the reunification, which is why the number of people who answer this way shot up . The same effect will seen in Belarus and Ukraine – I'm fairly certain of it.

Though there would be significant discontent in Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson

Discontent will be limited to educated, affluent, upwardly mobile circles of society. Demographic profile of Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper resembles demographic profile of Navalny supporters in Russia. These people are not fighters. Most of them will react to Russian takeover by self-deporting – they have the money and resources to do it.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 2:51 pm GMT

Demographic profile of Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper resembles demographic profile of Navalny supporters in Russia. These people are not fighters.

Repeating your claim over and over again doesn't make it true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion

The Azov Battalion has its roots in a group of Ultras of FC Metalist Kharkiv named "Sect 82″ (1982 is the year of the founding of the group).[18] "Sect 82″ was (at least until September 2013) allied with FC Spartak Moscow Ultras.[18] Late February 2014, during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine when a separatist movement was active in Kharkiv, "Sect 82″ occupied the Kharkiv Oblast regional administration building in Kharkiv and served as a local "self-defense"-force.[18] Soon, on the basis of "Sect 82″ there was formed a volunteer militia called "Eastern Corps".[18]

The brawling East Ukrainian nationalists who took the streets of Kharkiv and Odessa were not mostly rich, fey hipsters.

Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 2:53 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

Discontent will be limited to educated, affluent, upwardly mobile circles of society.

So, even by tour own admission, the only folks that would be for unifying with Russia are the uneducated, poor and those with no hopes of ever amounting to much in society. I don't agree with you, but I do see your logic. These are just the type of people that are the most easily manipulated by Russian propoganda – a lot of this went on in the Donbas, and we can see the results of that fiasco to this day.

Andrei Martyanov , Website December 19, 2017 at 2:55 pm GMT
@jimbojones

Russia and the US are natural allies.

While geopolitically and historically it is true:

a)Post-WWII American power elites are both incompetent and arrogant (which is a first derivative of incompetence) to understand that–this is largely the problem with most "Western" elites.

b) Currently the United States doesn't have enough (if any) geopolitical currency and clout to "buy" Russia. In fact, Russia can take what she needs (and she doesn't have "global" appetites) with or without the US. Plus, China is way more interested in Russia's services that the US, which will continue to increasingly find out more about its own severe military-political limitations.

c) The United States foreign policy is not designed and is not being conducted to serve real US national interests. In fact, US can not even define those interests beyond the tiresome platitudes about "global interests" and being "exceptional".

d) Too late

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 3:10 pm GMT
@AP I like how I got you talking about the Ukronazis, it's kinda funny actually, so let me pose as Ukraine's "defender" here:

This neo-Nazi scum is not in any way representative of the population of Eastern Ukraine. These are delinquents, criminals, low-lifes. They are despised, looked down upon by the normal people, pro-Russian and pro-Ukrainian alike. A typical Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper is a business owner, a journalist, an office worker, a student who dodges draft. It's just the way it is.

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 3:24 pm GMT
@AP The way to think about Azov battalion is to treat them like a simple group of delinquents, for whom Ukrainian nationalism has become a path to obtain money, resources, bigger guns and perhaps even political power. Azov is simply a gang. And Russian security services have plenty of experience dealing with gangs, so I don't expect Ukronazis to pose a major challenge.
reiner Tor , December 19, 2017 at 3:35 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich I'm not sure about Ukrainian football hooligans, but football hooligans in Hungary are not necessarily "low -lifes, criminals, delinquents", in fact, the majority of them aren't. Most groups consist mostly of working class (including a lot of security guards and similar) members, but there are some middle class (I know of a school headmaster, though I think he's no longer very active in the group) and working class entrepreneur types (e.g. the car mechanic who ended up owning a car dealership) and similar. I think outright criminal types are a small minority. Since it costs money to attend the matches, outright failures (the permanently unemployed and similar ne'er-do-wells) are rarely found in such groups.
Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 3:50 pm GMT
@reiner Tor LOL I classify all football hooligans as low-lifes simply due to the nature of their pastime. Ukrainian neo-Nazi militias have been involved in actual crimes including murder, kidnapping and racketeering. Their criminal activities go unpunished by the regime, because they are considered "heroes" or something.
AP , December 19, 2017 at 3:57 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

I like how I got you talking about the Ukronazis

I never denied the presence of them.

This neo-Nazi scum is not in any way representative of the population of Eastern Ukraine.

If by "representative" you mean majority, sure. Neither are artsy students, or Afghan war veterans, or schoolteachers, any other group a majority.

Also not all of the street fighters turned militias neo-Nazis, as are Azov. Right Sector are not neo-Nazis, they are more fascists.

These are delinquents, criminals, low-lifes.

As reiner tor correctly pointed out, this movement which grew out of the football ultra community is rather working class but is not lumpens. You fail again.

A typical Ukrainian nationalist East of Dnieper is a business owner, a journalist, an office worker, a student who dodges draft

Are there more business owners, students (many of whom do not dodge the draft), office workers combined than there are ultras/far-right brawlers? Probably. 30% of Kharkiv voted for nationalist parties (mostly Tymoshenko's and Klitschko's moderates) in the 2012 parliamentary elections, under Yanukovich. That represents about 900,000 people in that oblast. There aren't 900,000 brawling far-rightists in Kharkiv. So?

The exteme nationalist Banderist Svoboda party got about 4% of the vote in Kharkiv oblast in 2012. This would make Bandera twice as popular in Kharkiv as the democratic opposition is in Russia.

reiner Tor , December 19, 2017 at 4:00 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

I classify all football hooligans as low-lifes simply due to the nature of their pastime.

They are well integrated into the rest of society, so you can call them low-lifes, but they will still be quite different from ordinary criminals.

Ukrainian neo-Nazi militias have been involved in actual crimes including murder, kidnapping and racketeering.

But that's quite different from being professional criminals. Members of the Waffen-SS also committed unspeakable crimes, but they rarely had professional criminal backgrounds, and were, in fact, quite well integrated into German society.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:08 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

The way to think about Azov battalion is to treat them like a simple group of delinquents, for whom Ukrainian nationalism has become a path to obtain money, resources, bigger guns and perhaps even political power

Yes, there are elements of this, but not only. If they were ethnic Russians, as in Donbas, they would have taken a different path, as did the pro-Russian militants in Donbas who are similar to the ethnic Ukrainian Azovites. Young guys who like to brawl and are ethnic Russians or identify s such joined organizations like Oplot and moved to Donbas to fight against Ukraine, similar types who identified as Ukrainians became Azovites or joined similar pro-Ukrainian militias. Also not all of these were delinquents, many were working class, security guards, etc.

Good that you admit that in Eastern Ukraine nationalism is not limited to student activists and businessmen.

And Russian security services have plenty of experience dealing with gangs,

They chose to stay away from Kharkiv and limit Russia's action to Donbas, knowing that there would be too much opposition, and not enough support, to Russian rule in Kharkiv to make the effort worthwhile.

utu , December 19, 2017 at 4:08 pm GMT
@Anon Out of all hypotheses on the JFK assassination the one that Israel was behind it is the strongest. There is no question about it. From the day one when conspiracy theories were floated everything was done to hide how Israel benefited form the assassination.
Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 4:13 pm GMT
@reiner Tor I feel that comparing Azov to SS gives it too much credit.

My point is that this way of life is not something that many people in Ukraine are willing to actively participate in. Most people are not willing to condone it either. AP says that Azov and the like can act like underground insurgency in Eastern cities. But I don't see how this could work – there will a thousand people around them willing to rat them out.

There is no pro-Ukrainian insurgency in Crimea or inside the republics in Donbass, and it's not due to the lack of local football hooligans.

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 4:25 pm GMT
@AP

That represents about 900,000 people in that oblast. There aren't 900,000 brawling far-rightists in Kharkiv. So?

This means these people won't pose a big problem. These folks will take care of themselves either through self-deportation or gradually coming to terms with the new reality in Kharkov, just like their compatriots in Crimea did.

Even among Svoboda voters, I suspect only a small minority of them are the militant types. We should be to contain them through the use of local proxies. The armies of Donbass republics currently number some 40-60 thousand men according to Cassad blog, which compares with the size of the entire Ukrainian army. We should be able to recruit more local Ukrainian proxies once we're in Kharkov.

Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 4:31 pm GMT
@Gerard2 oligarchs, not nationalism are the driving force behind the "Ukrainian" mass crimes against humanity committing --
AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:48 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

AP says that Azov and the like can act like underground insurgency in Eastern cities. But I don't see how this could work – there will a thousand people around them willing to rat them out.

About 1/3 of the population in Eastern Ukrainian regions voted for Ukrainian nationalists in 2012, compared to only 10% in Donbas. Three times as many. Likely after 2014 many of the hardcore pro-Russians left Kharkiv, just as hardcore pro-Ukrainians left Donetsk. Furthermore anti-Russian attitudes have hardened, due to the war, Crimea, etc. So there would be plenty of local support for native insurgents.

Russians say, correctly, that after Kiev has shelled Donetsk how can the people of Donetsk reconcile themselves with Kiev?

The time when Russia could have bloodlessly marched into Kharkiv is over. Ukrainian forces have dug in. How will Kharkiv people feel towards uninvited Russian invaders shelling their city in order to to take it under their control?

There is no pro-Ukrainian insurgency in Crimea or inside the republics in Donbass, and it's not due to the lack of local football hooligans.

Crimea was 60% Russian, Donbas Republics territory about 45% Russian; Kharkiv oblast is only 25% Russian.

With Donbas – there are actually local pro-Ukrainian militants from Donbas, in the Donbas and Aidar battalions.

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 4:50 pm GMT
@AP It was a decision that Putin personally made. He wasn't going to move in Crimea either, until Maidanists overthrew his friend

It goes without saying that Putin doesn't share my nationalist approach to Ukraine problem: he does not see the destruction of Ukrainian project as necessary or even desirable. And I'm sure the restraint Putin has shown on Ukraine doesn't come from him being intimidated by Azov militia.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 4:56 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

These folks will take care of themselves either through self-deportation or gradually coming to terms with the new reality in Kharkov, just like their compatriots in Crimea did

The problem with this comparison is that Crimeans were far more in favor of joining Russia that are Kharkivites.

The armies of Donbass republics currently number some 40-60 thousand men according to Cassad blog, which compares with the size of the entire Ukrainian army.

Ukrainian military has 200,000 – 250,000 active members and about 100,000 reserves. Where did you get your information? The end of 2014?

We should be able to recruit more local Ukrainian proxies once we're in Kharkov.

You would be able to recruit some local proxies in Kharkiv. Kiev even did so in Donbas. But given the fact that Ukrainian nationalism was 3 times more popular on Kharkiv than in Donetsk, and that Kharkiv youth were split 50/50 in terms of or versus anti Maidan support (versus 80/20 IIIRC anti-Maidan in Donbas), it would not be so easy. Moreover, by now many of the hardcore anti-Kiev people have already left Kharkiv, while Kharkiv has had some settlement by pro-Ukrainian dissidents from Donbas. So the situation even in 2014 was hard enough that Russia chose to stay away, now it is even worse for the pro-Russians.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 5:00 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

And I'm sure the restraint Putin has shown on Ukraine doesn't come from him being intimidated by Azov militia.

This is rather a symptom of a much wider phenomenon: the population simply doesn't see itself as Russian and doesn't want to be part of Russia. So its hooligan-types go for Ukrainian, not Russian, nationalism as is the case in Russia.

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:02 pm GMT
@AP

The time when Russia could have bloodlessly marched into Kharkiv is over. Ukrainian forces have dug in. How will Kharkiv people feel towards uninvited Russian invaders shelling their city in order to to take it under their control?

The locals will move to disarm Ukrainian forces, who have taken their city hostage, then welcome Russian liberators with open arms, what else they are going to do? lol

It's just a joke though. In reality there is virtually no Ukrainian forces in city of Kharkov. They don't have the manpower. Ukrainian regime managed to fortify Perekop and the perimeter of the people's republics, but the rest of Ukraine-Russia border remains completely undefended. It's wide open!

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:05 pm GMT
@AP Honestly, I doubt that this kind of stuff has much impact on Putin's decisionmaking.
Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 5:09 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

It goes without saying that Putin doesn't share my nationalist approach to Ukraine problem: he does not see the destruction of Ukrainian project as necessary or even desirable.

Well there you have it. Putin is a much smarter guy than you are Felix (BTW, are you Jewish, all of the Felix's that I've known were Jewish?). Good to see that you're nothing more than a blackshirted illusionist.*

*фантазёр

German_reader , December 19, 2017 at 5:20 pm GMT
@for-the-record German and European reliance on US security guarantees is a problem, since it's become pretty clear that the US political system is dysfunctional and US "elites" are dangerous extremists. We need our own security structures to be independent from the US so they can't drag us into their stupid projects or blackmail us anymore why do you think Merkel didn't react much to the revelations about American spying on Germany? Because we're totally dependent on the Americans in security matters.

And while I don't believe Russia or Iran are really serious threats to Europe, it would be foolish to have no credible deterrence.

AP , December 19, 2017 at 5:25 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

"How will Kharkiv people feel towards uninvited Russian invaders shelling their city in order to to take it under their control?"

They will move to disarm ther Ukrainian forces, who have taken their city hostage, then welcome their Russian liberators with open arms, what else they are going to do? lol

While about 1/3 of Kharkiv voted for Ukrainian nationalists, only perhaps 10%-20% of the city would actually like to be part of Russia (and I am being generous to you). So your idea is equivalent to American fantasies of Iraqis greeting their troops with flowers.

It's just a joke though. In reality there is virtually no Ukrainian forces in city of Kharkov. They don't have the manpower. Ukrainian regime managed to fortify Perekop and the perimeter of the people's republics, but the rest of Ukraine-Russia border remains completely undefended.

Are you living in 2014? Russian nationalists always like to think of Ukraine as if it is 2014-2015. It is comforting for them.

Ukraine currently has 200,000-250,000 active troops. About 60,000 of them are around Donbas.

Here is a map of various positions in 2017:

Kharkiv does appear to be lightly defended, though not undefended (it has a motorized infantry brigade and a lot of air defenses). The map does not include national guard units such as Azov, however, which would add a few thousand troops to Kharkiv's defense.

It looks like rather than stationing their military in forward positions vs. a possible Russian attack, Ukraine, has put lot of troops in Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Kiev and Odessa.

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:34 pm GMT
@AP

Ukrainian military has 200,000 – 250,000 active members and about 100,000 reserves. Where did you get your information? The end of 2014?

I read Kassad blog, and he says Ukrainian formations assembled in Donbass number some 50-70 thousands men. The entire Ukrainian army is around 200.000 men, including the navy (LOL), the airforce, but most of it isn't combat ready. Ukraine doesn't just suffer from a lack of manpower, they don't have the resources to feed and clothe their soldiers, which limits their ability field an army.

By contrast the armies of people's republics have 40-60 thousand men – that's impressive level of mobilisation, and they achieved this without implementing draft.

Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 5:54 pm GMT
@AP So your idea is equivalent to American fantasies of Iraqis greeting their troops with flowers.

The local populations in Iraq were congenial to begin with, at least outside some Sunni centers. It was never an object of American policy to stay in Iraq indefinitely.

Felix Keverich , December 19, 2017 at 5:55 pm GMT
@AP

Kharkiv does appear to be lightly defended, though not undefended (it has a motorized infantry brigade and a lot of air defenses).

How many people does this "motorized infantry brigade" have? And more importantly what is its level of combat readiness? Couldn't we just smash this brigade with a termobaric bomb while they are sleeping?

Ukraine is full of shit. They had 20.000 troops in Crimea, "a lot of air defenses" and it didn't make a iota of difference. Somehow you expect me to believe Ukraine has a completely different army now. Why should I? They don't have the resources to afford a better army, so it is logical to assume that Ukrainian army is still crap.

Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 6:01 pm GMT
Russian nationalists always like to think of Ukraine as if it is 2014-2015. It is comforting for them.

Betwixt and between all the trash talking, they've forgotten that the last occasion on which one country attempted to conquer an absorb another country with a population anywhere near 30% of its own was during the 2d World War. Didn't work out so well for Germany and Japan.

Art Deco , December 19, 2017 at 6:03 pm GMT
@for-the-record Austria, on the other hand, has survived for more than 60 years without the US "umbrella" to protect it (and with a military strength rated below that of Angola and Chile), so why couldn't Germany?

Austria hasn't been absorbed by Germany or Italy therefore Germany doesn't have a use for security guarantees or an armed force. Do I render your argument correctly?

German_reader , December 19, 2017 at 6:32 pm GMT
@for-the-record

Germany has willingly supported the US

Not completely true, Germany didn't participate in the Iraq war and in the bombing of Libya.
I'm hardly an expert on military matters, but it would seem just common sense to me that a state needs sufficient armed forces to protect its own territory if you don't have that, you risk becoming a passive object whose fate is decided by other powers. Doesn't mean Germany should have a monstrously bloated military budget like the US, just sufficient forces to protect its own territory and that of neighbouring allies (which is what the German army should be for instead of participating in futile counter-insurgency projects in places like Afghanistan). Potential for conflict in Europe is obviously greatest regarding Russia it's still quite low imo, and I want good relations with Russia and disagree vehemently with such insanely provocative ideas as NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia, but it would be stupid not to have credible deterrence (whose point it is to prevent hostilities after all). I don't think that's an anti-Russian position, it's just realistic.
Apart from that Germany doesn't probably need much in the way of military capabilities maybe some naval forces for participation in international anti-piracy missions.
Regarding nuclear weapons, that's obviously something Germany can't or shouldn't do on its own (probably wouldn't be tolerated anyway given 20th century history), so it would have to be in some form of common European project. Hard to tell now if something like this could eventually become possible or necessary.

Mr. Hack , December 19, 2017 at 6:46 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich Sorry to prickle your little fantasy world once again tovarishch, but according to current CIA statistics Ukraine has 182,000 active personnel, and 1,000,000 reservists! For a complete rundown of Ukraine's military strength, read this and weep:

https://www.globalfirepower.com/country-military-strength-detail.asp?country_id=ukraine

inertial , December 19, 2017 at 8:18 pm GMT
@Art Deco They've had ample opportunity over a period of 26 years to make the decision you favor. It hasn't happened, and there's no reason to fancy they'll be more amenable a decade from now.

Yes, these people had been sold a vision. If only they leave behind the backward, Asiatic, mongoloid Russia, they will instantly Join Europe. They will have all of the good stuff: European level of prosperity, rule of law, international approval, and so on; and none of the bad stuff that they associated with Russia, like poverty, corruption, and civil strife.

Official Ukrainian propaganda worked overtime, and still works today, to hammer this into people's heads. And it's an attractive vision. An office dweller in Kiev wants to live in a shiny European capital, not in a bleak provincial city of a corrupt Asian empire. The problem is, it's ain't working. For a while Ukraine managed to get Russia to subsidize Ukrainian European dream. Now this is over. The vision is starting to fail even harder.

The experience of Communism shows that it may take decades but eventually people notice that the state ideology is a lie. Once they do, they change their mind about things rather quickly.

Swedish Family , December 19, 2017 at 8:26 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

It goes without saying that Putin doesn't share my nationalist approach to Ukraine problem: he does not see the destruction of Ukrainian project as necessary or even desirable.

Agreed, and he happens to be in the right here. Russia actually has a good hand in Ukraine, if only she keeps her cool . More military adventurism is foolish for at least three reasons:

(1) All the civilian deaths in the Donbass, somewhat perversely, play to Russia's advantage in that they take some of the sting out of the "Ukraine is the victim" narrative. Common people know full well that the Ukrainian troops are hated in the Donbass (I once watched a Ukrainian soldier shock the audience by saying this on Shuster Live), and they know also that Kiev has a blame in all those dead women and children. These are promising conditions for future reconciliation, and they would be squandered overnight if Russian troops moved further westward.

(2) The geopolitical repercussions would be enormous. As I and others have already written, the present situation is just about what people in elite Western circles can stomach. Any Russian escalation would seriously jeopardize European trade with Russia, among other things.

(3) There is a good chance that Crimea will eventually be internationally recognized as part of the RF (a British parliamentary report on this matter in 2015, I think it was, made this quite clear). The same might also be true of the Donbass. These "acquisitions," too, would be jeopardized by more military action.

Swedish Family , December 19, 2017 at 9:56 pm GMT
@Art Deco

You mean Putin mercs kill more Ukrainian civilians and we 'take some of the sting out of the 'Ukraine is a victim narrative'? Sounds like a plan.

No, I wrote that those civilians are already gone and that both sides had a hand in their deaths, which will help the peace process since no side can claim sole victimhood.

And your assumption that the separatists are mercenaries is groundless speculation. Estimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine, and there is no evidence to suggest that they are fighting for the love of money.

Did you cc the folks in Ramallah and Jerusalem about that?

Risible comparison. Theirs is a conflict involving three major religions and the survival of the Israeli state at stake. On the Crimean question, we have already heard influential Westerners voice the possibility that it might one day be accepted as Russian, and if you read between the lines, many Ukrainians are of a similiar mind.

Anatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 12:19 am GMT
@Felix Keverich Unfortunately, the Ukraine has been spending 5%* of its GDP on the military since c.2015 (versus close to 1% before 2014).

Doesn't really matter if tons of money continues to be stolen, or even the recession – with that kind of raw increase, a major enhancement in capabilities is inevitable.

As I was already writing in 2016 :

Like it or not, but outright war with Maidanist Ukraine has been ruled out from the beginning, as the more perceptive analysts like Rostislav Ischenko have long recognized. If there was a time and a place for it, it was either in April 2014, or August 2014 at the very latest. Since then, the Ukrainian Army has gotten much stronger. It has been purged of its "Russophile" elements, and even though it has lost a substantial percentage of its remnant Soviet-era military capital in the war of attrition with the LDNR, it has more than made up for it with wartime XP gain and the banal fact of a quintupling in military spending as a percentage of GDP from 1% to 5%.

This translates to an effective quadrupling in absolute military spending, even when accounting for Ukraine's post-Maidan economic collapse.

Russia can still crush Ukraine in a full-scale conventional conflict, and that will remain the case for the foreseeable future, but it will no longer be the happy cruise to the Dnepr that it would have been two years earlier.

* There's a report that says actual Ukrainian military spending remained rather more modest at 2.5% of GDP ( https://www.osw.waw.pl/sites/default/files/prace_66_ang_best_army_ukraine_net.pdf ); even so, that still translates to huge improvements over 2014.

AP , December 20, 2017 at 12:26 am GMT
@Felix Keverich

The entire Ukrainian army is around 200.000 men, including the navy (LOL), the airforce, but most of it isn't combat ready.

250,000. Combat readiness is very different from 2014.

Ukraine doesn't just suffer from a lack of manpower, they don't have the resources to feed and clothe their soldiers, which limits their ability field an army.

Again, it isn't 2014 anymore. Military budget has increased significantly, from 3.2 billion in 2015 to 5.17 billion in 2017. In spite of theft, much more is getting through.

By contrast the armies of people's republics have 40-60 thousand men – that's impressive level of mobilisation, and they achieved this without implementing draft

It's one of the only ways to make any money in the Republics, so draft is unnecessaary.

AP , December 20, 2017 at 12:35 am GMT
@Swedish Family

Estimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine, and there is no evidence to suggest that they are fighting for the love of money.

80% are natives. Perhaps as much as 90%. However, often it a way to make a meager salary in those territories, so there is a mercenary aspect to it. Lots of unemployed workers go into the Republic military.

Anatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 12:35 am GMT
@Swedish Family

Estimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine, and there is no evidence to suggest that they are fighting for the love of money.

80% in 2014-15, to be precise; another 10% from the Kuban; 10% from Russia, the Russian world, and the world at large.

NAF salaries are good by post-2014 Donbass standards, but a massive cut for Russians – no Russian went there to get rich.

That said, I strongly doubt there will ever be international recognition of Crimea, let alone Donbass. Israel has by far the world's most influential ethnic lobby. Even NATO member Turkey hasn't gotten Northern Cyprus internationally recognized, so what exactly are the chances of the international community (read: The West) recognizing the claims of Russia, which is fast becoming established in Western minds as the arch-enemy of civilization?

AP , December 20, 2017 at 12:56 am GMT
@Anatoly Karlin Fascinating link. The numbers for the military budget are a lot lower than reported elsewhere.

Mobilization percentages by region:

"Among the leaders of the fourth and fifth wave of partial mobilisation were the Khmelnitsky, Dnipropetrovsk, Vinnytsia, Kirovohrad and Zaporizhia regions, as well as the city of Kyiv, whose mobilisation plan was fulfilled 80-100% (the record was Vinnytsia oblast, which achieved 100% mobilisation). At the opposite extreme are the Kharkiv, Chernivtsi, Donetsk, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lugansk, Sumy, Ternopil and Transcarpathian regions, where the results of the mobilisation varied from 25 to 60%."

Summary:

2014:

The true face of the Ukrainian armed forces was revealed by the Russian annexation of Crimea and the first weeks of the war in the Donbas – they were nothing more than a fossilised structure, unfit for any effective function upon even a minimum engagement with the enemy, during which a significant part of the troops only realised whom they were representing in the course of the conflict and more than once, from the perspective of service in one of the post-Soviet military districts, they chose to serve in the Russian army

2017:

The war in the Donbas shaped the Ukrainian army. It gave awareness and motivation to the soldiers, and forced the leadership of the Defence Ministry and the government of the state to adapt the army's structure – for the first time since its creation – to real operational needs, and also to bear the costs of halting the collapses in the fields of training and equipment, at least to such an extent which would allow the army to fight a close battle with the pro-Russian separatists. Despite all these problems, the Ukrainian armed forces of the year 2017 now number 200,000, most of whom have come under fire, and are seasoned in battle. They have a trained reserve ready for mobilisation in the event of a larger conflict*; their weapons are not the latest or the most modern, but the vast majority of them now work properly; and they are ready for the defence of the vital interests of the state (even if some of the personnel still care primarily about their own vested interests). They have no chance of winning a potential military clash with Russia, but they have a reason to fight. The Ukrainian armed forces of the year 2014, in a situation where their home territory was occupied by foreign troops, were incapable of mounting an adequate response. The changes since the Donbas war started mean that Ukraine now has the best army it has ever had in its history.

* The Ukrainian armed forces have an operational reserve of 130,000 men, relatively well trained and with real combat experience, who since 2016 have been moulded out of veterans of the Donbas (as well as from formations subordinate to the Interior Ministry). It must be stressed, however, that those counted in the reserve represent only half of the veterans of the anti-terrorist operation (by October 2016, 280,000 Ukrainians had served in the Donbas in all formations subordinate to the government in Kyiv, with 266,000 reservists gaining combat status; at the beginning of February 2017, 193,400 reservists were in the armed forces). Thanks to that, at least in terms of the human factor, it should be possible in a relatively short period of time to increase the Ukrainian army's degree of combat readiness, as well as to fight a relatively close battle with a comparable opponent, something the Ukrainian armed forces were not capable of doing at the beginning of 2014.

AP , December 20, 2017 at 1:21 am GMT
@Anatoly Karlin

NAF salaries are good by post-2014 Donbass standards, but a massive cut for Russians – no Russian went there to get rich.

Which further points to the critical role played by Russians. Many of the local volunteers are participating because doing so offers a salary, which is very important in a wrecked, sanctioned Donbas. The Russian 10%-20% are motivated, often Chechen combat vets. They are more important than their % indicates.

Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:33 am GMT
@Gerard2 ..and lets not forget the failure in mobilisation from the Ukrainian military

That and having to hire loads of Georgians, Chechens, Poles and other mercenaries. Pretty much tallys perfectly with the failed shithole Ukraine government structure full of everyone else .but Ukrainians

melanf , December 20, 2017 at 5:16 am GMT
Amazing – almost any discussion in this section turns to хохлосрач (ukrohitstorm)
neutral , December 20, 2017 at 8:39 am GMT
@melanf What is almost incomprehensible for me in these endless Russia vs Ukraine arguments is how they (yes both sides) always ignore the real issues and instead keep on raising relatively petty points while thinking that mass non white immigration and things like the EU commissioner of immigration stating openly that Europe needs endless immigration, are not important.

It's like white South Africans who still debate the Boer war or the Irish debate the northern Ireland question, and are completely oblivious to the fact that these things don't matter anymore if you have an entirely new people ruling your land (ok in South Africa they were not new, but you know what I mean).

melanf , December 20, 2017 at 10:54 am GMT
@Swedish Family

Estimations are that well over half of the separatists are born and bred in Ukraine

much more than half. Donbass rebels: soldiers of the detachment of "Sparta". Data published by Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine:

https://imgur.com/a/Gh8zx

TT , December 20, 2017 at 12:05 pm GMT
I have read a article mentioned something like Putin said, to annexed whole Ukraine means to share the enormous resource wealth of vast Russia land with them, which make no economic sense. If Russia is worst than Ukraine, then there won't be million of Ukrainian migrating over after the Maidan coup.

So are all those Baltic states. Russia don't want these countries as it burden, it is probably only interested in selected strategic areas like the Eastern Ukraine industrial belt and military important Crimea warm water deep seaport, and skilled migrants. Ukraine has one of lowest per capital income now, with extreme corrupted politicians controlled by USNato waging foolish civil war killing own people resulting in collapsing economic and exudes of skilled people.

What it got to lose to unify with Russia to have peace, prosperity and been a nation of a great country instead of poor war torn? Plus a bonus of free Russia market access, unlimited cheap natural gas and pipeline toll to tax instead of buying LNG from US at double price.

Sorry this s just my opinion based on mostly fake news we are fed, only the Ukrainian know the best and able to decde themselves.

Randal , December 20, 2017 at 12:59 pm GMT
@Swedish Family

Agreed, and he happens to be in the right here. Russia actually has a good hand in Ukraine, if only she keeps her cool. More military adventurism is foolish for at least three reasons:

Yes, this is my view also. I think Russia was never in a position to do much more than it has, and those who talk about more vigorous military interference are just naïve, or engaging in wishful thinking, about the consequences. I think Putin played a very bad hand as well as could reasonably be expected in Ukraine and Crimea. No doubt mistakes were made, and perhaps more support at the key moment for the separatists (assassinations of some of the key oligarchs who chose the Ukrainian side and employed thugs to suppress the separatists in eastern cities, perhaps) could have resulted in a better situation now with much more of the eastern part of Ukraine separated, but if Russians want someone to blame for the situation in Ukraine apart from their enemies, they should look at Yanukovich, not Putin.

In the long run, it seems likely the appeal of NATO and the EU (assuming both still even exist in their current forms in a few years time) is probably peaking, but strategic patience and only limited covert and economic interference is advisable.

The return of Crimea to Russia alone has been a dramatic improvement in the inherent stability of the region. A proper division of the territory currently forming the Ukraine into a genuine Ukrainian nation in the west and an eastern half returned to Russia would be the ideal long term outcome, but Russia can surely live with a neutralised Ukraine.

Felix Keverich , December 20, 2017 at 1:18 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin

There's a report that says actual Ukrainian military spending remained rather more modest at 2.5% of GDP ( https://www.osw.waw.pl/sites/default/files/prace_66_ang_best_army_ukraine_net.pdf ); even so, that still translates to huge improvements over 2014.

You realise that Ukraine's GDP declined in dollar terms by a factor of 2-3 times, right? A bigger share of a smaller economy translates into the same paltry sum. It is still under $5 billion.

Futhermore an army that's actively deployed and engaged in fighting spends more money than during peacetime. A lot of this money goes to fuel, repairs, providing for soldiers and their wages rather than qualitatively improving capabilities of the army.

The bottom-line is Ukraine spent the last 3,5 years preparing to fight a war against the People's Republic of Donetsk. I'll admit Ukrainian army can hold its own against the People's Republic of Donetsk. Yet it remains hopelessly outmatched in a potential clash with Russia. A short, but brutal bombing campaign can whipe out Ukrainian command and control, will make it impossible to mount any kind of effective defence. Ukrainian conscripts have no experience in urban warfare, and their national loyalties are unclear.

AP predicts that the cities of Kharkov, Dniepropetrovsk will be reduced to something akin to Aleppo. But it has taken 3 years of constant shelling to cause the damage in Aleppo. A more likely outcome is that Ukrainian soldiers will promptly ditch their uniforms, once they realise the Russian are coming and their command is gone.

Anatoly Karlin , Website December 20, 2017 at 1:32 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich Nominal GDP collapsed, but real GDP only fell by around 20%. This matters more, since the vast majority of Ukrainian military spending occurs in grivnas.

By various calculations, Ukrainian military spending went up from 1% of GDP, to 2.5%-5%. Minus 20%, that translates to a doubling to quadrupling.

What it does mean is that they are even less capable of paying for advanced weapons from the West than before, but those were never going to make a cardinal difference anyway.

AP is certainly exaggerating wrt Kharkov looking like Aleppo and I certainly didn't agree with him on that. In reality Russia will still be able to smash the Ukraine, assuming no large-scale American intervention, but it will no longer be the trivial task it would have been in 2014, and will likely involve thousands as opposed to hundreds (or even dozens) of Russian military deaths in the event of an offensive up to the Dnieper.

Felix Keverich , December 20, 2017 at 1:50 pm GMT
@AP

It's one of the only ways to make any money in the Republics, so draft is unnecessaary.

It's not like the regime-controlled parts of the country are doing much better! LOL

My point is that this bodes well for our ability to recruit proxies in Ukraine, don't you think? We could easily assemble another 50.000-strong local army, once we're in Kharkov. That's the approach I would use in Ukraine: strip away parts of it piece by piece, create local proxies, use them to maintain control and absorb casualties in the fighting on the ground.

Mr. Hack , December 20, 2017 at 1:52 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin

In reality Russia will still be able to smash the Ukraine, assuming no large-scale American intervention, but it will no longer be the trivial task it would have been in 2014, and will likely involve thousands as opposed to hundreds (or even dozens) of Russian military deaths in the event of an offensive up to the Dnieper.

Fortunately, we'll not be seeing a replay of the sacking and destruction of Novgorod as was done in the 15th century by Ivan III, and all of its ugly repercussions in Ukraine. Besides, since the 15th century, we've seen the emergence of three separate nationalities out of the loose amalgamation of principalities known a Rus. Trying to recreate something (one Rus nation) out of something that never in effect existed, now in the 21st century is a ridiculous concept at best.

AP , December 20, 2017 at 1:58 pm GMT

"It's one of the only ways to make any money in the Republics, so draft is unnecessaary."

It's not like the regime-controlled parts of the country are doing much better! LOL

Well, they are, at least in the center and west. Kievans don't volunteer to fight because they have no other way of making money. But you probably believe the fairytale that Ukraine is in total collapse, back to the 90s.

We could easily assemble another 50.000-strong local army, once we're in Kharkov.

If in the process of taking Kharkiv the local economy goes into ruin due to wrecked factories and sanctions so that picking up a gun is the only way to feed one's family for some people, sure. But again, keep in mind that Kharkiv is much less pro-Russian than Donbas so this could be more complicated.

Art Deco , December 20, 2017 at 2:01 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin How so? Poland and France (together around equal to Germany's population) worked out perfectly for Nazi Germany.

You're forgetting a few things. In the United States, about 1/3 of the country's productive capacity was devoted to the war effort during the period running from 1940 to 1946. I'll wager you it was higher than that in Britain and continental Europe. That's what Germany was drawing on to attempt to sustain its holdings for just the 4-5 year period in which they occupied France and Poland. (Russia currently devotes 4% of its productive capacity to the military). Germany had to be exceedingly coercive as well. They were facing escalating partisan resistance that whole time (especially in the Balkans).

Someone whose decisions matter is going to ask the question of whether it's really worth the candle.

AP , December 20, 2017 at 2:07 pm GMT
@Art Deco Thanks for the correction. This suggests that transforming Iraq into a solidly pro-Western stable democracy would have been much harder than doing so for Japan. This I think would have been the only legitimate reason to invade in Iraq in 2003 (WMDs weren't there, and in 2003 the regime was not genocidal as it had been decades earlier when IMO an invasion would have been justified)

Again, much of Iraq is quiet and has been for a decade. What's not would be the provinces where Sunnis form a critical mass. Their political vanguards are fouling their own nest and imposing costs on others in the vicinity, such as the country's Christian population and the Kurds living in mixed provinces like Kirkuk.

Correct, but most of this have been the case had the Baathists remained in power?

You've seen severe internal disorders in the Arab world over 60 years in Algeria, Libya, the Sudan, the Yemen, the Dhofar region of Oman, Lebanon, Syria, and central Iraq.

Which is why one ought to either not invade a country and remove a regime that maintains stability and peace, or if one does so – take on the responsibility of investing massive effort and treasure in order to prevent the inevitable chaos and violence that would erupt as a result of one's invasion.

Felix Keverich , December 20, 2017 at 2:08 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin To be honest, I don't think it'll be necessary to sacrifice so many lives of Russian military personnel. Use LDNR army: transport them to Belgorod and with Russians they could move to take Kharkov, while facing minimal opposition. Then move futher to the West and South until the entire Ukrainian army in Donbass becomes encircled at which point they will likely surrender.

After supressing Ukrainian air-defence, our airforce should be able to destroy command and control, artillery, armoured formations, airfields, bridges over Dnieper, other infrustructure. Use the proxies to absord casualties in the fighting on the ground.

Andrei Martyanov , Website December 20, 2017 at 2:13 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin

but it will no longer be the happy cruise to the Dnepr that it would have been two years earlier.

Anatoly, please, don't write on things you have no qualification on writing. You can not even grasp the generational (that is qualitative) abyss which separates two armed forces. The question will not be in this:

but it will no longer be the happy cruise to the Dnepr that it would have been two years earlier.

By the time the "cruising" would commence there will be no Ukrainian Army as an organized formation or even units left–anything larger than platoon will be hunted down and annihilated. It is really painful to read this, honestly. The question is not in Russian "ambition" or rah-rah but in the fact that Ukraine's armed forces do not posses ANY C4ISR capability which is crucial for a dynamics of a modern war. None. Mopping up in the East would still be much easier than it would be in Central, let alone, Western Ukraine but Russia has no business there anyway. More complex issues were under consideration than merely probable losses of Russian Army when it was decided (rightly so) not to invade.

I will open some "secret"–nations DO bear collective responsibility and always were subjected to collective punishment -- latest example being Germany in both WWs -- the bacillus of Ukrainian "nationalism" is more effectively addressed by letting those moyahataskainikam experience all "privileges" of it. In the end, Russia's resources were used way better than paying for mentally ill country. 2019 is approaching fast.

P.S. In all of your military "analysis" on Ukraine one thing is missing leaving a gaping hole–Russian Armed Forces themselves which since 2014 were increasing combat potential exponentially. Ukies? Not so much–some patches here and there. Russian Armed Forces of 2018 are not those of 2013. Just for shits and giggles check how many Ratnik sets have been delivered to Russian Army since 2011. That may explain to you why timing in war and politics is everything.

AP , December 20, 2017 at 2:23 pm GMT
@Anatoly Karlin

Nominal GDP collapsed, but real GDP only fell by around 20%.

About 16% from 2013 to 2015 when Ukraine hit bottom:

https://www.worldeconomics.com/GrossDomesticProduct/Ukraine.gdp

AP is certainly exaggerating wrt Kharkov looking like Aleppo and I certainly didn't agree with him on that.

I wrote that parts of the city would look like that. I don't think there would be enough massive resistance that the entire city would be destroyed. But rooting out a couple thousand armed, experienced militiamen or soldiers in the urban area would cause a lot of expensive damage and, as is the case when civilians died in Kiev's efforts to secure Donbas, would probably not endear the invaders to the locals who after all do not want Russia to invade them.

And Kharkiv would be the easiest to take. Dnipropetrovsk would be much more Aleppo-like, and Kiev Felix was proposing for Russia to take all these areas.

Andrei Martyanov , Website December 20, 2017 at 2:31 pm GMT
@Felix Keverich

To be honest, I don't think it'll be necessary to sacrifice so many lives of Russian military personnel.

The question is not in losses, per se. Russians CAN accept losses if the deal becomes hot in Ukraine–it is obvious. The question is in geopolitical dynamics and the way said Russian Armed Forces were being honed since 2013, when Shoigu came on-board and the General Staff got its mojo returned to it. All Command and Control circuit of Ukie army will be destroyed with minimal losses if need be, and only then cavalry will be let in. How many Russian or LDNR lives? I don't know, I am sure GOU has estimates by now. Once you control escalation (Russia DOES control escalation today since can respond to any contingency) you get way more flexibility (geo)politcally. Today, namely December 2017, situation is such that Russia controls escalation completely. If Ukies want to attack, as they are inevitably forced to do so, we all know what will happen. Ukraine has about a year left to do something. Meanwhile considering EU intentions to sanction Poland, well, we are witnessing the start of a major shitstorm.

Mr. Hack , December 20, 2017 at 2:45 pm GMT

Most ukrops even admit that Kharkov could easily have gone in 2014, if Russia had wanted it/feasible

Really? So why didn't Russia take Kharkiv then? Why wan't it 'feasible', Mr.Know it All?

Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:48 pm GMT
@Mr. Hack

Trying to recreate something (one Rus nation) out of something that never in effect existed, now in the 21st century is a ridiculous concept at best.

A stupid comment for an adult. Ukraine, in effect never existed before Russia/Stalin/Lenin created it. Kiev is a historical Russian city, and 5 of the 7 most populated areas in Ukraine are Russian/Soviet created cities, Russian language is favourite spoken by most Ukrainians ( see even Saakashvili in court, speaking only in Russian even though he speaks fluent Ukrainian now and all the judges and lawyers speaking in Russian too), the millions of Ukrainians living happily in Russia and of course, the topic of what exactly is a Ukrainian is obsolete because pretty much every Ukrainian has a close Russian relative the level of intermarriage was at the level of one culturally identical people.

AK: Improvement! The first paragraph was acceptable, hence not hidden.

Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 2:52 pm GMT
@Mr. Hack economics, hope that the west and their puppets in Kiev would act like sane and decent people, threat of sanctions and so on.

As is obvious, if the west had remained neutral ( an absurd hypothetical because the west were the ringmasters of the farce in this failed state) ..and not supported the coup and then the evil war brought on the Donbass people, then a whole different situation works out in Ukraine ( for the better)

AP , December 20, 2017 at 3:17 pm GMT
@Gerard2

Kharkov always was and will be as pro-Russian as Donbass

Kharkiv oblast: 71% Ukrainian, 26% Russian
Donetsk oblast: 57% Ukrainian, 38% Russian (skews more Russian in the Donbas Republic parts)

Self-declared native language Kharkiv oblast: 54% Ukrainian, 44% Russian
Self-declared native language Donetsk oblast: 24% Ukrainian, 75% Russian

(not the same thing as language actually spoken, but a decent reflection of national self-identity)

2012 parliamentary election results (rounding to nearest %):

Kharkiv oblast: 62% "Blue", 32% "Orange" – including 4% Svoboda
Donetsk oblast – 84% "Blue", 11% "Orange" – including 1% Svoboda

A good illustration of Russian wishful thinking fairytales compared to reality on the ground.

S3 , December 20, 2017 at 3:23 pm GMT
@S3 Nietzsche famously foresaw the rise and fall of communism and the destruction of Germany in the two world wars. He also liked to think of himself as a Polish nobleman. Maybe this is what he meant.
Gerard2 , December 20, 2017 at 7:25 pm GMT
@AP Kharkiv oblast: 71% Ukrainian, 26% Russian
Donetsk oblast: 57% Ukrainian, 38% Russian (skews more Russian in the Donbas Republic parts)
gT , December 21, 2017 at 7:34 am GMT
Its very amusing reading all the comments so far. But reality is that Russia should take back all the lands conquered by the Tsars, and that includes Finland.

Look at America. Currently the US has troops stationed in other countries all over the world. And most of those "independent" countries can't take virtually no decision without America's approval. This is definitely the case with Germany and Japan, where their "presidents" have to take an oath of loyalty to the US on assuming office. Now America has even moved into Eastern Europe, and has troops and radars and nuclear capable missile batteries stationed there. So America is just expanding and expanding its grasp while Russia must contract its territories even further and further. Yippee.

So Russia must take back all the territories conquered by the Tsars so as to not lose this game of monopoly. Those in those territories not too happy about such matters can move to America or deal with the Red Army. This is not a matter of cost benefits analysis but a matter of Russia's national security, as in the case of Chechnya.

The territories to Russia's East are especially necessary for Russia's security; when the chips are down, when all the satellites have been blown out of space, all the aircraft blown out of the air, all the ground hardware blown to smithereens; when the battle is reduced to eye to eye rat like warfare, then those assorted Mongol mongrels from Russia's East come into their element. Genghis Khan was the biggest mass murderer in history, he made Hitler look like a school boy, his genes live on in those to Russia's East. So if America were to get involved in Ukraine Russia would have no issues losing a million troops in a matter of days while the US has never even lost a million troops in its civil war and WW2 combined.

Lets face it, those Mongol mongrels make much better fighters than the effete Sunni Arabs any day, so Russia should get them on her side. In Syria those ISIS idiots would never have got as far as they did were it not for those few Chechens in their midst's.

But alas, Russia has to eat humble pie at the moment, internationally and at the Olympics. But humble pie tastes good when its washed down with bottles of vodka, and its only momentarily after all.

Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 10:50 am GMT
@gT Look at America. Currently the US has troops stationed in other countries all over the world.

Since 1945, between 70% and 87% of American military manpower has been stationed in the United States and its possession. The vast bulk of the remainder is generally to be found in about a half-dozen countries. (In recent years, that would be Germany, Japan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait). Andrew Bacevich once went on a whinge about the stupidity of having a 'Southern Command' without bothering to tell his readers that the Southern Command had 2,000 billets at that time, that nearly half were stationed at Guantanamo Bay (an American possession since 1902), that no country had more than 200 American soldiers resident, and that the primary activity of the Southern Command was drug interdiction. On the entire African continent, there were 5,000 billets at that time.

And most of those "independent" countries can't take virtually no decision without America's approval. This is definitely the case with Germany and Japan, where their "presidents" have to take an oath of loyalty to the US on assuming office.

This is a fantasy.

Art Deco , December 21, 2017 at 10:52 am GMT
@gT Why not post sober?
gT , December 21, 2017 at 4:05 pm GMT
@Art Deco Fantasy?

Read here about Merkel obeying her real masters

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/editorial-merkel-has-left-germans-high-and-dry-a-911425.html

and read here about "BERLIN IS WASHINGTON'S VASSAL UNTIL 2099″

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-183232

I especially like the bit about "Though most of the German officers were not originally inclined against America, a lot of them being educated in the United States, they are now experiencing disappointment and even disgust with Washington's policies."

Seems its not only the Russians who are getting increasingly pissed off with the US when at first they actually liked the US. No wonder the Germans are just letting their submarines and tanks rot away.

Also https://www.veteranstodayarchives.com/2011/06/05/germany-still-under-the-control-of-foreign-powers/
(damn South Africans popping up everywhere)

[Dec 19, 2017] Not a lot of nuance, or diplomacy, on display and the tantrum was aimed at friends and rivals alike

Notable quotes:
"... Trump has promised to expand the half-million person Army when in fact there is no need for a US ground force; Canada and Mexico are quite benign. The NSS in fact makes it clear that the objective is not defense but increasing world hegemony: "We will advance American influence because a world that supports American interests and reflects our values makes America more secure and prosperous." Baloney, the wars have made America less secure and will continue to do so as new wars on North Korea and Iran are promoted. ..."
"... Thus hundreds of billions of dollars are wasted on the military in a country with dire domestic needs. That's no way to Make America Great Again, is it. That's just being stupid. ..."
Dec 19, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

jayc , Dec 19, 2017 2:32:48 PM | 29

Nikki Haley, in her distinct fashion, articulated an "America First" pov at the UNSC yesterday as she claimed the repudiation of decades of international understandings on the status of Jerusalem was an expression of American "sovereignty", and criticism of same amounted to an "insult" that "would not be forgotten." Not a lot of nuance, or diplomacy, on display and the tantrum was aimed at friends and rivals alike.

The National Security vision seems to place a lot of faith in a version of laissez-faire libertarian economics which, reading between the lines, will serve as a motivating principle in extending great power rivalry based on defining the "rules based international system" as precisely such economic system. That's probably not too different from the "exceptional" viewpoint of the previous administrations, but expressed, much like Haley, in far blunter fashion.

les7 , Dec 19, 2017 2:39:00 PM | 30
@ 2 lea

Very well said. I would only add that the globalist/financial sector did even better!

@ 15, 20

I am surprised that Russia does not openly support US regime change projects. (sarc)

Really, what other country gets so much bang for their buck? Perhaps this is history's version of shock and awe for those who arrogate to themselves the power to 'make' it.

harrylaw , Dec 19, 2017 12:13:22 PM | 20
Don Bacon@15, Don, projected costs of the Afghan and Iraq wars are not billions but trillions.
Kennedy School professor Linda Bilmes finds that the all-in costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will measure in the $4 trillion to $6 trillion range when all is said and done. But that's not the most terrifying element of her survey of the fiscal impact of the "war on terror" and related undertakings. What should really strike fear into your heart is her finding that "the largest portion of that bill is yet to be paid." http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/03/28/cost_of_iraq_linda_bilmes_says_iraq_and_afghanistan_wars_could_cost_6_trillion.html
So much for Trumps 'fix our infrastructure' first promises. instead of MAGA we get MIGA make Israel great again.
WorldBLee , Dec 19, 2017 11:29:24 AM | 17
The greatest danger of the US's decline in power relative to the rest of the world is an overreaction by the US to try to halt such decline. This has been true for a while; Trump's belligerence just brings it into sharper focus. Obama was actually pretty much the same but he hid it behind smoother language.
Don Bacon , Dec 19, 2017 11:15:26 AM | 15
NSS: "We will preserve peace through strength by rebuilding our military so that it remains preeminent, deters our adversaries, and if necessary, is able to fight and win."

Currently the military is in poor shape. Half the fighter planes can't fly, only one of eleven aircraft carriers is deployed, and the Pentagon has struggled to send one brigade to Europe. Morale is low, the Air Force has a deficit of about 2,000 pilots, Navy personnel are poorly trained in seamanship so collisions occur, and the Army is struggling to recruit because young people in the recruit pool have drug and weight problems (and better things to do).

The current "rebuilding" is characterized by spending tons of money on complex systems that don't work well, like the F-35 strike fighter, the Ford-class aircraft carrier, the stealth destroyer and the Littoral Combat Ship.

Budget limitations including sequestration mean that the defense budget funds for rebuilding are not available, and as the out-of-power Democrat Party insists that domestic needs be considered equally with "defense." (That's the good news.)

Of course the military budget has little to do with defense and mostly has served for elective wars which the US has consistently lost, and then paid to correct such as the $60 billion used for Iraq reconstruction in a country the US converted from an Iran enemy to an Iran ally (Iran says thank you Uncle Sam).

Trump has promised to expand the half-million person Army when in fact there is no need for a US ground force; Canada and Mexico are quite benign. The NSS in fact makes it clear that the objective is not defense but increasing world hegemony: "We will advance American influence because a world that supports American interests and reflects our values makes America more secure and prosperous." Baloney, the wars have made America less secure and will continue to do so as new wars on North Korea and Iran are promoted.

Thus hundreds of billions of dollars are wasted on the military in a country with dire domestic needs. That's no way to Make America Great Again, is it. That's just being stupid.

[Dec 17, 2017] Nikki Haley Is Not Good At Foreign Policy

Notable quotes:
"... Reza Marashi is director of research at the National Iranian American Council. He came to NIAC after serving in the Office of Iranian Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. His articles have appeared in The New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and The Atlantic, among other publications. He has been a guest contributor to CNN, NPR, the BBC, TIME Magazine, The Washington Post, and the Financial Times, among other broadcast outlets. Follow Reza on Twitter: @rezamarashi ..."
"... At least since 1980, millions of bombs have been dropped on the people of Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Gaza, Libya, all 'Made in USA' or 'Made in England': directly sold by Americans and the British and mostly dropped by the American/British pilots, but none has ever been displayed with such a vigor and moral concern and called for the international community to come forward to confront or condemn the manufacturer or the perpetrators who had used them against the civilians. ..."
"... What 'international' law/obligation is this that grants the US the monopoly and full rights to continue to arm criminal regimes in the Middle East and to shamelessly support them, but the same 'international obligation' requires Iran to refrain from any military or even moral support for the victims and demands that Iran must remain an observer of the US-Saudi-UAE mass murder in Yemen?! For how many more years and decades the people in the Middle East are supposed to accept such a contemptible hypocrisy and double standards! ..."
"... You diplomatically brought in the key motivation behind the show – political ambitions. She knows she needs 'name recognition' and seems determined to get it, no matter how. ..."
"... Ever since you left DOS, US' core policy on Iran has not been changed. As a matter of fact ever since the revolution, US Iran policy has not changed an iota, Nicki Healy, Samantha Powers, and Collin Powell and many others that came and gone are all the same, firmly anti- Iran and Iran in as long as Iran and Iranians maintains their nationalistic independence policy. ..."
Dec 15, 2017 | lobelog.com

Nikki Haley is not good at foreign policy. With few discernible achievements to speak of after one year as America's envoy to the UN, her most noteworthy moments have been two incoherent diatribes on Iran. The first -- an airing of grievances passed off as justification for killing the Iran nuclear deal -- came and went with little fanfare. Yesterday, she doubled down with a speech trying to make the case that Iran is, among other things, supplying Houthis in Yemen with ballistic missiles and "fanning the flames of conflict in the region." There are a variety of problems with Haley's assertions. Three in particular stand out.

First, Haley cited a UN report in her claim regarding Iranian missile transfers to the Houthis. Of course, the UN has reached no such conclusion. Instead, a panel of experts concluded that fired missile fragments show components from an Iranian company, but they have "no evidence as to the identity of the broker or supplier." Asked about Haley's claim that Iran is the culprit, Sweden's ambassador to the UN said, "The info I have is less clear." Analysts from the U.S. Department of Defense speaking to reporters at Haley's speech openly acknowledged that they do not know the missiles' origin. Perhaps most surreal is the very same UN report cited by Haley also says the missile included a component that was manufactured by an American company. Did she disingenuously omit that inconvenient bit from her remarks, or fail to read the entire UN report? The world may never know.

If Iran is arming the Houthis, it is a terrible policy that Iranian officials should reverse. All countries should stop arming the various factions in Yemen. Tehran is no exception. But neither is Washington. It was therefore appalling to see that Haley's speech reference Yemen and not include a single word about America's ongoing military, intelligence, and logistical support for the Saudi-led humanitarian catastrophe taking place. If she wanted to focus on facts regarding Iran and Yemen, she should have explained to reporters that, in addition to bolstering Iran's influence in country where it was previously negligible, the Saudi-led debacle has also empowered al-Qaeda -- the same al-Qaeda that attacked the United States on 9/11 with 15 Saudi nationals, and continues to plot attacks on America today.

There is also a stunning lack of foreign policy sophistication in Haley's prevailing assumption regarding Iran and missiles. Not only do we recklessly arm despots in the world's most volatile region with missile of their own, we also provide the Iranian government with a pretext to further develop its missile program -- and cite American and European military sales to an increasingly aggressive Saudi Arabia and UAE as justification for doing so. "Do as I say, not as I do" is a slogan, not a strategy. And if it remains the status quo, so too will the growth of Iran's missile program.

The most inexplicable part of Haley's charade is her insistence on talking about Iran rather than talking to Iran. The only thing stopping her from sitting down one on one with her Iranian counterpart at the UN to respectfully discuss these matters is her own shortsighted ideological rigidity. Frankly, the track record is clear. Talking about Iran produced more missiles under the Bush administration. Talking to Iran eventually produced compromises on missiles under the Obama administration. Haley should spend less time using the UN ambassadorship to boost her domestic political ambitions, and more time actually conducting diplomacy on behalf of the United States.

If Haley is truly concerned about Iran's missile program and regional activities, she can take three immediate steps to demonstrate her seriousness: First, immediately halt all American military, intelligence, and logistical support for the Saudi-led humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen. If the war ends, concerns about Iran in Yemen recede. Second, freeze all missile sales to Middle Eastern countries. If Saudi Arabia and the UAE aren't armed to the teeth with missiles they don't know how to use, Iran's threat perception and missile development reduces accordingly. Third, immediately offer bilateral and multilateral dialogue with the Iranian government on all issues of contention -- with no preconditions. The JCPOA is proof that sustained diplomacy with Iran can produce favorable outcomes for American interests.

Haley's dearth of foreign policy experience is no excuse for her shambolic performance yesterday. Rather than displaying the dignity and poise of America's face to the United Nations, she had her Colin Powell 2003 moment, demonstrating that too many of our leaders have still not learned the lessons of the Iraq war disaster. At best, this is willful ignorance on Haley's part. At worst (and more likely), she cherry-picked intelligence in a fashion eerily reminiscent of the 2002-2003 push for invading Iraq. It's not too late for Haley to salvage her tenure at the UN, but it will require listening more to the professional staff of career government officials she inherited rather than the motley crew of Republican operatives she brought with her to New York.

Reza Marashi is director of research at the National Iranian American Council. He came to NIAC after serving in the Office of Iranian Affairs at the U.S. Department of State. His articles have appeared in The New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and The Atlantic, among other publications. He has been a guest contributor to CNN, NPR, the BBC, TIME Magazine, The Washington Post, and the Financial Times, among other broadcast outlets. Follow Reza on Twitter: @rezamarashi

Khosrow, December 15, 2017

At least since 1980, millions of bombs have been dropped on the people of Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Gaza, Libya, all 'Made in USA' or 'Made in England': directly sold by Americans and the British and mostly dropped by the American/British pilots, but none has ever been displayed with such a vigor and moral concern and called for the international community to come forward to confront or condemn the manufacturer or the perpetrators who had used them against the civilians.

But why this time? Because this time the butcher of the world has found his buddy on the receiving end!

Kooshy, December 15, 2017
"Nikki Haley Is Not Good At Foreign Policy"

That's exactly why she was chosen by gods of Mount Zion for this job at UN, for constantly bashing Iran there is no need for expertise in FP.

Khosrow, December 15, 2017
"If Iran is arming the Houthis, it is a terrible policy that Iranian officials should reverse. All countries should stop arming the various factions in Yemen".

Mr Marashi, you speak from the safety of your office/country: Where the American armed and trained Saudi and Emirati forces and pilots viciously attack defenseless civilians in Yemen that has so far left more than 10,000 killed and 8 million near starvation, it is our moral obligation to support the oppressed Yemenis, not to leave them at the mercy of the Saudi savage air attacks – the Yemenis should not be denied support just as we Iranians were denied arms by the civilized world while we had come under Saddam's savage military attack in the 1980s.

What 'international' law/obligation is this that grants the US the monopoly and full rights to continue to arm criminal regimes in the Middle East and to shamelessly support them, but the same 'international obligation' requires Iran to refrain from any military or even moral support for the victims and demands that Iran must remain an observer of the US-Saudi-UAE mass murder in Yemen?! For how many more years and decades the people in the Middle East are supposed to accept such a contemptible hypocrisy and double standards!?

James Canning, December 15, 2017

Nikki Haley's record at the UN is pathetic, unless the measure in question is degree of gratification provided to the ISRAEL LOBBY.

david wright, December 15, 2017

'Nikki Haley is not good at foreign policy.'

Not good at it; even worse for it. But following in the hallowed tradition of Bush the Son's representative, Colin Powell. Let's hope that even the British have figured out what's going on this time, and will not behave like Lapdog Blair.

Given no excuse at all for waging war, the US will invent one. Past time it was called on this, by the the other 192 nations in the UN

Nona, December 17, 2017

"If Iran is arming the Houthis, it is a terrible policy that IRan should reverse."

WHY is it terrible? Someone should and MUST help the Houthis / Yemen PATRIOTS! No one else is helping them, NOT the U.N .and certainly, what use are they, if they don't prevail on the Saud.Arab. to stop the war.
Not even the Russians are helping the Yemenis.

It isn't even a war, because a war means two sides fighting, but in the case of Yemen, it's a matter of the Yemenis defending themselves. And it's the innocent civilians, women and children, as well as the civilian men, suffering and dying.

So the matter at hand is the Arab invasion, NOT where the missile came from.

The whole thing is a U.S. distraction from the Saudi invasion. And Haley frothing at the mouth, does a good job of distraction.

James Larrimore, December 17, 2017

Great article, Reza.

You diplomatically brought in the key motivation behind the show – political ambitions. She knows she needs 'name recognition' and seems determined to get it, no matter how.

She was mentioned to replace Tillerson as Sec of State, probably at her instigation. She knows T loves her style so she can do as she pleases, like flying with fanfare to see IAEA DG Amano in Vienna – where there is still no Ambassador. But you can bet her ambition is to be the first US woman President, to show the Clinton clan how that is done.

Unfortunately but necessarily, it will be important to 'put her in her place' in as many media fora as possible. Reza, you made a good contribution!

Kooshy, December 16, 2017

Mr. Marashi

Ever since you left DOS, US' core policy on Iran has not been changed. As a matter of fact ever since the revolution, US Iran policy has not changed an iota, Nicki Healy, Samantha Powers, and Collin Powell and many others that came and gone are all the same, firmly anti- Iran and Iran in as long as Iran and Iranians maintains their nationalistic independence policy.

As Mr. Zarif has said, we all have seen this show before and are not impressed with it. Noticeably, what has really been changed is yours and NIAC' analysis and opinions on US policies, especially ever since the failure of US' green color revolution back in 09.

However, IMO, you and NIAC, owe an explanation on what made you change your opinion of US intentions for Iran, after you left the DOS, if you seek support of expatriate Iranians for your efforts.

Jen, December 16, 2017

"Nikki Haley is not good at foreign policy "

I'd nominate this as the understatement of the year for 2017. But someone's got to point out the obvious and Reza Marashi nailed it.

Pity I can't link to a couple of articles on Haley's past incarnations as Governor of South Carolina or accountant to her parents' clothing boutique business so that readers can see Haley's talent for being truly abysmal at whatever she turns her hand to.

Mimo hard, December 16, 2017

Thank you Donald trump for uniting the arab dictators against you and the ugly apartheid state.

[Dec 17, 2017] Dr. Stephen Cohen on Tucker Carlson: Empty Accusations of Russian Meddling Have Become Grave National Security Threat

Notable quotes:
"... Cohen, who has been quite vocal against the Russophobic witch hunt gripping the nation , believes that this falsified 35 page report is part of an "endgame" to mortally wound Trump before he even sets foot in the White House, by grasping at straws to paint him as a puppet of the Kremlin. The purpose of these overt attempts to cripple Trump, which have relied on ham-handed intelligence reports that, according to Cohen "even the New York Times referred to as lacking any evidence whatsoever," is to stop any kind of détente or cooperation with Russia. ..."
Dec 17, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com

With eyebrows suspiciously furrowed, Tucker Carlson sat down tonight with NYU Professor of Russian Studies and contributor to The Nation , Stephen Cohen, to discuss the 35 page #FakeNews dossier which has gripped the nation with nightmares of golden showers and other perverted conduct which was to be used by Russia to keep Trump on a leash.

The left leaning Cohen, who holds a Ph.D. in government and Russian studies from Columbia, taught at Princeton for 30 years before moving to NYU. He has spent a lifetime deeply immersed in US-Russian relations, having been both a long standing friend of Mikhail Gorbachev and an advisor to President George H.W. Bush. His wife is also the editor of uber liberal " The Nation," so it's safe to assume he's not shilling for Trump - and Tucker was right to go in with eyebrows guarded against such a heavyweight.

Cohen, who has been quite vocal against the Russophobic witch hunt gripping the nation , believes that this falsified 35 page report is part of an "endgame" to mortally wound Trump before he even sets foot in the White House, by grasping at straws to paint him as a puppet of the Kremlin. The purpose of these overt attempts to cripple Trump, which have relied on ham-handed intelligence reports that, according to Cohen "even the New York Times referred to as lacking any evidence whatsoever," is to stop any kind of détente or cooperation with Russia.

Cohen believes that these dangerous accusations attempting to brand a US President as a puppet of a foreign government constitute a "grave American national security threat."

At the very end of the interview, Tucker's very un-furrowed eyebrows agreed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtwFEA4dM18

Content originally generated at iBankCoin.com

[Dec 16, 2017] Canada takes initiative among NATO countries in deciding to provide heavy weapons to Ukraine

Dec 16, 2017 | www.newcoldwar.org

Canada has taken a lead among NATO countries in approving heavy weapons sales to the government and armed forces of Ukraine. The Liberal Party government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the decision on December 13.

The U.S. government is poised to make a similar decision .

The decision by Washington's junior partner in Ottawa is a blow to human rights organizations and others in the U.S. and internationally who argue that increasing the arms flow to the regime in Kyiv will only escalate Ukraine's violence against the people's republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine was compelled to sign the 'Minsk-2' ceasefire and peace agreement on Feb 12, 2015. Germany and France endorsed the agreement and have pretended to stand by it. But Ukraine has violated Minsk-2 ( text here ) ever since its signing, with impunity from Kyiv's allies in western Europe and North America.

Minsk-2 was endorsed by the UN Security Council on Feb 17, 2015. That shows the regard which NATO members such as the U.S. and Canada attach to the world body -- the UN it is a useful tool when it can be manipulated to serve their interests, otherwise it is an annoyance to be ignored. Witness their boycotting of the UN General Assembly discussion (and eventual adoption) on July 7, 2017 of the Treaty on the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons .

[Dec 12, 2017] Saakashvii troubles: the reliability of Western support for him in under question

Notable quotes:
"... straight from the lips of Pavlo Munchkin. The west will not react to Saakashvili's detention , and considers it to be an internal Ukrainian matter. So Kiev can make up whatever wild charges it wants, and Uncle Sam will not ride to the rescue. Saakashvili has apparently outlived his usefulness. ..."
"... Well, indeed, it looks like the collective West decided to just say to poor, ageing, clumsy Mishiko "I know thee not, old man!". The ritualistic spitting and trampling of Saakasvhili effigy in the Freest Press in the World (Western one) will commence soon enough. But before that – a quick reminder of what they were saying, before re-alignment of the winds, blowing from Washington's ObCom. ..."
"... "AFTER the Maidan revolution and the start of the Russian war against Ukraine in 2014, Western policy had two aims: to halt and punish Russian aggression and to help Ukraine become a democratic state governed by the rule of law. America imposed sanctions on Russia, ordered the president, Petro Poroshenko, to establish an anti-corruption force and sent Joe Biden, then vice-president, on repeated visits to insist on fighting graft. The EU imposed sanctions on Russia, and made support for civil-society and the rule of law a linchpin of the association agreement it signed with Ukraine in 2014. ..."
"... In that light, the news out of Ukraine over the past few weeks has been dire. The country's prosecutor-general has disrupted investigations by its National Anti-corruption Bureau, with the apparent consent of Mr Poroshenko. The interior minister has intervened to protect his son from similar scrutiny. Officers in the security service, the SBU, have tried to arrest Mikheil Saakashvili, the former Georgian president turned Ukrainian corruption-fighter, only to be driven back by protesters. Prosecutors are targeting anti-corruption activists; the army, interior-ministry troops and private militias work at cross-purposes, answering to different politicians or oligarchs . Mr Poroshenko's government has been seriously weakened. ..."
"... "To some Europeans and Americans, this picture suggests that their efforts to persuade Ukraine to turn over a new leaf were always doomed to fail. That is a misreading. In fact, the recent chaos in Ukraine comes in part because in the past year, especially since the inauguration of President Donald Trump, Europe and America have eased the pressure. If they do not restore their commitment to defending anti-corruption reforms, Ukraine risks sinking back into the morass from which it tried to extricate itself with Maidan. ..."
"... Ukraine's grubby politicians and oligarchs have tried to frustrate Western aims without openly defying them (see article ). Partly as a result, policy under Mr Trump has lost its focus on fighting graft. Kurt Volker, the American envoy to Ukraine, works on external security; America may soon sell the country lethal weapons for the first time. But when the State Department complains about corruption, it is ignored -- because (unlike Mr Biden) the White House offers it no support. As for the EU, few believe it would jeopardise its association agreement with Ukraine for the sake of the rule of law. So, the country's elite no longer fears attacking investigators and activists." ..."
"... "Lay off the pay-offs ..."
"... If they succeed in ending the attempts to fight graft, it will be a disaster for Ukraine -- and a step back for Europe and America, too. The country is the focal point of the West's conflict with Russia. Weak and divided, it is vulnerable to Russian encroachment, especially if Vladimir Putin decides he needs to fire up patriotic Russian voters. Chaos would also buttress Mr Putin's claim that the West's aims in Ukraine are purely anti-Russian and have nothing to do with democracy or the rule of law. All this would undermine the rules-based global order, with consequences in the South China Sea and elsewhere. ..."
"... Now that Ukraine is defying complaints by America's State Department and the EU's foreign-policy arm, it is vital that America and Europe use every tool at their disposal to support corruption-fighters in Kiev. The EU should make plain that the benefits of the association pact depend on progress against graft; America should attach the same conditions to arms sales. Prosecutors in Western capitals should investigate the laundering of ill-gotten Ukrainian wealth. Support for Ukraine's territorial integrity should not involve tolerance for the lack of integrity among its politicians." ..."
Dec 12, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Warren , December 10, 2017 at 8:26 pm

Al Jazeera English
Published on 9 Dec 2017
SUBSCRIBE 1.7M
He was the president of Georgia, then a governor in Ukraine, and now he's in jail on hunger strike.

The arrest, and re-arrest, of Mikhail Saakashvii in Kiev has stirred protests which evoke memories of the Ukrainian revolution three years ago.

Saakashvili's supporters say his detention is based on lies and they want him let go. They already freed him once earlier this week – from a police van.

Tuesday's dramatic scenes saw a former president being dragged across a roof. Police arrested him for allegedly conspiring with Russia against the Ukrainian state. Saakashvili then escaped custody, before police tracked him down again on Friday. The former Georgian leader says his arrest is politically motivated.

But is it really?

Presenter: Sami Zeidan

Guests:

Alexander Korman – Former Head of the Public Council and First Deputy Chairman of Public Council to the Ministry of Foreign Relations of Ukraine.
Sergey Markov – Former Russian MP & spokesman for President Vladimir Putin.
Lilit Gevorgyan – IHS Global Insigh tanalyst and principal economist covering Russia & Ukraine.

marknesop , December 9, 2017 at 9:34 pm
Aaaaand there you have it, folks, straight from the lips of Pavlo Munchkin. The west will not react to Saakashvili's detention , and considers it to be an internal Ukrainian matter. So Kiev can make up whatever wild charges it wants, and Uncle Sam will not ride to the rescue. Saakashvili has apparently outlived his usefulness.

I don't really feel sorry for him, because I've always thought he was a twat and his preening over being the golden child of Washington was sickening. In fact, he probably deserves whatever happens to him, although I expect the west will make some kind of private deal to get him out on the promise that he will stay out of Ukraine. Where he will go then is anyone's guess, since he is a stateless person with no citizenship. But it is significant to note how much weight Ukraine still swings with the west, even though Europe is getting impatient about its hamfisted anti-corruption charade. Kiev just said "Stay out of it", and the west retired smartly.

I think you will agree that is hardly a climate in which Poroshenko will feel moved to do anything much about corruption beyond making a lot of noise and promises.

Lyttenburgh , December 10, 2017 at 12:36 am
Well, indeed, it looks like the collective West decided to just say to poor, ageing, clumsy Mishiko "I know thee not, old man!". The ritualistic spitting and trampling of Saakasvhili effigy in the Freest Press in the World (Western one) will commence soon enough. But before that – a quick reminder of what they were saying, before re-alignment of the winds, blowing from Washington's ObCom.

The Economist (Editorial): Ukraine is a mess; the West should press it harder to fight graft – Lay off the pay-offs
Drama in the streets is a sign of worsening corruption. Ukraine must notbe allowed to fail

Ukraine is a mess? Nooooo waaaaaay! Are you sure? Tell me more!

"AFTER the Maidan revolution and the start of the Russian war against Ukraine in 2014, Western policy had two aims: to halt and punish Russian aggression and to help Ukraine become a democratic state governed by the rule of law. America imposed sanctions on Russia, ordered the president, Petro Poroshenko, to establish an anti-corruption force and sent Joe Biden, then vice-president, on repeated visits to insist on fighting graft. The EU imposed sanctions on Russia, and made support for civil-society and the rule of law a linchpin of the association agreement it signed with Ukraine in 2014.

In that light, the news out of Ukraine over the past few weeks has been dire. The country's prosecutor-general has disrupted investigations by its National Anti-corruption Bureau, with the apparent consent of Mr Poroshenko. The interior minister has intervened to protect his son from similar scrutiny. Officers in the security service, the SBU, have tried to arrest Mikheil Saakashvili, the former Georgian president turned Ukrainian corruption-fighter, only to be driven back by protesters. Prosecutors are targeting anti-corruption activists; the army, interior-ministry troops and private militias work at cross-purposes, answering to different politicians or oligarchs . Mr Poroshenko's government has been seriously weakened. "

That's important part – keep it mind. But here comes the "meat" of the article! Good flunkies of Ed Lukas has found the answer to the eternal question "Whom to blame?" as pertains to the Ukraine and its current woes! Are you ready? Here it is:

"To some Europeans and Americans, this picture suggests that their efforts to persuade Ukraine to turn over a new leaf were always doomed to fail. That is a misreading. In fact, the recent chaos in Ukraine comes in part because in the past year, especially since the inauguration of President Donald Trump, Europe and America have eased the pressure. If they do not restore their commitment to defending anti-corruption reforms, Ukraine risks sinking back into the morass from which it tried to extricate itself with Maidan.

Ukraine's grubby politicians and oligarchs have tried to frustrate Western aims without openly defying them (see article ). Partly as a result, policy under Mr Trump has lost its focus on fighting graft. Kurt Volker, the American envoy to Ukraine, works on external security; America may soon sell the country lethal weapons for the first time. But when the State Department complains about corruption, it is ignored -- because (unlike Mr Biden) the White House offers it no support. As for the EU, few believe it would jeopardise its association agreement with Ukraine for the sake of the rule of law. So, the country's elite no longer fears attacking investigators and activists."

Trump! It is all Trump's fault! Because – surely! – under the watch of the President of Peace B. Obama and gramps Biden no dodgy things ever happened in the Ukraine, noooope! Biden (and his son) gonna defend this PO like lions! This also welcomes nasty question – aren't Mr. Poroshenko himself an oligarch, whose personal wealth skyrocketed since his election? And maybe – I'm not insisting, no-no – having lots of cash stashed in "Panama Papers Fund" precludes him from actually fighting corruption – and not, you know, the election of Trump? Heresy, I know!

But the articles goes from strength to strength, boldly skipping to the "What to do?" section. The solution is as brilliant and though-over as everything else in there:

"Lay off the pay-offs

If they succeed in ending the attempts to fight graft, it will be a disaster for Ukraine -- and a step back for Europe and America, too. The country is the focal point of the West's conflict with Russia. Weak and divided, it is vulnerable to Russian encroachment, especially if Vladimir Putin decides he needs to fire up patriotic Russian voters. Chaos would also buttress Mr Putin's claim that the West's aims in Ukraine are purely anti-Russian and have nothing to do with democracy or the rule of law. All this would undermine the rules-based global order, with consequences in the South China Sea and elsewhere.

Now that Ukraine is defying complaints by America's State Department and the EU's foreign-policy arm, it is vital that America and Europe use every tool at their disposal to support corruption-fighters in Kiev. The EU should make plain that the benefits of the association pact depend on progress against graft; America should attach the same conditions to arms sales. Prosecutors in Western capitals should investigate the laundering of ill-gotten Ukrainian wealth. Support for Ukraine's territorial integrity should not involve tolerance for the lack of integrity among its politicians."

Hahahahahhahahahhahahhahhahahahahaohmysidesarehurtinghahhahhahahahmakeitstophahahha

Nope. Your Russophobia is high (and you yourself dear Western elites are also high most of the time when it comes to Russia) that you will allow this unholy corrupt mess to persist. Because, really, you are not interested in "democracy" and "open society". Not at the prize of people electing someone, whose strings you cannot pull.

At the same time – this is "big: and "respectable" The Economist we are talking about. They smell the fire from the yet unlit tires of new Maidan. They are afraid . They know, that their "Operation: SHOWCASE" of turning Ukraine into a "democratic alternative to Russia" failed. They are in denial.

Oh, how sweet!

Cortes , December 10, 2017 at 2:08 am
The obligatory "rules-based global order" makes a tardy but welcome cameo appearance like an aging well-loved Thespian milking the audience for a final burst of applause before retirement. Great stuff!
Moscow Exile , December 10, 2017 at 6:25 am
Украинцы проголосовали за возвращение "преступного режима" Януковича

Ukrainians voted for a return of the "criminal regime" of Yanukovich
01:24 – 10.12.2017

Ninety-two percent of the audience of the Ukrainian TV channel "NewsOne" voted for the return of the regime of former President Viktor Yanukovych, reports the news portal "Politnavigator".

In Saturday's broadcast, viewers were asked to choose one of two options to answer the question "For whom would you vote: for the last criminal power or the current one?". Out of 46,686 people only eight per cent supported the policy of the current president, Petro Poroshenko.

On 23 October, the Centre for social studies "Sofia" published the results of a poll in which 79 percent of the population in varying degrees did not approve of Poroshenko being head of state: the answer "fully approve of the President" was chosen by only 1.6 percent.

On October 17, the Prosecutor General of the Ukraine, Yuriy Lutsenko, accused former president Viktor Yanukovich of embezzling assets worth $40 billion. According to the head of the supervisory authority, this was comparable with the annual budget of the country.

Yanukovych was President of the Ukraine from 2010 to 2014. After a violent regime change by means of the Euromaidan mass protests in Kiev and other cities, he left the country.

In the Ukraine, there have been initiated several criminal cases made against the former head of state and his property on the territory of the country has been seized.

marknesop , December 10, 2017 at 3:46 pm
There's a useful lesson there for someone: more than 90% – arguably; we have no way to know how scientific or representative this poll was – of the population does not support the current government, in a country that has considerable and recent practical experience of revolution. Yet the current government prevails with complete impunity, and even flaunts its contempt for accountability. How can these two realities coexist? Is it possible the violent nationalist element wields disproportionate influence, despite all the quacking about its low support in the polls and Russian exaggeration of its extremist beliefs?
Patient Observer , December 10, 2017 at 8:39 am
Can't vouch for the entire web site but this was interesting:

Baiting is the act of deliberately annoying or provoking someone to extreme emotion. When a person baits another, they are deliberately taunting in order to provoke a response from the offender's attack.

If you are a fisherman, it might be fun but if you're the fish -- or worse a worm squirming on a hook, being used to entice a predator to amuse? It's simply not as much fun for people who are the victims of any form of bait and switch attack.

Truly believing the world as they know it revolves around them, they tend to symptomatically behave in ways that are compulsively self-promoting, grandiose, illogical, irrational, egocentric, and grandiose.

Every social interaction is seen as a competition of sorts, with the Narcissist behaving as if their distorted, self-deluded version of any fact, story, or reality is somehow rooted in divine truth (rather than being recognized as a symptom of psychiatric dysfunction and outright gaslighting tales and lies).

The condition -- a personality TYPE classification, rather than an actual diagnosis of illness (per se) -- tends to be rooted in cultural nurturing, for the most part.

http://flyingmonkeysdenied.com/definition/baiting/

Warren , December 10, 2017 at 10:44 am
Can Neoliberalism Ever Go Away?

People all over the world are protesting against globalisation, inequality and selfishness. Democratic liberalism is supposed to solve these problems, but liberalism and its big brother neoliberalism are actually the cause of these problems. Furthermore, once a country has adopted neoliberalist policies it is very hard for it ever to reject them.

https://sputniknews.com/radio_brave_new_world/201707281055961487-can-neoliberalism-ever-go-away/

[Dec 09, 2017] What World Leaders Think of Jerusalem as Israel's Capital - YouTube

Dec 09, 2017 | www.youtube.com

dulsen20113 days ago

Here is a list of officials in the US Government who hold Dual Citizenship, as well as just how much influence Israel had and still have on our government..

1. Attorney General - Michael Mukasey
2. Head of Homeland Security - Michael Chertoff
3. Chairman Pentagon's Defense Policy Board - Richard Perle
4. Deputy Defense Secretary (Former) - Paul Wolfowitz
5. Under Secretary of Defense - Douglas Feith
6. National Security Council Advisor - Elliott Abrams
7. Vice President #$%$ Cheney's Chief of Staff (Former) - "Scooter" Libby
8. White House Deputy Chief of Staff - Joshua Bolten
9. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs - Marc Grossman
10. Director of Policy Planning at the State Department - Richard Haass
11. U.S. Trade Representative (Cabinet-level Position) - Robert Zoellick
12. Pentagon's Defense Policy Board - James Schlesinger
13. UN Representative (Former) - John Bolton
14. Under Secretary for Arms Control - David Wurmser
15. Pentagon's Defense Policy Board - Eliot Cohen
16. Senior Advisor to the President - Steve Goldsmith
17. Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary - Christopher Gersten
18. Assistant Secretary of State - Lincoln Bloomfield
19. Deputy Assistant to the President - Jay Lefkowitz
20. White House Political Director - Ken Melman
21. National Security Study Group - Edward Luttwak
22. Pentagon's Defense Policy Board - Kenneth Adelman
23. Defense Intelligence Agency Analyst (Former) - Lawrence (Larry) Franklin
24. National Security Council Advisor - Robert Satloff
25. President Export-Import Bank U.S. - Mel Sembler
26. Deputy Assistant Secretary, Administration for Children and Families - Christopher Gersten
27. Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development for Public Affairs - Mark Weinberger
28. White House Speechwriter - David Frum
29. White House Spokesman (Former) - Ari Fleischer
30. Pentagon's Defense Policy Board - Henry Kissinger
31. Deputy Secretary of Commerce - Samuel Bodman
32. Under Secretary of State for Management - Bonnie Cohen
33. Director of Foreign Service Institute - Ruth Davis

Senate:

Senator Dianne Feinstein (California)
Senator Barbara Boxer (California)
Senator Benjamin Cardin (Maryland)
Senator Russ Feingold (Wisconsin)
Senator Al Franken (Minnesota)
Senator Herb Kohl (Wisconsin)
Senator Frank Lautenberg (New Jersey)
Senator Joe Lieberman (Connecticut) (Independent)
Senator Carl Levin (Michigan)
Senator Bernard Sanders (Vermont) (Independent)
Senator Charles Schumer (New York)
Senator Ron Wyden (Oregon)

House of Representatives:

Representative Howard Berman (California)
Representative Susan Davis (California)
Representative Bob Filner (California)
Representative Jane Harman (California)
Representative Adam Schiff (California)
Representative Henry Waxman (California)
Representative Brad Sherman (California)
Representative Gary Ackerman (New York)
Representative John H. Adler (New Jersey)
Representative Shelley Berkley (Nevada)
Representative Steve Cohen (Tennessee)
Representative Eliot Engel (New York)
Representative Barney Frank (Massachusetts)
Representative Gabrielle Giffords (Arizona)
Representative Alan Grayson (Florida)
Representative Paul Hodes (New Hampshire)
Representative Steve Israel (New York)
Representative Steve Kagen (Wisconsin)
Representative Ronald Klein (Florida)
Representative Sander Levin (Michigan)
Representative Nita Lowey (New York)
Representative Jerry Nadler (New York)
Representative Jared Polis (Colorado)
Representative Steve Rothman (New Jersey)
Representative Jan Schakowsky (Illinois)
Representative Allyson Schwartz (Pennsylvania)
Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Florida)
Representative Anthony Weiner (New York)
Representative John Yarmuth (Kentucky)

Last and not the least influential Zionist lobby in America is the Christian Zionists Movement backed by American senators and politicians, bragging a million plus members

America is the only country in the world that has this many citizens of another country in its congress??? 

And 4 billions every year to israel ?? Why ?? 

No wonder israel AIPAC is running a muck


[Dec 09, 2017] Criticism of Ukraine's language law justified rights body by Alessandra Prentice

Paradoxically it was language question which by-and-large fueled Crimea secession and Donbass uprising. Now they decide to step on the same rake again.
If Ukraine strive to be like Canada and the part of EU why do not adopt English as an official language, to defuse the tensions relegating Ukrainian and Russian to the role of regional languages (which both of them now actually are). That will instantly diminish the influence of Russia and thus fulfill the main goal of Western Ukrainian nationalists who are in power after Maydan (at least partially). English is a great, cultural and scientifically dominant language now and countries like Canada enjoy full benefits of this situation. Because cultural and political influence of Russia is what Ukrainian nationalists are most afraid of. English is politically acceptable to them. That also will save money of textbooks and like, especially university level textbooks.
They now actually gave a powerful tool for Russia to further limit economic ties claiming discrimination of Russian speaking population. Not that Ukrainian nationalist care much about Russian reaction.
But Western Ukrainian nationalists have a penchant for making disastrous for the Ukrainian economy moves to feed their ambitions and stereotypes. Which led to the situation when Ukraine is just debt slave nation with limited sovereignty and huge problems due to impoverishment of population and decay of Soviet era infrastructure. Neoliberalism is not a friend of such countries as Ukraine, despite all population expectations after Maydan. They want to milk Ukraine, not to help. and they are very skillful in that as Ukraine probably leaned during 90th. This is what neoliberal " disaster capitalism " is about. In other words Ukraine which previously somehow managed to balance between West and East milking both, moved itself in the zugzwang position.
As for adoption of Ukrainian (which is a beautiful language, BTW), think what would happen if Canadian French nationalists managed to force French upon the county as official language while bordering with the USA (actually like in Ukraine where in western part of the country there are few people who do not speak Russian, there are few people in Canada who neither speak nor understand English)
It is critical now that the population can speak English because the markets for Ukraine now are in the West. Ukraine by and large lost Russian market. Probably for a long time.
Notable quotes:
"... "The less favorable treatment of these (non-EU) languages is difficult to justify and therefore raises issues of discrimination," it said. Language is a sensitive issue in Ukraine. ..."
"... After the pro-European Maidan uprising in 2014, the decision to scrap a law allowing some regions to use Russian as an official second language fueled anti-Ukrainian unrest in the east that escalated into a Russia-backed separatist insurgency. ..."
Dec 09, 2017 | www.reuters.com

Kiev has submitted the law for review by the Venice Commission, a body which rules on rights and democracy disputes in Europe and whose decisions member states, which include Ukraine, commit to respecting.

In an opinion adopted formally on Friday, the commission said it was legitimate for Ukraine to address inequalities by helping citizens gain fluency in the state language, Ukrainian.

"However, the strong domestic and international criticism drawn especially by the provisions reducing the scope of education in minority languages seems justified," it said in a statement.

It said the ambiguous wording of parts of the 'Article 7' legislation raised questions about how the shift to all-Ukrainian secondary education would be implemented while safeguarding the rights of ethnic minorities.

As of 2015, Ukraine had 621 schools that taught in Russian, 78 in Romanian, 68 in Hungarian and five in Polish, according to education ministry data. The commission said a provision in the new law to allow some subjects to be taught in official EU languages, such as Hungarian, Romanian and Polish, appeared to discriminate against speakers of Russian, the most widely used non-state language.

"The less favorable treatment of these (non-EU) languages is difficult to justify and therefore raises issues of discrimination," it said. Language is a sensitive issue in Ukraine.

After the pro-European Maidan uprising in 2014, the decision to scrap a law allowing some regions to use Russian as an official second language fueled anti-Ukrainian unrest in the east that escalated into a Russia-backed separatist insurgency.

[Dec 09, 2017] The West Backed the Wrong Man in Ukraine by Leonid Bershidsky

Poor Ukraine. It is now just a prey of major powers and other neoliberal predators, including transnational corporations. Each wants a fat piece. Looks after Poroshenko "revolt" against anti-corruption bureau prompted Washington to "switch horses during crossing the river" (which is very Tramp-style decision). A new favorite most probably is Timoshenko (about whom they have a lot of compromising material, so she will always be on the hook). When a neoliberals poodle like Aslund tweets " "President Poroshenko appears to have abandoned the fight against corruption, any ambition for economic growth, EU or IMF funding," you can be sure that Washington priorities now definitely changed. Such a brave man telling people the hard truth ;-) This guy would praise Poroshenko to skies, if that wouldn't be case. .. The message from Bershidsky handlers who ordered this "hit piece" is that same -- "The moor has done his duty, moor has to go". Such a hatchet job in MSM like Bloomberg, NYT or Wapo is usually done only under direct order from powers that be.
Re-appearance of Saakashvili with this farce of illegal crossing of the border (imagine this !) on the political scene is probably also orchestrated from Washington.
Formally Poroshenko is accused that he is trying to undermine the work of anti-corruption bureau controlled by FBI. The real situation might be that gradually Poroshenko probably understood that blind following of Washington political line is the road to nowhere and leads to further impoverishing of population. Also "independent" status of anti-corruption buro to a certain extent makes Ukrain a colony with colonial administration. Specifically it give FBI the possibility to persecute any Ukrainian politician. On the other hand Poroshenko also have far right nationalists sitting behind his back and they are probably not too exited by neoliberal reforms Poroshenko pursue. Standard of living in Ukraine dropped to the level when it corresponds to standard of living of some Central African countries -- less then $2 a day. It became a "sex shop" for Western Europeans, especially French. Most of prostitutes in Western Europe are Ukrainian woman. In other words both Ukraine and Poroshenko are now is zugzwang situation.
So in desperation Poroshenko probably started making some "unapproved" moves interfering with work of FBI controlled anti-corruption buro (which actually did not jail a single US citizen for corruption). Probably following Polish example of ' disobedience " to neoliberal dictate. A reaction followed.
Charges of corruption is such a classic tool of "color revolutions" that now it can be viewed as just a symbol of renewed attempt to interfere into Ukraine political life. A Washington Obcom dictate, if you wish. Actually corruption a little bit complicates looting of the country which if done by financial mechanisms as it means that in contracts Western companies have some disadvantage and need a local "roof" which negatively affects the profits.
Notable quotes:
"... He and his first prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, knew what the U.S. State Department and Vice President Joe Biden, who acted as the Obama administration's point man on Ukraine, wanted to hear. ..."
Dec 05, 2017 | www.bloomberg.com

President Petro Poroshenko is sacrificing Westernization to a personal political agenda.

It's become increasingly clear that Obama-era U.S. politicians backed the wrong people in Ukraine. President Petro Poroshenko's moves to consolidate his power now include sidelining the anti-corruption institutions he was forced to set up by Ukraine's Western allies.

Poroshenko, who had briefly served as Ukraine's foreign minister, looked worldlier than his predecessor, the deposed Viktor Yanukovych, and spoke passable English. He and his first prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk, knew what the U.S. State Department and Vice President Joe Biden, who acted as the Obama administration's point man on Ukraine, wanted to hear. So, as Ukraine emerged from the revolutionary chaos of January and February 2014, the U.S., and with it the EU, backed Poroshenko and Yatsenyuk as Ukraine's next leaders. Armed with this support, not least with promises of major technical aid and International Monetary Fund loans, they won elections, posing as Westernizers who would lead Ukraine into Europe. But their agendas turned out to be more self-serving.

... ... ...

After a failed attempt to kick Saakashvili, an anti-corruption firebrand, out of Ukraine for allegedly obtaining its citizenship under false pretences, Poroshenko's law enforcement apparatus has harassed and deported the Georgian-born politician's allies. Finance Minister Oleksandr Danilyuk, who helped Saakashvili set up a think tank in Kiev -- which is now under investigation for suspected financial violations -- has accused law-enforcement agencies of "putting pressure on business, on those who want to change the country." Danilyuk himself is being investigated for tax evasion.

... ... ...

"President Poroshenko appears to have abandoned the fight against corruption, any ambition for economic growth, EU or IMF funding," economist Anders Aslund, who has long been optimistic about Ukrainian reforms, tweeted recently.

... ... ...

Poroshenko, however, would have gotten nowhere -- and wouldn't be defending Ukraine's opaque, corrupt, backward political system today -- without Western support. No amount of friendly pressure is going to change him. If Ukrainians shake up their apathy to do to him what they did to Yanukovych -- or when he comes up for reelection in 2019 -- this mistake shouldn't be repeated. It's not easy to find younger, more principled, genuinely European-oriented politicians in Ukraine, but they exist. Otherwise, Western politicians and analysts will have to keep acting shocked that another representative of the old elite is suddenly looking a lot like Yanukovych.

[Dec 09, 2017] The Loose Cannon the Neocons Wanted in NATO by Patrick J. Buchanan

In no way Mr. Saakashvili is an independent political player, he is just a pawn of some complex gambit against Poroshenko. Who is behind him? Timoshenko, the far right nationalists (that would be very strange), the USA is completely unclear. But in no way he of his own can command loyalty of the crowd in Kiev, this crowd most probably consist of Timoshenko supporters, who were communicated the the "wish" of their leader that "we need to support Mr. Saakashvili, he is one of us". In any case those events are a huge surprise to most observers, who assumes that the USA firmly backs Poroshenko.
Notable quotes:
"... "With a Ukrainian flag draped across his shoulders and a pair of handcuffs still attached to one of his wrists, Mr. Saakashvili then led hundreds of supporters in a march across Kiev toward Parliament. Speaking through a bullhorn he called for 'peaceful protests' to remove Mr. Poroshenko from office, just as protests had toppled the former President, Victor F. Yanukovych, in February 2014." ..."
"... And there was broad support for bringing Georgia into NATO. This would have given Saakashvili an ability to ignite a confrontation with Russia, which could have forced U.S. intervention.Consider Ukraine. Three years ago, McCain was declaring, in support of the overthrow of the elected pro-Russian government in Kiev, "We are all Ukrainians now." Following that coup, U.S. elites were urging us to confront Putin in Crimea, bring Ukraine, as well as Georgia, into NATO, and send Kiev the lethal weapons needed to defeat Russian-backed rebels in the East. This could have led straight to a Ukraine-Russia war, precipitated by our sending of U.S. arms. ..."
"... Alliances, after all, are the transmission belts of war. ..."
"... These all purpose internationalist revolutionaries who keep turning up here and there like the proverbial bad penny usually have deep state connections. ..."
"... Neocons are a scourge on the planet. Somehow they always manage to stay in control of things even when they make so many war mongering blunders. They must have supernatural help, but not the good kind. ..."
"... "These all purpose internationalist revolutionaries who keep turning up here and there like the proverbial bad penny ' Saakashvili as a latter day Che Guevara? Ha, ha, ha. "History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce." K. Marx. ..."
"... Expanding NATO was a damn fool thing to do. The Romans couldn't hang onto Mesopotamia; overextension is real. Let's hope we get a leader who will retrench. Oh, and bring back Giraldi. Yes, Veruschka, there is an Israel Lobby. ..."
Dec 08, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Even interventionists are regretting some of the wars into which they helped plunge the United States in this century. Among those wars are Afghanistan and Iraq, the longest in our history; Libya, which was left without a stable government; Syria's civil war, a six-year human rights disaster we helped kick off by arming rebels to overthrow Bashar Assad; and Yemen, where a U.S.-backed Saudi bombing campaign and starvation blockade is causing a humanitarian catastrophe. Yet, twice this century, the War Party was beaten back when seeking a clash with Putin's Russia. And the "neo-isolationists" who won those arguments served America well.

What triggered this observation was an item on Page 1 of Wednesday's New York Times that read in its entirety: "Mikheil Saakashvili, former president of Georgia, led marchers through Kiev after threatening to jump from a five-story building to evade arrest. Page A4"

Who is Saakashvili? The wunderkind elected in 2004 in Tbilisi after a "Rose Revolution" we backed during George W. Bush's crusade for global democracy. During the Beijing Olympics in August 2008, Saakashvili sent his army crashing into the tiny enclave of South Ossetia, which had broken free of Georgia when Georgia broke free of Russia. In overrunning the enclave, however, Saakashvili's troops killed Russian peacekeepers. Big mistake. Within 24 hours, Putin's tanks and troops were pouring through Roki Tunnel, running Saakashvili's army out of South Ossetia, and occupying parts of Georgia itself. As defeat loomed for the neocon hero, U.S. foreign policy elites were alive with denunciations of "Russian aggression" and calls to send in the 82nd Airborne, bring Georgia into NATO, and station U.S. forces in the Caucasus.

"We are all Georgians!" thundered John McCain. Not quite. When an outcry arose against getting into a collision with Russia, Bush, reading the nation right, decided to confine U.S. protests to the nonviolent. A wise call. And Saakashvili? He held power until 2013, and then saw his party defeated, was charged with corruption, and fled to Ukraine. There, President Boris Poroshenko, beneficiary of the Kiev coup the U.S. had backed in 2014, put him in charge of Odessa, one of the most corrupt provinces in a country rife with corruption.

In 2016, an exasperated Saakashvili quit, charged his patron Poroshenko with corruption, and fled Ukraine. In September, with a band of supporters, he made a forced entry back across the border.

Here is the Times' Andrew Higgins on his latest antics:

"On Tuesday Saakashvili, onetime darling of the West, took his high-wire political career to bizarre new heights when he climbed onto the roof of his five-story apartment building in the center of Kiev... As hundreds of supporters gathered below, he shouted insults at Ukraine's leaders and threatened to jump if security agents tried to grab him. Dragged from the roof after denouncing Mr. Poroshenko as a traitor and a thief, the former Georgian leader was detained but then freed by his supporters, who blocked a security service van before it could take Mr. Saakashvili to a Kiev detention center and allowed him to escape.

"With a Ukrainian flag draped across his shoulders and a pair of handcuffs still attached to one of his wrists, Mr. Saakashvili then led hundreds of supporters in a march across Kiev toward Parliament. Speaking through a bullhorn he called for 'peaceful protests' to remove Mr. Poroshenko from office, just as protests had toppled the former President, Victor F. Yanukovych, in February 2014."

This reads like a script for a Peter Sellers movie in the '60s. Yet this clown was president of Georgia, for whose cause in South Ossetia some in our foreign policy elite thought we should go to the brink of war with Russia.

And there was broad support for bringing Georgia into NATO. This would have given Saakashvili an ability to ignite a confrontation with Russia, which could have forced U.S. intervention.Consider Ukraine. Three years ago, McCain was declaring, in support of the overthrow of the elected pro-Russian government in Kiev, "We are all Ukrainians now." Following that coup, U.S. elites were urging us to confront Putin in Crimea, bring Ukraine, as well as Georgia, into NATO, and send Kiev the lethal weapons needed to defeat Russian-backed rebels in the East. This could have led straight to a Ukraine-Russia war, precipitated by our sending of U.S. arms.

Do we really want to cede to folks of the temperament of Mikhail Saakashvili an ability to instigate a war with a nuclear-armed Russia, which every Cold War president was resolved to avoid, even if it meant accepting Moscow's hegemony in Eastern Europe all the way to the Elbe?

Watching Saakashvili losing it in the streets of Kiev like some blitzed college student should cause us to reassess the stability of all these allies to whom we have ceded a capacity to drag us into war. Alliances, after all, are the transmission belts of war.

Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever.

Kirt Higdon , says: December 8, 2017 at 12:15 am
I'd bet that Saak is a CIA asset who is probably moon-lighting for other intelligence services as well. Israel? Russia? Iran? Turkey? Who knows? These all purpose internationalist revolutionaries who keep turning up here and there like the proverbial bad penny usually have deep state connections.
Mary Myers , says: December 8, 2017 at 12:58 am
Neocons are a scourge on the planet. Somehow they always manage to stay in control of things even when they make so many war mongering blunders. They must have supernatural help, but not the good kind.
cka2nd , says: December 8, 2017 at 6:19 am
Maybe its time conservatives acknowledged that the Rosenbergs did a good thing by helping the Soviet Union get the A-bomb. It's obvious that the only thing stopping our bloodthirsty, mad dog foreign policy establishment from attacking Russia or North Korea is their nukes, just as the threat of Soviet nukes is what kept U.S. presidents from dropping ours on North Korea and North Vietnam. If the so-called "foreign policy realists" – whose forebears have copious amounts of Latin American, African and Asian blood on their hands – ever get back into Foggy Bottom and the West Wing, maybe they could prevail on the President to issue a posthumous pardon for the Rosenbergs and all of the other American Communists who greased the wheels for the Red Bomb.
Michael Kenny , says: December 8, 2017 at 10:39 am
Mr Buchanan's standard line. Vladimir Putin must be allowed to inflict a humiliating defeat on the evil United States. What Mr Buchanan sidesteps is the inherent contradiction in his argument. As anyone who has read his articles over the years will know, his enemy is the EU, which he wants to destroy at all costs, probably because he sees it as a challenge to US global hegemony. In the original neocon scam, Putin was a "useful idiot" to serve as a battering ram to break up the EU and a bogeyman to frighten the resulting plethora of weak statelets to submit to US hegemony in return for such protection as the US vouchsafed to give them. In return for his services, the US would give Putin such part of the European cake as it vouchsafed to give him. Putin, at that point, would, of course, have been an American stooge, logical in the context of US global hegemony. However, by grabbing Ukrainian territory by military force, Putin challenged US global hegemony and as long as he is allowed to occupy Ukrainian territory, US global hegemony is worthless. That, in its turn, will probably provoke a Soviet-style implosion of the whole American house of cards. Thus, in order to maintain US global hegemony by destroying the EU, Mr Buchanan has to destroy US global hegemony by backing Putin!
darko , says: December 8, 2017 at 10:42 am
"These all purpose internationalist revolutionaries who keep turning up here and there like the proverbial bad penny ' Saakashvili as a latter day Che Guevara? Ha, ha, ha. "History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce." K. Marx.
Grumpy Old Man , says: December 8, 2017 at 11:03 am
Expanding NATO was a damn fool thing to do. The Romans couldn't hang onto Mesopotamia; overextension is real. Let's hope we get a leader who will retrench. Oh, and bring back Giraldi. Yes, Veruschka, there is an Israel Lobby.
ukm1 , says: December 8, 2017 at 11:31 am
Mr. Buchanan wrote: "We are all Georgians!" thundered John McCain.

Will American Senators claim this time around that "We are all South Koreans!" or "We are all Japanese!" or "We are all Taiwanese!"?

LINK: http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2017/12/06/chinese-state-media-tells-citizens-prepare-north-korea-nuclear-war/

Mary Myers , says: December 8, 2017 at 1:17 pm
Michael Kenney suffers from PDS –Putin Derangement Syndrome.
One Guy , says: December 8, 2017 at 1:23 pm
I'm having trouble understanding why I should care about the Ukraine, or NATO, or this Saakashvili person. Someone please tell me how they affect me personally.
PR Doucette , says: December 8, 2017 at 2:59 pm
That Saakashvili has always been a few bricks short of a full load is not in dispute but to argue that this means the US and Europe should back away from making it clear to Putin that parts of Eastern Europe are not going to be ceded to Russian domination again makes no sense.

Like Premier Xi of China who in now trying to argue that Chinese domination of Asia is justified by some prior period in Chinese history, Putin would like us to believe that Russian domination of large parts of Eastern Europe is perfectly natural because of past Russian history or even on religious grounds. We forget at our peril that Putin was a former communist and atheist and a part of an organization that not only believed the West was decadent and deserved to be defeated but also worked to suppress and eradicate religion. Putin now cravenly uses religiously based arguments to justify Russian actions and would like us to believe he is defending Christianity from Western decadence. We might as well put the proverbial fox in charge of the hen house if we allow ourselves to accept that Putin really has any interest in defending Christianity or doesn't lust for the restoration of Russian domination of Eastern Europe.

Russia may no longer be the "Evil Empire" that it was called when it was the USSR but it would be pure folly to not push back against Putin's dreams of Russian hegemony any more than it would make sense for the US to assume that Russian and China are not going to push back against what they perceive as US hegemony. Conversely we need to guard against assuming that just because a country declares itself to be a democracy that the actions of any new democratic leaders automatically deserves our support and protection. In fairness to Georgia, the Soviets weren't known for allowing deep pools of democracy supporting leaders to develop which unfortunately means that people like Saakashvili will float to the top.

peter , says: December 8, 2017 at 3:33 pm
Excellent article.
Yes TAC – please bring back Mr. Giraldi – his articles about the hidden aspects of international events are refreshing.

Mr. Michael Kenny – there you go again ranting against Putin!
You remind me of the "Bewitched" mother-in-law.

Senator McCain – do the country a favor and retire.

Ken Zaretzke , says: December 8, 2017 at 4:12 pm
"Three years ago, McCain was declaring, in support of the overthrow of the elected pro-Russian government in Kiev, "We are all Ukrainians now."

The neocons probably won't be saying "We're all Kazkhstans now" in a few years when the long-serving president of Kazakhstan dies without a clear successor and Russia moves in to the north and east of Kazakhstan to crush the ensuing acts of Islamic terrorism and incidentally help protect China's crucial border state of Xinjiang from ISIS, giving Russia the balance of power in Central Asia and thus restoring it to superpower status.

Alex (the one that likes Ike) , says: December 8, 2017 at 4:37 pm
Contemplating the behavior of this gentleman really makes one think that in some cases college student is a state of mind. On the other hand, if wanted to threaten someone with his suicide, he could have swallowed a non-lethal quantity of belladonna berries instead of a dull standing on a roof. Politically the outcome would have likely been the same, but knowing the mental impact of tropane alkaloids, with a hell lot of fun along the way.

Setting this walking curiosity aside for a moment there, I also join those wishing the return of Mr. Giraldi.

[Dec 07, 2017] Is trying to make this artificial entity strong, not only will end up badly anyway, but simply is not even in the US national interest?

Dec 07, 2017 | www.unz.com

renfro , December 7, 2017 at 2:37 am GMT

@CanSpeccy

It would surely be in the US interest if fewer Jews felt the need to put the interests of Israel before those of their own country, the USA. Moreover, if Israel were truly independent and secure, or as secure as is possible for any small country to be, would that not encourage America's Israel Firsters to go and live in Israel, thus loosening the grip that the Israeli lobby has on the US Government

Afraid not.

First and foremost Israel has to have enough Jews in the US to talk it up to politicians as a voting block for them.

Another First is that Israel is not self supporting and never will be –they don't the land water or resources to be self sufficient -- hence the stealing of Palestine and the constant money grubbing from other states.

Second..They also have to have Jews here to ensure the politicians keep giving Israel billions of our tax money every year. And Israel really has to have the Uber Jews in the US stay here to fund and sway both parties and elections, threaten politicians, form their lobby and keep an eye on their Israel voting.

Also important, Israel must have all the 100s of US Jewish agencies, clubs, org and etc to propagandize and to use Congress to get special grants and favors for hundreds of Jewish charities.

Jews also make 100 phone calls for Israel and Jewish programs to their congresspeople for every one call a non Jew makes to their rep on some issue.
Another point, Israel must have enough Jews in the US to get a lot of them educated -- the average IQ of Jews in Israel is 85, Jews have only succeeded and excelled when exposed to non Jewish education.

If there were no Jews in the US it is unlikely US tech giants and others would set up plants in Israel when they could find cheaper and just as skilled and more educated workers in Asia and elsewhere or that Israel would get special trade favors from the US.

If there were no Jews in the US Israel wouldn't be able to sell a billion dollars worth of bonds to US unions and pension funds every year.

If there were no Jews in the US, Jews couldn't send 2 billion of money made in the US to Israel every year -- that money would have been in non Jewish pockets and stayed and circulated in the US economy.

If there were no Jews in the US then the 90% of Dept of Homeland Security funds might go to improving school security and preventing school shootings in the US instead of to Jewish temples and office buildings for Jewish security.

If there were no Jews in the US then they couldn't clog up American courts to sue every other country and corporation in the world for more money for the Jews.

If there were no Jews in the US our constitutional free speech rights wouldn't be under assault by the uber Jews.

If there were no Jews in the US congress wouldn't even think of trying to criminalize citizens rights to boycott whoever he wishes.

If there were no Jews there wouldn't be Jews who go into small towns around the country looking for some town or county that opens their business meetings with a Christian prayer so they can sue them under separation of church and state because it hurts their feeling and saying Jesus makes them uncomfortable- -yea they did that in my state and took it all the way to the supreme court –and lost thankfully.

Last but not least if there were no Jews in the US Israel probably would never have existed or would have failed shortly after it started because there would have been no diaspora Jews to lobby the countries they lived in to help Israel .

I getting tired but will list more sometime
Meanwhile -- If you go to the presidential libraries starting with Truman, in all their papers and discussions on Israel you will see the phase .. "domestic political considerations " ..over and over and over by every president meaning the pressure and money that the tribe exerts for or against a politician according to their Israel policy.

[Dec 05, 2017] Further sabotage of the Iran deal would not bring success -- only embarrassment

This is two years old article. Not much changed... Comments sound as written yesterday. Check it out !
The key incentive to Iran deal is using Iran as a Trojan horse against Russia in oil market -- the force which helps to keep oil prices low, benefitting the USA and other G7 members and hurting Russia and other oil-producing nations. Iran might also serve as a replacement market for EU goods as Russian market is partially lost. Due to sanctions EU now lost (and probably irrevocably) Russian market for food, and have difficulties in maintaining their share in other sectors (cars, machinery) as Asian tigers come in.
Notable quotes:
"... The waning clout stems from the lobby siding with the revanchist Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, whose Iran strategy since the 2012 US presidential campaign has been to unabashedly side with Republican hawks. AIPAC's alignment with the position effectively caused the group to marginalize itself; the GOP is now the only place where AIPAC can today find lockstep support. The tens of millions AIPAC spent lobbying against the deal were unable to obscure this dynamic. ..."
"... Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina took to the floor during the debate and pulled out an old trick from the run-up to the Iraq war: blaming Iran for 9/11 and saying a failure to act would result in a worse attack – is any indication, even Democrats like the pro-Israel hawk Chuck Schumer will find it untenable to sidle up to AIPAC and the Republicans. ..."
"... The problem with the right in the USA is that they offer no alternatives, nothing, nada and zilch they have become the opposition party of opposition. They rely on talking point memes and fear, and it has become the party of extremism and simplicity offering low hanging fruit and red meat this was on perfect display at their anti Iran deal rally, palin, trump, beck and phil robinson who commands ducks apparently. ..."
"... Is it any wonder the Iranians don't trust the US. After the US's spying exploits during the Iraqi WMD inspections, why are you surprised that Iran asks for 24 days notice of inspection (enough time to clear out conventional weapons development but not enough to remove evidence of nuclear weapons development). ..."
"... Most Americans don't know the CIA overthrew the Iranian government in 1953 and installed the Shaw. Most Republicans know that most Americans will believe what Fox news tells them. Republicans live in an alternate universe where there is no climate change, mammon is worshiped and wisdom is rejected hatred is accepted negotiation is replaced by perpetual warfare. Now most Americans are tired of stupid leadership and the Republicans are in big trouble. ..."
"... AIPAC - Eventually everything is seen for what is truly is. ..."
"... Israel is opposed because they wish to maintain their nuclear weapons monopoly in the region ..."
"... With the threat you describe from Israel it seems only sensible for Iran to develop nuclear weapons - if my was country (Scotland) was in Iran's place and what you said is true i would only support politicians who promised fast and large scale production of atomic weapons to counter the clear threat to my nation. ..."
"... Netanyahu loves to play the victim, but he is the primary cause that Jews worldwide, but especially in the United States, are rethinking the idea of "Israel." I know very few people who willingly identify with a strident right wing government comprised of rabid nationalists, religious fundamentalists, and a violent, almost apocalyptic settler community. ..."
"... The Israeli electorate has indicated which path it wishes to travel, but that does not obligate Jews throughout the world to support a government whose policies they find odious. ..."
"... As part of this deal the US and allies should guarantee Iran protection against Israeli aggression. Otherwise, considering Israel's threats, Iran is well justified in seeking a nuclear deterrent. ..."
"... AIPAC's defeat shows that their grip on the testicles of congress has been broken. ..."
"... Their primary goal was to keep Iran isolated and economically weak. They knew full well that the Iranians hadn't had a nuclear program since 2003, but Netanhayu needed an existential threat to Israel in order to justify his grip on power. All of this charade has bee at the instigation of and directed by Israel. And they lost They were beaten by that hated schwartze and the liberals that Israel normally counts on for unthinking support. ..."
"... No doubt Netanyahu will raise the level of his anger; he just can't accept that a United States president would do anything on which Israel hadn't stamped its imprimatur. It gets tiresome listening to him. ..."
"... It is this deal that feeds the military industrial complex. We've already heard Kerry give Israel and Saudi Arabia assurances of more weapons. And that $150 billion released to Iran? A healthy portion will be spent for arms..American, Russian, Chinese. Most of the commenters have this completely backwards. This deal means a bonanza for the arms industry. ..."
"... The Iran nuclear agreement accomplishes the US policy goal of preventing the creation of the fissionable material required for an Iranian nuclear weapons program. What the agreement does not do is eliminate Iran as a regional military and economic power, as the Israelis and Saudis -- who have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to lobby American politicians and brainwash American TV viewers -- would prefer. ..."
"... Rejection equals war. It's not surprising that the same crowd most stridently demanding rejection of the agreement advocated the disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq. These homicidal fools never learn, or don't care as long as it's not their lives at risk. ..."
"... And how did the Republicans' foreign policy work out? Reagan created and financed Al Qaeda. Then Bush II invades Iraq with promises the Iraqis will welcome us with flowers (!), the war will be over in a few weeks and pay for itself, and the middle east will have a nascent democracy (Iraq) that will be a grateful US ally. ..."
"... I've seen Iranian statements playing internal politics, but I have never seen any actual Iranian threats. I've seen plenty about Israel assassinating people in other countries, using incendiaries and chemical weapons against civilians in other countries, conducting illegal kidnappings overseas, using terrorism as a weapon of war, developing nuclear weapons illegally, ethnically cleansing illegally occupied territories, that sort of thing. ..."
"... Iran is not a made-up country like Iraq it is as old as Greece. If the Iraq war was sold as pushover and failed miserably then an Iran war would be unthinkable. War can be started in an instant diplomacy take time. UK, France, Germany & EU all agree its an acceptable alternative to war. So as these countries hardly ever agree it is clear the deal is a good one. ..."
"... Rank and file Americans don't even know what the Iran deal is. And can't be bothered to actually find out. They just listen to sound bites from politicians the loudest of whom have been the wildly partisan republicans claiming that it gives Iran a green light to a nuclear weapon. Not to mention those "less safe" polls are completely loaded. Certain buzz words will always produce negative results. If you associate something positive "feeling safe" or "in favor of" anything that Iran signs off on it comes across as indirectly supporting Iran and skews the results of the poll. "Iran" has been so strongly associated with evil and negative all you have to do is insert it into a sentence to make people feel negatively about the entire sentence. In order to get true data on the deal you would have to poll people on the individual clauses the deal. ..."
"... American Jews are facing one of the most interesting choices of recent US history. The Republican Party, which is pissing into a stiff wind of unfavorable demographics, seems to have decided it can even the playing field by peeling Jews away from the Democrats with promises to do whatever Israel wants. So we have the very strange (but quite real) prospect of Jews increasingly throwing in their lot with the party of Christian extremists whose ranks also include violent antiSemites. ..."
"... The American Warmonger Establishment (that now fully entrenched "Military Industrial Complex" against which no more keen observer than President Dwight Eisenhower warned us), is rip-shit over the Iran Agreement. WHAT? We can't Do More War? That will be terrible for further increasing our obscene 1-percent wealth. Let's side with Israeli wingnut Netanyahu, who cynically leverages "an eye for an eye for an eye for an eye" to hold his "Power." ..."
"... AIPAC is a dangerous anti-american organization, and a real and extant threat to the sovereignty of the U.S. Any elected official acting in concert with AIPAC is colluding with a foreign government to harm the U.S. and should be considered treasonous and an enemy of the American people. ..."
Sep 14, 2015 | The Guardian

The waning clout stems from the lobby siding with the revanchist Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, whose Iran strategy since the 2012 US presidential campaign has been to unabashedly side with Republican hawks. AIPAC's alignment with the position effectively caused the group to marginalize itself; the GOP is now the only place where AIPAC can today find lockstep support. The tens of millions AIPAC spent lobbying against the deal were unable to obscure this dynamic.

We may not look back at this as a sea change – some Senate Democrats who held firm against opposition to the deal are working with AIPAC to pass subsequent legislation that contains poison pills designed to kill it – but rather as a rising tide eroding the once sturdy bipartisan pro-Israeli government consensus on Capitol Hill. Some relationships have been frayed; previously stalwart allies of the Israel's interests, such as Vice President Joe Biden, have reportedly said the Iran deal fight soured them on AIPAC.

Even with the boundaries of its abilities on display, however, AIPAC will continue its efforts. "We urge those who have blocked a vote today to reconsider," the group said in a spin-heavy statement casting a pretty objective defeat as victory with the headline, "Bipartisan Senate Majority Rejects Iran Nuclear Deal." The group's allies in the Senate Republican Party have already promised to rehash the procedural vote next week, and its lobbyists are still rallying for support in the House. But the Senate's refusal to halt US support for the deal means that Senate Democrats are unlikely to reconsider, especially after witnessing Thursday's Republican hijinx in the House. These ploys look like little more than efforts to embarrass Obama into needing to cast a veto.

If Republicans' rhetoric leading up to to their flop in the Senate – Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina took to the floor during the debate and pulled out an old trick from the run-up to the Iraq war: blaming Iran for 9/11 and saying a failure to act would result in a worse attack – is any indication, even Democrats like the pro-Israel hawk Chuck Schumer will find it untenable to sidle up to AIPAC and the Republicans.

Opponents of the deal want to say the Democrats played politics instead of evaluating the deal honestly. That charge is ironic, to say the least, since most experts agree the nuclear deal is sound and the best agreement diplomacy could achieve. But there were politics at play: rather than siding with Obama, Congressional Democrats lined up against the Republican/Netanyahu alliance. The adamance of AIPAC ended up working against its stated interests.

Groups like AIPAC will go on touting their bipartisan bona fides without considering that their adoption of Netanyahu's own partisanship doomed them to a partisan result. Meanwhile, the ensuing fight, which will no doubt bring more of the legislative chaos we saw this week, won't be a cakewalk, so to speak, but will put the lie to AIPAC's claims it has a bipartisan consensus behind it. Despite their best efforts, Obama won't be the one embarrassed by the scrambling on the horizon.

TiredOldDog 13 Sep 2015 21:47

a foreign country whose still hell bent on committing war crimes

I guess this may mean Israel. If it does, how about we compare Assad's Syria, Iran and Israel. How many war crimes per day in the last 4 years and, maybe, some forecasts. Otherwise it's the usual gratuitous use of bad words at Israel. It has a purpose. To denigrate and dehumanize Israel or, at least, Zionism.

ID7612455 13 Sep 2015 18:04

The problem with the right in the USA is that they offer no alternatives, nothing, nada and zilch they have become the opposition party of opposition. They rely on talking point memes and fear, and it has become the party of extremism and simplicity offering low hanging fruit and red meat this was on perfect display at their anti Iran deal rally, palin, trump, beck and phil robinson who commands ducks apparently.

winemaster2 13 Sep 2015 17:01

Put a Brush Mustache on the control freak, greed creed, Nentanhayu the SOB not only looks like but has the same mentality as Hitler and his Nazism crap.

Martin Hutton -> mantishrimp 12 Sep 2015 23:50

I wondered when someone was going to bring up that "forgotten" fact. Is it any wonder the Iranians don't trust the US. After the US's spying exploits during the Iraqi WMD inspections, why are you surprised that Iran asks for 24 days notice of inspection (enough time to clear out conventional weapons development but not enough to remove evidence of nuclear weapons development).

mantishrimp 12 Sep 2015 20:51

Most Americans don't know the CIA overthrew the Iranian government in 1953 and installed the Shaw. Most Republicans know that most Americans will believe what Fox news tells them. Republicans live in an alternate universe where there is no climate change, mammon is worshiped and wisdom is rejected hatred is accepted negotiation is replaced by perpetual warfare. Now most Americans are tired of stupid leadership and the Republicans are in big trouble.

ByThePeople -> Sieggy 12 Sep 2015 20:27

Is pitiful how for months and months, certain individuals blathered on and on and on when it was fairly clear from the get go that this was a done deal and no one was about cater to the war criminal. I suppose it was good for them, sucking every last dime they could out of the AICPA & Co. while they acted like there was 'a chance'. Nope, only chance is that at the end of the day, a politician is a politician and he'll suck you dry as long as you let 'em.

What a pleasure it is to see the United States Congress finally not pimp themselves out completely to a foreign country whose still hell bent on committing war crimes. A once off I suppose, but it's one small step for Americans.

ByThePeople 12 Sep 2015 20:15

AIPAC - Eventually everything is seen for what is truly is.

ambushinthenight -> Greg Zeglen 12 Sep 2015 18:18

Seems that it makes a lot of sense to most everyone else in the world, it is now at the point where it really makes no difference whether the U.S. ratifies the deal or not. Israel is opposed because they wish to maintain their nuclear weapons monopoly in the region. Politicians here object for one of two reasons. They are Israeli first and foremost not American or for political expediency and a chance to try undo another of this President's achievements. Been a futile effort so far I'd say.

hello1678 -> BrianGriffin 12 Sep 2015 16:42

With the threat you describe from Israel it seems only sensible for Iran to develop nuclear weapons - if my was country (Scotland) was in Iran's place and what you said is true i would only support politicians who promised fast and large scale production of atomic weapons to counter the clear threat to my nation.

nardone -> Bruce Bahmani 12 Sep 2015 14:12

Netanyahu loves to play the victim, but he is the primary cause that Jews worldwide, but especially in the United States, are rethinking the idea of "Israel." I know very few people who willingly identify with a strident right wing government comprised of rabid nationalists, religious fundamentalists, and a violent, almost apocalyptic settler community.

The Israeli electorate has indicated which path it wishes to travel, but that does not obligate Jews throughout the world to support a government whose policies they find odious.

Greg Zeglen -> Glenn Gang 12 Sep 2015 13:51

good point which is found almost nowhere else...it is still necessary to understand that the whole line of diplomacy regarding the west on the part of Iran has been for generations one of deceit...and people are intensely jealous of what they hold dear - especially safety and liberty with in their country....

EarthyByNature -> Bruce Bahmani 12 Sep 2015 13:45

I do trust your on salary with a decent benefits package with the Israeli government or one of it's slavish US lobbyists. Let's face it, got to be hard work pouring out such hateful drivel.

BrianGriffin -> imipak 12 Sep 2015 12:53

The USA took about six years to build a bomb from scratch. The UK took almost six years to build a bomb. Russia was able to build a bomb in only four years (1945-1949). France took four years to build a bomb. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction

The Chinese only took four years. http://www.china.org.cn/english/congress/228244.htm

steelhead 12 Sep 2015 12:48

As part of this deal the US and allies should guarantee Iran protection against Israeli aggression. Otherwise, considering Israel's threats, Iran is well justified in seeking a nuclear deterrent.

BrianGriffin -> HauptmannGurski 12 Sep 2015 12:35

"Europe needs business desperately."

Sieggy 12 Sep 2015 12:32

In other words, once again, Obama out-played and out-thought both the GOP and AIPAC. He was playing multidimensional chess while they were playing checkers. The democrats kept their party discipline while the republicans ran around like a schoolyard full of sugared-up children. This is what happens when you have grownups competing with adolescents. The republican party, to put it very bluntly, can't get it together long enough to whistle 'Yankee Doodle Dandy' in unison.

They lost. Again. And worse than being losers, they're sore, whining, sniveling, blubbering losers. Even when they've been spanked - hard - they swear it's not over and they're gonna get even, just you wait and see! Get over it. They lost - badly - and the simple fact that their party is coming apart at the seams before our very eyes means they're going to be losing a lot more, too.

AIPAC's defeat shows that their grip on the testicles of congress has been broken. All the way around, a glorious victory for Obama, and an ignominious defeat for the republicans. And most especially, Israel. Their primary goal was to keep Iran isolated and economically weak. They knew full well that the Iranians hadn't had a nuclear program since 2003, but Netanhayu needed an existential threat to Israel in order to justify his grip on power. All of this charade has bee at the instigation of and directed by Israel. And they lost They were beaten by that hated schwartze and the liberals that Israel normally counts on for unthinking support.

Their worst loss, however, was losing the support of the American jews. Older, orthodox jews are Israel-firsters. The younger, less observant jews are Americans first. Netanhayu's behavior has driven a wedge between the US and Israel that is only going to deepen over time. And on top of that, Iran is re-entering the community of nations, and soon their economy will dominate the region. Bibi overplayed his hand very, very stupidly, and the real price that Israel will pay for his bungling will unfold over the next few decades.

BrianGriffin -> TiredOldDog 12 Sep 2015 12:18

"The Constitution provides that the president 'shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators present concur'"

http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/Treaties.htm

Hardly a done deal. If Obama releases funds to Iran he probably would be committing an impeachable crime under US law. Even many Democrats would vote to impeach Obama for providing billions to a sworn enemy of Israel.

Glenn Gang -> Bruce Bahmani 12 Sep 2015 12:07

"...institutionally Iranclad(sic) HATRED towards the west..." Since you like all-caps so much, try this: "B.S."

The American propel(sic) actually figured out something else---that hardline haters like yourself are desperate to keep the cycle of Islamophobic mistrust and suspicion alive, and blind themselves to the fact that the rest of us have left you behind.

FACT: More than half of the population of Iran today was NOT EVEN BORN when radical students captured the U.S. Embassy in Teheran in 1979.

People like you, Bruce, conveniently ignore the fact that Ahmedinejad and his hardline followers were voted out of power in 2013, and that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei further marginalized them by allowing the election of new President Hassan Rouhani to stand, though he was and is an outspoken reformer advocating rapprochement with the west. While his outward rhetoric still has stern warnings about anticipated treachery by the 'Great Satan', Khamenei has allowed the Vienna agreement to go forward, and shows no sign of interfering with its implementation.

He is an old man, but he is neither stupid nor senile, and has clearly seen the crippling effects the international sanctions have had on his country and his people. Haters like you, Bruce, will insist that he ALWAYS has evil motives, just as Iranian hardliners (like Ahmedinejad) will ALWAYS believe that the U.S. has sinister motives and cannot EVER be trusted to uphold our end of any agreement. You ascribe HATRED in all caps to Iran, the whole country, while not acknowledging your own simmering hatred.

People like you will always find a 'boogeyman,' someone else to blame for your problems, real or imagined. You should get some help.

beenheretoolong 12 Sep 2015 10:57

No doubt Netanyahu will raise the level of his anger; he just can't accept that a United States president would do anything on which Israel hadn't stamped its imprimatur. It gets tiresome listening to him.

geneob 12 Sep 2015 10:12

It is this deal that feeds the military industrial complex. We've already heard Kerry give Israel and Saudi Arabia assurances of more weapons. And that $150 billion released to Iran? A healthy portion will be spent for arms..American, Russian, Chinese. Most of the commenters have this completely backwards. This deal means a bonanza for the arms industry.

Jack Hughes 12 Sep 2015 08:38

The Iran nuclear agreement accomplishes the US policy goal of preventing the creation of the fissionable material required for an Iranian nuclear weapons program.

What the agreement does not do is eliminate Iran as a regional military and economic power, as the Israelis and Saudis -- who have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to lobby American politicians and brainwash American TV viewers -- would prefer.

To reject the agreement is to accept the status quo, which is unacceptable, leaving an immediate and unprovoked American-led bombing campaign as the only other option.

Rejection equals war. It's not surprising that the same crowd most stridently demanding rejection of the agreement advocated the disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq. These homicidal fools never learn, or don't care as long as it's not their lives at risk.

American politicians opposed to the agreement are serving their short-term partisan political interests and, under America's system of legalized bribery, their Israeli and Saudi paymasters -- not America's long-term policy interests.

ID293404 -> Jeremiah2000 12 Sep 2015 05:01

And how did the Republicans' foreign policy work out? Reagan created and financed Al Qaeda. Then Bush II invades Iraq with promises the Iraqis will welcome us with flowers (!), the war will be over in a few weeks and pay for itself, and the middle east will have a nascent democracy (Iraq) that will be a grateful US ally.

He then has pictures taken of himself in a jet pilot's uniform on a US aircraft carrier with a huge sign saying Mission Accomplished. He attacks Afghanistan to capture Osama, lets him get away, and then attacks Iraq instead, which had nothing to do with 9/11 and no ties with Al Qaeda.

So then we have two interminable wars going on, thanks to brilliant Republican foreign policy, and spend gazillions of dollars while creating a mess that may never be straightened out. Never mind all the friends we won in the middle east and the enhanced reputation of our country through torture, the use of mercenaries, and the deaths and displacement of hundreds of thousands of civilians. Yeah, we really need those bright Republicans running the show over in the Middle East!

HauptmannGurski -> lazman 12 Sep 2015 02:31

That is a very difficult point to understand, just look at this sentence "not understanding the fact in international affairs that to disrespect an American president is to disrespect Americans" ... too much emperor thinking for me. We have this conversation with regard to Putin everywhere now, so we disrespect all 143 million Russians? There's not a lot of disrespect around for Japanese PM Abe and Chinese Xi - does this now mean we respect them and all Japanese and Chinese? Election campaigns create such enormous personality cults that people seem to lose perspective.

On the Iran deal, if the US had dropped out of it it would have caused quite a rift because many countries would have just done what they wanted anyway. The international Atomic Energy Organisation or what it is would have done their inspections. Siemens would have sold medical machines. Countries would grow up as it were. But as cooperation is always better than confrontation it is nice the US have stayed in the agreement that was apparently 10 years in the making. It couldn't have gone on like that. With Europe needing gazillions to finance Greece, Ukraine, and millions of refugees (the next waves will roll on with the next spring and summer from April), Europe needs business desparately. Israel was happy to buy oil through Marc Rich under sanctions, now it's Europe's turn to snatch some business.

imipak -> BrianGriffin 11 Sep 2015 21:56

Iran lacks weapons-grade uranium and the means to produce it. Iran has made no efforts towards nuclear weapons technology for over a decade. Iran is a signatory of the NPT and is entitled to the rights enshrined therein. If Israel launches a nuclear war against Iran over Iran having a medical reactor (needed to produce isotopes for medicine, isotopes America can barely produce enough of for itself) that poses no security threat to anyone, then Israel will have transgressed so many international laws that if it survives the radioactive fallout (unlikely), it won't survive the political fallout.

It is a crime of the highest order to use weapons of mass destruction (although that didn't stop the Israelis using them against Palestinian civilians) and pre-emtive self-defence is why most believe Bush and Blair should be on trial at the ICJ, or (given the severity of their crimes) Nuremberg.

Israel's right to self-defense is questionable, I'm not sure any such right exists for anyone, but even allowing for it, Israel has no right to wage unprovoked war on another nation on the grounds of a potential threat discovered through divination using tea leaves.

imipak -> Jeremiah2000 11 Sep 2015 21:43

Iran's sponsorship of terrorism is of no concern. Such acts do not determine its competency to handle nuclear material at the 5% level (which you can find naturally). There are only three questions that matter - can Iran produce the 90-95% purity needed to build a bomb (no), can Iran produce such purity clandestinely (no), and can Iran use its nuclear technology to threaten Israel (no).

Israel also supports international terrorism, has used chemical weapons against civilians, has directly indulged in terrorism, actually has nuclear weapons and is paranoid enough that it may use them against other nations without cause.

I respect Israel's right to exist and the intelligence of most Israelis. But I neither respect nor tolerate unreasoned fear nor delusions of Godhood.

imipak -> commish 11 Sep 2015 21:33

I've seen Iranian statements playing internal politics, but I have never seen any actual Iranian threats. I've seen plenty about Israel assassinating people in other countries, using incendiaries and chemical weapons against civilians in other countries, conducting illegal kidnappings overseas, using terrorism as a weapon of war, developing nuclear weapons illegally, ethnically cleansing illegally occupied territories, that sort of thing.

Until such time as Israel implements the Oslo Accords, withdraws to its internationally recognized boundary and provides the International Court of Justice a full accounting of state-enacted and state-sponsored terrorism, it gets no claims on sainthood and gets no free rides.

Iran has its own crimes to answer, but directly threatening Israel in words or deeds has not been one of them within this past decade. Its actual crimes are substantial and cannot be ignored, but it is guilty only of those and not fictional works claimed by psychotic paranoid ultra-nationalists.

imipak -> moishe 11 Sep 2015 21:18

Domestic politics. Of no real consequence, it's just a way of controlling a populace through fear and a never-ending pseudo-war. It's how Iran actually feels that is important.

For the last decade, they've backed off any nuclear weapons research and you can't make a bomb with centrifuges that can only manage 20% enriched uranium. You need something like 90% enrichment, which requires centrifuges many, many times more advanced. It'd be hard to smuggle something like that in and the Iranians lack the skills, technology and science to make them.

Iran's conventional forces are busy fighting ISIS. What they do afterwards is a concern, but Israel has a sizable military presence on the Golan Heights. The most likely outcome is for Iran to install puppet regimes (or directly control) Syria and ISIS' caliphate.

I could see those two regions plus Iraq being fully absorbed into Iran, that would make some sense given the new geopolitical situation. But that would tie up Iran for decades. Which would not be a bad thing and America would be better off encouraging it rather than sabre-rattling.

(These are areas that contribute a lot to global warming and political instability elsewhere. Merging the lot and encouraging nuclear energy will do a lot for the planet. The inherent instability of large empires will reduce mischief-making elsewhere to more acceptable levels - they'll be too busy. It's idle hands that you need to be scared of.)

Israelis worry too much. If they spent less time fretting and more time developing, they'd be impervious to any natural or unnatural threat by now. Their teaching of Roman history needs work, but basically Israel has a combined intellect vastly superior to that of any nearby nation.

That matters. If you throw away fear and focus only on problems, you can stop and even defeat armies and empires vastly greater than your own. History is replete with examples, so is the mythologicized history of the Israeli people. Israel's fear is Israel's only threat.

mostfree 11 Sep 2015 21:10

Warmongers on all sides would had loved another round of fear and hysteria. Those dark military industrial complexes on all sides are dissipating in the face of the high rising light of peace for now . Please let it shine.

bishoppeter4 11 Sep 2015 20:09

The rabid Republicans working for a foreign power against the interest of the United States -- US citizens will know just what to do.

Jeremiah2000 -> Carolyn Walas Libbey 11 Sep 2015 19:21

"Netanyahu has no right to dictate what the US does."

But he has every right to point out how Obama is a weak fool. How's Obama's red line working in Syria? How is his toppling of Qadaffi in Libya working? How about his completely inept dealings with Egypt, throwing support behind the Muslim Brotherhood leaders? The leftists cheer Obama's weakening of American influence abroad. But they don't talk much about its replacement with Russian and Chinese influence. Russian build-up in Syria part of secret deal with Iran's Quds Force leader. Obama and Kerry are sending a strongly worded message.

Susan Dechancey -> whateverworks4u 11 Sep 2015 19:05

Incredible to see someone prefer war to diplomacy - guess you are an armchair General not a real one.

Susan Dechancey -> commish 11 Sep 2015 19:04

Except all its neighbours ... not only threatened but entered military conflict and stole land ... murdered Iranian Scientists but apart from that just a kitten

Susan Dechancey -> moishe 11 Sep 2015 19:00

Israel has nukes so why are they afraid ?? Iran will never use nukes against Israel and even Mossad told nuttyyahoo sabre rattling

Susan Dechancey 11 Sep 2015 18:57

Iran is not a made-up country like Iraq it is as old as Greece. If the Iraq war was sold as pushover and failed miserably then an Iran war would be unthinkable. War can be started in an instant diplomacy take time. UK, France, Germany & EU all agree its an acceptable alternative to war. So as these countries hardly ever agree it is clear the deal is a good one.

To be honest the USA can do what it likes now .. UK has set up an embassy - trade missions are landing Tehran from Europe. So if Israel and US congress want war - they will be alone and maybe if US keeps up the Nuttyahoo rhetoric European firms can win contracts to help us pay for the last US regime change Iraq / Isis / Refugees...

lswingly -> commish 11 Sep 2015 16:58

Rank and file Americans don't even know what the Iran deal is. And can't be bothered to actually find out. They just listen to sound bites from politicians the loudest of whom have been the wildly partisan republicans claiming that it gives Iran a green light to a nuclear weapon. Not to mention those "less safe" polls are completely loaded. Certain buzz words will always produce negative results. If you associate something positive "feeling safe" or "in favor of" anything that Iran signs off on it comes across as indirectly supporting Iran and skews the results of the poll. "Iran" has been so strongly associated with evil and negative all you have to do is insert it into a sentence to make people feel negatively about the entire sentence. In order to get true data on the deal you would have to poll people on the individual clauses the deal.

It's no different from how when you run a poll on who's in favor "Obamacare" the results will be majority negative. But if you poll on whether you are in favor of "The Affordable Care Act" most people are in favor of it and if you break it down and poll on the individual planks of "Obamacare" people overwhelming approve of the things that "Obamacare does". The disapproval is based on the fact that Republican's have successfully turned "Obamacare" into a pejorative and has almost no reflection of people feelings on actual policy.

To illustrate how meaningless those poll numbers are a Jewish poll (supposedly the people who have the most to lose if this deal is bad) found that a narrow majority of Jews approve of the deal. You're numbers are essentially meaningless.

The alternative to this plan is essentially war if not now, in the very near future, according to almost all non-partisan policy wonks. Go run a poll on whether we should go to war with Iran and see how that turns out. Last time we destabilized the region we removed a secular dictator who was enemies with Al Queda and created a power vacuum that led to increased religious extremism and the rise of Isis. You want to double down on that strategy?

MadManMark -> whateverworks4u 11 Sep 2015 16:34

You need to reread this article. It's exactly this attitude of yours (and AIPAC and Netanyahu) that this deal is not 100% perfect, but then subsequently failed to suggest ANY way to get something better -- other than war, which I'm sorry most people don't want another Republican "preemptive" war -- caused a lot people originally uncertain about this deal (like me) to conclude there may not be a better alternative. Again, read the article: What you think about me, I now think about deal critics like you ("It seems people will endorse anything to justify their political views.)

USfan 11 Sep 2015 15:34

American Jews are facing one of the most interesting choices of recent US history. The Republican Party, which is pissing into a stiff wind of unfavorable demographics, seems to have decided it can even the playing field by peeling Jews away from the Democrats with promises to do whatever Israel wants. So we have the very strange (but quite real) prospect of Jews increasingly throwing in their lot with the party of Christian extremists whose ranks also include violent antiSemites.

Interesting times. We'll see how this plays out. My family is Jewish and I have not been shy in telling them that alliances with the GOP for short-term gains for Israel is not a wise policy. The GOP establishment are not antiSemtic but the base often is, and if Trump's candidacy shows anything it's that the base is in control of the Republicans.

But we'll see.

niyiakinlabu 11 Sep 2015 15:29

Central question: how come nobody talks about Israel's nukes?

hello1678 -> BrianGriffin 11 Sep 2015 14:02

Iran will not accept being forced into dependence on outside powers. We may dislike their government but they have as much right as anyone else to enrich their own fuel.

JackHep 11 Sep 2015 13:30

Netanyahu is an example of all that is bad about the Israeli political, hence military industrial, establishment. Why Cameron's government allowed him on British soil is beyond belief. Surely the PM's treatment of other "hate preachers" would not have been lost on Netanyahu? Sadly our PM seems to miss the point with Israel.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/10692563/David-Cameron-tells-Israelis-about-his-Jewish-ancestors.html

talenttruth 11 Sep 2015 13:12

The American Warmonger Establishment (that now fully entrenched "Military Industrial Complex" against which no more keen observer than President Dwight Eisenhower warned us), is rip-shit over the Iran Agreement. WHAT? We can't Do More War? That will be terrible for further increasing our obscene 1-percent wealth. Let's side with Israeli wingnut Netanyahu, who cynically leverages "an eye for an eye for an eye for an eye" to hold his "Power."

And let's be treasonous against the United States by trying to undermine U.S. Foreign Policy FOR OUR OWN PROFIT. We are LONG overdue for serious jail time for these sociopaths, who already have our country "brainwashed" into 53% of our budget going to the War Profiteers and to pretending to be a 19th century Neo-Colonial Power -- in an Endless State of Eternal War. These people are INSANE. Time to simply say so.

Boredwiththeusa 11 Sep 2015 12:58

At the rally to end the Iran deal in the Capitol on Wednesday, one of the AIPAC worshipping attendees had this to say to Jim Newell of Slate:

""Obama is a black, Jew-hating, jihadist putting America and Israel and the rest of the planet in grave danger," said Bob Kunst of Miami. Kunst-pairing a Hillary Clinton rubber mask with a blue T-shirt reading "INFIDEL"-was holding one sign that accused Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry of "Fulfilling Hitler's Dreams" and another that queried, "DIDN'T WE LEARN ANYTHING FROM 1938?"

His only reassurance was that, when Iran launches its attack on the mainland, it'll be stopped quickly by America's heavily armed citizenry."

That is indicative of the mindset of those opposed to the agreement.

Boredwiththeusa 11 Sep 2015 12:47

AIPAC is a dangerous anti-american organization, and a real and extant threat to the sovereignty of the U.S. Any elected official acting in concert with AIPAC is colluding with a foreign government to harm the U.S. and should be considered treasonous and an enemy of the American people.

tunejunky 11 Sep 2015 12:47

AIPAC, its constituent republicans, and the government of Israel all made the same mistake in a common episode of hubris. by not understanding the American public, war, and without the deference shown from a proxy to its hegemon, Israel's right wing has flown the Israeli cause into a wall. not understanding the fact in international affairs that to disrespect an American president is to disrespect Americans, the Israeli government acted as a spoiled first-born - while to American eyes it was a greedy, ungrateful ward foisted upon barely willing hands. it presumed far too much and is receiving the much deserved rebuke.

impartial12 11 Sep 2015 12:37

This deal is the best thing that happened in the region in a while. We tried war and death. It didn't work out. Why not try this?

[Dec 05, 2017] Ukraine: draft dodgers face jail as Kiev struggles to find new fighter by Shaun Walker

This article is two years old, but still sounds current. The only difference now is that the conflict between Western nationalists and neoliberal central government of President Poroshenko became more acute. Nationalists do not understand that "The Moor has done his duty, Moor can go" and neoliberal government of Poroshenko do not need (and actually is afraid of) them.
Vr13vr: "Even in Kiev they view Western Ukrainians as strangers" Historically Kiev was a Russian speaking city. Western Ukrainians typically were called "zapadentsi".
Notable quotes:
"... Even in Kiev they view Western Ukrainians as strangers. ..."
"... So they didn't have any hate back towards the West Ukrainians. Besides, West Ukraine was sufficiently far from Donbass for Russians there not to feel threatened. ..."
"... So the Western [Ukrainians] hate towards Russians vs. Russian neutral attitude towards Ukrainians has existed for decades. ..."
"... "criminalizes the denial or justification of Russia's aggression against Ukraine" with a fine equivalent to 22 to 44,000 USD for the first offense and up to three years in prison for repeat offenders. ..."
"... But isn't it wrong that the faith of those people will depend on what EU or US will allow them to do rather than on their natural desire? How does it co-exist with all those democratic ideas. ..."
"... They key thing in all of this is to stop being naive. Learn it, remember it. Our media will only care for the "right" journalists and will throw campaigns only for them and there will be rallies only over the death of "right" people, while we won't pay attention to thousands of deaths of the "wrong" people. ..."
"... The US actively encouraged the overthrow of the democratically elected president of Ukraine, a void filled by right wing nationalists and an act that led directly to the current conflict ..."
"... In turn, the maidan coup d'etat de facto disenfranchised the culturally russian majority in SE-ukr. ..."
"... the NW-ukr neonazi bands fighting in SE-ukr are de facto foreign in SE-ukr, both culturally and geo-politically, and are there to give this majority a lesson. ..."
"... In Zakarpattia Oblast, only 410 out of 1,110 people who received draft notices came to mobilization centers, Oleg Lysenko, a representative of General Staff said recently.(kyiv news) ..."
"... For some reason that isn't quite clear to me, discussion among Western experts has overwhelmingly centered not on the imminent economic apocalypse facing Kiev, but on whether or not the United States should supply it with advanced weapons systems to beat back the Russians. ..."
"... It might be inconvenient to note, but Russia is positively crucial to Ukraine's economy not merely as a source of raw materials and energy but as a destination for industrial production that would otherwise be unable to find willing customers. According to Ukrainian government data, Russia accounted for roughly a quarter of the country's total foreign trade. The equivalent figure from the Russian side? Somewhere between 6 and 7%. Given that reality, Russia's leverage over Ukraine is obviously much greater that Ukraine's leverage over Russia. ..."
"... During the Vietnam War, the draft was a huge issue with many thousands of young men going to Canada, thousand who were in the military receiving less than honorable discharges and still others doing jail time. The war was view as an unjust war by the better educated and those who didn't have to enlist for food and shelter ("three hots and a cot"). ..."
"... The rebellion against the draft in Ukraine tells us that the war against the people in the Eastern area is an unjust war. People don't need a degree in history to understand when they are being use in ways that is not in their interest. We find only the fascist battalion who are hungry for this war. The US and EU should keep out of this internal civil struggle in Ukraine. ..."
Feb 10, 2015 | The Guardian

vr13vr -> jezzam 10 Feb 2015 18:35

The distrust between the West and the rest of Ukraine is not 14 months old. It has always existed. Since the War at the very list. Even in Kiev they view Western Ukrainians as strangers. Western Ukrainians would call everyone a moscovite, and in the East and the South, the Russians were neutral because their lives were much closer to Russia than to all this Ukrainian bullshit. So they didn't have any hate back towards the West Ukrainians. Besides, West Ukraine was sufficiently far from Donbass for Russians there not to feel threatened.

So the Western [Ukrainians] hate towards Russians vs. Russian neutral attitude towards Ukrainians has existed for decades.

Systematic

A new law to likely be approved by the Rada "criminalizes the denial or justification of Russia's aggression against Ukraine" with a fine equivalent to 22 to 44,000 USD for the first offense and up to three years in prison for repeat offenders.

Meanwhile, while the law is not approved,

In February 8 in Mariupol a rally was planned against mobilization. On the eve the adviser of Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said that everyone who comes there will be arrested, "Everyone who comes to the rally tomorrow against mobilization, will be delayed for several hours for identification and after fingerprinting and photographing until released. Let me remind you that I and my fellow lawmaker Boris Filatov has filed a bill to impose criminal liability for public calls for the failure of mobilization "- he wrote on his page on Facebook. As a result, the action did not take place.

http://www.gazeta.ru/politics/2015/02/10_a_6407945.shtml

vr13vr -> SallyWa 10 Feb 2015 18:25

With all the hot headed claims of how the Soviet Union just grabbed the piece of land from Poland, Ukraine has a good chance to correct those misdeeds. Give West Ukraine to Poland, Transkarpathia - to Hungary, and the South West - to Romania. That would be restoring historical injustice.

vr13vr -> SallyWa 10 Feb 2015 18:18

But isn't it wrong that the faith of those people will depend on what EU or US will allow them to do rather than on their natural desire? How does it co-exist with all those democratic ideas.

Besides, federalization may or may not protect them. Kiev may or may not adhere to rules in the future, there will be a tax issue, there will be cultural issues as Kiev will try to Ukrainize those areas subtly - you know those programs that are not anti-Russian per se but that increase Ukrainian presence, thus diluting the original population. Remaining under the same roof with Kiev and L'vov isn't really the best solution for Donbass if they want to preserve their independence and identity.

SallyWa -> VladimirM 10 Feb 2015 18:16

They key thing in all of this is to stop being naive. Learn it, remember it. Our media will only care for the "right" journalists and will throw campaigns only for them and there will be rallies only over the death of "right" people, while we won't pay attention to thousands of deaths of the "wrong" people.

theeskimo -> ridibundus 10 Feb 2015 18:02

The US actively encouraged the overthrow of the democratically elected president of Ukraine, a void filled by right wing nationalists and an act that led directly to the current conflict. Now they want to arm a leadership with no national mandate who have ceded responsibility for prosecuting their war in the east to an ultra nationalist bunch of thugs.

I think it's you who should keep up with what's happening. By the time this is over, Ukraine will be no more.

newsflashUK 10 Feb 2015 18:01

Scraping the barrel for cannon fodder by pro-NATO puppet Poroshenko regime: "The draft officers have been tapping men from 20 to 60 years old and women of 20 to 50 years old with relevant military service experience and training. The age limit for senior officers that could be mobilized is 65 years. Vladyslav Seleznev, spokesman of General Staff, said" (Kyiv news).

theeskimo -> ridibundus 10 Feb 2015 18:02

The US actively encouraged the overthrow of the democratically elected president of Ukraine, a void filled by right wing nationalists and an act that led directly to the current conflict. Now they want to arm a leadership with no national mandate who have ceded responsibility for prosecuting their war in the east to an ultra nationalist bunch of thugs.

I think it's you who should keep up with what's happening. By the time this is over, Ukraine will be no more.

newsflashUK 10 Feb 2015 18:01

Scraping the barrel for cannon fodder by pro-NATO puppet Poroshenko regime: "The draft officers have been tapping men from 20 to 60 years old and women of 20 to 50 years old with relevant military service experience and training. The age limit for senior officers that could be mobilized is 65 years. Vladyslav Seleznev, spokesman of General Staff, said" (Kyiv news).

erpiu 10 Feb 2015 17:59

The focus on Putin and geopolitics forces the actual ukr people out of the picture and blurrs understanding.

The maidan was a genuinely popular NW-ukr rebellion after NW-ukr had lost all recent pre-2014 elections to the culturally Russian majority of voters mainly in SE-ukr.

In turn, the maidan coup d'etat de facto disenfranchised the culturally russian majority in SE-ukr.

the NW-ukr neonazi bands fighting in SE-ukr are de facto foreign in SE-ukr, both culturally and geo-politically, and are there to give this majority a lesson.

USA+EU weapons would only help the punitive "pacification" of SE ukr, the place that was deciding UKR elections until the coup.

The real festering conflict is the incompatibility of the anti-Russian feelings in NW ukr (little else is shared by the various maidan factions) with the cccp/russian heritage of most people in SE ukr... that incompatibility is the main problem that needs to be "solved".

Neither the maidan coup nor yanukovich&the pre-coup electoral dominance of SE ukr voters were ever stable solutions.

newsflashUK 10 Feb 2015 17:57

In Zakarpattia Oblast, only 410 out of 1,110 people who received draft notices came to mobilization centers, Oleg Lysenko, a representative of General Staff said recently.(kyiv news)

SallyWa 10 Feb 2015 17:51

Ukraine's Economy Is Collapsing And The West Doesn't Seem To Care

For some reason that isn't quite clear to me, discussion among Western experts has overwhelmingly centered not on the imminent economic apocalypse facing Kiev, but on whether or not the United States should supply it with advanced weapons systems to beat back the Russians.

It might be inconvenient to note, but Russia is positively crucial to Ukraine's economy not merely as a source of raw materials and energy but as a destination for industrial production that would otherwise be unable to find willing customers. According to Ukrainian government data, Russia accounted for roughly a quarter of the country's total foreign trade. The equivalent figure from the Russian side? Somewhere between 6 and 7%. Given that reality, Russia's leverage over Ukraine is obviously much greater that Ukraine's leverage over Russia.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/markadomanis/2015/02/09/ukraines-economy-is-collapsing-and-the-west-doesnt-seem-to-care/

TET68HUE 10 Feb 2015 17:35

During WW 2 Draft dodging was almost unheard of. The war was perceived as "just", a righteous cause. Thus, men correctly saw it as their duty to take up arms against fascism.

During the Vietnam War, the draft was a huge issue with many thousands of young men going to Canada, thousand who were in the military receiving less than honorable discharges and still others doing jail time. The war was view as an unjust war by the better educated and those who didn't have to enlist for food and shelter ("three hots and a cot").

The rebellion against the draft in Ukraine tells us that the war against the people in the Eastern area is an unjust war. People don't need a degree in history to understand when they are being use in ways that is not in their interest. We find only the fascist battalion who are hungry for this war. The US and EU should keep out of this internal civil struggle in Ukraine.

[Dec 05, 2017] AFP Calling Americans A Great People Is Anti-American

In reality Ukraine is run by neoliberals. Still this is an interesting propaganda twist. Actually "antisemitism" bait works perfectly well in most cases.
moonofalabama.org

This, by AFP, is one of the most misleading propaganda efforts I have ever seen.

The headline:

Ukraine run by 'miserable' Jews: rebel chief

80% of the readers will not read more than that headline.

The first paragraph:

Donetsk (Ukraine) (AFP) - Ukraine's pro-Russian rebel chief on Monday branded the country's leaders "miserable" Jews in an apparent anti-Semitic jibe.

Of those 20% of the readers who will read the first paragraph only one forth will also read the second one. The "anti-semitic" accusation has thereby been planted in 95% of the readership. Now here is the second paragraph:

Alexander Zakharchenko, leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, claimed that Kiev's pro-Western leaders were "miserable representatives of the great Jewish people".

Saying that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney were "miserable representatives of the great American people" would be "anti-American"? What is anti-semitic in calling "the Jewish people" "great"?

The AFP reporter and editor who put that up deserve an Orwellian reward. It is one of the most misleading quotations I have ever seen. Accusing Zakharchenko of anti-semitism when he is actually lauding Jews.

Now I do not agree with Zakharchenko. There is no such thing as "the Jewish people" in the sense of a racial or national determination. There are people of various nationalities and racial heritages who assert that they follow, or their ancestors followed, religious Jewish believes. Some of them may have been or are "great".

But that does not make them "the Jewish people" just like followers of Scientology do not make "the Scientologish people".

Posted by b at 06:51 AM | Comments (76)

jfl | Feb 3, 2015 8:27:41 AM | 4

@1

Saker has a link to the youtube, the audio in Russian with English subtitles. It begins at about 12:30.

@3

When Sarkozy came in AFP really hit the skids. Like the NYTimes and Bush XLIII.

Lysander | Feb 3, 2015 12:02:09 PM | 13
What Zacharchenko did that was unforgivable is to draw attention to the fact that Kiev's current leadership is largely Jewish. From Yats to Petro (Waltzman) Poroshenko To Igor Kolomoiski. No matter how gracefully Zach would put it, it is the content that they hate.

Not saying there is anything wrong with that, but I guess there are some who would rather you not notice.

Lone Wolf | Feb 3, 2015 2:01:47 PM | 20

Right-wing nazi-rag KyivPost has a miserable coverage of same piece. "Agence France-Presse: Russia's guy says Ukraine run by 'miserable Jews'" Zhakharchenko is "Russia's guy," his picture under the headline with a totally unrelated caption, subtitled by the first paragraph of the AFP fake "news" (sic!)"Ukraine's pro-Russian rebel chief on Monday branded the country's leaders "miserable" Jews in an apparent anti-Semitic jibe.", and a link to Yahoo news reproducing the AFP piece in full.

https://tinyurl.com/nes4o9g

Zionazi thieves stole the word "semitic" to mean "Jews," when in fact it comprehends many other languages and peoples. Zhakharchenko's AFP phony "anti-Semitic jibe" would be insulting to all these many peoples.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_people

"...Semitic peoples and their languages, in ancient historic times (between the 30th and 20th centuries BC), covered a broad area which encompassed what are today the modern states and regions of Iraq, Syria, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestinian territories, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Yemen, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and the Sinai Peninsula and Malta..."

...The word "Semite" and most uses of the word "Semitic" relate to any people whose native tongue is, or was historically, a member of the associated language family.[35][36] The term "anti-Semite", however, came by a circuitous route to refer most commonly to one hostile or discriminatory towards Jews in particular...[37]

Yet another historical theft by the so-called "chosen" crooks.

[Nov 22, 2017] Here is an analysis of how much Israel spent to influence USA elections

Nov 22, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com

outthere , 22 November 2017 at 03:24 PM

Here is an analysis of how much Israel spent to influence USA elections
Washington - Which Nation is Really Interfering in the Electoral Process?
http://viableopposition.blogspot.ru/2017/07/washington-which-nation-is-really.html

[Nov 22, 2017] Here is an analysis of how much Israel spent to influence USA elections

Nov 22, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com

outthere , 22 November 2017 at 03:24 PM

Here is an analysis of how much Israel spent to influence USA elections
Washington - Which Nation is Really Interfering in the Electoral Process?
http://viableopposition.blogspot.ru/2017/07/washington-which-nation-is-really.html

[Nov 10, 2017] Saudi Arabia's Desperate Gamble

More wars... more victims... More destruction...
Nov 10, 2017 | consortiumnews.com

Abe , November 10, 2017 at 10:03 pm

Israel's next desperate gamble is direct military attack on Lebanon and Syria.

On 5 November, the ever more delusional Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu complained to the BBC about an "Iranian takeover" of Lebanon.

On 9 November, the equally delusional Israeli Intelligence Minister Israel Katz complained to the Associated Press that "Lebanon is Hezbollah and Hezbollah is Iran".

Israel is by no means content to merely "contemplate" a war.

With the rollback of ISIS and Al Qaeda terrorist proxy forces in Syria, and the failure of Kurdish separatist efforts in Iraq, Israel plans to launch military attacks against southern Lebanon and Syria.

War against Lebanon and Syria is the next stage of the Israeli-Saudi-US Axis "project".

Saudi Arabia and the United States are very much available to "assist" the upcoming Israeli military adventure.

South Front has presented a cogent and fairly detailed analysis of Israel's upcoming war in southern Lebanon.

Conspicuously absent from the South Front analysis is any discussion of the Israeli planned assault on Syria, or possible responses to the conflict from the United States or Russia.

Israeli propaganda preparations for attack are already in high gear. Unfortunately, sober heads are in perilously short supply in Israel and the U.S., so the prognosis can hardly be optimistic.

"Scenarios for the Third Lebanon War

Over time, IDF's military effectiveness had declined. [ ] In the Second Lebanon War of 2006 due to the overwhelming numerical superiority in men and equipment the IDF managed to occupy key strong points but failed to inflict a decisive defeat on Hezbollah. The frequency of attacks in Israeli territory was not reduced; the units of the IDF became bogged down in the fighting in the settlements and suffered significant losses. There now exists considerable political pressure to reassert IDF's lost military dominance and, despite the complexity and unpredictability of the situation we may assume the future conflict will feature only two sides, IDF and Hezbollah. Based on the bellicose statements of the leadership of the Jewish state, the fighting will be initiated by Israel.

"The operation will begin with a massive evacuation of residents from the settlements in the north and centre of Israel. Since Hezbollah has agents within the IDF, it will not be possible to keep secret the concentration of troops on the border and a mass evacuation of civilians. Hezbollah units will will be ordered to occupy a prepared defensive position and simultaneously open fire on places were IDF units are concentrated. The civilian population of southern Lebanon will most likely be evacuated. IDF will launch massive bombing causing great damage to the social infrastructure and some damage to Hezbollah's military infrastructure, but without destroying the carefully protected and camouflaged rocket launchers and launch sites.

"Hezbollah control and communications systems have elements of redundancy. Consequently, regardless of the use of specialized precision-guided munitions, the command posts and electronic warfare systems will not be paralysed, maintaining communications including through the use of fibre-optic communications means. IDF discovered that the movement has such equipment during the 2006 war. Smaller units will operate independently, working with open communication channels, using the pre-defined call signs and codes.

"Israeli troops will then cross the border of Lebanon, despite the presence of the UN peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon, beginning a ground operation with the involvement of a greater number of units than in the 2006 war. The IDF troops will occupy commanding heights and begin to prepare for assaults on settlements and actions in the tunnels. The Israelis do not score a quick victory as they suffer heavy losses in built-up areas. The need to secure occupied territory with patrols and checkpoints will cause further losses.

"The fact that Israel itself started the war and caused damage to the civilian infrastructure, allows the leadership of the movement to use its missile arsenal on Israeli cities. While Israel's missile defence systems can successfully intercept the launched missiles, there are not enough of them to blunt the bombardment. The civilian evacuation paralyzes life in the country. As soon IDF's Iron Dome and other medium-range systems are spent on short-range Hezbollah rockets, the bombardment of Israel with long-range missiles may commence. Hezbollah's Iranian solid-fuel rockets do not require much time to prepare for launch and may target the entire territory of Israel, causing further losses.

"It is difficult to assess the duration of actions of this war. One thing that seems certain is that Israel shouldn't count on its rapid conclusion, similar to last September's exercises. Hezbollah units are stronger and more capable than during the 2006 war, despite the fact that they are fighting in Syria and suffered losses there.

"Conclusions

"The combination of large-scale exercises and bellicose rhetoric is intended to muster Israeli public support for the aggression against Hezbollah by convincing the public the victory would be swift and bloodless. Instead of restraint based on a sober assessment of relative capabilities, Israeli leaders appear to be in a state of blood lust. In contrast, the Hezbollah has thus far demonstrated restraint and diplomacy.

"Underestimating the adversary is always the first step towards a defeat. Such mistakes are paid for with soldiers' blood and commanders' careers. The latest IDF exercises suggest Israeli leaders underestimate the opponent and, more importantly, consider them to be quite dumb. In reality, Hezbollah units will not cross the border. There is no need to provoke the already too nervous neighbor and to suffer losses solely to plant a flag and photograph it for their leader. For Hezbollah, it is easier and safer when the Israeli soldiers come to them. According to the IDF soldiers who served in Gaza and southern Lebanon, it is easier to operate on the plains of Gaza than the mountainous terrain of southern Lebanon. This is a problem for armoured vehicles fighting for control of heights, tunnels, and settlements, where they are exposed to anti-armor weapons.

"While the Israeli establishment is in a state of patriotic frenzy, it would be a good time for them to turn to the wisdom of their ancestors. After all, as the old Jewish proverb says: 'War is a big swamp, easy to go into but hard to get out'."

Israeli Defense Forces: Military Capabilities, Scenarios for the Third Lebanon War
https://southfront.org/israeli-defense-forces-military-capabilities-scenarios-for-the-third-lebanon-war/

Sally Snyder , November 10, 2017 at 10:05 pm

Here are some cables that Wikileaks released showing us how the Saudi royal family tries to control the world's media:

http://viableopposition.blogspot.ca/2016/01/how-saudi-arabia-controls-its-own-media.html

The Saudi Royal Family has bottomless pockets when it comes to controlling negative press coverage.

Zachary Smith , November 10, 2017 at 10:28 pm

And in the shadows, at the back of the gaming room, stands Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. The idea of going to the casino was his, in the first place. If the hero lands on black, he will share in the joy, but if it is red never mind: Bibi's home is not forfeit.

At first glance it looks to me as if Netanyahu wins any coin flip, whether it is "heads" or "tails". No matter what happens, Saudi Arabia is going to be severely shaken up, and chaos in surrounding Muslim nations is almost always a "plus" for Israel.

But at second glance I imagine I can also see a downside. The Arabian Peninsula has a hefty population, and if the Kingdom here does shatter, there is a possibility that an Arabic Napoleon could emerge. During the time of Muhammad there was an outward-moving crusade, and might it not happen again? Saudi Arabia may not have much of an army at the moment, but that could change quickly. A glance at a world globe shows Israel to be very close by. This sort of thing would cause me to lose sleep if I were an Israeli strategist.

At the moment the KSA is being taken over by a young numbskull, if all the accounts I've read are even remotely true. Perhaps Israel is providing the brains. The Moon of Alabama blogger has a low opinion of the young man.

Saudi Arabia – This "Liberal Reformer" Is An Impulsive Tyrant

h**p://www.moonofalabama.org/2017/11/saudi-arabia-the-liberal-reformer-reveals-himself-as-an-impulsive-tyrant-.html

David G , November 10, 2017 at 10:59 pm

The singular fact that the planned next royal succession from Salman to MbS will be the first from father to son since the death of Abdulaziz seems to me to add a whole other level of uncertainty to what is already a difficult time for the kingdom.

[Nov 10, 2017] Saudi Arabia's Desperate Gamble

More wars... more victims... More destruction...
Nov 10, 2017 | consortiumnews.com

Abe , November 10, 2017 at 10:03 pm

Israel's next desperate gamble is direct military attack on Lebanon and Syria.

On 5 November, the ever more delusional Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu complained to the BBC about an "Iranian takeover" of Lebanon.

On 9 November, the equally delusional Israeli Intelligence Minister Israel Katz complained to the Associated Press that "Lebanon is Hezbollah and Hezbollah is Iran".

Israel is by no means content to merely "contemplate" a war.

With the rollback of ISIS and Al Qaeda terrorist proxy forces in Syria, and the failure of Kurdish separatist efforts in Iraq, Israel plans to launch military attacks against southern Lebanon and Syria.

War against Lebanon and Syria is the next stage of the Israeli-Saudi-US Axis "project".

Saudi Arabia and the United States are very much available to "assist" the upcoming Israeli military adventure.

South Front has presented a cogent and fairly detailed analysis of Israel's upcoming war in southern Lebanon.

Conspicuously absent from the South Front analysis is any discussion of the Israeli planned assault on Syria, or possible responses to the conflict from the United States or Russia.

Israeli propaganda preparations for attack are already in high gear. Unfortunately, sober heads are in perilously short supply in Israel and the U.S., so the prognosis can hardly be optimistic.

"Scenarios for the Third Lebanon War

Over time, IDF's military effectiveness had declined. [ ] In the Second Lebanon War of 2006 due to the overwhelming numerical superiority in men and equipment the IDF managed to occupy key strong points but failed to inflict a decisive defeat on Hezbollah. The frequency of attacks in Israeli territory was not reduced; the units of the IDF became bogged down in the fighting in the settlements and suffered significant losses. There now exists considerable political pressure to reassert IDF's lost military dominance and, despite the complexity and unpredictability of the situation we may assume the future conflict will feature only two sides, IDF and Hezbollah. Based on the bellicose statements of the leadership of the Jewish state, the fighting will be initiated by Israel.

"The operation will begin with a massive evacuation of residents from the settlements in the north and centre of Israel. Since Hezbollah has agents within the IDF, it will not be possible to keep secret the concentration of troops on the border and a mass evacuation of civilians. Hezbollah units will will be ordered to occupy a prepared defensive position and simultaneously open fire on places were IDF units are concentrated. The civilian population of southern Lebanon will most likely be evacuated. IDF will launch massive bombing causing great damage to the social infrastructure and some damage to Hezbollah's military infrastructure, but without destroying the carefully protected and camouflaged rocket launchers and launch sites.

"Hezbollah control and communications systems have elements of redundancy. Consequently, regardless of the use of specialized precision-guided munitions, the command posts and electronic warfare systems will not be paralysed, maintaining communications including through the use of fibre-optic communications means. IDF discovered that the movement has such equipment during the 2006 war. Smaller units will operate independently, working with open communication channels, using the pre-defined call signs and codes.

"Israeli troops will then cross the border of Lebanon, despite the presence of the UN peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon, beginning a ground operation with the involvement of a greater number of units than in the 2006 war. The IDF troops will occupy commanding heights and begin to prepare for assaults on settlements and actions in the tunnels. The Israelis do not score a quick victory as they suffer heavy losses in built-up areas. The need to secure occupied territory with patrols and checkpoints will cause further losses.

"The fact that Israel itself started the war and caused damage to the civilian infrastructure, allows the leadership of the movement to use its missile arsenal on Israeli cities. While Israel's missile defence systems can successfully intercept the launched missiles, there are not enough of them to blunt the bombardment. The civilian evacuation paralyzes life in the country. As soon IDF's Iron Dome and other medium-range systems are spent on short-range Hezbollah rockets, the bombardment of Israel with long-range missiles may commence. Hezbollah's Iranian solid-fuel rockets do not require much time to prepare for launch and may target the entire territory of Israel, causing further losses.

"It is difficult to assess the duration of actions of this war. One thing that seems certain is that Israel shouldn't count on its rapid conclusion, similar to last September's exercises. Hezbollah units are stronger and more capable than during the 2006 war, despite the fact that they are fighting in Syria and suffered losses there.

"Conclusions

"The combination of large-scale exercises and bellicose rhetoric is intended to muster Israeli public support for the aggression against Hezbollah by convincing the public the victory would be swift and bloodless. Instead of restraint based on a sober assessment of relative capabilities, Israeli leaders appear to be in a state of blood lust. In contrast, the Hezbollah has thus far demonstrated restraint and diplomacy.

"Underestimating the adversary is always the first step towards a defeat. Such mistakes are paid for with soldiers' blood and commanders' careers. The latest IDF exercises suggest Israeli leaders underestimate the opponent and, more importantly, consider them to be quite dumb. In reality, Hezbollah units will not cross the border. There is no need to provoke the already too nervous neighbor and to suffer losses solely to plant a flag and photograph it for their leader. For Hezbollah, it is easier and safer when the Israeli soldiers come to them. According to the IDF soldiers who served in Gaza and southern Lebanon, it is easier to operate on the plains of Gaza than the mountainous terrain of southern Lebanon. This is a problem for armoured vehicles fighting for control of heights, tunnels, and settlements, where they are exposed to anti-armor weapons.

"While the Israeli establishment is in a state of patriotic frenzy, it would be a good time for them to turn to the wisdom of their ancestors. After all, as the old Jewish proverb says: 'War is a big swamp, easy to go into but hard to get out'."

Israeli Defense Forces: Military Capabilities, Scenarios for the Third Lebanon War
https://southfront.org/israeli-defense-forces-military-capabilities-scenarios-for-the-third-lebanon-war/

Sally Snyder , November 10, 2017 at 10:05 pm

Here are some cables that Wikileaks released showing us how the Saudi royal family tries to control the world's media:

http://viableopposition.blogspot.ca/2016/01/how-saudi-arabia-controls-its-own-media.html

The Saudi Royal Family has bottomless pockets when it comes to controlling negative press coverage.

Zachary Smith , November 10, 2017 at 10:28 pm

And in the shadows, at the back of the gaming room, stands Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. The idea of going to the casino was his, in the first place. If the hero lands on black, he will share in the joy, but if it is red never mind: Bibi's home is not forfeit.

At first glance it looks to me as if Netanyahu wins any coin flip, whether it is "heads" or "tails". No matter what happens, Saudi Arabia is going to be severely shaken up, and chaos in surrounding Muslim nations is almost always a "plus" for Israel.

But at second glance I imagine I can also see a downside. The Arabian Peninsula has a hefty population, and if the Kingdom here does shatter, there is a possibility that an Arabic Napoleon could emerge. During the time of Muhammad there was an outward-moving crusade, and might it not happen again? Saudi Arabia may not have much of an army at the moment, but that could change quickly. A glance at a world globe shows Israel to be very close by. This sort of thing would cause me to lose sleep if I were an Israeli strategist.

At the moment the KSA is being taken over by a young numbskull, if all the accounts I've read are even remotely true. Perhaps Israel is providing the brains. The Moon of Alabama blogger has a low opinion of the young man.

Saudi Arabia – This "Liberal Reformer" Is An Impulsive Tyrant

h**p://www.moonofalabama.org/2017/11/saudi-arabia-the-liberal-reformer-reveals-himself-as-an-impulsive-tyrant-.html

David G , November 10, 2017 at 10:59 pm

The singular fact that the planned next royal succession from Salman to MbS will be the first from father to son since the death of Abdulaziz seems to me to add a whole other level of uncertainty to what is already a difficult time for the kingdom.

[Nov 08, 2017] More 'Fake News,' Alas, From the New York Times The American Conservative by Andrew J. Bacevich

Notable quotes:
"... Third, Manafort's efforts mattered bigly. In 2010, he helped Victor F. Yanukovych become president of Ukraine. An unquestionably nasty piece of work, Yanukovych was, according to Farkas, "Putin's man in Kiev." Yet like it or not, he came to power as the result of democratic election. In 2013, Yanukovych opted against joining the EU, which along with NATO, had, in Farkas's words, "experienced a burst of membership expansion" right up to Russia's own borders. ..."
"... In response to Yanukovych's action, "the Ukrainian people," that is, the enlightened ones, "took to the streets," forcing him to flee the country. Rather than bowing to the expressed will of the people, however, Russia's Vladimir Putin "instigated a separatist movement" in eastern Ukraine, thereby triggering "a war between Russia and Ukraine that continues to this day." ..."
"... To accept Farkas's account as truthful, one would necessarily conclude that as Manafort was hijacking history, the United States remained quietly on the sidelines, an innocent bystander sending prayers heavenward in hopes that freedom and democracy might everywhere prevail ..."
"... Furthermore, Russia was not alone in its meddling. The United States has been equally guilty. When "the Ukrainian people took to the streets," as Farkas puts it, the State Department and CIA were behind the scenes vigorously pulling strings. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland believed it was incumbent upon the United States to decide who should govern Ukraine. ("Yats is the guy," she said on a leaked call). Nuland would brook no interference from allies slow to follow Washington's lead. ("F–k the EU," she told the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.) ..."
"... That Ukraine is, as Farkas correctly states, a torn country, did not give Nuland pause. Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. policymakers have assigned to themselves a magical ability to repair such tears and to make broken countries whole. The results of their labors are amply on display everywhere from Somalia and Haiti to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. Now add Ukraine to that sorry list. ..."
"... Even so, can't we at least assume Nuland's motives were morally superior to Putin's? After all, President Putin is clearly a thug whereas Nuland is an estimable product of the American foreign policy establishment. She's married to Robert Kagan, for heaven's sake. ..."
"... This is why we should disband politically oriented NGO's. In essence, a country is only a democracy if it is pro-U.S. Resistance is futile. Meddling at this level will only bring about more conflict, instability and military obligations will follow. It is good to be king but it is also quite expensive and ultimately ruinous. ..."
"... Imperialism rules other peoples against their will, necessitating for its survival the lessening of democratic accountability at home, too, since it lessens the importance of citizens' own concerns, also requiring for its warmaking security keeping voters in the dark. ..."
"... Make that, More 'Fake News,' Of Course From the New York Times. Saturated with Fake News of various manifestations, the NY Times and its rancid analog Washington Post on the other end of the Crony-Elite NY-DC axis are unreadable. ..."
"... Given a ham-fisted EU run by Elite hacks in Brussels that is white washing Europe's Christian legacy, mandating overbearing economic and social controls and absorbing millions of net negative migrants, the Czechs, Poles, Hungarians and Balts seem to be having second thoughts. BTW, The Russians will not and do not want to invade those countries. As the EU spins out of control and the One Belt One Road initiative develops, Russia only needs to ask them what direction they want to face in the future. ..."
"... So, having said that, on foreign policy they, all newspapers and the vast majority of magazines, are war-peddling neo-con supporters. ..."
"... Do not buy any major newspaper. Let them wither away and, it wasn't fake spun 'news' we have been getting only this year: fake agenda driven bull has been going on for decades. Go to the internet and overseas for news think what I said over and you will see ..."
"... All this social, economic and political mess is the result of deregulation in the economic, social, political spheres. The effects of those deregulations are now quite obvious in: economy, society, morality and politics that are already corrupted to the core, but the corruption is not stopping there, it is consuming everything else on its way. There is no end to it, and what is even more surprising is that people want even more of all kinds of deregulations etc. ..."
"... Wouldn't it be more logical to bring back responsibility, moral standards and decency to politics, society and economy etc? What I now see in media is the total lack of any ideas on how to correct the obvious, but instead everybody is spinning his/her lies to make them more believable to the yet unconverted. This is pure relativism and sophistry and it destroys not only the USA, but the West as well. ..."
"... If an opinion piece in NYT or other MSM blatantly distorts the facts, then it belongs to the category of "fake news." Which should probably be called "malicious rumors." So the defense of some commenters that you can blatantly lie in opinion pieces (the right NYT exercised to the full extent in this particular example and for which Bacevich criticized them) is wrong. Anti-Russian witch hunt in NYT and other MSM destroys the credibility of the USA version of neoliberalism as well as the USA foreign policy. Along with Trump election, I view it as a symptom of the crisis of neoliberalism for which the US elite is unable to find a more suitable answer than scapegoating. Also the fact that Nuland is married to neocon warmonger Kagan is a material fact. ..."
Nov 08, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Disregarding President Trump's insistent claim that the establishment press propagates "fake news" requires a constant effort -- especially when a prestigious outlet like the New York Times allows itself to be used for blatantly fraudulent purposes.

I cherish the First Amendment. Mark me down as favoring journalism that is loud, lively, and confrontational. When members of the media snooze -- falling for fictitious claims about Saddam's WMD program or Gaddafi's genocidal intentions, for example -- we all lose.

So the recent decision by Times editors to publish an op-ed regarding Paul Manafort's involvement in Ukraine is disturbing. That the Times is keen to bring down Donald Trump is no doubt the case. Yet if efforts to do so entail grotesque distortions of U.S. policy before Trump, then we are courting real trouble. Put simply, ousting Trump should not come at the cost of whitewashing the follies that contributed to Trump's rise in the first place.

The offending Times op-ed, the handiwork of Evelyn N. Farkas, appears under the title "With Manafort, It Really Is About Russia, Not Ukraine." During the Obama administration, Farkas served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia, and Mess Kit Repair. Okay, I added that last bit, but it does seem like quite an expansive charter for a mere deputy assistant secretary.

The story Farkas tells goes like this.

First, from the moment it achieved independence in 1991, Ukraine was a divided nation, "torn between Western Europe and Russia." Ukrainians in the country's western precincts wanted to join the European Union and NATO. Those further to east "oriented themselves toward Russia, which exerted maximum influence to keep Ukraine closely aligned." In one camp were enlightened Ukrainians. In the other camp, the unenlightened.

Second, Manafort's involvement in this intra-Ukrainian dispute was -- shockingly -- never about "advanc[ing] the interests of democracy, Western Europe or the United States." Manafort's motives were strictly venal. In what Farkas describes as a "standoff between democracy and autocracy," he threw in with the autocrats, thereby raking in millions.

Third, Manafort's efforts mattered bigly. In 2010, he helped Victor F. Yanukovych become president of Ukraine. An unquestionably nasty piece of work, Yanukovych was, according to Farkas, "Putin's man in Kiev." Yet like it or not, he came to power as the result of democratic election. In 2013, Yanukovych opted against joining the EU, which along with NATO, had, in Farkas's words, "experienced a burst of membership expansion" right up to Russia's own borders.

In response to Yanukovych's action, "the Ukrainian people," that is, the enlightened ones, "took to the streets," forcing him to flee the country. Rather than bowing to the expressed will of the people, however, Russia's Vladimir Putin "instigated a separatist movement" in eastern Ukraine, thereby triggering "a war between Russia and Ukraine that continues to this day."

To accept Farkas's account as truthful, one would necessarily conclude that as Manafort was hijacking history, the United States remained quietly on the sidelines, an innocent bystander sending prayers heavenward in hopes that freedom and democracy might everywhere prevail .

Such was hardly the case, however. One need not be a Putin apologist to note that the United States was itself engaged in a program of instigation, one that ultimately induced a hostile -- but arguably defensive -- Russian response.

In the wake of the Cold War, the EU and NATO did not experience a "burst" of expansion, a formulation suggesting joyous spontaneity. Rather, with Washington's enthusiastic support, the West embarked upon a deliberate eastward march at the Kremlin's expense, an undertaking made possible by (and intended to exploit) Russia's weakened state. In football, it's called piling on.

That this project worked to the benefit of Czechs, Poles, Hungarians, the Baltic Republics, and others is very much the case. On that score, it is to be applauded.

That at some point a resentful Russia would push back was all but certain. Indeed, more than a few Western observers had warned against such a response.

The proposed incorporation of Ukraine into NATO brought matters to a head. For Putin, this was an unacceptable prospect. He acted as would any U.S. president contemplating the absorption of a near neighbor into hostile bloc of nations. Indeed, he acted much as had Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy when they assessed the implications of Cuba joining the Soviet bloc.

That doesn't justify or excuse Putin's meddling in Ukraine. Yet it suggests an explanation for Russian behavior other than the bitterness of an ex-KGB colonel still with his shorts in a knot over losing the Cold War. Russia has an obvious and compelling interest in who controls Ukraine, even if few in Washington or in the editorial offices of the New York Times will acknowledge that reality.

Furthermore, Russia was not alone in its meddling. The United States has been equally guilty. When "the Ukrainian people took to the streets," as Farkas puts it, the State Department and CIA were behind the scenes vigorously pulling strings. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland believed it was incumbent upon the United States to decide who should govern Ukraine. ("Yats is the guy," she said on a leaked call). Nuland would brook no interference from allies slow to follow Washington's lead. ("F–k the EU," she told the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.)

That Ukraine is, as Farkas correctly states, a torn country, did not give Nuland pause. Since the end of the Cold War, U.S. policymakers have assigned to themselves a magical ability to repair such tears and to make broken countries whole. The results of their labors are amply on display everywhere from Somalia and Haiti to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. Now add Ukraine to that sorry list.

Even so, can't we at least assume Nuland's motives were morally superior to Putin's? After all, President Putin is clearly a thug whereas Nuland is an estimable product of the American foreign policy establishment. She's married to Robert Kagan, for heaven's sake.

Persuade yourself that the United States is all about democracy promotion, as Farkas appears to believe, and the answer to that question is clearly yes. Alas, the record of American statecraft stretching over decades provides an abundance of contrary evidence. In practice, the United States supports democracy only when it finds it convenient to do so. Should circumstances require, it unhesitatingly befriends despots, especially rich ones that pay cash while purchasing American weaponry.

Yanukovych was Putin's man, "and therefore, indirectly, so was Mr. Manafort," Farkas concludes. All that now remains is to determine "the extent to which Mr. Manafort was Putin's man in Washington." For Farkas, the self-evident answer to that question cannot come too soon.

As to whether Russia -- or any other great power -- might have legitimate security interests that the United States would do well to respect, that's not a matter worth bothering about. Thus does the imperative of ousting Trump eclipse the need to confront the pretensions and the hubris that helped make Trump possible.

Andrew Bacevich is writer-at-large at The American Conservative

John Fargo , says: November 7, 2017 at 11:17 pm

This is why the term "fake news" is so harmful and should not be used by media outlets. The use of "bad journalism" would be much more useful as it forces the claimants to justify their reasons for doing so.
"Fake news" is just a dog whistle.
William Dalton , says: November 8, 2017 at 12:02 am
Has it not occurred to the foreign policy establishment in Washington that it is more in America's national interests for Ukraine to remain in Moscow's orbit, so as to strengthen U.S.-Russian relations, not exacerbate tensions, rather than to pull them into the EU, or, God forbid, NATO? Isn't this what any of the seasoned experts at Foggy Bottom would tell you? Why aren't they doing so?
Tiktaalik , says: November 8, 2017 at 2:49 am
Two comments in order

1) Yanukovich won in 2004 as well and the election results were hijacked by 'Maidan'

2) Yanukovich wasn't Putin man back in 2010. As a matter of fact, he and his party actively promoted EU integration deal, until they read its actual conditions. After that they backtracked and rushed to Putin for a support.

So it was classical case of sitting on two chairs simultaneously.

JonB , says: November 8, 2017 at 5:39 am
Completely agree with John Fargo. "Fake News" should be reserved for deliberate falsehoods published knowingly. This NYT op-ed amounts to "an interpretation of history Bacevich doesn't agree with." I may not agree with it either – but it's not like claiming that the Vegas shooter was anti-Trump, or creating a Facebook account for a non-existent person or organization.
Nolan , says: November 8, 2017 at 6:42 am
Mr Fargo: Disagree. "Bad journalism" implies the author is lazy yet innocent in their way. "Fake news" is more about narrative control and manipulation of the reader through reinvention or exaggeration, et cetera. Calling articles and outlets fake news is more accurate and levies much more weight against the lies and deceit than simply accusing someone or thing of bad journalism.
Christian Chuba , says: November 8, 2017 at 6:54 am
This is why we should disband politically oriented NGO's. In essence, a country is only a democracy if it is pro-U.S. Resistance is futile. Meddling at this level will only bring about more conflict, instability and military obligations will follow. It is good to be king but it is also quite expensive and ultimately ruinous.
Fran Macadam , says: November 8, 2017 at 7:30 am
If it were all about democracy promotion, they wouldn't also be so anxious to negate an election here at home. Imperialism rules other peoples against their will, necessitating for its survival the lessening of democratic accountability at home, too, since it lessens the importance of citizens' own concerns, also requiring for its warmaking security keeping voters in the dark.
SteveM , says: November 8, 2017 at 7:36 am
Re: "More 'Fake News,' Alas, From the New York Times"

Make that, More 'Fake News,' Of Course From the New York Times. Saturated with Fake News of various manifestations, the NY Times and its rancid analog Washington Post on the other end of the Crony-Elite NY-DC axis are unreadable.

Re: "That this project worked to the benefit of Czechs, Poles, Hungarians, the Baltic Republics, and others is very much the case. On that score, it is to be applauded."

Given a ham-fisted EU run by Elite hacks in Brussels that is white washing Europe's Christian legacy, mandating overbearing economic and social controls and absorbing millions of net negative migrants, the Czechs, Poles, Hungarians and Balts seem to be having second thoughts. BTW, The Russians will not and do not want to invade those countries. As the EU spins out of control and the One Belt One Road initiative develops, Russia only needs to ask them what direction they want to face in the future.

Dee , says: November 8, 2017 at 8:08 am
How is it someone's "opinion" constitutes "fake News"? Trump did not win by policy issues, he rode the right-wing outrage at all things clinton/libtard better than anyone else. His policy positions were mostly promise everything to everyone, but his campaign was about Lock her up/ build the wall! After bashing Goldman Sachs during the election, once he won he promptly filled his cabinet with them and other mega donor types.
Mario Diana , says: November 8, 2017 at 9:30 am
@John Fargo – I'm in almost complete sympathy with Mr. Bacevich's essay, but you make an excellent point. "Bad journalism" is the better term. In fact, the only criticism I can make of your statement is that "dog whistle" is the wrong term. Everyone associates the term "fake news" with Donald Trump. (If it were possible, he no doubt would have trademarked it.) Using the term alienates the very people who need to hear criticisms like those in Mr. Bacevich's essay. They hear it, too; and upon hearing it, they stop listening.
Egypt Steve , says: November 8, 2017 at 11:34 am
Look, elite and non-elite self-delusion about the purity of U.S. motives abroad dates back to the Roosevelt administration at least -- and I mean the Teddy Roosevelt administration. I don't see how any of this amounts to a defense of charges of money-laundering against Manafort.
Janek , says: November 8, 2017 at 11:37 am
I disagree with John Fargo. The news that NYT, Washington Post, and other media outlets (not only liberal ) "produce" is the "Fake News". "Bad journalism" should be reserved and used in the sense Nolan explains. Besides the "Fake News" on the so called "left" in American politics in general is the problem of "double speak" and speaking with the "forked tongues". American "right" is the camp of the white flag.
Tom , says: November 8, 2017 at 12:20 pm
The op-ed page is for opinion pieces of writing and that is what this was an opinion. It isn't fake news because it isn't news.
SteveM , says: November 8, 2017 at 12:43 pm
Re: Janek:

Besides the "Fake News" on the so called "left" in American politics in general is the problem of "double speak" and speaking with the "forked tongues". American "right" is the camp of the white flag.

I've mentioned the various "flavors" of Fake News before. There is (1) the obvious – what is claimed as true is actually false. But also (2), what is claimed as important, actually isn't. And (3) what is important, is weakly or not reported at all.

An example of Type 2 is the WaPost reporting on its front page before the 2016 that Jared Kushner may have been greased into the Harvard MBA program. As if Ivy League greasing by monied Elites is unheard of. How was that front page news? And how about the acceptances of Chelsea Clinton (Stanford) and Malia Obama (Harvard)?

The cases of Type 3 Fake News are much more egregious. For example, the reasoned arguments and analysis by retired American intelligence officers and academics that the Syrian forces "chemical weapon attack" in April was almost certainly a false flag with staged recovery activity.

The NY Times and WaPost have consistently refused to acknowledge that those arguments and analysis even exist.

The linking of Russia to the DNC email leaks as factual by the Times, Post and NPR without a scintilla of published hard evidence is another example.

There are many more examples of Type 3 Fake News that could be demonstrated. Much of what claims to be journalism by the MSM is now Fake News trash.

Siarlys Jenkins , says: November 8, 2017 at 1:09 pm
Disregarding President Trump's insistent claim that the establishment press propagates "fake news" requires a constant effort -- especially when a prestigious outlet like the New York Times allows itself to be used for blatantly fraudulent purposes.

I agree in principal, although I note that President Trump and his team are as guilty of fake news as anyone, and the president himself appears to be positively delusional. I might at times disagree with Bacevich as to which news is fake.

I would also agree that there has been a great deal of "fake news" out of Ukraine, and what is really going on their is a former SSR with a bitterly divided population that each has about equal numbers, proponderance in some territories compared to others, and equally opportunistic leadership showing no great commitment to anything recognizable as "democracy."

Fayez Abedaziz , says: November 8, 2017 at 3:22 pm
Say, can we refrain from using the word 'journalism' when we refer to the American media? We should.

The internet and sources overseas, such as the Independent News paper/site out of Britain, have news that is not purposely spun as is by the neo-con American news papers and magazines. Not as much, anyway. Several points here, for example of what bad news (pun intended) the joke of American media is:

1- quit calling the main stream media liberal or left. They are liberal in a 'social issues sense,' that is, to be politically correct.

2- So, having said that, on foreign policy they, all newspapers and the vast majority of magazines, are war-peddling neo-con supporters.

3-They have agendas. Do we not remember how they, at the new york times, peddled the war against Iraq and how, when you look at the editorial page you feel that these people and the guests opinion writers are soulless people that have no concern for America's 'flyover' country?

4- Yeah, isn't that ironic that these people look down on America's middle class, blue collar workers and yes, it's troops, by that constant bashing of nations here and there and pushing for aggressive stands or even military attacks? Let the people at the major newspapers like this n.y.times rag tell us when they served in the U.S. military or their when their offspring did or when they're gonna join and volunteer for combat duty. Never mind, I've got the answer-none of 'em.

Do not buy any major newspaper. Let them wither away and, it wasn't fake spun 'news' we have been getting only this year: fake agenda driven bull has been going on for decades. Go to the internet and overseas for news think what I said over and you will see

Janek , says: November 8, 2017 at 3:39 pm
@SteveM

Not everybody has the time to analyze the deluge of all the "Fake News" and categorize it into classes and/or sub-classes you or somebody else proposes. Where all that leads? Soon we will have new sociopolitical discipline and experts on "fake-newsology" that will introduce another layer of pseudo-information that will have to be translated to the uninitiated and unwashed.

All this social, economic and political mess is the result of deregulation in the economic, social, political spheres. The effects of those deregulations are now quite obvious in: economy, society, morality and politics that are already corrupted to the core, but the corruption is not stopping there, it is consuming everything else on its way. There is no end to it, and what is even more surprising is that people want even more of all kinds of deregulations etc.

Wouldn't it be more logical to bring back responsibility, moral standards and decency to politics, society and economy etc? What I now see in media is the total lack of any ideas on how to correct the obvious, but instead everybody is spinning his/her lies to make them more believable to the yet unconverted. This is pure relativism and sophistry and it destroys not only the USA, but the West as well.

nikbez

If an opinion piece in NYT or other MSM blatantly distorts the facts, then it belongs to the category of "fake news." Which should probably be called "malicious rumors."

So the defense of some commenters that you can blatantly lie in opinion pieces (the right NYT exercised to the full extent in this particular example and for which Bacevich criticized them) is wrong.

Anti-Russian witch hunt in NYT and other MSM destroys the credibility of the USA version of neoliberalism as well as the USA foreign policy. Along with Trump election, I view it as a symptom of the crisis of neoliberalism for which the US elite is unable to find a more suitable answer than scapegoating.

Also the fact that Nuland is married to neocon warmonger Kagan is a material fact.

[Nov 08, 2017] The Trump Administration's Contempt for Diplomacy

Nov 08, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com

SteveM , says: November 8, 2017 at 11:21 am

When you have a Global Cop War Machine hammer and surround yourself with a Pentagon/Security State steering committee advising you to use it, everything else is a nail. I have to admit, Trump is even a much smaller man than I imagined him to be at his worst.

Belligerent global power projection is currently unaffordable and quickly becoming obsolete. While China is eating America's lunch with it's productive foreign aid and investments that do not involve killing, destroying and intimidation.

Neither of which Trump comprehends. And of his in-house Neocon minions ("my generals"), it goes without saying

SDS , says: November 8, 2017 at 11:53 am
"and the American diplomatic core is down to Nikki Haley screaming into a phone in some basement office of the Pentagon"

That would be hilarious if it weren't so prophetic

rayray , says: November 8, 2017 at 1:13 pm
Every time a diplomat works to reduce tensions, build relationships, avoid conflict, this is literally taking money and opportunity out of the pockets of the Military/Industrial complex.

Trump, being ironically a terrible negotiator and, as @SDS notes above, has never had the temperament, intelligence, or empathy to be much more than a bully, is the perfect tool for the military/industrial complex.

[Oct 30, 2017] Nick Turse A Red Scare in the Gray Zone by Tom Engelhardt

Notable quotes:
"... Memo to Senator John McCain: ..."
Oct 29, 2017 | www.unz.com

Memo to Senator John McCain: Senator, the other day I noticed that, as chairman of the Armed Services Committee, you threatened to subpoena the Trump administration for information about the recent attack in Niger that killed four American soldiers. "There's a mindset over there that they're a unicameral government," you said. "It was easier under Obama We are coequal branches of government; we should be informed at all times. We're just not getting the information in the timely fashion that we need."

How true! But let me make one small suggestion. If you really want to know what led to those deaths in Niger, the first place you might consider looking -- no subpoena needed -- is this very website, TomDispatch . Or, to be more specific, Nick Turse's coverage of the way U.S. Africa Command and American Special Operations forces have, with a certain stealth but also without significant coverage in the mainstream media, extended the war on terror deep into Africa. He alone has covered this story and the secret bases , widespread " training missions " (like the one in Niger), and barely noticed wars being fought there since at least 2012, when I was already writing this of his work:

"So here's another question: Who decided in 2007 that a U.S. Africa Command should be set up to begin a process of turning that continent into a web of U.S. bases and other operations? Who decided that every Islamist rebel group in Africa, no matter how local or locally focused, was a threat to the U.S., calling for a military response? Certainly not the American people, who know nothing about this, who were never asked if expanding the U.S. global military mission to Africa was something they favored, who never heard the slightest debate, or even a single peep from Washington on the subject."

By 2013, in a passage that sounds eerily up to date as we read of ISIS-allied militants on the lawless Niger-Mali border, he was already reporting that

"while correlation doesn't equal causation, there is ample evidence to suggest the United States has facilitated a terror diaspora, imperiling nations and endangering peoples across Africa. In the wake of 9/11, Pentagon officials were hard-pressed to show evidence of a major African terror threat. Today, the continent is thick with militant groups that are increasingly crossing borders, sowing insecurity, and throwing the limits of U.S. power into broad relief. After 10 years of U.S. operations to promote stability by military means, the results have been the opposite. Africa has become blowback central."

Four years later, when the Niger events occurred, nothing had changed, except that the U.S. military had moved, again with little attention (except from Turse), even deeper into the heart of Africa, setting up a remarkable array of bases and outposts of every sort (including two drone bases in Niger).

[Oct 30, 2017] Nick Turse A Red Scare in the Gray Zone by Tom Engelhardt

Notable quotes:
"... Memo to Senator John McCain: ..."
Oct 29, 2017 | www.unz.com

Memo to Senator John McCain: Senator, the other day I noticed that, as chairman of the Armed Services Committee, you threatened to subpoena the Trump administration for information about the recent attack in Niger that killed four American soldiers. "There's a mindset over there that they're a unicameral government," you said. "It was easier under Obama We are coequal branches of government; we should be informed at all times. We're just not getting the information in the timely fashion that we need."

How true! But let me make one small suggestion. If you really want to know what led to those deaths in Niger, the first place you might consider looking -- no subpoena needed -- is this very website, TomDispatch . Or, to be more specific, Nick Turse's coverage of the way U.S. Africa Command and American Special Operations forces have, with a certain stealth but also without significant coverage in the mainstream media, extended the war on terror deep into Africa. He alone has covered this story and the secret bases , widespread " training missions " (like the one in Niger), and barely noticed wars being fought there since at least 2012, when I was already writing this of his work:

"So here's another question: Who decided in 2007 that a U.S. Africa Command should be set up to begin a process of turning that continent into a web of U.S. bases and other operations? Who decided that every Islamist rebel group in Africa, no matter how local or locally focused, was a threat to the U.S., calling for a military response? Certainly not the American people, who know nothing about this, who were never asked if expanding the U.S. global military mission to Africa was something they favored, who never heard the slightest debate, or even a single peep from Washington on the subject."

By 2013, in a passage that sounds eerily up to date as we read of ISIS-allied militants on the lawless Niger-Mali border, he was already reporting that

"while correlation doesn't equal causation, there is ample evidence to suggest the United States has facilitated a terror diaspora, imperiling nations and endangering peoples across Africa. In the wake of 9/11, Pentagon officials were hard-pressed to show evidence of a major African terror threat. Today, the continent is thick with militant groups that are increasingly crossing borders, sowing insecurity, and throwing the limits of U.S. power into broad relief. After 10 years of U.S. operations to promote stability by military means, the results have been the opposite. Africa has become blowback central."

Four years later, when the Niger events occurred, nothing had changed, except that the U.S. military had moved, again with little attention (except from Turse), even deeper into the heart of Africa, setting up a remarkable array of bases and outposts of every sort (including two drone bases in Niger).

[Oct 30, 2017] The Crooks, the Clowns and the Nazis by Saker

Questionable analysis by Saker (omitted for brevity). Some good comments in the discussion. The situation with the standard of living in Ukraine is really bad and it is unclear how it can improve. If you get 4000 grivna monthly salary and pay for the apartment around 2000 (heating with gas at winter often is over 1000 grivna) you can barely survive on the remaining money (2000 grivna is around 66 grivna a day) . Even food is a problem, unless you adhere to basic diet of bread, milk, eggs and potatoes. You simply can't. They are in a trap. This war in Donbass just make the bad situation even worse. But it sill continue, because there are powerful forces interesting in escalation of this war.
Notable quotes:
"... Just because one thinks American moves are not "strategic" only means you don't fully grasp what is going on. Remember, the narrative which is being presented here is that the United States has caused both conflicts. A coup in Ukraine and supporting regime-change in Syria. That necessitates that Russia is reacting – not calling the shots. ..."
"... Ask yourself a simple question: would Washington be better off with the status quo ante, would they be happy to go back to 2012? Of course they would – Crimea would be in Ukraine and in play, Russia would be subsidising Ukraine (not EU or IMF). But most importantly Russia would be sweating what 'might happen' with Crimea. Once West made its move and lost that threat was gone. It was just stupid. ..."
"... My take is that people there, based on a long experience, simply recognize that they are caught between two oligarchies, and unwilling to choose between them. That lethargy (for a lack of better word) is interesting. They don't buy US/West vision anymore. The thing is, they don't buy Russian either. They just don't care. Maybe that's worse than fighting for either side. ..."
"... The United States does not care about Poland or Estonia or Crimea or Ukraine or Syria or Georgia or even whether the other NATO members spend enough money. It cares about the bigger long-term picture. ..."
"... All this stuff like the coup in Ukraine, sanctions over Crimea – it's just probing moves, games. The US has Putin boxed in. He's got to scrape and claw over nothing. ..."
"... I guess it's kinda true in the sense that the US specifically (not necessarily the West as such, it seems) needs to have the uninterrupted chain of wars and cartoonish all-powerful super-evil adversaries threatening its very existence. I suppose it's needed for economic (mic) reasons, to maintain the internal unity/morale/discipline, and to run the usual protection racket abroad. Sorta like Oceania in Orwell's 1984. ..."
"... Russia is boxed in by its geography, and so is China. There is nothing new there. Enemies have been pressing on Russia's extensive borders forever. It is not likely that anyone would actually try to cross that border given this one reality: nuclear weapons. Unless the constant prodding has an answer to that reality, what is it all about? What's the point? ..."
"... Wars happen even if nobody 'wants' them. There are situations when wars happen almost on their own and nobody ever claims ownership. And if there is a war, there will be fighting in Poland – it is literally ground zero (as so often before), and no amount of NY Times editorials will make any damn difference. The country is too small, so it would be annihilated. Poland is storing missiles and 'defensive' divisions for its allies across the Atlantic with an open admission that they are targeting Russia. What do you think would happen in a real crisis or a war? Do you think US would look kindly at Russian missiles in Canada or Mexico? That is the true madness, and Poland is kind of in a heart of it. As so often before. ..."
"... At the end, I suspect, when/if it comes to renewal of hostilities, it will be: First and foremost artillery exchanges. Nothing changes. Then, small unit raids. Nothing changes. Then, tactical incursions by Ukrainian best. After initial success they'll be met by Donbas best.Because either side don't have many of those nothing changes too. A lot of talk from Washington and Moscow. Some dead/mutilated mercenaries. And while those "games" go the rest of peoples there just keep what they've been doing so far. Oceania vs Eurasia .. ..."
"... The single best way to assure that there isn't a 'regime change' is by constant probing of Russia's borders, by constant attacks, etc So I don't buy that, the experts in Washington are not that stupid. They understand fully well that placing missiles, coups, border harassment are by far the most reliable way to make sure that nothing changes in Moscow. ..."
"... The Ukraine situation will not be decided by fighting in Donbass, or in Moscow. It will be decided in Kiev (and Odessa, Lviv, Charkov) by the currently passive masses. Unless a miracle happens, or most people emigrate, this is not a sustainable situation. They are living worse than in 2013, and they already had it very bad in 2013. Marshall Plan isn't coming, membership in EU isn't coming either. Once that sinks in – it might take 5-10 years – things will change. ..."
"... That seems to be Russia's strategy. I agree that by far the best thing Moscow could do is to improve quality of life in Russia. Nato strategy is to delay it by any means: sanctions, energy, new arms race, whatever they can think off, lately mostly media campaigns. ..."
"... In Ukraine the EU-West infatuation will take a long time to dissipate. Getting hurt will eventually lead to making things better in the head , but it will take at least a generation. And things don't stay quiet for that long, other events will intervene. A circle cannot be squared: Kiev has attempted a great leap into its imagined future – Europe!!! – they bet everything on it, cut off all else, and there is no realistic way the leap will land Ukraine happily and soon enough in EU. EU will not agree to absorb 40 million poor people who mostly just want to live immediately like Germans, or move there. This is a mad dream, reality will intervene. ..."
"... I am sorry but I have to say this. How has led by Kissinger and Nixon strategy of opening China worked out? Is creating major geopolitical foe where there was none considered a sign of deep strategically long term thinking? ..."
"... The Ukrainian nationalists think that based on their accomplishments as a nation (there are none) they rightfully deserve to be geographically located somewhere between Germany and France. For this state of affairs they again blame the Russians. You see, because Russia is so big, and definitely in Eastern Europe, that they have the gravitational force that keeps Ukraine in Eastern Europe. If it wasn't for the Russians, Ukraine would have long ago catapulted into Western Europe – probably even geographically. It's only Russia that prevents them from acquiring their rightful place in the heart of Europe. ..."
"... In Ukrainians' defence, they have a bad location: wide-open, unprotected, with few geographic features and at the same time very high-quality earth. On second thought, if Ukraine, as is, was located in Western Europe 'somewhere between Germany and France' , I would be willing to bet that not a single Ukrainian would exist today. The Western Europeans know their genocide and know how to pacify populations. They almost got to them during WWII, Ukraine was the lebensraum that Nazis dreamt about. ..."
"... the assassination attempt on Mosiychuk [the former deputy commander of the infamous neo-Nazi Azov Battalio] is the initial phase of an escalation of the conflict between the Nazis and Jewish oligarchs headed by President Poroshenko, an escalation which is transitioning from a political to a "hot", or armed phase. ..."
"... Btw, Kolomoysky is an Israeli citizen. Speaking about Holocaust deniers – is it kosher to support neo-Nazi and work on the resurrection of Nazism in Ukraine and to remain an honorable Israeli citizen? It seems that Kolomoysky is such case. Next time the Israel-firsters attempt to squeal about any critics of "Holocaust story" they should be presented with the story of Jewish oligarch Kolomoysky. ..."
"... Your usage of the imbecilic word 'regime' betrays bias. What the f k is a'regime'? Is EU a 'regime', or the Saudi king, or China? If not, why not? Stick with term government and use it for all and you won't sound like a bitter dead-ender unable to see things rationally. ..."
"... Decent article, although some generalizations which is understandable. Couple points about Poland. Yes its allied with neocons atm (the bad). The government has some forces somewhat supporting Ukraine (Basically as long as the blame is focused on Russia). The government knows there are "neonazi" elements, as has mentioned Ukraine will not join EU until they stop that. As for the people Poland is divided like crazy on the Ukraine issue. ..."
"... Pax Americana's wave broke and is now rolling back out to sea, creating undertows as it goes. ..."
"... The ramifications of that sea change will take years, maybe decades, to play themselves out, but my assessment is that there will be no active "roll back (of the) '90s" or that said roll back is desirable/possible. The Ukraine and Serbia/Kosovo will wind up having to fit themselves into whatever new paradigm the world will be living under at the time. That paradigm won't be American led, or of American design. ..."
"... I don't see much of a future for Ukraine. Neither the West nor Russia is willing to underwrite the massive investment that would be required to rebuild the economy. Sure it makes sense to split the country. However, both sides are more than willing to live with an impoverished buffer between NATO and Russia. If the country is split, there is no longer any territorial disputes and the new West Ukraine ultimately becomes a NATO member and NATO weapons move hundreds of miles closer to the Russian border. Not to mention the fact that Russia would find it expensive to subsidize the new government. Same with the EU. ..."
"... The Black Sea may be important to Russia's regional aspirations, but for the US, what could be better than have as many Russian naval vessels as possible parked there? ..."
Oct 30, 2017 | www.unz.com

Johnny Rico , October 26, 2017 at 2:16 pm GMT

Russian activity in Syria and Ukraine are moves of desperation from a position of weakness. The United States has Russia boxed in. The United States forced Putin to take these actions. He would be removed from power otherwise. He had no choice. He is not in control.

In Russia you are either strong and in total control or they murder you. At least that has been the case for the last thousand years.

There was no "huge effort not to intervene." If there was, I'd like to know who made it and when.

This is not Iraq or Afghanistan. Comparisons to American involvement in these two places have limited utility.

Just because one thinks American moves are not "strategic" only means you don't fully grasp what is going on. Remember, the narrative which is being presented here is that the United States has caused both conflicts. A coup in Ukraine and supporting regime-change in Syria. That necessitates that Russia is reacting – not calling the shots.

The United States is not in "control" either, but it has the initiative and has Putin off-balance.

Priss Factor , Website October 26, 2017 at 3:49 pm GMT
To better understand what is going on, all three groups -- crooks, clowns, and nazis -- fall into the schnook category. They are being duped and used by the Globalist Empire that also controls the US. US is the Jewel in the Crown of the Globalist Empire but still a subject than a sovereign nation. It's like India was the Jewel in the Crown of the British Empire but not a free independent nation.

... ... ...

Beckow , October 26, 2017 at 4:17 pm GMT
@Johnny Rico

Assigning emotional labels is not helpful. You are right that Ukraine is nothing like Iraq or Afghanistan, it is hard to understand why Saker would use such a facile analogy.

You are also right that US-West have the initiative. But that is not necessarily a sustainable advantage. Hitler had the initiative too, and so did Napoleon, they had all the initiative until they didn't. (I know poor analogy, but tempting).

The prize in Ukraine was Crimea and the Russian Naval base. That was the prize, not who gets to grow potatoes in Lviv or scoop up coal in Donbass. Crimea is gone, and I think all rational people would agree that for now that is irreversible. So what is the fight about? Torch marching in Kiev, Nato relevancy, or who gets to subsidise 40 million very poor people? To control Ukraine (Kiev really) is now a hot potato that nobody particularly wants. It is like fighting over who has the control of Bihar in India, or eastern Nigeria, or any number of poor, non-strategic backwaters full of people who mostly want to emigrate.

Washington (with Poland and a few other fire-eating nut-cases in EU) made a strong move in 2013-14 trying to get their hands on Crimea and to replace the very strategic Russian Navy base in Sebastopol with a Nato base. They invested a lot in it, and they had the initiative. But the locals screwed up, they were too slow, too unfocused and too distracted by nationalism. So Russia won Crimea and all else are just provincial consequences of little long-term interest.

Ask yourself a simple question: would Washington be better off with the status quo ante, would they be happy to go back to 2012? Of course they would – Crimea would be in Ukraine and in play, Russia would be subsidising Ukraine (not EU or IMF). But most importantly Russia would be sweating what 'might happen' with Crimea. Once West made its move and lost that threat was gone. It was just stupid.

peterAUS , October 26, 2017 at 5:32 pm GMT
@Johnny Rico

A coup in Ukraine and supporting regime-change in Syria. That necessitates that Russia is reacting – not calling the shots.

The United States is not in "control" either, but it has the initiative and has Putin off-balance.

Well, I'd say:
A coup in Ukraine and supporting regime-change in Syria. That necessitates that Russia was reacting – not calling the shots.

The United States is not in "control" either, but it has the initiative and had Putin off-balance.

What has been interesting to me is something Martyanov hinted to here:

no part of the Novorossia, with the exception of Lugansk and Donetsk, matched even one tenth of scale and effort required to get back to Russia, or, at least, get away from Kiev. I don't blame them but it is what it is and this couldn't be ignored and it is not being ignored, thankfully.

My take is that people there, based on a long experience, simply recognize that they are caught between two oligarchies, and unwilling to choose between them. That lethargy (for a lack of better word) is interesting. They don't buy US/West vision anymore. The thing is, they don't buy Russian either. They just don't care. Maybe that's worse than fighting for either side.

When you are, effectively, in a state of constant conflict between states and most of population doesn't care, that looks as people there got their spirit crushed. And, oligarchies do like people with crushed spirit. Just a pliable mass doing what's told. Just a thought.

Beckow , October 26, 2017 at 6:39 pm GMT
@Mao Cheng Ji

Initiative means that US-West are the ones starting conflicts. It is neither good nor bad and initiatives that fail are worse than if they had done nothing. That is true about Iraq, Syria, Libya and Ukraine; in each case the status quo before the 'initiative' was better. Russia and China don't show anywhere as much 'initiative', they mostly react, they don't set the agenda.

People with too much initiative get stuck in muck of their own creation and eventually lose even what they safely controlled before. But the Washington-Brussels elites cannot help it, they must start things because they are not fully serious, they have had it too good, they believe in their own mythologized narratives, and their careers are based on it. So they will keep it going. The insurgencies within the domestic domain are still very minor, this has years to go, maybe decades.

Johnny Rico , October 26, 2017 at 6:43 pm GMT
@Beckow

I agree with much of what you say.

My feeling is that The Saker is always talking about the superiority of Russian "strategy" in retrospect while speculating about the minutiae of tactical deployments.

Americans rarely talk strategy and there is always an ongoing discussion in the higher levels of foreign policy academia and journals about what exactly the policy or strategy is or whether we even need one.

That was the title of Kissinger's 2002 book :

Does America Need a Foreign Policy? : Toward a Diplomacy for the 21st Century

This, however, does not mean there is no strategy.

The United States does not care about Poland or Estonia or Crimea or Ukraine or Syria or Georgia or even whether the other NATO members spend enough money. It cares about the bigger long-term picture.

We are not fighting insurgencies (as Mao Cheng Ji contends). That ended in Iraq in about 2010 and Afghanistan in about 2012.

Since 1980, Russia and the Soviet Union have lost FAR more troops (especially as a proportion of total population) in combat than the United States.

Everywhere US elite light infantry troops are stationed now they basically sit on their asses safe in bases. Occasionally they go out and call in airstrikes for local allies or conduct a raid on a "high-value target." Occasionally they die or get suicide-bombed by a local infiltrator.

All the guys I've ever met that are in these units LIVE to do what they are doing. I even know a couple dozen guys who have been either kicked out of the military or been wounded in Afghanistan or Iraq and they still say that the best time of their lives was walking around over there with a rifle.

They would be quite surprised by the notion that they are being forced to do what they do by the "ZioMedia" – whatever that is. This is not 1968 in Vietnam.

Syria has no oil. Ukraine is a basket-case economy with too many people. Georgia has 4 million people. That's more than Albania and less than Massachusetts. Most Americans couldn't find the state of Georgia on a map – nevermind the country.

Now in 2008 Russia launched an assault on Georgia that it had been planning for at least a decade after provoking what it wanted. It didn't go well technically but it went okay tactically, but because of the size mismatch it couldn't not be a success for the Russians. But it was quick because the Georgians are stupid but not that stupid. So it could be called an operational and strategic win. The United States tailored its response. But here you will always see it portrayed as some great Russian victory over a NATO-trained military and an attempted genocide of the South Ossetians. The Russians it appears used it successfully as a learning experience and got their act together militarily.

All along the periphery of the Russian Empire/former Soviet Union the US and the Russians play games. It's a big game.

Saker's last article was about whose propaganda is better. It's a big game. It keeps people employed in the respective defense industries.

The latest thing I read is that the US is spending $8 Billion on a rapid response division or something in Eastern Europe. There was a Toyota ad I think for an armor brigade in Poland during the Super Bowl. Ridiculous. A single division.

Nobody wants a war. There isn't going to be any fighting in Poland. If Russians and Ukrainians want to kill themselves over Kharkov, Americans don't care. I think the Russians and Germans fought three times over Kharkov. I guess it had a railroad track or something. Americans don't care.

All this stuff like the coup in Ukraine, sanctions over Crimea – it's just probing moves, games. The US has Putin boxed in. He's got to scrape and claw over nothing.

The Saker always talks about Russia having a "defensive" strategy. Change the perspective for a second. Knowing that all the planet's real estate is "owned"- where the US Empire stands now – trade routes, bases everywhere around the remaining oilfields in the Middle East. AND, here is the kicker – what if you consider that the US has the defensive strategy now? That is some serious flexible depth.

And Russia is still boxed in.

Mao Cheng Ji , October 26, 2017 at 7:24 pm GMT
@Beckow

Initiative means that US-West are the ones starting conflicts.

I guess it's kinda true in the sense that the US specifically (not necessarily the West as such, it seems) needs to have the uninterrupted chain of wars and cartoonish all-powerful super-evil adversaries threatening its very existence. I suppose it's needed for economic (mic) reasons, to maintain the internal unity/morale/discipline, and to run the usual protection racket abroad. Sorta like Oceania in Orwell's 1984.

But I don't think this amounts to 'initiative' in any flattering sense. By the same token a rabid dog shows 'initiative'.

Beckow , October 26, 2017 at 7:34 pm GMT
@Johnny Rico

Change the perspective for a second. Knowing that all the planet's real estate is "owned"- where the US Empire stands now – trade routes, bases everywhere around the remaining oilfields in the Middle East. AND, here is the kicker – what if you consider that the US has the defensive strategy now? That is some serious flexible depth.

You can call it 'depth', or you can also call it being exposed with too long supply lines. I don't think there is an automatic benefit to being everywhere, it could be a liability in a multi-site crisis. Hitler controlled almost all of continental Europe (and so did Napoleon), all it did was that when he was forced on a defensive (in the east), all of those territories became potential liabilities with allied landings, rebellions, countries switching sides, etc

Another problem is that US is trying to do it on the cheap with bombing, technology and allies – but with minimal casualties. The inability to take casualties is a weakness, you cannot in the long-run control all this geography and also protect every GI's life.

And Russia is still boxed in.

Russia is boxed in by its geography, and so is China. There is nothing new there. Enemies have been pressing on Russia's extensive borders forever. It is not likely that anyone would actually try to cross that border given this one reality: nuclear weapons. Unless the constant prodding has an answer to that reality, what is it all about? What's the point?

Nobody wants a war. There isn't going to be any fighting in Poland.

Wars happen even if nobody 'wants' them. There are situations when wars happen almost on their own and nobody ever claims ownership. And if there is a war, there will be fighting in Poland – it is literally ground zero (as so often before), and no amount of NY Times editorials will make any damn difference. The country is too small, so it would be annihilated. Poland is storing missiles and 'defensive' divisions for its allies across the Atlantic with an open admission that they are targeting Russia. What do you think would happen in a real crisis or a war? Do you think US would look kindly at Russian missiles in Canada or Mexico? That is the true madness, and Poland is kind of in a heart of it. As so often before.

I don't think either Russia or West have better or worse 'strategy'. They play with what they have. Lately Russia has been prevailing, maybe because West pushed too far and is on thin ice in most of these far-away places.

By the way, your description of the Georgia conflict in 2008 omitted the key event: as the Beijing Olympics were starting, Georgia attacked S Ossetia with massive bombardment (100+ civilians killed). You say that somehow Russia 'anticipated' it and took advantage. Isn't it their job to 'anticipate'? Wouldn't any country? But the key point is that without the extremely stupid, almost suicidial attack by Georgia, none of that would happened. Who the hell told Saakasvilli that this would be a good idea? Some 'strategist' who likes to 'poke the Russian borders' to keep them in a 'box'? This is abstract thinking at its worst. Get real.

peterAUS , October 26, 2017 at 7:37 pm GMT
Speaking of crooks and thieves. True, those Ukrainian elites are that. Can't argue that most of US/Western elite aren't. But, Russian (current) regime elite? How about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_of_crooks_and_thieves

So, I guess that an average Ukrainian ponders a simple question: For which crook I am supposed to lose my life and limb? And risking the same for people I care for? Tough decision. If if doubt do nothing feels as the best option. Keep your head down, keep your mouth shut and try to scrap a living there. Or, if you can, emigrate somewhere. If you can that is.

peterAUS , October 26, 2017 at 9:13 pm GMT
@Beckow

what is it all about? What's the point?

That rhetorical question? Regime change in Moscow->incorporating Russia into Empire at vassal level. Or back to happy Yeltsin era. Happy for some I mean. With vengeance.

As for this:

There are situations when wars happen almost on their own and nobody ever claims ownership

Couldn't agree more. That's the real worry at present. Combination of who are people in power and means of warfare.

People on the ground in Ukraine at "West" side incompetent and weak crooks. People on the ground in Ukraine at "East" side are also incompetent crooks. Not so sure how weak they are, though. They must be weak enough to obey Moscow but hard enough to keep .ahm..pruning own ranks from those unpopular with Moscow. Besides, they got into power by armed insurrection so usually those types can be hard.

I, personally, don't see much fuss about all this. Could be wrong, of course. The real question would be how, really, good Ukrainian armed forces are.
Have they used the time well to get good enough to create a serious problem for Donbass. My feeling .(haven't spent much time researching it) is they have not. Now, not so sure, whatever Saker is saying here, how good Donbass military is. In reality. I concede that they got better organized and equipped. Doesn't mean much , IMHO. The more important is how WILLING they would be to face an attack.

I .suspect .that the will when it was all started isn't there anymore. Could be wrong. Still think I am not. Or, better .feel that way. Those assassinations, plus overall quality of life there, plus unclear future (not what Moscow is saying, people on the ground don't buy that) aren't good for combat morale.

At the end, I suspect, when/if it comes to renewal of hostilities, it will be: First and foremost artillery exchanges. Nothing changes.
Then, small unit raids. Nothing changes. Then, tactical incursions by Ukrainian best. After initial success they'll be met by Donbas best.Because either side don't have many of those nothing changes too. A lot of talk from Washington and Moscow. Some dead/mutilated mercenaries. And while those "games" go the rest of peoples there just keep what they've been doing so far. Oceania vs Eurasia ..

Issac , October 26, 2017 at 9:44 pm GMT
@Priss Factor

Saker writing a Philip Giraldi level expose from that angle would probably have him out of a job. The Russian ruling class is not interested in making an enemy of Israel or vice versa.

Beckow , October 27, 2017 at 12:53 am GMT
@peterAUS

"Regime change in Moscow"

The single best way to assure that there isn't a 'regime change' is by constant probing of Russia's borders, by constant attacks, etc So I don't buy that, the experts in Washington are not that stupid. They understand fully well that placing missiles, coups, border harassment are by far the most reliable way to make sure that nothing changes in Moscow.

The Ukraine situation will not be decided by fighting in Donbass, or in Moscow. It will be decided in Kiev (and Odessa, Lviv, Charkov) by the currently passive masses. Unless a miracle happens, or most people emigrate, this is not a sustainable situation. They are living worse than in 2013, and they already had it very bad in 2013. Marshall Plan isn't coming, membership in EU isn't coming either. Once that sinks in – it might take 5-10 years – things will change.

peterAUS , October 27, 2017 at 2:08 am GMT

They understand fully well that placing missiles, coups, border harassment are by far the most reliable way to make sure that nothing changes in Moscow.

That's one way to look at it. Another is that they believe that's exactly what's needed. Worked rather well since '91 I think. US soldier couldn't get pass Germany (West/East) border. Now

It will be decided in Kiev (and Odessa, Lviv, Charkov) by the currently passive masses.

Sounds reasonable. In meantime

Beckow , October 29, 2017 at 8:27 am GMT
@Mr. Hack

"'Novorussian' fighting forces have from the very beginning just been a rag tag collection of Chechen and Russian mercenaries ,with a few local alcoholic yahoos , all directed by imported Russian degenerates, supported all along with Russian national troops and armaments"

All soldiers today get paid, thus you can call all of them 'mercenaries'. All soldiers drink. Their ethnicities are hard to establish and generalize. Words like 'rag tag', 'yahoos', 'degenerates' mean literally nothing in this context, you just add them to make yourself feel better.

If you take what your wrote and strip out the unnecessary poetry you might be closer to the truth: Novorussian forces are a combination of local separatists and volunteers who joined them mostly from Russia; Russia has provided most of their modern arms. Russia also acts as a backstop in case of another Kiev offensive to make sure that they cannot be defeated.

See, I fixed it for you. Now drop the poetic abuse and tell us what can be done about it. And take into account interests of all parties and their relative strength. All people are equal, applying emotional adjectives to your enemies changes nothing.

Avery , October 29, 2017 at 9:21 am GMT
@Beckow

Well said. Regarding: { . a rag tag collection of Chechen and Russian mercenaries,with a few local alcoholic yahoos, all directed by imported Russian degenerates }

If that is true, then it means Ukrainian military is even more incompetent than it is, being soundly defeated by a 'rag tag collection of mercenaries, alcoholic yahoos, and degenerates'. Being defeated by a professional opposing force is bad enough, but being defeated and chased out of Novorussia by 'degenerates'? How embarrassing for the Kiev junta.

Beckow , October 29, 2017 at 9:26 am GMT
@Sergey Krieger

That seems to be Russia's strategy. I agree that by far the best thing Moscow could do is to improve quality of life in Russia. Nato strategy is to delay it by any means: sanctions, energy, new arms race, whatever they can think off, lately mostly media campaigns. With Russia's resources, favourable demographics and global economic realities (China), it will not work. And then what? Once the quality of life is comparable to the average EU country, the gig will be up. Today Russia is slightly worse off than Poland and Lithuania, but better off than Romania or Bulgaria. But it is dramatically worse off than Germany, Czech R or Austria. Between 2000-2014 Germany and Russia were feeding off each other's growth, now they both suffer. We will see how that plays out, but there was a natural synergy that was artificially curtailed. More than anything else the Atlantic neo-cons fear more prosperity in Russia, so they will do almost anything to prevent it.

In Ukraine the EU-West infatuation will take a long time to dissipate. Getting hurt will eventually lead to making things better in the head , but it will take at least a generation. And things don't stay quiet for that long, other events will intervene. A circle cannot be squared: Kiev has attempted a great leap into its imagined future – Europe!!! – they bet everything on it, cut off all else, and there is no realistic way the leap will land Ukraine happily and soon enough in EU. EU will not agree to absorb 40 million poor people who mostly just want to live immediately like Germans, or move there. This is a mad dream, reality will intervene.

Those still hoping for a happy ending have not been paying attention.

Sergey Krieger , October 29, 2017 at 10:51 am GMT
@Johnny Rico

I am sorry but I have to say this. How has led by Kissinger and Nixon strategy of opening China worked out? Is creating major geopolitical foe where there was none considered a sign of deep strategically long term thinking?

Cyrano , October 29, 2017 at 11:04 am GMT
@Beckow

One often hears about "historical injustices" being committed against this nation or that ethnic group. Ukraine is probably a unique (basket) case because they think (the stupid ones) that beside historical injustices, they have also suffered geographical injustice.

The Ukrainian nationalists think that based on their accomplishments as a nation (there are none) they rightfully deserve to be geographically located somewhere between Germany and France. For this state of affairs they again blame the Russians. You see, because Russia is so big, and definitely in Eastern Europe, that they have the gravitational force that keeps Ukraine in Eastern Europe. If it wasn't for the Russians, Ukraine would have long ago catapulted into Western Europe – probably even geographically. It's only Russia that prevents them from acquiring their rightful place in the heart of Europe.

Beckow , October 29, 2017 at 11:32 am GMT
@Cyrano

"they have also suffered geographical injustice"

And so a solution is to have a war against geography. That usually goes very well, check with the Georgians :)

In Ukrainians' defence, they have a bad location: wide-open, unprotected, with few geographic features and at the same time very high-quality earth. On second thought, if Ukraine, as is, was located in Western Europe 'somewhere between Germany and France' , I would be willing to bet that not a single Ukrainian would exist today. The Western Europeans know their genocide and know how to pacify populations. They almost got to them during WWII, Ukraine was the lebensraum that Nazis dreamt about.

My estimate would be that if Russia had not sacrificed 20 million people to defeat Germany, today there would be no Poles, no Ukrainians, and no Czechs. A few smaller nations, like Croats, Slovaks, Slovenians, would exist as tiny folklor-only curiosity, regularly brutally culled for potential dissenters. Those 'damn Russkies', how dare they stop this? No wonder the sneaky Westerners will never forgive them. But one wonders why some of the designated victims, Poles, Ukrainians, Czechs, are also angry that the lebensraum genocide Nazi plan was not allowed to take place. But we are leaving geography and getting into psychiatry

Anon , Disclaimer October 29, 2017 at 11:37 am GMT
@Johnny Rico

A repost from consortiumnews.com: "The Kaganzation of Ukraine, which started on Clinton watch, is moving to a next, neo-Nazi phase: http://www.fort-russ.com/2017/10/mosiychuk-assassination-attempt.html

" the assassination attempt on Mosiychuk [the former deputy commander of the infamous neo-Nazi Azov Battalio] is the initial phase of an escalation of the conflict between the Nazis and Jewish oligarchs headed by President Poroshenko, an escalation which is transitioning from a political to a "hot", or armed phase.

Ironically enough, it is the Jewish oligarch Kolomoysky who is financing the operations of such Nazi revolutionaries. Indeed, all of the "Ukrainian revolutions," as is well known, have been done with Jewish money and through the hands of Ukrainian Nazis. By all accounts, Mosiychuk himself is one of the key figures behind preparing a Nazi coup d'etat."

Any reaction from the diligent ADL? Any peep from AIPAC? Kolomoysky is an Israeli citizen and a pillar of the Jewish community of Ukraine. He has been financing the Ukrainian neo-Nazis for several years already; Kolomoysky is also implicated in the downing of MH17. Still no interest from the Israel-occupied US Congress? Amazing. In the US, the "victims of Holocaust" from the Kagans' clan have been plotting and implementing the collaborative projects with Ukrainian neo-Nazis. Interesting times.

Just to reiterate –– "all of the "Ukrainian revolutions" have been done with Jewish money and through the hands of Ukrainian Nazis." And the Jewish vigilantes are busy fighting against BDS " https://consortiumnews.com/2017/10/28/hillary-clinton-keeps-pointing-fingers/#comment-293951

Btw, Kolomoysky is an Israeli citizen. Speaking about Holocaust deniers – is it kosher to support neo-Nazi and work on the resurrection of Nazism in Ukraine and to remain an honorable Israeli citizen? It seems that Kolomoysky is such case. Next time the Israel-firsters attempt to squeal about any critics of "Holocaust story" they should be presented with the story of Jewish oligarch Kolomoysky.

Beckow , October 29, 2017 at 12:17 pm GMT
@peterAUS

You use language very loosely: 'total control, 'fully integrated', 'force's skeleton', all those terms are both unprovable and meaningless in Donbass context. There are millions of Russians in Donbass, they have always lived there. They are willing to oppose post-coup Kiev government on their own. All else is vague verbiage that means nothing.

"the regime in Moscow decide to abandon the project it could dissolve that force in 12 hours tops and leave Novorussia ripe for takeover by the regime in Kiev"

Your usage of the imbecilic word 'regime' betrays bias. What the f k is a'regime'? Is EU a 'regime', or the Saudi king, or China? If not, why not? Stick with term government and use it for all and you won't sound like a bitter dead-ender unable to see things rationally.

Russia cannot abandon Donbass because the Kiev government would massacre many Russians living in Donbass. Or they would let their nationalist allies do it. In any case, millions would either be expelled, imprisoned or killed. That would mean the end of Putin's government. The fact that Brussels and Mme Merkel would look the other way and that Western media would pretend that not much was happening would not help either. So that's not going to happen, Russia is committed, it cannot 'abandon the project'. Kiev will either negotiate seriously now, or in the future. And time is definitely not on their side, longer this goes on, worse deal will be on the table for Kiev.

Anon , Disclaimer October 29, 2017 at 7:03 pm GMT
@Beckow

" it might take 5-10 years – things will change." It is already on the go: http://www.fort-russ.com/2017/10/mosiychuk-assassination-attempt.html
" another Maidan to be held under openly Nazi slogans and leading to the overthrow of the Jewish oligarchs led by Petro Poroshenko who seized power in Ukraine. Ukrainian Nazis are the most consistent and terrifying enemies of the Poroshenko regime, which they call an "internal occupation regime." We are now seeing a rehearsal for such a Nazi Maidan. Apparently, Poroshenko is taking a serious turn, and now terrorist methods are being used against the regime's mortal enemies."

polskijoe , October 29, 2017 at 7:42 pm GMT
Decent article, although some generalizations which is understandable. Couple points about Poland. Yes its allied with neocons atm (the bad).
The government has some forces somewhat supporting Ukraine (Basically as long as the blame is focused on Russia). The government knows there are "neonazi" elements, as has mentioned Ukraine will not join EU until they stop that. As for the people Poland is divided like crazy on the Ukraine issue.
Sergey Krieger , October 29, 2017 at 8:04 pm GMT
@Mao Cheng Ji

Lots of people changed from Russians into Ukrainians. I see many guys with Russian surnames there from news who are rabidly antirussians. Give some time. When Russia rises and life in Russia will be good there will be suddenly 90% of Ukrainian population Russians.

Erebus , October 29, 2017 at 8:10 pm GMT
Alas, you've yet again missed the salient point you're commenting on. The sea change I talk about is "a sea change in both capability and prospects" . And yes, a sea change in the sense that the high water mark of the USA's capabilities and prospects is now plainly visible. Its role has been reduced from world leader to that of spoiler in Syriaq, Philippines, MENA, ECS & SCS, in Africa, and in Europe itself. A spoiler's role is a very far cry from the world leader at "the end of history" it proclaimed itself to be in the early '90s. Pax Americana's wave broke and is now rolling back out to sea, creating undertows as it goes.

The ramifications of that sea change will take years, maybe decades, to play themselves out, but my assessment is that there will be no active "roll back (of the) '90s" or that said roll back is desirable/possible. The Ukraine and Serbia/Kosovo will wind up having to fit themselves into whatever new paradigm the world will be living under at the time. That paradigm won't be American led, or of American design.

polskijoe , October 29, 2017 at 8:34 pm GMT
@Dan Hayes

Prof Cohen, he is smart on Russian affairs, for a Jewish guy suprising he speaks favorably of the Russians. I dont know his political views. Certainly a change from the Neocon bs.

anon , Disclaimer October 29, 2017 at 11:52 pm GMT
I don't see much of a future for Ukraine. Neither the West nor Russia is willing to underwrite the massive investment that would be required to rebuild the economy. Sure it makes sense to split the country. However, both sides are more than willing to live with an impoverished buffer between NATO and Russia. If the country is split, there is no longer any territorial disputes and the new West Ukraine ultimately becomes a NATO member and NATO weapons move hundreds of miles closer to the Russian border. Not to mention the fact that Russia would find it expensive to subsidize the new government. Same with the EU.

The obsession with theoretical military engagements ignore the reality that 'winning' is simply taking a nation that is still a paying customer for natural gas and turning them into an expense.

As far as the value of Ukraine as an agricultural power -- Russia no longer cares. Russia (thanks to the US sanctions, among other things) is now the world's largest grain exporter.

The Black Sea may be important to Russia's regional aspirations, but for the US, what could be better than have as many Russian naval vessels as possible parked there?

Anatoly Karlin , Website October 30, 2017 at 12:05 am GMT
@Mr. Hack

The Saker does indeed peddle a lot of BS, but you are hardly one to talk.

1. The Chechens were briefly involved in 2014, have long since left.

2. The vast majority of the NAF (80%) are Ukrainian citizens , as confirmed by multiple sources including a list of names leaked by your ideological comrades at the Peacekeeper website. About another 10% are Russians from the Kuban, which is ethnically and culturally close to the Donbass, while the last 10% are Russians and other adventurers from the wider world.

So yes, it is indeed very homegrown, though it is true that the NAF would not have survived in its embryonic stages without the more competent and experienced Russian volunteers like Strelkov, as well as Russian logistical and artillery support.

3. NAF volunteers are indeed probably lower than average on the socio-economic scale, but I would be exceedingly surprised if it was otherwise for the UAF and the independent batallions. Certainly the chronic drunkeness , accidents, etc. in the Ukrainian Army that are constantly being written about indicates that doesn't harvest the cream of Ukraine's crop. (And that makes sense – apart from a hard core of patriots and nationalists, any Ukrainian would pay to avoid conscription, if he has the means).

[Oct 27, 2017] False Flag Bombings, Murder Plots, Bizarre Phone Calls The Stunning Revelations In The JFK Assassination Files Zero Hedge

Oct 27, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com

Following last night's release of the latest set of JFK Assassination Files, the public has been busy combing through the several thousand documents. Among the more notable discoveries so far are the following: the CIA contemplated mafia hits on Cuban President Fidel Castro, involving the "false flag" staging of bombings in Miami; Someone calling the FBI threatening to kill Lee Harvey Oswald a day before Oswald's murder; the US examined sabotaging airplane parts heading to Cuba. As a reminder, following a deadline 25 years in the making, last night the National Archives released an abridged dump of JFK Assassination files. While president Trump blocked the release of some, arguably the most controversial, documents citing national security concerns, the release still left researchers and conspiracy theorists with 52 previously unreleased full documents and thousands in part to sift through.

Here are the key highlights from the trove so far, courtesy of CBS and AP :

[Oct 24, 2017] Did the USA cool to Poroshenko? Mishiko just said: What stands between us and that future? A tiny clique of oligarchs and speculators: The President and his entourage

Notable quotes:
"... "Everyone knows that five-billion contracts are not signed by the defense minister or by his deputy, or even by any head of the Defense Ministry department. All politicians know who signs five-billion contracts. And this is the president of Ukraine," Tymoshenko said, while commenting on the scandal with the detention by the NABU of Deputy Defense Minister Ihor Pavlovsky and director of the public procurement department at the Defense Ministry Volodymyr Hulevych. ..."
Oct 24, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

yalensis , October 22, 2017 at 6:25 am

Only just got some time to start following Mishiko's "Mikho-Maidan" (English-language hashtag is #Mikhomaidan .

Apparently Saakashvili came up with a humdinger this morning: He promised his followers from the stump that the Ukraine will become a superpower dictating conditions to Europe and the world.


"Там где есть сила, там будет Украинская сверхдержава, которая будет диктовать условия в Европе и всем другим, и где люди будут жить достойно Что стоит между нами и этим будущим? Это маленькая кучка олигархов, барыг – президент и его окружение", -- сказал он, заверив, что сменить нынешнюю власть при желании населения можно "очень быстро и очень безболезненно".

"Кто-то говорит – "вот, этот гастролер, зачем он тут?" Все очень просто. Нет будущего ни у Грузии, ни у Молдовы, ни у Белоруссии, ни у кого в регионе, если не будет Украины", -- подчеркнул Саакашвили.

TRANSLATION:
"If people shall unite as a force, then there will be a Ukrainian superpower which will dictate conditions in Europe and to all the others; and people [here] will be able to live their lives with dignity. What stands between us and that future? A tiny clique of oligarchs and speculators: The President and his entourage," he said, assuring people that it would be a very quick and painless matter to overturn the existing government, given the desire of the people.
"Some people say, oh, here is that travelling showman, why is he here? It's very simple: There can be no future, neither for Gruzia, nor Moldavia, nor Belorussia, not for anyone in this region, if a Ukraine doesn't exist," Saakashvili underscored.

Pavlo Svolochenko , October 22, 2017 at 7:43 am
Does he even have any legal right to be in the country?
yalensis , October 22, 2017 at 11:56 am
No.
Jen , October 22, 2017 at 7:14 pm
Mishiko doesn't have the legal right to be in any country. He's stateless.
yalensis , October 23, 2017 at 3:08 am
He is just like Philip Nolan, "The Man Without A Country".

http://files.constantcontact.com/766c6672201/17c86a4a-16a5-412a-bffe-da50a5251b12.png?a=1127596639173

Patient Observer , October 22, 2017 at 7:56 am
Some people say, oh, here is that travelling showman, why is he here?

A good question yet to be answered by Mr. Saakashvili. The answer probably includes money, food, cocaine, public attention, food, sex and did I mention food?

marknesop , October 22, 2017 at 11:20 am
Mmmmm ..that sounds suspiciously like his oratory while President of Georgia, when he predicted that within X years of his modernizations like the Glass Bridge in Tbilisi (between 3 and 5, I forget now and the source was assimilated into the government's propaganda-pablum machine), there would be more tourists in Georgia than there were Georgians. Or like the time he told the US Senate that Georgia was so honest a place that people did not even lock their doors, the same year the US Government's State Department released a travel warning for Georgia that warned against pickpockets and various forms of thieving, including stopping your car on the road and robbing you or making you get out and taking the car. Crimes carried out by Georgian and Ukrainian organized criminals are often blamed on the Russian mafia.
yalensis , October 22, 2017 at 11:58 am
Also don't forget when Mishka bragged that Gruzia didn't need no stinking Russian wine market – they could always sell their best stuff to Western Europe!
'cause, see, the French and Germans and Italians don't produce any good wines
marknesop , October 22, 2017 at 12:48 pm
Yes, that's right! And then when the Russian market opened up again, it was greeted with great relief by the Georgian winemakers, and impartial sources remarked that there was not much of an appetite in Europe for Georgia's sweet and somewhat heavy wines, while Russians were very fond of them. Ukraine is learning the same bitter lesson now, and there would be nobody like Mishka to teach them. For the west's part, they would probably be quite willing to give Mishka another project, to keep him busy and keep Ukraine from slipping back into the Russian orbit.

Don't forget that Poroshenko is not likely to be going anywhere, since Ukraine is making him richer and richer, and he is likely to dabble in politics even after he is evicted in the next election. But having Mishka there to split the vote could easily result in a Tymoshenko victory. And that would be just perfect, with all her histrionic squalling about getting a machine gun and going to kill some Katsaps. She did say 'we'. Go ahead, Yooooolia. Let's see you bring it.

Speaking of Yoooolia, she now says that Poroshenko is using the army's fuel contracts to launder money .

"Everyone knows that five-billion contracts are not signed by the defense minister or by his deputy, or even by any head of the Defense Ministry department. All politicians know who signs five-billion contracts. And this is the president of Ukraine," Tymoshenko said, while commenting on the scandal with the detention by the NABU of Deputy Defense Minister Ihor Pavlovsky and director of the public procurement department at the Defense Ministry Volodymyr Hulevych.

Ponder for a moment the irony of Tymoshenko – who browbeat the director of Naftogaz into signing the take-or-pay contract with Russia which caused Ukraine such grief and then flew to Russia herself to wrap it up, after being specifically told by the Rada cabinet not to do it – pointing the accusing finger at corruption in the energy business.

[Oct 23, 2017] If granny had become POTUS there might have been a lot more radiation around the world because of her "charm".

Oct 23, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Moscow Exile , October 21, 2017 at 4:19 am

The re-modelling of Killary? Why does nobody mention that Hillary Clinton is perfectly nice? Hillary Clinton on The Graham Norton Show: no Paxman-style grilling, but the Democrat radiated grandmotherly charm

Who the fuck is this Norton bloke, anyway?

Moscow Exile , October 21, 2017 at 4:21 am
If granny had become POTUS there might have been a lot more radiation around the world because of her "charm".

[Oct 21, 2017] Washington Funds Foreign Think Tanks That Blacklist Opponents of Neocon Foreign Policy by Ron Paul

I admired Ron Paul foright policy views for a along time. and this time he also did not disappointed his reader.
Soviet labeled anybody who dissented from communist propaganda line or did not believe in Communist dogma as "agents of imperialism". Neocons similarly bland and-war activists and people who question this war mongering as peddlers of "Russian propaganda". This is what often happen with victors in wars: they acquired worst features of their defeated enemies. for example to defeat the USSR the USA create powerful network of intelligence agencies. Which promptly went out of civil control in 1963, much like KGB in the USSR and became state within the state. In a way now it in now now unfeasible that the Soviet Union posthumously have won the Cold War, as it is more and more difficult to distinguish Soviet propaganda and the US government propaganda.
So the fact that the US government allocate large sums of money for the propaganda against another neoliberal state -- Russia, which represent regional threat to the US hegemonic ambitions -- tells a lot about neoliberalism as a social system. Hostilities among neoliberal states, much like hostilities between communist states are not only possible, they are the reality.
Notable quotes:
"... So what is the "European Values" think tank? A bunch of kooks? Well perhaps, but they are well-funded kooks. In fact they are funded by American taxpayers to defame other Americans who appear on media outlets that are out of favor with Washington's elites. Among the top donors to the "European Values" think tank is the United States Embassy in Prague. Other top funders include George Soros' "Open Society Foundation," the European Commission, and the European Parliament. They are also funded by other US government funded think tanks such as the Prague-based "League of Human Rights." ..."
"... How ironic that such a Soviet-style attack on political dissent in the United States was launched from Prague, which for decades suffered under the Štátna bezpečnosť -- ..."
"... "I am not here to defend RT," I said on the program tonight. I am here to defend the marketplace of ideas that is critical to a free society. I am here to defend the right of US citizens to dissent from the foreign policy of their government without being attacked by their own government -- or by foreign think tanks funded by their government. ..."
"... This should infuriate us: The US government defines anyone who dissents from its foreign policy of endless wars and a global military empire as peddlers of "Russian propaganda" and then Congress appropriates tens of million dollars to "counter Russian propaganda." ..."
"... That means the US Congress is appropriating tens of millions of our dollars to silence our objection to Washington's trillion dollar global military empire. What a scam! How anti-American! Is that not a declaration of war on the rest of us? Is that not an act of tyranny? ..."
Oct 21, 2017 | ronpaulinstitute.org

Dear Friends of the Ron Paul Institute:

I just finished an interview on RT.

Someday soon, perhaps, anyone writing the above sentence will land in some sort of gulag, as once did East Europeans found to have appeared on a foreign broadcast questioning the historical inevitability of the worldwide communist revolution.

In my case, I was asked to comment on a new report (see above pic) from a Czech " think tank " exposing 2,327 American "useful idiots" who dared appear on the Russian government-funded RT television network.

Among the "Kremlin stooges" listed in the report of the "European Values" think tank? Alongside critics of US foreign policy like Ron Paul, the Czech "European Values" think tank listed Sen. Lindsay Graham, Joe Lieberman, Dick Cheney, US Rep. Adam Schiff, former acting CIA director Michael Morrell, former CIA director Michael Hayden, and hundreds more prominent Americans who have been notably hostile to Russia and its government.

I said: "Wow! this conspiracy is even deeper than we thought! Even the virulently anti-Russian neocons and Russia-hating CIA bigwigs are in fact Putin's poodles!"

It's funny but it's not. This is when the neo-McCarthyism lately in fashion across the ideological divide descends into the absurd. This is when the mask slips from the witch trials, when the naked emperor can no longer expect to not be noticed.

So what is the "European Values" think tank? A bunch of kooks? Well perhaps, but they are well-funded kooks. In fact they are funded by American taxpayers to defame other Americans who appear on media outlets that are out of favor with Washington's elites. Among the top donors to the "European Values" think tank is the United States Embassy in Prague. Other top funders include George Soros' "Open Society Foundation," the European Commission, and the European Parliament. They are also funded by other US government funded think tanks such as the Prague-based "League of Human Rights."

Since when did "European values" come to be defined as government-funded lists of political "enemies" who dare question US foreign policy on television networks despised by neocons and Washington interventionists? How ironic that such a Soviet-style attack on political dissent in the United States was launched from Prague, which for decades suffered under the Štátna bezpečnosť -- the communist secret police -- that took exactly the same view of those who deviated from the Soviet party line as does the modern Czech "European Values" think tank.

Anyone questioning our one trillion dollar global military empire is automatically considered to be in the pay of hostile foreign governments. How patriotic is that?

"I am not here to defend RT," I said on the program tonight. I am here to defend the marketplace of ideas that is critical to a free society. I am here to defend the right of US citizens to dissent from the foreign policy of their government without being attacked by their own government -- or by foreign think tanks funded by their government.

This should infuriate us: The US government defines anyone who dissents from its foreign policy of endless wars and a global military empire as peddlers of "Russian propaganda" and then Congress appropriates tens of million dollars to "counter Russian propaganda."

That means the US Congress is appropriating tens of millions of our dollars to silence our objection to Washington's trillion dollar global military empire. What a scam! How anti-American! Is that not a declaration of war on the rest of us? Is that not an act of tyranny?

The noose is tightening around us. Yet we must continue to fight for what we believe in! We must continue to fight for the prosperity that comes from a peaceful foreign policy. Your generous support for the Ron Paul Institute helps us continue to be your voice in the fight for free expression and a peaceful foreign policy.

[Oct 17, 2017] The Lobby British Style by Philip M. Giraldi

Maybe, instead of Russia-Gate, we have is Israel-Gate. This time Netanyahu discreetly interfering in US Presidential Election ..Chilling thought though!
Notable quotes:
"... casus belli ..."
"... To be sure, my observations are neither new nor unique. Former Congressmen Paul Findley indicted the careful crafting of a pro-Israel narrative by American Jews in his seminal book They Dare to Speak Out: People and Institutions Confront Israel's Lobby , written in 1989. Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt's groundbreaking book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy said much the same thing nine years ago and discussions of Jewish power do emerge occasionally, even in the mainstream media. In the Jewish media Jewish power is openly discussed and is generally applauded as a well-deserved reward bestowed both by God and by mankind due to the significant accomplishments attributed to Jews throughout history. ..."
"... That many groups and well-positioned individuals work hand-in-hand with the Israeli government to advance Israeli interests should not be in dispute after all these years of watching it in action. Several high level Jewish officials, including Richard Perle , associated with the George W. Bush Pentagon, had questionable relationships with Israeli Embassy officials and were only able to receive security clearances after political pressure was applied to "godfather" approvals for them. Former Congressman Tom Lantos and Senator Frank Lautenberg were, respectively, referred to as Israel's Congressman and Senator, while current Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has described himself as Israel's "shomer" or guardian in the U.S. Senate. ..."
"... The documentary reveals that local Jewish groups, particularly at universities and within the political parties, do indeed work closely with the Israeli Embassy to promote policies supported by the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. ..."
"... That's the money shot, Phil. I'm okay with Jews, okay with the existence of Israel, all that, but I think we were massively had by Iraq II. When Valerie Plame spoke in my area, she talked disgustedly about a plan to establish American military power throughout the Middle East. She used the euphemism "neocons" for the plan's authors, and seemed about to burst with anger. ..."
"... I recall the basic idea was for the U. S. to do Israel's dirty work at U. S. expense and without a U. S. benefit, and I think there was the usual "God talk" cover in it about "democratization", "development", blah-blah. ..."
"... I'd also add Adlai E. Stevenson III and John Glenn. Stevenson was crucial in getting compensation -- paltry sum though it was– payed to "Liberty" families for their loss. The Israelis had been holding out. Something for which the Il Senator was never forgiven (especially by The Lobby). ..."
"... Netanyahu should not have been allowed to address the joint session. No foreign leader should be speaking in opposition to any sitting President (in this case Obama). It only showed the power of "The Lobby." Netanyahu who knew that Iran didn't have the weapons the Bush Adm. had claimed, was treated like a trusted ally. He shouldn't have been. ..."
"... Maybe, instead of Russia-Gate, we have is Israel-Gate. This time Netanyahu discreetly interfering in US Presidential Election ..Chilling thought though! ..."
"... And Israeli interference in U.S. government and elections is also a given. Endorsement of Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election by the Netanyahu government was more-or-less carried out in the open. ..."
"... All embassies try to further their national interest through political machinations and all people in politics tend to use hyperbolic language to describe what they are doing. I don't know if your shock is just for show or you are just a bit dim. The same applies to Buzzfeed's 'expose' of Bannon and the gasps the article let out at his use of terms like #War. ..."
"... The British government attitude was that everything was fine because the Israeli government "apologised" and the "rogue individual" responsible was taken out of the country, and the British media mostly ignored the story after an initial brief scandal. Indeed the main substantive response was the Ofcom fishing expedition against Al Jazeera looking for ways to use the disclosure of these uncomfortable truths as a pretext for shutting that company's operations down. ..."
"... The supreme irony behind all this is that Trump has been prevented by his own personal and family/adviser bias from using the one certain way of removing all the laughably vague "Russian influence" nonsense that has been used against him so persistently. All he had to do was to, at every opportunity, tie criticism and investigation of Russian "influence" to criticism and investigation of Israel Lobby influence under the general rubric of "foreign influence", and almost all of the high level backing for the charges would in due course have quietly evaporated. ..."
"... WASP culture has always been philo-Semitic. That cannot be stated too much. WASP culture is inherently philo-Semtic. WASP culture was born of Anglo-Saxon Puritanism, which was a Judaizing heresy. ..."
"... You cannot solve 'the Jewish problem' unless you also solve 'the WASP problem.' ..."
"... The Israeli lobby is more powerful throughout the Anglosphere than the Saudi/Arabic lobby, but the Saudi lobby is equally detestable and probably even a more grave threat to the very existence of Western man. ..."
"... That the intelligence services of many countries engage in such conduct is not really news. Indeed, you could say that it's part of their normal job. They usually don't get caught and when accused of anything they shout "no evidence!" (now, where have I heard that recently?) Of course, if the Israelis engage in such conduct, then, logically, other countries' services do so too. ..."
"... Not surprising that the Jewish public gets gamed by Israeli political elites, just as the American public keeps getting gamed by our own cabal of bought politicians. Trying to fool enough of the people, enough of the time, contra Lincoln (who was not exactly a friend of critical dissent against war either .) ..."
Oct 17, 2017 | www.unz.com

One month ago, I initiated here at Unz.com a discussion of the role of American Jews in the crafting of United States foreign policy. I observed that a politically powerful and well-funded cabal consisting of both Jewish individuals and organizations has been effective at engaging the U.S. in a series of wars in the Middle East and North Africa that benefit only Israel and are, in fact, damaging to actual American interests. This misdirection of policy has not taken place because of some misguided belief that Israeli and U.S. national security interests are identical, which is a canard that is frequently floated in the mainstream media. It is instead a deliberate program that studiously misrepresents facts-on-the ground relating to Israel and its neighbors and creates casus belli involving the United States even when no threat to American vital interests exists. It punishes critics by damaging both their careers and reputations while its cynical manipulation of the media and gross corruption of the national political process has already produced the disastrous war against Iraq, the destruction of Libya and the ongoing chaos in Syria. It now threatens to initiate a catastrophic war with Iran.

To be sure, my observations are neither new nor unique. Former Congressmen Paul Findley indicted the careful crafting of a pro-Israel narrative by American Jews in his seminal book They Dare to Speak Out: People and Institutions Confront Israel's Lobby , written in 1989. Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt's groundbreaking book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy said much the same thing nine years ago and discussions of Jewish power do emerge occasionally, even in the mainstream media. In the Jewish media Jewish power is openly discussed and is generally applauded as a well-deserved reward bestowed both by God and by mankind due to the significant accomplishments attributed to Jews throughout history.

There is undeniably a complicated web of relationships and networks that define Israel's friends. The expression "Israel Lobby" itself has considerable currency, so much so that the expression "The Lobby" is widely used and understood to represent the most powerful foreign policy advocacy group in Washington without needing to include the "Israel" part. That the monstrous Benjamin Netanyahu receives 26 standing ovations from Congress and a wealthy Israel has a guaranteed income from the U.S. Treasury derives directly from the power and money of an easily identifiable cluster of groups and oligarchs – Paul Singer, Sheldon Adelson, Bernard Marcus, Haim Saban – who in turn fund a plethora of foundations and institutes whose principal function is to keep the cash and political support flowing in Israel's direction. No American national interest, apart from the completely phony contention that Israel is some kind of valuable ally, would justify the taxpayers' largesse. In reality, Israel is a liability to the United States and always has been.

And I do understand at the same time that a clear majority of American Jews, leaning strongly towards the liberal side of the political spectrum, are supportive of the nuclear agreement with Iran and do not favor a new Middle Eastern war involving that country. I also believe that many American Jews are likely appalled by Israeli behavior, but, unfortunately, there is a tendency on their part to look the other way and neither protest such actions nor support groups like Jewish Voice for Peace that are themselves openly critical of Israel. This de facto gives Israel a free pass and validates its assertion that it represents all Jews since no one important in the diaspora community apart from minority groups which can safely be ignored is pushing back against that claim.

That many groups and well-positioned individuals work hand-in-hand with the Israeli government to advance Israeli interests should not be in dispute after all these years of watching it in action. Several high level Jewish officials, including Richard Perle , associated with the George W. Bush Pentagon, had questionable relationships with Israeli Embassy officials and were only able to receive security clearances after political pressure was applied to "godfather" approvals for them. Former Congressman Tom Lantos and Senator Frank Lautenberg were, respectively, referred to as Israel's Congressman and Senator, while current Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has described himself as Israel's "shomer" or guardian in the U.S. Senate.

A recent regulatory decision from the United Kingdom relates to a bit of investigative journalism that sought to reveal precisely how the promotion of Israel by some local diaspora Jews operates, to include how critics are targeted and criticized as well as what is done to destroy their careers and reputations.

Last year, al-Jazeera Media Network used an undercover reporter to infiltrate some U.K. pro-Israel groups that were working closely with the Israeli Embassy to counter criticisms coming from British citizens regarding the treatment of the Palestinians. In particular, the Embassy and its friends were seeking to counter the growing Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS), which has become increasingly effective in Europe. The four-part documentary released late in 2016 that al-Jazeera produced is well worth watching as it consists mostly of secretly filmed meetings and discussions.

The documentary reveals that local Jewish groups, particularly at universities and within the political parties, do indeed work closely with the Israeli Embassy to promote policies supported by the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It also confirms that tagging someone as an anti-Semite has become the principal offensive weapon used to stifle any discussion, particularly in a country like Britain which embraces concepts like the criminalization of "hate speech." At one point, two British Jews discussed whether "being made to feel uncomfortable" by people asking what Israel intends to do with the Palestinians is anti-Semitic. They agreed that it might be.

The documentary also describes how the Embassy and local groups working together targeted government officials who were not considered to be friendly to Israel to "be taken down," removed from office or otherwise discredited. One government official in particular who was to be attacked was Foreign Office Minister Sir Alan Duncan.

Britain, unlike the U.S., has a powerful regulatory agency that oversees communications, to include the media. It is referred to as Ofcom. When the al-Jazeera documentary was broadcast, Israeli Embassy political officer Shai Masot, who reportedly was a Ministry of Strategic Affairs official working under cover, was forced to resign and the Israeli Ambassador offered an apology. Masot was filmed discussing British politicians who might be "taken down" before speaking with a government official who plotted a "a little scandal" to bring about the downfall of Duncan. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who is the first head of a political party in Britain to express pro-Palestinian views, had called for an investigation of Masot after the recording of the "take down" demand relating to Duncan was revealed. Several Jewish groups (the Jewish Labour Movement, the Union of Jewish Students and We Believe in Israel) then counterattacked with a complaint that the documentary had violated British broadcast regulations, including the specific charge that the undercover investigation was anti-Semitic in nature.

On October 9 th , Ofcom ruled in favor of al-Jazeera, stating that its investigation had done nothing improper, but it should be noted that the media outlet had to jump through numerous hoops to arrive at the successful conclusion. It had to turn over all its raw footage and communications to the investigators, undergoing what one source described as an "editorial colonoscopy," to prove that its documentary was "factually accurate" and that it had not "unfairly edited" or "with bias" prepared its story. One of plaintiffs, who had called for critics of Israel to "die in a hole" and had personally offered to "take down" a Labour Party official, responded bitterly. She said that the Ofcom judgment would serve as a "precedent for the infringement of privacy of any Jewish person involved in public life."

The United States does not yet have a government agency to regulate news stories, though that may be coming, but the British tale has an interesting post script. Al-Jazeera also had a second undercover reporter inserted in the Israel Lobby in the United States, apparently a British intern named James Anthony Kleinfeld, who had volunteered his services to The Israel Project, which is involved in promoting Israel's global image. He also had contact with at least ten other Jewish organizations and with officials at the Israeli Embassy,

Now that the British account of "The Lobby" has cleared a regulatory hurdle the American version will reportedly soon be released. Al-Jazeera's head of investigative reporting Clayton Swisher commented "With this U.K. verdict and vindication past us, we can soon reveal how the Israel lobby in America works through the eyes of an undercover reporter. I hear the U.S. is having problems with foreign interference these days, so I see no reason why the U.S. establishment won't take our findings in America as seriously as the British did, unless of course Israel is somehow off limits from that debate."

Americans who follow such matters already know that groups like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) swarm over Capitol Hill and have accomplices in nearly every media outlet. Back in 2005-6 AIPAC Officials Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman were actually tried under the Espionage Act of 1918 in a case involving obtaining classified intelligence from government official Lawrence Franklin to pass on to the Israeli Embassy. Rosen had once boasted that, representing AIPAC and Israel, he could get the signatures of 70 senators on a napkin agreeing to anything if he sought to do so. The charges against the two men were, unfortunately, eventually dropped "because court rulings had made the case unwinnable and the trial would disclose classified information."

And Israeli interference in U.S. government and elections is also a given. Endorsement of Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election by the Netanyahu government was more-or-less carried out in the open. And ask Congressmen like Paul Findley, Pete McCloskey, William Fulbright, Charles Percy and, most recently, Cynthia McKinney, what happens to your career when you appear to be critical of Israel. And the point is that while Israel calls the shots in terms of what it wants, it is a cabal of diaspora American Jews who actually pull the trigger. With that in mind, it will be very interesting to watch the al-Jazeera documentary on The Lobby in America.

Rurik , October 17, 2017 at 4:29 am GMT

Philip Giraldi is a rare American treasure. A voice of integrity and character in a sea of moral cowardice and corruption. If there is any hope for this nation, it will be due specifically to the integrity of men like Mr. Giraldi to keep speaking truth to power.
googlecensors , October 17, 2017 at 5:00 am GMT
One is unable to open the documentary – all 4 parts – on YouTube suggesting that google/YouTube are censoring it and have caved into the Jewish Lobby
Malla , October 17, 2017 at 5:03 am GMT
When the Jewish Messiah comes, all of us goyim (Black, White, Yellow, brown or Red) will be living like today's Palestinians. Our slave descendant will be scurrying around in their ghettos afraid of the Greater Israeli Army military andriod drones in the sky.

But if I was a Westerner, I would support Israel any day. Because if the Israeli state were to be ever dismantled, all of them Israelis would go to the West. Why would you want that?

Frankie P , October 17, 2017 at 5:42 am GMT
@Rurik

He has been set free by the truth, proving the old maxim.

wayfarer , October 17, 2017 at 5:43 am GMT
Understand a Spoiled Child, and You Will Understand Israel. source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoiled_child

Discipline the Spoiled Child, and Boycott Israel. source: https://bdsmovement.net/

Israel Anti-Boycott Act – An Attack on Free Speech?

Dan Hayes , October 17, 2017 at 5:48 am GMT
Philip,

My admittedly subjective impression is that your UR reports are becoming more open/unbounded after your release from the constraints of the American Conservative . In other word, you're now being enabled to let it all hang out. In my book that's all to the good.

Of course your work and those of the other UR writers are enabled by the beneficence of its patron, Ron!

Uebersetzer , October 17, 2017 at 6:14 am GMT
There may be limits to their power in Britain. Jeremy Corbyn is hated by them, and stories are regularly run in the MSM, in Britain and also (of course!) in the New York Times claiming that under Corbyn Labour is a haven of anti-Semitism. Corbyn actually gained millions of votes in the last election. Perhaps they will nail him somewhere down the road but they have failed so far.
JackOH , October 17, 2017 at 6:59 am GMT
" . . . [W]ars in the Middle East and North Africa that benefit only Israel and are, in fact, damaging to actual American interests (emphases mine).

That's the money shot, Phil. I'm okay with Jews, okay with the existence of Israel, all that, but I think we were massively had by Iraq II. When Valerie Plame spoke in my area, she talked disgustedly about a plan to establish American military power throughout the Middle East. She used the euphemism "neocons" for the plan's authors, and seemed about to burst with anger. I looked up the plan, but don't recall the catch phrase for it.

I recall the basic idea was for the U. S. to do Israel's dirty work at U. S. expense and without a U. S. benefit, and I think there was the usual "God talk" cover in it about "democratization", "development", blah-blah.

Cloak And Dagger , October 17, 2017 at 7:43 am GMT
I remain skeptical that the Al-Jazeera undercover story in the US will be able to be viewed. I anticipate a hoard of Israel-firster congress critters to crawl out from under their respective rocks and deem Al-Jazeera to be antisemitic and call for it being banned as a foreign propaganda apparatus, much as is being done with RT and Sputnik.

I fear that we are long past the point of being redeemed as a nation. We can only watch with sorrow as this great nation crumbles under the might of Jewish power – impotent in our ability to arrest its fall.

Mark James , October 17, 2017 at 9:32 am GMT
ask Congressmen like Paul Findley, Pete McCloskey, William Fulbright, Charles Percy

I'd also add Adlai E. Stevenson III and John Glenn. Stevenson was crucial in getting compensation -- paltry sum though it was– payed to "Liberty" families for their loss. The Israelis had been holding out. Something for which the Il Senator was never forgiven (especially by The Lobby).

Netanyahu should not have been allowed to address the joint session. No foreign leader should be speaking in opposition to any sitting President (in this case Obama). It only showed the power of "The Lobby." Netanyahu who knew that Iran didn't have the weapons the Bush Adm. had claimed, was treated like a trusted ally. He shouldn't have been.

Kevin , October 17, 2017 at 9:37 am GMT
And the point is that while Israel calls the shots in terms of what it wants, it is a cabal of diaspora American Jews who actually pull the trigger. With that in mind, it will be very interesting to watch the al-Jazeera documentary on The Lobby in America.

Maybe, instead of Russia-Gate, we have is Israel-Gate. This time Netanyahu discreetly interfering in US Presidential Election ..Chilling thought though!

Tyrion , October 17, 2017 at 9:53 am GMT

And Israeli interference in U.S. government and elections is also a given. Endorsement of Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election by the Netanyahu government was more-or-less carried out in the open.

London's Mayor, Sadiq Khan, actually went to America to campaign for Hillary. Numerous European leaders endorsed her, while practically all denounced Trump. Exactly the same can be said of the Muslim world, only more so.

The problem with criticism of Israel is not that it lacks basis in truth. It is that it is removed from the context of the rest of the world. Israel's actions do not make Israel an outlier. Israel fits very much within the norm. Even with the recording this is the case.

All embassies try to further their national interest through political machinations and all people in politics tend to use hyperbolic language to describe what they are doing. I don't know if your shock is just for show or you are just a bit dim. The same applies to Buzzfeed's 'expose' of Bannon and the gasps the article let out at his use of terms like #War.

Unfortunately, contemporary idiots of all stripes seem to specialise in removing context so that they can further their specious arguments.

Randal , October 17, 2017 at 9:58 am GMT

"so I see no reason why the U.S. establishment won't take our findings in America as seriously as the British did"

Sadly, Clayton Swisher is probably correct that the US establishment will take their findings in America just as "seriously" as the British media and political establishment, and government, did.

The British government attitude was that everything was fine because the Israeli government "apologised" and the "rogue individual" responsible was taken out of the country, and the British media mostly ignored the story after an initial brief scandal. Indeed the main substantive response was the Ofcom fishing expedition against Al Jazeera looking for ways to use the disclosure of these uncomfortable truths as a pretext for shutting that company's operations down.

But there's no "undue influence" or bias involved, and if you say there might be then you are an anti-Semite and a hater.

The supreme irony behind all this is that Trump has been prevented by his own personal and family/adviser bias from using the one certain way of removing all the laughably vague "Russian influence" nonsense that has been used against him so persistently. All he had to do was to, at every opportunity, tie criticism and investigation of Russian "influence" to criticism and investigation of Israel Lobby influence under the general rubric of "foreign influence", and almost all of the high level backing for the charges would in due course have quietly evaporated.

geokat62 , October 17, 2017 at 9:59 am GMT
@Rurik

Philip Giraldi is a rare American treasure.

Rare, indeed, Rurik.

And in this rare company I would place former congressman, Ron Paul.

Here's an excerpt from his latest article, President Trump Beats War Drums for Iran :

Let's be clear here: President Trump did not just announce that he was "de-certifying" Iran's compliance with the nuclear deal. He announced that Iran was from now on going to be in the bullseye of the US military. Will Americans allow themselves to be lied into another Middle East war?

http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2017/october/16/president-trump-beats-war-drums-for-iran/

animalogic , October 17, 2017 at 10:54 am GMT
This state of affairs, where the Zionist tail wags -- thrashes -- the US dog is bizarre to the point of laughter. Absent familiarity with the facts, who could believe it all? Is there a historical parallel ? I can't think of one that approaches the sheer profundity of the toxic embrace the Zionists have cover the US & west generally.
The Alarmist , October 17, 2017 at 11:01 am GMT
So how is using money we give them as foreign aid (it's fungible by any definition of the US Treasury and Justice Department) to lobby our legislators not a form of money laundering? Somebody ought to tell Mnuchin to get FINCEN on this yeah, I know, it sounded naive as I typed it. FINCEN is only there to harass little people like you and me.
Bardon Kaldian , October 17, 2017 at 11:05 am GMT
@googlecensors

Not true.

jacques sheete , October 17, 2017 at 11:15 am GMT
@Malla

Abby Martin is amazingly sharp. Many of the things she says can be confirmed by Uri Avnery, both his books and articles.

Here's a link to his weekly columns.

http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery

Incredible stuff there; thanks for posting it.

jacques sheete , October 17, 2017 at 11:21 am GMT
@Malla

Our slave descendant will be scurrying around in their ghettos afraid of the Greater Israeli Army military andriod drones in the sky.

According to the first vid, those drones will be built by the goyim.

Maybe there's a message there for us.

jacques sheete , October 17, 2017 at 11:32 am GMT
@Cloak And Dagger

I fear that we are long past the point of being redeemed as a nation. We can only watch with sorrow as this great nation crumbles

We are long past that point.

I myself am watching with joy, because this supposedly "great nation" was corrupt to the core from its inception.

For evidence, all one has to do is read the arguments of the anti-federalists who opposed the ratification of the constitution* such as Patrick Henry, Robert Yates and Luther Martin. Their predictions about the results have come true. Even the labels, "federalist" and "anti-federalist" are misleading and no doubt intentionally so.

Those who spoke out against the formation of the federal reserve bank* scheme were also correct.

The only thing great about the US in a moral sense are the high sounding pretenses upon which it was built. As a nation we have never adhered to them.

*Please note that I intentionally refrain from capitalizing those words since I refuse to show even that much deference to those instruments of corruption.

ISmellBagels , October 17, 2017 at 11:45 am GMT
Philip, glad to see you undaunted after the recent attacks on you. We can maybe take solace in the fact that their desire for MORE will finally pass a critical point, and dumbass Americans will finally wake up.
jacques sheete , October 17, 2017 at 11:47 am GMT

"She said that the Ofcom judgment would serve as a "precedent for the infringement of privacy of any Jewish person involved in public life."

I have news for that twister of words.

In my opinion, if you choose to put yourself in the limelight, you have no private life. That is especially true for those who think they're entitled to a position of power.

In other words, if you think you're special, then you get judged by stricter standards than the rest of us.

It's called accountability.

BTW, speaking of Netanyahu, why do we hear so little about the scandal involving the theft of nuclear triggers from the US?

"The Israeli press is picking up Grant Smith's revelation from FBI documents that Benjamin Netanyahu was part of an Israeli smuggling ring that spirited nuclear triggers out of the U.S. in the 80s and 90s."

http://mondoweiss.net/2012/07/netanyahu-implicated-in-nuclear-smuggling-from-u-s-big-story-in-israel.html

jacques sheete , October 17, 2017 at 11:58 am GMT
Thank you Mr Giraldi. You covered an amazing number of issues in such a well written and compact article.

Thanks also to Mr Unz for publishing these sorts of things.

ISmellBagels , October 17, 2017 at 12:30 pm GMT
@jacques sheete

What she really meant by that was HOLOCAUST ALERT HOLOCAUST ALERT!!

Anon , Disclaimer October 17, 2017 at 12:42 pm GMT
@Malla

When you listen to Abby Martin describe her experience regarding this brutal apartheid system in Israel and the genocide of the Palestinian people, remember, Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic , was a prison guard in the Israeli Defense Forces guarding the West Bank death camp. And David Brooks, political and cultural commentator for The New York Times and former op-ed editor for The Wall Street Journal , has a son in the Israel Defense Forces helping to perpetuate this holocaust of the Palestinian people. I hope I live to see the day when some Palestinian Simon Wiesenthal hunts these monsters down and brings them to trial in The Hague.

iffen , October 17, 2017 at 12:47 pm GMT
NPR Morning Edition 10/17/17

Rachel Martin talks to Vahil Ali, the communications director for the Kurdish president.

In which she tries to steer him into calling for armed American intervention in Kurdistan to resist the Iranian sponsored militia.

LondonBob , October 17, 2017 at 12:58 pm GMT
The lobby is not as powerful in Britain as it is the US, we can talk about it and someone like Peter Oborne is still a prominent journalist, but I don't see that it makes that much difference. We seem to end up in the same places the US does.
Sherman , October 17, 2017 at 1:15 pm GMT
I had my meeting with the Rothschilds, Goldman Sachs and the Israeli Department of Hasbara last week and we discussed how our plan to suppress both the US and British governments is progressing.

Apparently we are meeting our targets and everything is going according to plan.

Thanks for update Phil!

ChuckOrloski , October 17, 2017 at 1:25 pm GMT
@geokat62

Hey geokat62,

Speaking about how greatly rare a treasure are the P.G.'s words, below is linked a deliberately rare letter written by Congressman Donald Rumsfeld on behalf of the AZC.

http://www.israellobby.org/azcdoj/congress/defaultZAC .

Also, re, "Will Americans allow themselves to be lied into another M.E. war?"

(Sigh)

History shows that, in order for ZUSA to start M.E. wars, Americans are routinely fed Executive Branch / Corporate Media-sauteed lies. Such deceit is par-for-the-course.

At present, it would be foolish for me to not realize there is a False Flag Pentagon plan "on the table" & ready for a war with Iran.

Jake , October 17, 2017 at 1:27 pm GMT
What is playing out in the UK, and is in early stages in America, is the fight between the two side of Victorian WASP pro-Semtiism.

WASP culture has always been philo-Semitic. That cannot be stated too much. WASP culture is inherently philo-Semtic. WASP culture was born of Anglo-Saxon Puritanism, which was a Judaizing heresy. Judaizing heresy naturally and inevitably produces pro-Jewish culture. No less than Oliver Cromwell made the deal to get Jewish money so he could wage culture war to destroy British Isles natives were not WASPs.

WASP culture has always been allied with Jews to destroy white Christians who are not WASPs. You cannot solve 'the Jewish problem' unless you also solve 'the WASP problem.'

By the beginning of the Victorian era, virtually all WASP Elites in the Empire – who then had a truly globalist perspective – were divided into two pro-Semitic camps. The larger one was pro-Jewish. It would give the world the Balfour Declaration and the state of Israel.

The smaller and growing one was pro-Arabic and pro-Islamic. It would give the world the people who backed Lawrence of Arabia and came to prop up the House of Saud.

Each of these philo-Semitic WASP Elites groups was more than happy to keep the foot on the pedal to destroy non-WASP European cultures while spending fortunes propping up its favorite group of Semites.

And while each of those camps was thrilled to ally to keep up the war against historic Christendom and the peoples who naturally would gravitate to any hope of a revival of Christendom, they also squabbled endlessly. Each wished, and always will wish, to be the A-#1 pro-Semitic son of daddy WASP. Each will play any dirty trick, make any deal with the Devil himself, to get what he wants.

The Israeli lobby is more powerful throughout the Anglosphere than the Saudi/Arabic lobby, but the Saudi lobby is equally detestable and probably even a more grave threat to the very existence of Western man.

It is impossible to take care of a serious problem without knowing its source and acting to sanitize and/or cauterize and/or cut out that source. The source of this problem is WASP culture.

Michael Kenny , October 17, 2017 at 1:31 pm GMT
That the intelligence services of many countries engage in such conduct is not really news. Indeed, you could say that it's part of their normal job. They usually don't get caught and when accused of anything they shout "no evidence!" (now, where have I heard that recently?) Of course, if the Israelis engage in such conduct, then, logically, other countries' services do so too.

Thus, Mr Giraldi's argument lends credibility to the claims that Russia interfered in the US election and to the proposition that US intelligence agents are seeking to undermine the EU.

Since those two operations are part of the same transaction, i.e. maintain US global hegemony by breaking the EU up into its constituent Member States or even into the regional components of the larger Member States, using Putin as a battering ram and a bogeyman to frighten the resulting plethora of small and largely defenseless statelets back under cold war-era American protection, could it be that US and Russian intelligence services collaborated to manipulate Trump into the White House? If that were true, it would be quite a scandal! Overthrowing foreign governments is one thing, collaborating with a foreign power to manipulate your own country's politics is quite another! But of course, there's "no evidence"

Fran Macadam , Website October 17, 2017 at 1:32 pm GMT
Not surprising that the Jewish public gets gamed by Israeli political elites, just as the American public keeps getting gamed by our own cabal of bought politicians. Trying to fool enough of the people, enough of the time, contra Lincoln (who was not exactly a friend of critical dissent against war either .)
Anon , Disclaimer October 17, 2017 at 1:53 pm GMT
@wayfarer

Daphne Caruana Galizia exposed both local thieves and the CIA-Azerbaijan cooperation in supplying ISIS with arms:

https://www.rt.com/news/406963-assange-reward-caruana-galizia-death/ https://www.newsbud.com/2017/10/16/breaking-gladio-b-assassinates-journalist-with-car-bomb/

"Azerbaijan considers Malta to be "one of its provinces": https://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2017/09/azerbaijan-considers-malta-one-provinces/
The Middle Eastern wars have repercussion .

[Oct 17, 2017] Ukrainian foreign trade deficit in January-August has grown to over three billion dollars

Slightly edited Google translation from Ukrainian
Please note that grivna generally kept its value and fluctuated in the band of 26-27 grivna per dollar for the same period. The general impression from 2015 to 2017 is slight growth of economic activity, especially in home building. Standard of living did not change much for this period and remains low. Food prices were more or less stable, which communal services costs especially house/apartment heating skyrocketed and even for one bedroom apartment now at winter can well exceed average pension.
Some percentage of foreign trade deficit might well be due to additional costs of import of coal (with some coming from the USA now) and gas (which is bought not directly but from Eastern European countries which has extra volumes at low prices from Russia). The continuing war at Donbass although at very low level still also attracts a lot funds.
Notable quotes:
"... Ukrainian foreign trade deficit in January-August has grown to 3.279 billion dollars, which is 2.3 times higher than the deficit for the same period last year - 1.448 billion dollars. ..."
"... The export coverage ratio was 0.89, while in January-August 2016 it was 0.94. ..."
"... For the whole 2016, Ukraine enjoyed a small surplus of foreign trade balance amounted to 337.3 million dollars. ..."
www.pravda.com.ua/

Ukrainian foreign trade deficit in January-August has grown to 3.279 billion dollars, which is 2.3 times higher than the deficit for the same period last year - 1.448 billion dollars.

Those data were reported by the Ukrainian National State Statistics Service.

Exports of goods from Ukraine over the period in comparison with the same period in 2016 increased by 21,1% - to 27,512 billion dollars, import - by 27,4%, to 30,791 billion dollars.

The export coverage ratio was 0.89, while in January-August 2016 it was 0.94. Foreign trade operations were conducted with partners from 219 countries of the world. For the whole 2016, Ukraine enjoyed a small surplus of foreign trade balance amounted to 337.3 million dollars.

[Oct 17, 2017] Kiev Should Give Up on the Donbass by Alexander J. Motyl

The article was written before April, 2017 and as such has only historical interest.
foreignpolicy.com

It didn't take long for things in Ukraine to go south in the Trump era.

Before last fall's U.S. election, Ukraine had finally appeared to be stabilizing after several tumultuous years. The country was receiving generally good grades and assistance from the International Monetary Fund; it enjoyed the political, diplomatic, and financial -- if not quite military -- support of the West; and it was making headway on internal reforms in the legal, economic, social, educational, health, and energy sectors. Finally, its armed forces had successfully transformed themselves from the 6,000 combat-ready troops available in mid-2014 to a powerful, battle-hardened army that managed to fight Russia and its proxies to a standstill in the east.

... ... ...

Kiev couldn't turn down such an offer, because it has continually insisted that the Donbass must, and will, be brought back into the Ukrainian fold. But the consequences of this gift would be ugly. Kiev would likely face an all-out war with the abandoned separatists, one that it would probably win, but then have to follow with enormous investments to fix the devastated region and try to win the hearts and minds of its anti-Kiev population. Estimates of how much it would cost to undo the damage done by Russia start at $20 billion, according to economist Anders Aslund; Ukraine's entire budget amounts to about $26 billion.

No less debilitating for Ukraine would be the political consequences of reintegrating the occupied Donbass. Several million anti-Western voters would be brought into the fold, to vote against Ukraine's pro-Western reforms. The pro-Russian political forces that ruled and still rule the region would get a second life. And the oligarchs and thieves who mismanaged the Donbass for decades would return to power. The Donbass would then play the same retrograde role it has played in Ukrainian politics since independence in 1991. Political tensions would increase, East-West polarization would return, Kiev would be rendered politically and economically impotent, and Putin would have achieved what he wanted all along -- a thoroughly unstable Ukraine, minus the cost of funding a low-level conflict in an economically doomed enclave.

Of course, it's impossible to say just which of these scenarios -- ranging from all-out war to dumping the Donbass to some other intermediate move -- will happen. The point is that, with Trump's unpredictability, radicalism, and pro-Russian sympathies, all of them are now possible or far more possible than they were before Trump's election.

The point is that, with Trump's unpredictability, radicalism, and pro-Russian sympathies, all of them are now possible or far more possible than they were before Trump's election.

Since the status quo that has held for the past two years is unlikely to do so for long, Ukraine needs to develop a realistic strategy toward the occupied Donbass -- one attuned to the new geopolitical circumstances -- and prepare for all of Trump and Putin's possible faits accomplis.

The good news is that Ukraine is prepared for all-out war with Russia; it is also prepared for and could cope with aid cutoffs from Washington and the end of sanctions. The bad news is that Kiev is thoroughly unprepared for the one scenario that could destroy Ukraine at little cost to Putin: Russia's return of the Donbass.

Whatever Kiev decides to do, Ukrainians must first decide what they believe is more important: independence or territorial integrity. The Minsk accords enabled Ukraine to enjoy the first and aspire to the second. This state of affairs could not have lasted forever, but Trump and Putin have brought it to a premature end.

Before Trump, Ukrainians could avoid making too many tough decisions about their strategic priorities. After Trump, they cannot.

[Oct 17, 2017] Empire's Workshop Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism (American Empire Project) Greg Grandi

There is a danger for Ukraine to become "European El Salvador" or, worse, "European Iraq"
Notable quotes:
"... After an opening chapter that makes the case for Latin America's role in the formation of the U.S. empire, the rest of this hook explores the importance of the region to the consolidation of what could be called a new, revolutionary imperialism. ..."
May 01, 2007 | www.amazon.com

After an opening chapter that makes the case for Latin America's role in the formation of the U.S. empire, the rest of this hook explores the importance of the region to the consolidation of what could be called a new, revolutionary imperialism.

Taken each on their own, the ideas, tactics, politics, and economics that have driven Bush's global policy are not original. An interventionist military posture, belief that America has a special role to play in world history, cynical realpolitik, vengeful nationalism, and free-market capitalism have all driven U.S.
diplomacy in one form or another for nearly two centuries. But whatis new is how potent these elements have become and how tightly they are bound to the ambitions of America's domestic ruling conservative coalition -- a coalition that despite its power and influence paints itself as persecuted, at odds not just with much of the world but with modern life itself. 6

The book goes on to explore the intellectual re-orientation or American diplomacy in the wake if Vietnam and the increasing willingness of militarists to champion human rights, nation building, and democratic reform. The third chapter considers how the rehabilitation of unconventional warfare doctrine in LI Salvador and Nicaragua by militarists in and around the Reagan White House laid the groundwork for today's offensive military posture. Here, the human costs of this resurgence of militarism will be addressed. In the many tributes that followed Reagan's death, pundits enjoyed repeating Margaret Thatcher's comment that Reagan won the Cold War "without firing a shot." The crescendo of carnage that overw helmed Central America in the 1980s not only gives the lie to such a legacy but highlights the inescapable violence of empire. The fourth chapter turns to the imperial home front, examining how r the Reagan administration first confronted and then began to solve the domestic crisis of authority generated by Vietnam and Watergate. It also argues that Reagan's Central American policy served as a crucible that forged the coalition that today stands behind George W. Bush. Chanter 5 is con cerned with the economics of empire, how the financial contraction of the 1970s provided an opportunity for the avatars of free-market orthodoxy -- the true core of the Bush Doctrine -- to join with other constituencies of the ascendant New Right, inaugurating first in Chile and then throughout Latin America a new, brutally competitive global economy.

The last chapter tallies the score of the new imperialism in Latin America. Celebrated by Bill Clinton, and now Bush, as a model of what the United States hopes to accomplish in the rest of the world, Latin America continues to be gripped by unrelenting poverty and periodic political instability, as the promise of living under a benevolent American imperialism has failed to materialize. As a result, new political movements and antagonists have emerged to contest the terms of
United States-promoted corporate globalization, calling for increased regional integration to offset the power of the United States and more social spending to alleviate Latin American inequality. With little to offer the region in terms of development except the increasingly hollow promises of free trade, Washington is responding to these and similar challenges by once again militarizing hemispheric relations, with all dissent now set in the crosshairs of the "global war on terror."

... ... ...

Over the last year, Washington has had some success in preventing leftists and nationalists from coming to power, in Peru, for instance, and in Mexico. But notwithstanding the outcome of specific votes, and despite the very real conflicts of interest among Latin American nations, the centrifugal forces pushing the region out of the U.S.'s orbit will continue.

What, then, will be Washington's long-term response to this independence movement? One could hope that the Democrats would seize the moment to assert their commitment to nonintervention and to work with economic nationalists to promote a fair and sustainable economic policy. Depending on the country, such a policy would include land reform, government regulation of foreign investment and currency speculation, more equitable contracts with multinationals, debt relief, increased spending on welfare, education, health care, and public works, and, in the U.S., a just immigration policy.

Don't count on it. Unlike after WWII, when a confident corporate class threw its backing behind New Deal political liberalism at home and at least some reform capitalism abroad, the financiers of today's Democratic Party are too deeply invested in war production and speculative capital and too intensely committed to keeping the third world open. They will not brook any sustained attempt to restructure the global economy in a more equitable direction. At the same time, the party's leadership -- unlike Republicans who are organically linked to their base -- is terrified of the antimilitarism of its rank-and-file. Thirty percent of the U.S. population opposed the war in Iraq even when it looked like a cakewalk, even as Dick Cheney and his cronies held a cocktail party to celebrate the PR-orchestrated toppling of Saddam's statue in Baghdad -- a significant minority that is much larger than anything the Goldwater insurgency and the Reagan Revolution started with.

But rather than building on this thirty percent, Democrats run away from it, with one after the other tripping over themselves to prove they are better equipped to fight the "war on terror'' than the Republicans. We may hope that the Democratic nominee in the 2008 election will challenge the ideology and the interests that
have capitalized on the problem of terrorism to launch a war for civilization. It's more likely we'll see him or her criticizing the way the "war" has been executed and demanding more of a say in how it is waged.

If there is change in American diplomacy, it will come from the citizens who mobilized to oppose the occupation of Iraq and who in 2006 gave back the Congress to the Democratic Party. But to truly break up the New Right, and not just temporarily slow it down, the reactive antimilitarism that so drives the neocons crazy will have to be converted into a forward-looking agenda, as cohesive and coherent as the one that led to the catastrophic war in Iraq. In this task, Latin America, long the workshop of U.S. elites, can provide a different kind of instruction.

Across the continent, political movements have emerged from decades of unrelenting state terror underwritten by imperial patronage to creatively and effectively oppose first corporate-driven neoliberalism and then a renewed U.S. militarism. Through exemplary courage, perseverance, and organizational skill, Latin American activists have provided a beacon of hope on an otherwise bleak global landscape. They have multiple agendas and objectives, yet they share a common set of values: human dignity, local autonomy, a vision of individual freedom rooted in collective solidarity, and a notion of democracy defined not simply by proceduralism or individual rights but by economic equity. It is they who are the world's true "democracy promoters" and who are fighting the real war on terror, and offering lessons to us all.

New York
December 2006

PABG, Somewhere in the world, on August 1, 2011

Unbelievable book

Have you ever wonder why the rest of America despises or doesn't trust the USA? Yes I wrote America so the people living in the USA will finally comprehend that America is a continent not a country, people please check your map!!! Well let me tell you why, is because the USA always interfere or sticks her big nose in the business of her American neighbors, just to name a few examples/ Guatemala 1954 and Chile 1973, and also a big part of the real problem is that the USA is not governed by the President, he or she is just a pawn or an employee of the big corporations, and the person in the Oval Office will do anything in his or her power to keep the big CEO's happy.

You want proof of this? Think about these recent events, 9\11, the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan, the tax payer's money given to big corporations to cover the losses caused by their satanic greed and Guantanamo. Also I'm tired of hearing that illegal immigration has ruined the USA, let me tell you that if you keep your nose to your own business and leave the rest of America alone, you won't have a big immigration problem and just to keep in mind that the USA was built by immigrant hands. Please the USA has enough problems, public education, public health, a failed economic system and social disintegration just to mention a few, for the United States' Government to start thinking about building a global empire.

FYI I'm not a leftist or a USA hater, I like the USA and its people very much but I don't have affection for the neoconservatives and the capitalist pigs that think in big profits before their fellow human beings. Enough said, peace, live long and prosper. I'M PROUD OF BEING A REAL AMERICAN!!!!!

[Oct 11, 2017] The Myths of Interventionists by Daniel Larison

Notable quotes:
"... There are dangers and threats in the world, but all of the threats from state actors are manageable and deterrable without spending more on the military, and these threats are much less severe than anything the U.S. faced between the 1940s and the end of the Cold War. The U.S. can and should get by safely with a much lower level of military spending, and our government should also adopt a strategy of restraint that keeps us out of unnecessary wars. ..."
"... The Iraq war is just the most obvious example of how the U.S. forcibly intervenes in other parts of the world over the objections of allies, in flagrant disregard for international law, and with no thought for the destabilizing effects that military action will have on the surrounding region. ..."
"... It would be much more accurate to say that the U.S. intervenes often in the affairs of weaker countries because it can, because our leaders leaders want to, and because there is usually no other power willing or able to stop it from happening. Exorbitant military spending far beyond what is needed to provide for our defense makes it possible to take military action on a regular basis, and the constant inflation of foreign threats makes a large part of the public believe that our government's frequent use of force overseas has something to do with self-defense. This frenetic meddling in the affairs of other nations hasn't made and won't make America any safer, it makes far more enemies than it eliminates, and it imposes significant fiscal and human costs on our country and the countries where our government interferes. ..."
"... At least Churchill had a focus. Neocons claim that any country that doesn't yield to our every desire is an existential threat. One article says, 'Iran', another 'China', yet another 'Russia' or 'N. Korea'. ..."
Oct 11, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com

Dakota Wood makes the usual alarmist case for throwing more money at the military. This passage stood out for how wrong it is:

Churchill repeatedly warned his countrymen of the dangers of complacency, misguided priorities, and weakness of will, of the foolishness to see the world and major competitors as being anything other than what they truly are. While praising the virtues and spirit of moderation that defined the English-speaking peoples of his day, he also urged them to recognize the necessity of having the courage to take timely action when dangers threatened and clearly visible trends in an eroding ability to provide for their common defense were leading toward disaster.

A similar state of affairs afflicts the United States today. To the extent America intervenes in the affairs of others, it is because the United States has been attacked first, an ally is in dire need of assistance, or an enemy threatens broader regional stability [bold mine-DL].

Over ten years ago, Rick Santorum talked incessantly about "the gathering storm" in a very conscious echo of Churchill, and subsequent events have proven his alarmism to have been just as unfounded and ridiculous as it seemed to be at the time. Hawks are often eager to invoke the 1930s to try to scare their audience into accepting more aggressive policies and more military spending than our security actually requires. Some of this may come from believing their own propaganda about the threats that they exaggerate, and some of it may just be a reflex, but as analysis of the contemporary scene it is always wrong. There are dangers and threats in the world, but all of the threats from state actors are manageable and deterrable without spending more on the military, and these threats are much less severe than anything the U.S. faced between the 1940s and the end of the Cold War. The U.S. can and should get by safely with a much lower level of military spending, and our government should also adopt a strategy of restraint that keeps us out of unnecessary wars.

Churchill-quoting alarmists aren't just bad at assessing the scale and nature of foreign threats, but they are usually also oblivious to the shoddy justifications for intervening and the damage that our interventionist policies do. The section quoted above reflects an almost touchingly naive belief that U.S. interventions are always justified and never cause more harm than they prevent. Very few U.S. interventions over the last thirty years fit the description Wood gives. The only time that the U.S. has intervened militarily abroad in response to an attack during this period was in Afghanistan as part of the immediate response to the 9/11 attacks. Every other intervention has been a choice to attack another country or to take sides in an ongoing conflict, and these interventions have usually had nothing to do with coming to the defense of an ally or preventing regional instability. Our interference in the affairs of others is often illegal under both domestic and/or international law (e.g., Kosovo, Libya, Iraq), it is very rarely related to U.S. or allied security, and it tends to cause a great deal of harm to the country and the surrounding region that are supposedly being "helped" by our government's actions.

The Iraq war is just the most obvious example of how the U.S. forcibly intervenes in other parts of the world over the objections of allies, in flagrant disregard for international law, and with no thought for the destabilizing effects that military action will have on the surrounding region. The U.S. didn't invade Panama in 1989 to help an ally or because we were attacked, but simply to topple the government there. Intervention in Haiti in 1994 didn't come in response to an attack or to assist an ally, but because Washington wanted to restore a deposed leader. Bombing Yugoslavia in 1999 was an attack on a country that posed no threat to us or our allies. The Libyan war was a war for regime change and a war of choice. A few allies did urge the U.S. to intervene in Libya, but not because they were in "dire need of assistance." The only thing that Britain and France needed in 2011 was the means to launch an attack on another country whose government posed no threat to them. Meddling in Syria since at least 2012 had nothing to do with defending the U.S. and our allies. Wood's description certainly doesn't apply to our support for the shameful Saudi-led war on Yemen, as the U.S. chose to take part in an attack on another country so that our despotic clients could be "reassured."

It would be much more accurate to say that the U.S. intervenes often in the affairs of weaker countries because it can, because our leaders leaders want to, and because there is usually no other power willing or able to stop it from happening. Exorbitant military spending far beyond what is needed to provide for our defense makes it possible to take military action on a regular basis, and the constant inflation of foreign threats makes a large part of the public believe that our government's frequent use of force overseas has something to do with self-defense. This frenetic meddling in the affairs of other nations hasn't made and won't make America any safer, it makes far more enemies than it eliminates, and it imposes significant fiscal and human costs on our country and the countries where our government interferes.

Posted in foreign policy , politics .

Tagged Syria , Rick Santorum , Yemen , Iraq war , Panama , Libyan war , Saudi Arabia , Haiti , Winston Churchill , Dakota Wood .

MORE FROM THIS AUTHOR

Democracy Vs. Hegemonism? In Defense Of Mary Grabar

Christian Chuba , says: October 11, 2017 at 4:22 pm

'The gathering storm' I read that and I was dying to know which storm he was referring too.

At least Churchill had a focus. Neocons claim that any country that doesn't yield to our every desire is an existential threat. One article says, 'Iran', another 'China', yet another 'Russia' or 'N. Korea'.

It's surprising how low on the list N. Korea typically ranks as the hawks try to turn attention quickly back to Iran. 'Iran is funding and developing their nuclear program, Iran is going to buy their nuclear weapons'. At least in the case of N. Korea we do have a country that obviously does possess WMD and is developing ICBM's and is likely to sell them in the future (even to our best friends the Saudis).

[Oct 11, 2017] The Perils of Arming Ukraine by Daniel Larison

Oct 11, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
Rajan Menon and Will Ruger elaborate on why arming Ukraine would be an extremely foolish thing for the U.S. to do:

The proposition that Putin won't be provoked by a U.S. decision to send lethal arms to Ukraine amounts to a hunch. It's not supported by evidence, and Putin's past behavior contradicts it. This is not a minor point: if he does ramp up the war and the Ukrainian army is forced into retreat, the United States will face three bad choices.

First, Washington could pour even more arms into Ukraine in hopes of concentrating Putin's mind; but he can easily provide additional firepower to the Donbas insurgents. Second, it could deepen its military involvement by sending American military advisers, or even troops, to the frontline to bolster the Ukrainian army; but then Russia could call America's bluff. Third, the United States could decide not to respond to Russia's escalation given the geographical disadvantage and the limited strategic interests at stake. That would amount to backing down, abandoning Ukraine, and shredding the oft-repeated argument that American and European security hinges on the outcome of the Donbas war.

As hawks often do, advocates of arming Ukraine minimize the potential risks of their proposal while exaggerating the benefits that it will produce. On the one hand, they insist that they are "merely" calling for the U.S. to help Ukraine defend itself (they are actually calling for enabling Ukraine's government to go on the offensive), but at the same time they believe that in doing so they will "raise the costs" for Russia to such an extent that it will significantly alter Russian behavior in and towards Ukraine. If the policy is as likely to change Moscow's behavior as they say, it can't be as low-risk as they claim, but if it doesn't pose a serious risk it is probably going to have no positive effects at all. In the worst case, arming Ukraine sets them up for a disastrous defeat that the U.S. will have helped to enable.

The other flaw in the pro-arming case is that advocates of sending weapons to the Ukrainian government simply dismiss the negative consequences that are very likely to follow. They assume that the Russian government has a low tolerance for casualties, but they conveniently forget that it was Russian casualties in Tskhinvali that served as part of the rallying cry for the invasion of Georgia in the August 2008 war. The same people that called for pulling Ukraine out of Moscow's orbit in 2014 didn't anticipate the Russian response to Yanukovych's overthrow, but they still think that Moscow will be more inclined to back down now when faced with new provocations. Western hawkish analysts and pundits have consistently underestimated how far Moscow will go in this conflict, so why should their assurances be trusted now? We should have learned over the last decade that Moscow is much more likely to respond forcefully to provocative Western actions than most of us have assumed, and that means that the U.S. should approach this conflict with greater caution instead of increased recklessness.

Menon and Ruger make another important point that tends to get lost in the debate on this question:

The case for arming Ukraine also tends to be made in a vacuum, never mind that what the United States does in Ukraine could determine what Russia does elsewhere. Moscow could respond by putting more pressure on the Baltics, acting as a spoiler in North Korea or Iran, or even arming the Taliban (that would be an ironic turn: in the 1980s, the United States bled the Soviets by arming the Afghan mujahideen). If these outcomes seem impossible, consider the United States' awful record in foreseeing the effects of its military moves [bold mine-DL].

The explicit purpose of sending arms to Ukraine is to give their government the means to kill more Russians and Russian proxies. This may be dressed up in euphemisms by advocates (e.g., "raising costs," "making them pay a price"), but that is what they expressly hope to achieve with this policy. If our positions were reversed, our government would not respond to the deaths of our soldiers and proxies by yielding to the preferences of the government that provided the weapons that killed them. On the contrary, our government would intensify its support for whatever policy that government was trying to thwart. It would be foolish to assume that the Russian government would respond differently. We should assume that they would respond both directly in Ukraine by increasing their support for separatists and indirectly by aiding our enemies in other wars. This last part was the point that analyst Michael Kofman made in a report from August:

Russia's response to scattering Javelins among Ukrainian ground forces should factor into the decision, Kofman said.

"The Russians have a very clear policy of reciprocity, as we saw in the recent diplomatic purge. They see this as a premise of the U.S. wanting to kill Russians," Kofman said.

"The answer to this won't come in Ukraine."

[Oct 10, 2017] How to Turn Battleground Ukraine Into a Success Story

Notable quotes:
"... The US on the other hand is very keen on keeping control over its newest vassal, since, to quote Brzezinski's grand chess board, "without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire, but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire" . ..."
Oct 10, 2017 | nationalinterest.org

Pifer's narrative suggests that Putin's proposal concerning peace in Donbass is not serious so long as it does not comply with the deployment scheme suggested by the West. This statement is also quite erroneous. Putin's proposal is serious. The president of Russia does want peace . But his rules imply the conservation of non-bloc status of Ukraine.

Additionally, the rules mandate that Ukraine cease its attempts to discredit Russia-Europe energy cooperation vis-à-vis Nord Stream II, bring the "Crimean question" to a close, remove sanctions, and, presumably, pay special attention and respect to the rights of the Russian-speaking community in Ukraine.

PERICLES--- , October 9, 2017 10:36 PM

No offense is intended to the authors of this article, but it wasn't hard to tell they were Russian even just judging on the contents of the proposal. The entire point of any sort of DMZ in Ukraine is to make static potentially temporary Russian gains in a fluid battleground. This hypothetical DMZ would essentially be a third-party Maginot Line for Russia. Russia has stolen a comfy little buffer zone and would like to see that maintained. That's why the US would undoubtedly veto this.

Alternatively, the US could call Putin's bluff and use armored units and heavy bombers to retake Donbas for the Ukrainians, but pointedly stop short of Crimea. Russia maintains un-plausible deniability in the Donbas, so Putin would be able to save a least a little face. Crimea is claimed as full Russian territory, Putin would be politically unable to stop war from occurring if it was retaken by Ukrainian forces. After this a full withdrawal of US forces would be advisable so as not to trigger Russian fears of encirclement. Ukraine could be a neutral- but sovereign- nation. It could do more as a positive example to potential Russian dissidents than it ever could as a NATO member. A full-blown conflict with NATO would mean Putin's fall from power, and so it is very much in his interests to avoid it. We are operating from a position of strength, let's take advantage of it.

Andrey Kuleshov -> PERICLES--- , October 9, 2017 10:58 PM

"Alternatively, the US could call Putin's bluff and use armored units and heavy bombers to retake Donbas for the Ukrainians"..."

Wet dreams

0x7be -> PERICLES--- , October 10, 2017 4:03 PM

Somewhy US doesn't want to operate from "position of strength". May be because there is no position of strength...

Midnight -> PERICLES--- , October 10, 2017 10:21 AM

Lesson of geopolitics from redneck?

PERICLES--- -> Midnight , October 10, 2017 3:51 PM

I'm a Northerner.

Sascha Gruss -> Midnight , October 10, 2017 3:21 PM

The west will act tough and send more Ukrainians to die.

Midnight -> Sascha Gruss , October 10, 2017 3:33 PM

In Russia there is such a sad joke - the Americans will fight with Russia until the last Ukrainian ((

Sascha Gruss -> Midnight , October 10, 2017 4:39 PM

It should be the US will fight Russia until the last european dies.

Fake News Russian Troll , October 10, 2017 5:44 AM

Ukraine and the West have no interest in ending the war. This is why Minsk 2 failed, this is why the peace keeper proposal is bound to fail. Putins proposal is the separation of the opposing forces.

Again: Ukraine has no interest in it. It didn't adhere to it after Minsk, instead using it to occupy territory vacated by Donbass militias adhering to the peace agreement. The Western proposal is a complete occupation of the Donbass.

The peace troops would not be impartial, instead they want them to be posed by the West. It basically is the demand to hand everything over. A demand with no correlation to the political or military situation on the ground.

And handing over the control of the borders would not merely stop the weapons flow into Ukraine (something the Donbass never depended on, since some of the worlds largest weapons storages in the world were located right there and they've got them in abundance), but would surely be abused to stop any crossings and any trade across this border whatsoever.

Ukraine is blocking almost all trade between the Donbass and the rest of the country. They don't want them to trade with anyone else. They simply want to starve them out.

And finally: The worst thing that could happen to the regime in Kiev and its Western backers would be peace. Peace would force them to give up on blaming every fault on everyone else. Peace would make the Ukrainians wonder what has happened to their country since their coup. Peace would make them wonder what has happened to their economy since. Peace would make them wonder what had happened to the tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers who simply "disappeared" since the government tried to keep the already colossal losses down and the cost of paying annuities to their relatives.

Russia has no interest in this war. It knows that the economic future of Ukraine depends on Russia, and therefore has ample means to influence its neighbour.

The US on the other hand is very keen on keeping control over its newest vassal, since, to quote Brzezinski's grand chess board, "without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire, but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire" .

TotalBS -> Fake News Russian Troll , October 10, 2017 12:39 PM

Amen.

bakbaklazhan , October 10, 2017 4:26 PM

"To vanquish strategically, one often needs to take a tactical step back. "

in this phrase the authors are coming clear with regards to their goal of genociding russian speaking population of the eastern Ukraine and sucking "the Ukraine" into NATO...

[Sep 24, 2017] Trump allies see vindication in reports on Manafort wiretapping

Obama did spied on his political opponents... He really was a well connected to intelligence agencies wolf in sheep's clothing.
Notable quotes:
"... For some of President Trump's staunchest allies, reports that former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was under U.S. surveillance are nothing short of vindication of the president's widely-dismissed claims that former President Obama wiretapped Trump Tower. ..."
"... Surveillance experts are skeptical of that suggestion. For one thing, it is illegal for investigators to "reverse target" a U.S. person by spying on a person with whom they know their true target to be in communication. ..."
Sep 24, 2017 | www.msn.com

For some of President Trump's staunchest allies, reports that former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was under U.S. surveillance are nothing short of vindication of the president's widely-dismissed claims that former President Obama wiretapped Trump Tower.

... ... ...

Longtime advisor Roger Stone has gleefully circulated a segment from Tucker Carlson's show on Fox News in which the host says "all those patronizing assurances that nobody is spying on political campaigns were false" and "it looks like Trump's tweet may have been right."

... ... ...

A spokesperson for Manafort, Jason Maloni, has characterized the court orders as an abuse of power by the Obama administration, which he says wanted to spy on a political opponent.

"It's unclear if Paul Manafort was the objective," Maloni told The Journal. "Perhaps the real objective was Donald Trump."

Surveillance experts are skeptical of that suggestion. For one thing, it is illegal for investigators to "reverse target" a U.S. person by spying on a person with whom they know their true target to be in communication.

If the president were in fact the oblique target of government surveillance - either as a candidate or as the president-elect - both Eddington and Shedd say, it would have been so explosive that it would have almost certainly been leaked to the press.

... ... ...

The disclosure of the warrants targeting Manafort have drawn legitimate scrutiny as a violation of Manafort's civil liberties and a possible criminal leak - the mere existence of a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, warrant is classified.

House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), who first raised alarm about the practice of "unmasking" the names of Americans caught up in government surveillance, is currently under investigation by the House Ethics Committee for allegedly exposing classified information when he disclosed his findings to reporters.

[Sep 23, 2017] Sensational Report Is Russiagate a Hoax Ordered by Vladimir Putin

Notable quotes:
"... One possible explanation would simply be that they have all gone nuts. But since this cannot possibly be the case, this leaves just one other explanation: Russiagate itself is a clever but sinister hoax intended to make it look like our political and media class have lost their marbles, therefore undermining our democracy, our values and our way of life ..."
Sep 23, 2017 | russia-insider.com

The Russians may have developed the capability to create elaborate hoaxes that turn the US into a laughing stock in the eyes of outsiders Russell O'Phobe 90

For almost a year, Russia's meddling in last year's election, along with collusion with the Trump campaign, have dominated the political and media landscape. But an explosive new classified report produced by US intelligence may be about to blow apart the narrative, and reveal an even bigger story that has been missed in all the commentary so far.

The report was set up to try to answer two questions: firstly, why is it that after nearly a year, there still hasn't been a single piece of hard evidence to prove either the hacking or the collusion? And secondly, given this lack of credible evidence, how is it that the US media and political classes have been talking about nothing else for months and months without any sign of letting it go, to the point of giving the impression of being obsessed with the issue?

The report, which was signed off by all 17 agencies ! that's the DIA, CIA, FBI and NSA ! reaches a conclusion which is nothing short of sensational:

"If there hasn't actually been any hard evidence presented of meddling or collusion, we must ask the question of how and why the entire political and media class have been talking about nothing else for months.

One possible explanation would simply be that they have all gone nuts. But since this cannot possibly be the case, this leaves just one other explanation: Russiagate itself is a clever but sinister hoax intended to make it look like our political and media class have lost their marbles, therefore undermining our democracy, our values and our way of life."

... ... ...

[Sep 19, 2017] The Glaring Omissions in Trumps U.N. Speech by Daniel Larison

Highly recommended!
Sep 19, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
harmful and dangerous things in this U.N. speech today, but it is also worth noting the things that he chose to leave out. Many observers have already pointed out how the worsening crisis in Myanmar and the military's large-scale ethnic cleansing campaign against the Rohingya didn't rate a mention in the speech, but then I suppose Trump wouldn't have anything constructive to say about the violent mass expulsion of a Muslim population in any case. The most obvious omission in the speech was also the most predictable: Trump said nothing about the Saudi-led war on Yemen or its role in causing the world's worst humanitarian crisis, and when he did mention Yemen at one point it was perversely to claim credit for providing humanitarian aid for the catastrophe that our government has helped create.

There was no attempt to justify ongoing U.S. support for the war, and there wasn't even any acknowledgment that the Saudi-led war effort was happening. Trump's enthusiasm for the Saudi relationship means that he isn't going to call attention to the disaster the Saudis and their allies have created with our help, and the only other time he referred to Yemen was to use it to criticize Iran. Iran is faulted for supposedly fueling "Yemen's civil war," which exaggerates their involvement, but there is no mention of the Saudi-led coalition's role in escalating the conflict and wrecking the country for over two years. It is a given that the Saudis and Iranians are judged by two very different standards by this administration, but emphasizing the minimal Iranian role in Yemen while completely ignoring the massive, devastating role that the Saudis and their allies (and the U.S.) have had is as bad as it gets. As usual, those most responsible for the suffering of the people of Yemen weren't held responsible, the war on Yemen was ignored, and Trump's Iran obsession won out.

[Sep 18, 2017] Nikki Haley Meltdown Assad Must Go... and War With North Korea! - Antiwar.com Original

Sep 18, 2017 | original.antiwar.com

Nikki Haley Meltdown: Assad Must Go and War With North Korea!

by Daniel McAdams Posted on September 18, 2017 September 16, 2017 There must be something about being named US Ambassador to the UN that brings out the inner mass murderer in people. Madeline Albright famously admitted that she thought 500,000 dead Iraqi children due to US sanctions was "worth it." John Bolton never met a disagreement he didn't want to turn into a war. Samantha Power barked about human rights while her Administration's drones snuffed out human life in unprecedented numbers. The real "butcher of the Balkans" Richard Holbrooke sold the Yugoslavia war on lies . John "Death Squad" Negroponte sold the lie that Saddam Hussein needed to be killed and his country destroyed for democracy to flourish, and so on.

Considering how many millions of civilians have been killed on the war propaganda of US ambassadors to the UN, perhaps the equivalent of another Holocaust could have been avoided if Ron Paul's HR 1146 has passed 30 years ago.

But nothing could have prepared us for Nikki "Holocaust" Haley, who has thundered into the Trump Administration as US Ambassador to the UN despite hating Trump and Trump hating her . Why would President Trump pick someone for such an influential position despite her being vocally and publicly opposed to the foreign policy that provided the margin of victory for him? We can only guess. Was Trump lying on the campaign trail? Possibly. Does he not bother to notice that he has surrounded himself with people who are deeply opposed, at the DNA level, to the policies he ran and won on? Seems more likely. As Johnny Rotten famously ended the Sex Pistols run, "ever get the feeling you've been cheated?"

In fact yes. One-time top Trump supporter Ann Coulter today Tweeted the question "is there anyone out there left who doesn't want Trump impeached?"

Coulter meant the wall or something else, but she could just as well have been complaining about the foreign policy about-face. Trump ran as a Ron Paul Republican, he governs as a George W. Bush Republican. Cheated? Yes, once again.

Which brings us back to the odious Nikki Haley. Today she no doubt thought she was being clever Tweeting in response to the predictable fact that yet another round of sanctions against North Korea did not result in Kim Jong-Un doing a Gaddafi suicide knife dance, that since the sanctions destroying the North Korean economy – such as it is – have not resulted in Kim's surrender it was time to hand the matter over to Defense Secretary James Mattis.

Said US top UN diplomat Nikki: "We cut 90% of trade & 30% of oil. I have no problem kicking it to Gen. Mattis because I think he has plenty of options."

We killed their trade, we destroyed their oil imports and still they have the nerve to defy us and not surrender so time for World War Three! That's Nikki. No foreign policy experience beyond the fetid breath of the neocon "experts" whispering in her all-too-willing ear.

But Nikki was not done today. After threatening a war on North Korea that would likely leave ten or more thousand US troops dead, hundreds of thousands of South Korean civilians dead, and maybe another million North Koreans dead, she decided to opine on the utterly failed six year US regime change operation in Syria. Today, as Deir Ezzor has finally been liberated by the Syrian government from the scourge of ISIS, Nikki Haley chose to go on record defending ISIS and al-Qaeda by repeating Obama's line that Assad must go.

Ponder this for a minute: Assad has just defeated ISIS in Deir Ezzor. ISIS is the reason the US has invaded Syrian sovereignty and initiated military action. Yet according to Nikki Haley Assad's reward for wiping out ISIS is that he must be deposed – presumably in favor of US-backed rebels who have been in bed with ISIS for six years!

Is Nikki Haley pro-ISIS? Is she pro-al-Qaeda? Is she evil or just stupid?

You decide.

But if she is not removed from office soon, she will be leading perhaps a million people to their graves.

Daniel McAdams is director of the The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity . Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.

[Sep 17, 2017] The So-called Russian Hack of the DNC Does Not Make Sense by Publius Tacitus

Highly recommended!
All signs of sophisticated false flag operation, which probably involved putting malware into DNC servers and then detecting and analyzing them
Notable quotes:
"... 6 May 2016 when CrowdStrike first detected what it assessed to be a Russian presence inside the DNC server. Follow me here. One week after realizing there had been a penetration, the DNC learns, courtesy of the computer security firm it hired, that the Russians are doing it. Okay. Does CrowdStrike shut down the penetration. Nope. The hacking apparently continues unabated. ..."
"... The Smoking Gun ..."
"... I introduce Seth Rich at this point because he represents an alternative hypothesis. Rich, who reportedly was a Bernie Sanders supporter, was in a position at the DNC that gave him access to the emails in question and the opportunity to download the emails and take them from the DNC headquarters. Worth noting that Julian Assange offered $20,000 for information leading to the arrest of Rich's killer or killers. 8. 22 July 2016. Wikileaks published the DNC emails starting on 22 July 2016. Bill Binney, a former senior official at NSA, insists that if such a hack and electronic transfer over the internet had occurred then the NSA has in it possession the intelligence data to prove that such activity had occurred. ..."
"... Notwithstanding the claim by CrowdStrike not a single piece of evidence has been provided to the public to support the conclusion that the emails were hacked and physically transferred to a server under the control of a Russian intelligence operative. ..."
"... Please do not try to post a comment stating that the "Intelligence Community" concluded as well that Russia was responsible. That claim is totally without one shred of actual forensic evidence. Also, Julian Assange insists that the emails did not come from a Russian source. ..."
"... Wikileaks, the protector of the accountability of the top, has announced a reward for finding the murderers of Seth Rich. In comparison, the DNC has not offered any reward to help the investigation of the murder of the DNC staffer, but the DNC found a well-connected lawyer to protect Imran Awan who is guilty (along with Debbie Wasserman-Schultz) in the greatest breach of national cybersecurity: http://dailycaller.com/2017/07/29/wasserman-schultz-seemingly-planned-to-pay-suspect-even-while-he-lived-in-pakistan/ ..."
"... I'm afraid you're behind the times. Wheeler is no longer relevant now that Sy Hersh has revealed an FBI report that explicitly says Rich was in contact with Wikileaks offering to sell them DNC documents. ..."
"... It's unfortunate for the Rich family, but now that the connection is pretty much confirmed, they're going to have to allow the truth to come out ..."
"... Mr. Dmitri Alperovitch, of Jewish descent (and an emigre from Russia), has been an "expert" at the Atlantic Council, the same organization that cherishes and provides for Mr. Eliot Higgins. These two gentlemen - and the directorate of Atlantic Council - are exhibit one of opportunism and intellectual dishonesty (though it is hard to think about Mr. Higgins in terms of "intellect"). ..."
"... Alperovitch is not just an incompetent "expert" in cybersecurity - he is a willing liar and war-mongering, for money. ..."
"... One could of course start earlier. What is the exact timeline of the larger cyberwar post 9/11, or at least the bits and pieces that surfaced for the nitwits among us, like: Stuxnet? ..."
"... Scott Ritter's article referenced in PT's post is terrific, covering a ton of issues related to CrowdStrike and the DNC hack. You need to read it, not just PT's timeline. In case you missed the link in PT's post: ..."
"... His article echoes and reinforces what Carr and others have said about the difficulty of attribution of infosec breaches. Namely that the basic problem of both intelligence and infosec operations is that there is too much obfuscation, manipulation, and misdirection involved to be sure of who or what is going on. ..."
"... The Seth Rich connection is pretty much a done deal, now that Sy Hersh has been caught on tape stating that he knows of an FBI report based on a forensic analysis of Rich's laptop that shows Rich was in direct contact with Wikileaks with an attempt to sell them DNC documents and that Wikileaks had access to Rich's DropBox account. Despite Hersh's subsequent denials - which everyone knows are his usual impatient deflections prior to putting out a sourced and organized article - it's pretty clear that Rich was at least one of the sources of the Wikileaks email dump and that there is zero connection to Russia. ..."
"... None of this proves that Russian intelligence - or Russians of some stripe - or for that matter hackers from literally anywhere - couldn't or didn't ALSO do a hack of the DNC. But it does prove that the iron-clad attribution of the source of Wikileaks email release to Russia is at best flawed, and at worst a deliberate cover up of a leak. ..."
Sep 05, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com

Notwithstanding the conventional wisdom that Russia hacked into the DNC computers, downloaded emails and a passed the stolen missives to Julian Assange's crew at Wikileaks, a careful examination of the timeline of events from 2016 shows that this story is simply not plausible.

Let me take you through the known facts:

1. 29 April 2016 , when the DNC became aware its servers had been penetrated (https://medium.com/homefront-rising/dumbstruck-how-crowdstrike-conned-america-on-the-hack-of-the-dnc-ecfa522ff44f). Note. They apparently did not know who was doing it. 2, 6 May 2016 when CrowdStrike first detected what it assessed to be a Russian presence inside the DNC server. Follow me here. One week after realizing there had been a penetration, the DNC learns, courtesy of the computer security firm it hired, that the Russians are doing it. Okay. Does CrowdStrike shut down the penetration. Nope. The hacking apparently continues unabated. 3. 25 May 2016. The messages published on Wikileaks from the DNC show that 26 May 2016 was the last date that emails were sent and received at the DNC. There are no emails in the public domain after that date. In other words, if the DNC emails were taken via a hacking operation, we can conclude from the fact that the last messages posted to Wikileaks show a date time group of 25 May 2016. Wikileaks has not reported nor posted any emails from the DNC after the 25th of May. I think it is reasonable to assume that was the day the dirty deed was done. 4. 12 June 2016, CrowdStrike purged the DNC server of all malware. Are you kidding me? 45 days after the DNC discovers that its serve has been penetrated the decision to purge the DNC server is finally made. What in the hell were they waiting for? But this also tells us that 18 days after the last email "taken" from the DNC, no additional emails were taken by this nasty malware. Here is what does not make sense to me. If the DNC emails were truly hacked and the malware was still in place on 11 June 2016 (it was not purged until the 12th) then why are there no emails from the DNC after 26 May 2016? an excellent analysis of Guccifer's role : Almost immediately after the one-two punch of the Washington Post article/CrowdStrike technical report went public, however, something totally unexpected happened -- someone came forward and took full responsibility for the DNC cyber attack. Moreover, this entity -- operating under the persona Guccifer 2.0 (ostensibly named after the original Guccifer , a Romanian hacker who stole the emails of a number of high-profile celebrities and who was arrested in 2014 and sentenced to 4 ½ years of prison in May 2016) -- did something no state actor has ever done before, publishing documents stolen from the DNC server as proof of his claims.
Hi. This is Guccifer 2.0 and this is me who hacked Democratic National Committee.

With that simple email, sent to the on-line news magazine, The Smoking Gun , Guccifer 2.0 stole the limelight away from Alperovitch. Over the course of the next few days, through a series of emails, online posts and interviews , Guccifer 2.0 openly mocked CrowdStrike and its Russian attribution. Guccifer 2.0 released a number of documents, including a massive 200-plus-missive containing opposition research on Donald Trump.

Guccifer 2.0 also directly contradicted the efforts on the part of the DNC to minimize the extent of the hacking, releasing the very donor lists the DNC specifically stated had not been stolen. More chilling, Guccifer 2.0 claimed to be in possession of "about 100 Gb of data" which had been passed on to the online publisher, Wikileaks, who "will publish them soon." 7. Seth Rich died on 10 July 2016. I introduce Seth Rich at this point because he represents an alternative hypothesis. Rich, who reportedly was a Bernie Sanders supporter, was in a position at the DNC that gave him access to the emails in question and the opportunity to download the emails and take them from the DNC headquarters. Worth noting that Julian Assange offered $20,000 for information leading to the arrest of Rich's killer or killers. 8. 22 July 2016. Wikileaks published the DNC emails starting on 22 July 2016. Bill Binney, a former senior official at NSA, insists that if such a hack and electronic transfer over the internet had occurred then the NSA has in it possession the intelligence data to prove that such activity had occurred. Notwithstanding the claim by CrowdStrike not a single piece of evidence has been provided to the public to support the conclusion that the emails were hacked and physically transferred to a server under the control of a Russian intelligence operative. Please do not try to post a comment stating that the "Intelligence Community" concluded as well that Russia was responsible. That claim is totally without one shred of actual forensic evidence. Also, Julian Assange insists that the emails did not come from a Russian source.

Fool , 05 September 2017 at 09:01 AM

Where was it reported that Rich was a Sanders supporter?
Publius Tacitus -> Fool... , 05 September 2017 at 09:15 AM
This is one of the reports, http://heavy.com/news/2016/08/seth-rich-julian-assange-source-wikileaks-wiki-dnc-emails-death-murder-reward-video-interview-hillary-clinton-shawn-lucas/.
Anna -> Publius Tacitus ... , 05 September 2017 at 10:56 AM
Wikileaks, the protector of the accountability of the top, has announced a reward for finding the murderers of Seth Rich. In comparison, the DNC has not offered any reward to help the investigation of the murder of the DNC staffer, but the DNC found a well-connected lawyer to protect Imran Awan who is guilty (along with Debbie Wasserman-Schultz) in the greatest breach of national cybersecurity: http://dailycaller.com/2017/07/29/wasserman-schultz-seemingly-planned-to-pay-suspect-even-while-he-lived-in-pakistan/
Stephanie -> Publius Tacitus ... , 06 September 2017 at 12:12 PM
Seth Rich's family have pleaded, and continue to plead, that the conspiracy theorists leave the death of their son alone and have said that those who continue to flog this nonsense around the internet are only serving to increase their pain. I suggest respectfully that some here may wish to consider their feelings. (Also, this stuff is nuts, you know.)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/were-seth-richs-parents-stop-politicizing-our-sons-murder/2017/05/23/164cf4dc-3fee-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html?utm_term=.b20208de48d3

"We also know that many people are angry at our government and want to see justice done in some way, somehow. We are asking you to please consider our feelings and words. There are people who are using our beloved Seth's memory and legacy for their own political goals, and they are using your outrage to perpetuate our nightmare."

http://www.businessinsider.com/seth-rich-family-response-lawsuit-rod-wheeler-2017-8

"Wheeler, a former Metropolitan Police Department officer, was a key figure in a series of debunked stories claiming that Rich had been in contact with Wikileaks before his death. Fox News, which reported the story online and on television, retracted it in June."

Richardstevenhack -> Stephanie... , 07 September 2017 at 07:43 PM
I'm afraid you're behind the times. Wheeler is no longer relevant now that Sy Hersh has revealed an FBI report that explicitly says Rich was in contact with Wikileaks offering to sell them DNC documents.

It's unfortunate for the Rich family, but now that the connection is pretty much confirmed, they're going to have to allow the truth to come out.

Anna , 05 September 2017 at 09:20 AM
Mr. Dmitri Alperovitch, of Jewish descent (and an emigre from Russia), has been an "expert" at the Atlantic Council, the same organization that cherishes and provides for Mr. Eliot Higgins. These two gentlemen - and the directorate of Atlantic Council - are exhibit one of opportunism and intellectual dishonesty (though it is hard to think about Mr. Higgins in terms of "intellect").

Here is an article by Alperovitch: http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/russian-cyber-attacks-in-the-united-states-will-intensify

Take note how Alperovitch coded the names of the supposed hackers: "Russian intelligence services hacked the Democratic National Committee's computer network and accessed opposition research on Donald Trump, according to the Atlantic Council's Dmitri Alperovitch.

Two Russian groups ! codenamed FancyBear and CozyBear ! have been identified as spearheading the DNC breach." Alperovitch is not just an incompetent "expert" in cybersecurity - he is a willing liar and war-mongering, for money.

The DNC hacking story has never been about national security; Alperovitch (and his handlers) have no loyalty to the US.

LeaNder , 05 September 2017 at 09:59 AM
PT, I make a short exception. Actually decided to stop babbling for a while. But: Just finished something successfully.

And since I usually need distraction by something far more interesting then matters at hand. I was close to your line of thought yesters.

But really: Shouldn't the timeline start in 2015, since that's supposedly the time someone got into the DNC's system?

One could of course start earlier. What is the exact timeline of the larger cyberwar post 9/11, or at least the bits and pieces that surfaced for the nitwits among us, like: Stuxnet?

But nevermind. Don't forget developments and recent events around Eugene or Jewgeni Walentinowitsch Kasperski?

LondonBob , 05 September 2017 at 03:27 PM
The Russia thing certainly seems to have gone quiet.

Bannon's chum says the issue with pursuing the Clinton email thing is that you would end up having to indict almost all of the last administration, including Obama, unseemly certainly. Still there might be a fall guy, maybe Comey, and obviously it serves Trump's purposes to keep this a live issue through the good work of Grassley and the occasional tweet.

Would be amusing if Trump pardoned Obama. Still think Brennan should pay a price though, can't really be allowed to get away with it

Richardstevenhack , 05 September 2017 at 06:23 PM
Scott Ritter's article referenced in PT's post is terrific, covering a ton of issues related to CrowdStrike and the DNC hack. You need to read it, not just PT's timeline. In case you missed the link in PT's post:

Dumbstruck: How CrowdStrike Conned America on the Hack of the DNC https://medium.com/homefront-rising/dumbstruck-how-crowdstrike-conned-america-on-the-hack-of-the-dnc-ecfa522ff44f

The article by Jeffrey Carr on CrowdStrike referenced from back in 2012 is also worth reading: Where's the "Strike" in CrowdStrike? https://jeffreycarr.blogspot.com/2012/09/wheres-strike-in-crowdstrike.html

Also, the article Carr references is very important for understanding the limits of malware analysis and "attribution". Written by Michael Tanji, whose credentials appear impressive: "spent nearly 20 years in the US intelligence community. Trained in both SIGINT and HUMINT disciplines he has worked at the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, and the National Reconnaissance Office. At various points in his career he served as an expert in information warfare, computer network operations, computer forensics, and indications and warning. A veteran of the US Army, Michael has served in both strategic and tactical assignments in the Pacific Theater, the Balkans, and the Middle East."

Malware Analysis: The Danger of Connecting the Dots: https://www.oodaloop.com/technology/2012/09/11/malware-analysis-the-danger-of-connecting-the-dots/

His article echoes and reinforces what Carr and others have said about the difficulty of attribution of infosec breaches. Namely that the basic problem of both intelligence and infosec operations is that there is too much obfuscation, manipulation, and misdirection involved to be sure of who or what is going on.

The Seth Rich connection is pretty much a done deal, now that Sy Hersh has been caught on tape stating that he knows of an FBI report based on a forensic analysis of Rich's laptop that shows Rich was in direct contact with Wikileaks with an attempt to sell them DNC documents and that Wikileaks had access to Rich's DropBox account. Despite Hersh's subsequent denials - which everyone knows are his usual impatient deflections prior to putting out a sourced and organized article - it's pretty clear that Rich was at least one of the sources of the Wikileaks email dump and that there is zero connection to Russia.

None of this proves that Russian intelligence - or Russians of some stripe - or for that matter hackers from literally anywhere - couldn't or didn't ALSO do a hack of the DNC. But it does prove that the iron-clad attribution of the source of Wikileaks email release to Russia is at best flawed, and at worst a deliberate cover up of a leak.

And Russiagate depends primarily on BOTH alleged "facts" being true: 1) that Russia hacked the DNC, and 2) that Russia was the source of Wikileaks release. And if the latter is not true, then one has to question why Russia hacked the DNC in the first place, other than for "normal" espionage operations. "Influencing the election" then becomes a far less plausible theory.

The general takeaway from an infosec point of view is that attribution by means of target identification, tools used, and "indicators of compromise" is a fatally flawed means of identifying, and thus being able to counter, the adversaries encountered in today's Internet world, as Tanji proves. Only HUMINT offers a way around this, just as it is really the only valid option in countering terrorism.

[Sep 05, 2017] Should Tillerson Resign by Daniel Larison

for some reasons Larison support neocon blabbering of Daniel W. Drezner in WaPo Why Secretary of State Rex Tillerson should resign - The Washington Post ez
If Critics such as neocon Max Boot are calling for him to resign, I want him to stay.
The "wrecking of the State Department" that By Daniel Larison is concerned, is necessary as it is too infested with neocons leftover from Hillary days, including cadre of female warmongers.
Also color revolutions zeal needs to be tamed.
Taking into account that Trump effectivly changed sided starting from infamous Tomahawk attack, the nes round of sanctions for Russia and sabersrattling with Iran and North Korea, it is difficult to forsee how the Secratary of State can be effective with such a boss. Being a bully in the schoolyard was the policy the the USA sucessfully tried for all presidencies since Reagan, so in a sense Trump is proud hier f this noble tradition.
Notable quotes:
"... Tillerson was a CEO of for the longest time head of the US largest corporation by market cap. His problem or problems no doubt reflect his tenure in the corporate world. A world where you have to get things done some work out some don't. ..."
"... Point is he is a non fit in the Swamp where dysfunction is implanted. Can readers recall how an experience career politician like John Boy ran all over the world and in the end was manipulated by the Russians to their advantage. Hillary logged millions of miles obviously to the benefit of the Clinton foundation. So until the prior ruling class gets back in office a new diplomat will have to wait. ..."
"... Even setting aside the critical matter of civilian control of the government and military in a democratic society, these days our military isn't exactly a by-word for competency, success, or even sound judgment. ..."
Aug 31, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
calls for Rex Tillerson's resignation:

In less than seven months in the job, Tillerson has proven to be a feckless manager of his organization and a poor handler of the president of the United States. To be fair, even the savviest secretary of state would have his or her hands full with a president like Trump. The sharp contrast between Tillerson's fumblings and the more nimble footwork of Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis shows that Tillerson is the opposite of a good secretary of state. Most of Trump's private-sector cabinet officials have been dreadful, but Tillerson is the worst of the lot.

Tillerson has been presiding over the wrecking of the State Department ever since he was confirmed, and he has very little else to show for his tenure. It's safe to say that the demoralization and hollowing out of the department will just keep getting worse the longer he is in charge. The trouble is that replacing Tillerson probably won't change any of that, because the gutting of the State Department has been and continues to be an administration priority. The person Trump chooses to replace Tillerson is likely to have the same disdain for diplomacy and diplomats that he has.

So while I am inclined to agree with the call for Tillerson's resignation, I can't agree with Drezner when he says "I am no longer worried about who Trump would pick to replace him." This is exactly what we should be worrying about.

Tillerson got the job at State in part because all of the other people Trump was considering were so fanatical, ethically compromised, or otherwise awful that he seemed the best of a bad lot at the time. That may have been true, but that process produced one of the least effective Secretaries of State in modern times.

Now imagine Trump going through a similar process a second time. Is he likely to choose someone more capable than Tillerson? Considering the state of Trump's administration after just seven months, would anyone who fits that description be willing to take the job? If there is someone willing, I am concerned Trump would end up choosing another former general on account of his fascination with military officers, and that would be at least one too many in this Cabinet.

Tillerson reportedly never wanted the job, so it shouldn't take much to persuade him to leave. That said, the damage already done to the State Department isn't going to be repaired anytime soon, and as long as Trump is president we should assume it will continue regardless. I have been very critical of how Tillerson has been running his department, but as one his critics I think we should acknowledge that his successor could still be even worse.

Dan Green , August 31, 2017 at 10:07 am

Tillerson was a CEO of for the longest time head of the US largest corporation by market cap. His problem or problems no doubt reflect his tenure in the corporate world. A world where you have to get things done some work out some don't.

Point is he is a non fit in the Swamp where dysfunction is implanted. Can readers recall how an experience career politician like John Boy ran all over the world and in the end was manipulated by the Russians to their advantage. Hillary logged millions of miles obviously to the benefit of the Clinton foundation. So until the prior ruling class gets back in office a new diplomat will have to wait.

icarusr , August 31, 2017 at 10:15 am
Looks like what's good for Exxon is not necessarily good for the United States.
Seven Months In 2017 , August 31, 2017 at 10:47 am
"I am concerned Trump would end up choosing another former general on account of his fascination with military officers, and that would be at least one too many in this Cabinet."

And you should be concerned. Even setting aside the critical matter of civilian control of the government and military in a democratic society, these days our military isn't exactly a by-word for competency, success, or even sound judgment.

It has failed to win on multiple battlegrounds. Judging by the recent Three Stooges performance of the Pacific Fleet, there are basic competency issues at the highest levels of command. And now we learn that both Gens. Mattis and McMaster strongly urged Trump to double down in Afghanistan, one of the worst examples of judgment and decision-making in recent memory.

So far as I know, Tillerson had nothing to do with that idiocy, so I'd leave him where he is and pray that Trump will eventually be disabused of the instinct to defer to (or rather cringe before) his generals.

collin , August 31, 2017 at 11:20 am
TBH, I can't figure out exactly why Tillerson has been so bad but I assume his lack of experience of the State Department makes him a very poor choice for President Trump. Judging by the Trump's administration G&G (General & Goldman) cabinet is very experience expertise with Job-like patience is needed to work with President Trump. Basically, it fits Drezner's toddler comments that Mattis works well with Trump because Mattis knows a lot more than the President and is willing to allow Trump to throw two hour tantrums for his policy. It is to the point that we almost need Mattis to be Secretary of State as at least we know that he can work with the President. (Dear God is wrong to state that an ex-General be our chief Diplomat.)

However, one area where Tillerson does work well is he truly dislikes taking media oxygen away from Trump so he may last awhile.

JEinCA , August 31, 2017 at 11:28 am
Why doesn't everyone resign and we'll make little "Billy" Kristol of the Weekly Standard the official Emperor of United States? Tillerson is the last voice of reason (and bulwark against the psychotic war mongering neocons) lefy in Trump's Administration.
Viriato , August 31, 2017 at 12:46 pm
@collin: We've had at least two generals serve as Secretary of State before: George Marshall and Colin Powell. And those are just two examples that I can name off the top of my head. I would not be surprised to find out that there have been other generals who served as our nation's Chief Diplomat.
Viriato , August 31, 2017 at 12:54 pm
Personally, I think Tillerson has been doing reasonably well at State. He seems to be a very articulate, thoughtful person. Certainly I much prefer Sec. Tillerson's ineffectiveness to Sec. Clinton's deadly effectiveness in Libya.

As to the gutting of the State Department. Tillerson recently stated that the hiring freeze was temporary and indeed announced a major hiring initiative: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=s8LynW4TmTU

MB , August 31, 2017 at 12:56 pm
There's probably an easily identifiable formula out there for who Trump might chose as a Tillerson replacement, based on who donated to his campaign, who has more money than Trump himself, and/or who has suspicious ties to Russian interests. Rohrabacher? Royce?
Cynthia McLean , August 31, 2017 at 1:31 pm
Tillerson should probably resign to retain his integrity and save his soul.
Swami , August 31, 2017 at 4:36 pm
Rumor is that Hillary Clinton is currently between gigs.

[Aug 30, 2017] The President of Belgian Magistrates - Neoliberalism is a form of Fascism by Manuela Cadelli

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... By Manuela Cadelli, President of the Magistrates' Union of Belgium ..."
"... Every totalitarianism starts as distortion of language, as in the novel by George Orwell. Neoliberalism has its Newspeak and strategies of communication that enable it to deform reality. In this spirit, every budgetary cut is represented as an instance of modernization of the sectors concerned. If some of the most deprived are no longer reimbursed for medical expenses and so stop visiting the dentist, this is modernization of social security in action! ..."
"... translated from French by Wayne Hall ..."
Aug 30, 2017 | www.defenddemocracy.press

By Manuela Cadelli, President of the Magistrates' Union of Belgium

The time for rhetorical reservations is over. Things have to be called by their name to make it possible for a co-ordinated democratic reaction to be initiated, above all in the public services.

Liberalism was a doctrine derived from the philosophy of Enlightenment, at once political and economic, which aimed at imposing on the state the necessary distance for ensuring respect for liberties and the coming of democratic emancipation. It was the motor for the arrival, and the continuing progress, of Western democracies.

Neoliberalism is a form of economism in our day that strikes at every moment at every sector of our community. It is a form of extremism.

Fascism may be defined as the subordination of every part of the State to a totalitarian and nihilistic ideology.

I argue that neoliberalism is a species of fascism because the economy has brought under subjection not only the government of democratic countries but also every aspect of our thought.

The state is now at the disposal of the economy and of finance, which treat it as a subordinate and lord over it to an extent that puts the common good in jeopardy.

The austerity that is demanded by the financial milieu has become a supreme value, replacing politics. Saving money precludes pursuing any other public objective. It is reaching the point where claims are being made that the principle of budgetary orthodoxy should be included in state constitutions. A mockery is being made of the notion of public service.

The nihilism that results from this makes possible the dismissal of universalism and the most evident humanistic values: solidarity, fraternity, integration and respect for all and for differences.

There is no place any more even for classical economic theory: work was formerly an element in demand, and to that extent there was respect for workers; international finance has made of it a mere adjustment variable.

Every totalitarianism starts as distortion of language, as in the novel by George Orwell. Neoliberalism has its Newspeak and strategies of communication that enable it to deform reality. In this spirit, every budgetary cut is represented as an instance of modernization of the sectors concerned. If some of the most deprived are no longer reimbursed for medical expenses and so stop visiting the dentist, this is modernization of social security in action!

Read also: The only real way to stop atrocities like the Manchester attack is to end the wars which allow extremism to grow

Abstraction predominates in public discussion so as to occlude the implications for human beings.

Thus, in relation to migrants, it is imperative that the need for hosting them does not lead to public appeals that our finances could not accommodate. Is it In the same way that other individuals qualify for assistance out of considerations of national solidarity?

The cult of evaluation

Social Darwinism predominates, assigning the most stringent performance requirements to everyone and everything: to be weak is to fail. The foundations of our culture are overturned: every humanist premise is disqualified or demonetized because neoliberalism has the monopoly of rationality and realism. Margaret Thatcher said it in 1985: "There is no alternative." Everything else is utopianism, unreason and regression. The virtue of debate and conflicting perspectives are discredited because history is ruled by necessity.

This subculture harbours an existential threat of its own: shortcomings of performance condemn one to disappearance while at the same time everyone is charged with inefficiency and obliged to justify everything. Trust is broken. Evaluation reigns, and with it the bureaucracy which imposes definition and research of a plethora of targets, and indicators with which one must comply. Creativity and the critical spirit are stifled by management. And everyone is beating his breast about the wastage and inertia of which he is guilty.

The neglect of justice

The neoliberal ideology generates a normativity that competes with the laws of parliament. The democratic power of law is compromised. Given that they represent a concrete embodiment of liberty and emancipation, and given the potential to prevent abuse that they impose, laws and procedures have begun to look like obstacles.

Read also: EU lies on Cyprus, Ireland, Portugal and Greece

The power of the judiciary, which has the ability to oppose the will of the ruling circles, must also be checkmated. The Belgian judicial system is in any case underfunded. In 2015 it came last in a European ranking that included all states located between the Atlantic and the Urals. In two years the government has managed to take away the independence given to it under the Constitution so that it can play the counterbalancing role citizens expect of it. The aim of this undertaking is clearly that there should no longer be justice in Belgium.

A caste above the Many

But the dominant class doesn't prescribe for itself the same medicine it wants to see ordinary citizens taking: well-ordered austerity begins with others. The economist Thomas Piketty has perfectly described this in his study of inequality and capitalism in the twenty-first century (French edition, Seuil, 2013).

In spite of the crisis of 2008 and the hand-wringing that followed, nothing was done to police the financial community and submit them to the requirements of the common good. Who paid? Ordinary people, you and me.

And while the Belgian State consented to 7 billion-euro ten-year tax breaks for multinationals, ordinary litigants have seen surcharges imposed on access to justice (increased court fees, 21% taxation on legal fees). From now on, to obtain redress the victims of injustice are going to have to be rich.

All this in a state where the number of public representatives breaks all international records. In this particular area, no evaluation and no costs studies are reporting profit. One example: thirty years after the introduction of the federal system, the provincial institutions survive. Nobody can say what purpose they serve. Streamlining and the managerial ideology have conveniently stopped at the gates of the political world.

The security ideal

Read also: DEMOCRATIC MENTAL HEALTH SOLIDARITY NETWORK

Terrorism, this other nihilism that exposes our weakness in affirming our values, is likely to aggravate the process by soon making it possible for all violations of our liberties, all violations of our rights, to circumvent the powerless qualified judges, further reducing social protection for the poor, who will be sacrificed to "the security ideal".

Salvation in commitment

These developments certainly threaten the foundations of our democracy, but do they condemn us to discouragement and despair?

Certainly not. 500 years ago, at the height of the defeats that brought down most Italian states with the imposition of foreign occupation for more than three centuries, Niccolo Machiavelli urged virtuous men to defy fate and stand up against the adversity of the times, to prefer action and daring to caution. The more tragic the situation, the more it necessitates action and the refusal to "give up" (The Prince, Chapters XXV and XXVI).

This is a teaching that is clearly required today. The determination of citizens attached to the radical of democratic values is an invaluable resource which has not yet revealed, at least in Belgium, its driving potential and power to change what is presented as inevitable. Through social networking and the power of the written word, everyone can now become involved, particularly when it comes to public services, universities, the student world, the judiciary and the Bar, in bringing the common good and social justice into the heart of public debate and the administration of the state and the community.

Neoliberalism is a species of fascism. It must be fought and humanism fully restored.

Published in the Belgian daily Le Soir, 3.3.2016

translated from French by Wayne Hall
Le néolibéralisme est un fascisme, par Manuela Cadelli

[Aug 28, 2017] Krauthammer Shows True Colors Over Charlottesville

Aug 23, 2017 | www.unz.com

John Derbyshire August 23, 2017 300 Words 4 Comments Reply

One of the side-effects of these periodic moral panics that sweep through American society -- Trayvon , Ferguson , Charlottesville -- is that they unmask people -- bring out their inner nature.

Well, two weeks ago on the podcast I said some kind words , or at least not un -kind words, about TV talking head Charles Krauthammer. I said that while I'd written him off for years as a, quote, "cucky neocon Israel-first GOP establishment front man," more recently I've been warming to him because of the mostly sensible things he's said on Tucker Carlson's show.

Well, I'm biting my tongue. Last Tuesday on Fox News Krauthammer reverted to cucky type, acting scandalized that Trump dared suggest there is anything wrong with masked anarchists throwing rocks at citizens lawfully demonstrating.

Fortunately Laura Ingraham was there to counter him. I have, as I have often noted , a very soft spot for Ms. Ingraham. Not to be shy about it, I would walk over hot coals for her, leap the ice floes of a swollen river for her, wrestle alligators for her.

Art Deco > , August 25, 2017 at 1:51 pm GMT

So OK, I yield. I got Krauthammer right the first time: cucky neocon shill.

"Shill"? A shill is a bogus competitor employed by a casino to promote interest in the blackjack tables. Krauthammer isn't a shill.

He's had a certain political trajectory over the years: from mainline Democrat to dissenting Democrat to mainline Republican (a trajectory traversed over the period running from about 1979 to 1995). There is no indication he's ever advocated anything but what he thinks or that he favors the party he's not formally affiliated with; his antagonism to Trump is an indicator of the crevasse which separates starboard opinion journalists from starboard voters.

A real shill would be someone employed by the media to play a Republican. The WaPoo hired David Weigel to do this, but the act wasn't credible after his private correspondence was published in the Journ-O-List scandal.

Tyler Cowen, whose public writings suggest he's consumed with anxiety about status considerations in faculty settings, might be seen as a manifestation of libertarian pseudo-opposition on the George Mason payroll (since he never critiques any progtrasn sacred cows). Bruce Bartlett, the Republican whose signature is attacking other Republicans, might be considered a shill or a poseur depending on who is paying his bills.

And, of course, 'neocon' is a nonsense term.

Krauthammer is a Canadian-reared scion of a very prosperous family. He's lived pretty much all his life in New York, Montreal, Boston, and Washington. His brother spent his adult life in Los Angeles. His son lives in the Bay Area, his niece and her husband in Washington.

Between them, his parents lived in a half-dozen countries during the course of their lives before landing in Quebec. He does not have any natural affinity for the Trump constituency.

The best he can do is to attempt to appreciate it, and at that he is very hit-and-miss.

[Aug 28, 2017] Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause

Aug 20, 2017 | www.unz.com

SolontoCroesus > , August 20, 2017 at 4:14 pm GMT

@Corvinus "The plantation owners had them and in spite of Northern propaganda, these people (slaves) were usually treated very humanely."

Ripping them from their homeland, putting them on boats and dying by the dozens, being sold on a stage and branded, and then being forced to work against their will...and you claim they were treated "humanely" because Boss Hogg gave them enough food to eat, clothes on their backs, and tin roof over their head.

"Moving our flags and our statues for spite only angers us and hastens our will to become independent again. Keep it up and see."

Most normies (north and south, east and west) abhor the Confederacy. It represented slavery and secession. The Confederacy sought to DESTROY our nation. The norms are about what those monuments represent FROM THE PAST. They do not care that monuments serve as a historical record, nor do they care about the history of such individuals the monuments pay tribute to. Yes, Robert E. Lee opposed slavery. Yes, he had significant reservations about personally abandoning the Union. But what matters most is that he supported the Confederacy.

What about Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln? Should not their monuments be ripped down? According to most normies, no. While these individuals supported slavery, their accomplishments are generally viewed as BUILDING or PRESERVING our nation. That is the nuance here. The Confederacy monuments and the Washington/Jefferson/Lincoln monuments are on a separate moral plane as viewed by normies. In the end, the monuments are used as political pawns by the right and the left, not as historical pieces. I say move the monuments to private property. But in the meantime, anyone who rips them down now and in the future is defacing public property and ought to be arrested. Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie?

Corvinus > , August 20, 2017 at 6:28 pm GMT

@SolontoCroesus Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie? "What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?"

There are myths in Sherman's March that need to be explored.

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/rethinking-shermans-march/

We know that to the victors go the spoils. Winners write the history, and losers claim that the history is other than accurate. Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause. There is no doubt that if the tables were turned, and Lee was rampaging through Philadelphia and New York to finally put an end to "northern aggression", southern apologists would say the exact thing.

So, I take it that you oppose a similar Shermanesque policy if proposed by your allies or those on the Alt Right, correct? Make it official.

Furthermore, you do realize that the slave owners themselves had committed crimes against humanity, right? Are you ready to condemn them? Make it official.

"Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?"

Kurgen, a commenter at the Men Of The West blog, said, "Unfortunately, violence is inevitable. In fact, from a practical and logical point of view, violence is required to expel all the SJWs and their allies from polite civilization, and will further be required to man the walls of the forts that hold the line against them, as well as to expel any dissidents within them."

Do you share his sentiments? Would not those allies include women and children? I mean, if the overall goal is for Western Civilization to emerge on top, would it not be in the best interest to cull the herd? In this next "civil war", will YOU abide by those age-old norms?

"Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more."

Great theory, just impractical when one desires to obliterate your enemy. Besides, is it not best to salt the earth to ensure that the offspring of your enemy will NOT "come back"?

[Aug 28, 2017] Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause

Aug 20, 2017 | www.unz.com

SolontoCroesus > , August 20, 2017 at 4:14 pm GMT

@Corvinus "The plantation owners had them and in spite of Northern propaganda, these people (slaves) were usually treated very humanely."

Ripping them from their homeland, putting them on boats and dying by the dozens, being sold on a stage and branded, and then being forced to work against their will...and you claim they were treated "humanely" because Boss Hogg gave them enough food to eat, clothes on their backs, and tin roof over their head.

"Moving our flags and our statues for spite only angers us and hastens our will to become independent again. Keep it up and see."

Most normies (north and south, east and west) abhor the Confederacy. It represented slavery and secession. The Confederacy sought to DESTROY our nation. The norms are about what those monuments represent FROM THE PAST. They do not care that monuments serve as a historical record, nor do they care about the history of such individuals the monuments pay tribute to. Yes, Robert E. Lee opposed slavery. Yes, he had significant reservations about personally abandoning the Union. But what matters most is that he supported the Confederacy.

What about Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln? Should not their monuments be ripped down? According to most normies, no. While these individuals supported slavery, their accomplishments are generally viewed as BUILDING or PRESERVING our nation. That is the nuance here. The Confederacy monuments and the Washington/Jefferson/Lincoln monuments are on a separate moral plane as viewed by normies. In the end, the monuments are used as political pawns by the right and the left, not as historical pieces. I say move the monuments to private property. But in the meantime, anyone who rips them down now and in the future is defacing public property and ought to be arrested. Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie?

Corvinus > , August 20, 2017 at 6:28 pm GMT

@SolontoCroesus Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie? "What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?"

There are myths in Sherman's March that need to be explored.

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/rethinking-shermans-march/

We know that to the victors go the spoils. Winners write the history, and losers claim that the history is other than accurate. Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause. There is no doubt that if the tables were turned, and Lee was rampaging through Philadelphia and New York to finally put an end to "northern aggression", southern apologists would say the exact thing.

So, I take it that you oppose a similar Shermanesque policy if proposed by your allies or those on the Alt Right, correct? Make it official.

Furthermore, you do realize that the slave owners themselves had committed crimes against humanity, right? Are you ready to condemn them? Make it official.

"Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?"

Kurgen, a commenter at the Men Of The West blog, said, "Unfortunately, violence is inevitable. In fact, from a practical and logical point of view, violence is required to expel all the SJWs and their allies from polite civilization, and will further be required to man the walls of the forts that hold the line against them, as well as to expel any dissidents within them."

Do you share his sentiments? Would not those allies include women and children? I mean, if the overall goal is for Western Civilization to emerge on top, would it not be in the best interest to cull the herd? In this next "civil war", will YOU abide by those age-old norms?

"Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more."

Great theory, just impractical when one desires to obliterate your enemy. Besides, is it not best to salt the earth to ensure that the offspring of your enemy will NOT "come back"?

[Aug 26, 2017] Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause

Aug 26, 2017 | www.unz.com

August 20, 2017

SolontoCroesus > , August 20, 2017 at 4:14 pm GMT

@Corvinus "The plantation owners had them and in spite of Northern propaganda, these people (slaves) were usually treated very humanely."

Ripping them from their homeland, putting them on boats and dying by the dozens, being sold on a stage and branded, and then being forced to work against their will...and you claim they were treated "humanely" because Boss Hogg gave them enough food to eat, clothes on their backs, and tin roof over their head.

"Moving our flags and our statues for spite only angers us and hastens our will to become independent again. Keep it up and see."

Most normies (north and south, east and west) abhor the Confederacy. It represented slavery and secession. The Confederacy sought to DESTROY our nation. The norms are about what those monuments represent FROM THE PAST. They do not care that monuments serve as a historical record, nor do they care about the history of such individuals the monuments pay tribute to. Yes, Robert E. Lee opposed slavery. Yes, he had significant reservations about personally abandoning the Union. But what matters most is that he supported the Confederacy.

What about Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln? Should not their monuments be ripped down? According to most normies, no. While these individuals supported slavery, their accomplishments are generally viewed as BUILDING or PRESERVING our nation. That is the nuance here. The Confederacy monuments and the Washington/Jefferson/Lincoln monuments are on a separate moral plane as viewed by normies. In the end, the monuments are used as political pawns by the right and the left, not as historical pieces. I say move the monuments to private property. But in the meantime, anyone who rips them down now and in the future is defacing public property and ought to be arrested. Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie?

Corvinus > , August 20, 2017 at 6:28 pm GMT

@SolontoCroesus Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie? "What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?"

There are myths in Sherman's March that need to be explored.

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/rethinking-shermans-march/

We know that to the victors go the spoils. Winners write the history, and losers claim that the history is other than accurate. Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause. There is no doubt that if the tables were turned, and Lee was rampaging through Philadelphia and New York to finally put an end to "northern aggression", southern apologists would say the exact thing.

So, I take it that you oppose a similar Shermanesque policy if proposed by your allies or those on the Alt Right, correct? Make it official.

Furthermore, you do realize that the slave owners themselves had committed crimes against humanity, right? Are you ready to condemn them? Make it official.

"Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?"

Kurgen, a commenter at the Men Of The West blog, said, "Unfortunately, violence is inevitable. In fact, from a practical and logical point of view, violence is required to expel all the SJWs and their allies from polite civilization, and will further be required to man the walls of the forts that hold the line against them, as well as to expel any dissidents within them."

Do you share his sentiments? Would not those allies include women and children? I mean, if the overall goal is for Western Civilization to emerge on top, would it not be in the best interest to cull the herd? In this next "civil war", will YOU abide by those age-old norms?

"Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more."

Great theory, just impractical when one desires to obliterate your enemy. Besides, is it not best to salt the earth to ensure that the offspring of your enemy will NOT "come back"?

[Aug 26, 2017] Why Google The long war

Notable quotes:
"... The Pentagon's New Map. ..."
"... New York Times ..."
"... Washington Post ..."
"... Barnett's vision is neoconservative to the root. He sees the world as divided into essentially two realms : The Core, which consists of advanced countries playing by the rules of economic globalization (the US, Canada, UK, Europe and Japan) along with developing countries committed to getting there (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and some others); and the rest of the world, which is The Gap, a disparate wilderness of dangerous and lawless countries defined fundamentally by being "disconnected" from the wonders of globalization. This includes most of the Middle East and Africa, large swathes of South America, as well as much of Central Asia and Eastern Europe. It is the task of the United States to "shrink The Gap," by spreading the cultural and economic "rule-set" of globalization that characterizes The Core, and by enforcing security worldwide to enable that "rule-set" to spread. ..."
"... In the near future, Barnett had predicted, US military forces will be dispatched beyond Iraq and Afghanistan to places like Uzbekistan, Djibouti, Azerbaijan, Northwest Africa, Southern Africa and South America. ..."
"... Barnett's Pentagon briefing was greeted with near universal enthusiasm. The Forum had even purchased copies of his book and had them distributed to all Forum delegates, ..."
"... "I'm not convinced that Barnett's cure would be any better than the disease," wrote Dr. Karen Kwiatowski, a former senior Pentagon analyst in the Near East and South Asia section, who blew the whistle on how her department deliberately manufactured false information in the run-up to the Iraq War. "It would surely cost far more in American liberty, constitutional democracy and blood than it would be worth." ..."
Aug 26, 2017 | medium.com

No better illustration of the truly chauvinistic, narcissistic, and self-congratulatory ideology of power at the heart of the military-industrial complex is a book by long-time Highlands Forum delegate, Dr. Thomas Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map. Barnett was assistant for strategic futures in the Pentagon's Office of Force Transformation from 2001 to 2003, and had been recommended to Richard O'Neill by his boss Vice Admiral Arthur Cebrowski. Apart from becoming a New York Times bestseller, Barnett's book had been read far and wide in the US military, by senior defense officials in Washington and combatant commanders operating on the ground in the Middle East.

Barnett first attended the Pentagon Highlands Forum in 1998, then was invited to deliver a briefing about his work at the Forum on December 7th 2004, which was attended by senior Pentagon officials, energy experts, internet entrepreneurs, and journalists. Barnett received a glowing review in the Washington Post from his Highlands Forum buddy David Ignatius a week later, and an endorsement from another Forum friend, Thomas Friedman, both of which helped massively boost his credibility and readership.

Barnett's vision is neoconservative to the root. He sees the world as divided into essentially two realms : The Core, which consists of advanced countries playing by the rules of economic globalization (the US, Canada, UK, Europe and Japan) along with developing countries committed to getting there (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and some others); and the rest of the world, which is The Gap, a disparate wilderness of dangerous and lawless countries defined fundamentally by being "disconnected" from the wonders of globalization. This includes most of the Middle East and Africa, large swathes of South America, as well as much of Central Asia and Eastern Europe. It is the task of the United States to "shrink The Gap," by spreading the cultural and economic "rule-set" of globalization that characterizes The Core, and by enforcing security worldwide to enable that "rule-set" to spread.

These two functions of US power are captured by Barnett's concepts of "Leviathan" and "System Administrator." The former is about rule-setting to facilitate the spread of capitalist markets, regulated via military and civilian law. The latter is about projecting military force into The Gap in an open-ended global mission to enforce security and engage in nation-building. Not "rebuilding," he is keen to emphasize, but building "new nations."

For Barnett, the Bush administration's 2002 introduction of the Patriot Act at home, with its crushing of habeas corpus, and the National Security Strategy abroad, with its opening up of unilateral, pre-emptive war, represented the beginning of the necessary re-writing of rule-sets in The Core to embark on this noble mission. This is the only way for the US to achieve security, writes Barnett, because as long as The Gap exists, it will always be a source of lawless violence and disorder. One paragraph in particular sums up his vision:

"America as global cop creates security. Security creates common rules. Rules attract foreign investment. Investment creates infrastructure. Infrastructure creates access to natural resources. Resources create economic growth. Growth creates stability. Stability creates markets. And once you're a growing, stable part of the global market, you're part of the Core. Mission accomplished."

Much of what Barnett predicted would need to happen to fulfill this vision, despite its neoconservative bent, is still being pursued under Obama. In the near future, Barnett had predicted, US military forces will be dispatched beyond Iraq and Afghanistan to places like Uzbekistan, Djibouti, Azerbaijan, Northwest Africa, Southern Africa and South America.

Barnett's Pentagon briefing was greeted with near universal enthusiasm. The Forum had even purchased copies of his book and had them distributed to all Forum delegates, and in May 2005, Barnett was invited back to participate in an entire Forum themed around his "SysAdmin" concept.

The Highlands Forum has thus played a leading role in defining the Pentagon's entire conceptualization of the 'war on terror.' Irving Wladawsky-Berger, a retired IMB vice president who co-chaired the President's Information Technology Advisory Committee from 1997 to 2001, described his experience of one 2007 Forum meeting in telling terms:

"Then there is the War on Terror, which DoD has started to refer to as the Long War, a term that I first heard at the Forum. It seems very appropriate to describe the overall conflict in which we now find ourselves. This is a truly global conflict the conflicts we are now in have much more of the feel of a battle of civilizations or cultures trying to destroy our very way of life and impose their own."

The problem is that outside this powerful Pentagon-hosted clique, not everyone else agrees. "I'm not convinced that Barnett's cure would be any better than the disease," wrote Dr. Karen Kwiatowski, a former senior Pentagon analyst in the Near East and South Asia section, who blew the whistle on how her department deliberately manufactured false information in the run-up to the Iraq War. "It would surely cost far more in American liberty, constitutional democracy and blood than it would be worth."

Yet the equation of "shrinking The Gap" with sustaining the national security of The Core leads to a slippery slope. It means that if the US is prevented from playing this leadership role as "global cop," The Gap will widen, The Core will shrink, and the entire global order could unravel. By this logic, the US simply cannot afford government or public opinion to reject the legitimacy of its mission. If it did so, it would allow The Gap to grow out of control, undermining The Core, and potentially destroying it, along with The Core's protector, America. Therefore, "shrinking The Gap" is not just a security imperative: it is such an existential priority, that it must be backed up with information war to demonstrate to the world the legitimacy of the entire project.

Based on O'Neill's principles of information warfare as articulated in his 1989 US Navy brief, the targets of information war are not just populations in The Gap, but domestic populations in The Core, and their governments: including the US government. That secret brief, which according to former senior US intelligence official John Alexander was read by the Pentagon's top leadership, argued that information war must be targeted at: adversaries to convince them of their vulnerability; potential partners around the world so they accept "the cause as just"; and finally, civilian populations and the political leadership so they believe that "the cost" in blood and treasure is worth it.

Barnett's work was plugged by the Pentagon's Highlands Forum because it fit the bill, in providing a compelling 'feel good' ideology for the US military-industrial complex.

But neoconservative ideology, of course, hardly originated with Barnett, himself a relatively small player, even though his work was extremely influential throughout the Pentagon. The regressive thinking of senior officials involved in the Highlands Forum is visible from long before 9/11, which was ceased upon by actors linked to the Forum as a powerful enabling force that legitimized the increasingly aggressive direction of US foreign and intelligence policies.

[Aug 26, 2017] Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause

Aug 26, 2017 | www.unz.com

August 20, 2017

SolontoCroesus > , August 20, 2017 at 4:14 pm GMT

@Corvinus "The plantation owners had them and in spite of Northern propaganda, these people (slaves) were usually treated very humanely."

Ripping them from their homeland, putting them on boats and dying by the dozens, being sold on a stage and branded, and then being forced to work against their will...and you claim they were treated "humanely" because Boss Hogg gave them enough food to eat, clothes on their backs, and tin roof over their head.

"Moving our flags and our statues for spite only angers us and hastens our will to become independent again. Keep it up and see."

Most normies (north and south, east and west) abhor the Confederacy. It represented slavery and secession. The Confederacy sought to DESTROY our nation. The norms are about what those monuments represent FROM THE PAST. They do not care that monuments serve as a historical record, nor do they care about the history of such individuals the monuments pay tribute to. Yes, Robert E. Lee opposed slavery. Yes, he had significant reservations about personally abandoning the Union. But what matters most is that he supported the Confederacy.

What about Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln? Should not their monuments be ripped down? According to most normies, no. While these individuals supported slavery, their accomplishments are generally viewed as BUILDING or PRESERVING our nation. That is the nuance here. The Confederacy monuments and the Washington/Jefferson/Lincoln monuments are on a separate moral plane as viewed by normies. In the end, the monuments are used as political pawns by the right and the left, not as historical pieces. I say move the monuments to private property. But in the meantime, anyone who rips them down now and in the future is defacing public property and ought to be arrested. Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie?

Corvinus > , August 20, 2017 at 6:28 pm GMT

@SolontoCroesus Yo, Corvie the normie,

What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?

Good idea to kill civilians and destroy property with reckless abandon because the only thing that matters is WINNING!
Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?

Just War theory is a legacy from millennia a ago -- waaaay before you normies developed your keen sense of moral clarity -- (don't you just love that term? moral clarity -- Israelis love that term, moral clarity: IDF drops phosphorus on children in Gaza with moral clarity . . .)

Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more.

Did Sherman abide by those age-old norms, normie? "What's your view -- you and your fellow normies -- on Sherman's Scorched earth march to the sea?"

There are myths in Sherman's March that need to be explored.

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/rethinking-shermans-march/

We know that to the victors go the spoils. Winners write the history, and losers claim that the history is other than accurate. Did Sherman commit war crimes? In my opinion, yes. But in war, does winning ultimately matter? Yes. There is no "honor" in war itself, just bloodshed by men who honorable in their willingness to die for their cause. There is no doubt that if the tables were turned, and Lee was rampaging through Philadelphia and New York to finally put an end to "northern aggression", southern apologists would say the exact thing.

So, I take it that you oppose a similar Shermanesque policy if proposed by your allies or those on the Alt Right, correct? Make it official.

Furthermore, you do realize that the slave owners themselves had committed crimes against humanity, right? Are you ready to condemn them? Make it official.

"Or is the notion of killing civilians -- women and children -- abhorrent to self-respecting military men who view a war as something engaged in between martial forces who observe codes of military honor?"

Kurgen, a commenter at the Men Of The West blog, said, "Unfortunately, violence is inevitable. In fact, from a practical and logical point of view, violence is required to expel all the SJWs and their allies from polite civilization, and will further be required to man the walls of the forts that hold the line against them, as well as to expel any dissidents within them."

Do you share his sentiments? Would not those allies include women and children? I mean, if the overall goal is for Western Civilization to emerge on top, would it not be in the best interest to cull the herd? In this next "civil war", will YOU abide by those age-old norms?

"Just War Theory states that war, once engaged, must act to protect civilians to the fullest extent possible, and should should meet force with proportionate force and not more."

Great theory, just impractical when one desires to obliterate your enemy. Besides, is it not best to salt the earth to ensure that the offspring of your enemy will NOT "come back"?

[Aug 26, 2017] Why Google The long war

Notable quotes:
"... The Pentagon's New Map. ..."
"... New York Times ..."
"... Washington Post ..."
"... Barnett's vision is neoconservative to the root. He sees the world as divided into essentially two realms : The Core, which consists of advanced countries playing by the rules of economic globalization (the US, Canada, UK, Europe and Japan) along with developing countries committed to getting there (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and some others); and the rest of the world, which is The Gap, a disparate wilderness of dangerous and lawless countries defined fundamentally by being "disconnected" from the wonders of globalization. This includes most of the Middle East and Africa, large swathes of South America, as well as much of Central Asia and Eastern Europe. It is the task of the United States to "shrink The Gap," by spreading the cultural and economic "rule-set" of globalization that characterizes The Core, and by enforcing security worldwide to enable that "rule-set" to spread. ..."
"... In the near future, Barnett had predicted, US military forces will be dispatched beyond Iraq and Afghanistan to places like Uzbekistan, Djibouti, Azerbaijan, Northwest Africa, Southern Africa and South America. ..."
"... Barnett's Pentagon briefing was greeted with near universal enthusiasm. The Forum had even purchased copies of his book and had them distributed to all Forum delegates, ..."
"... "I'm not convinced that Barnett's cure would be any better than the disease," wrote Dr. Karen Kwiatowski, a former senior Pentagon analyst in the Near East and South Asia section, who blew the whistle on how her department deliberately manufactured false information in the run-up to the Iraq War. "It would surely cost far more in American liberty, constitutional democracy and blood than it would be worth." ..."
Aug 26, 2017 | medium.com

No better illustration of the truly chauvinistic, narcissistic, and self-congratulatory ideology of power at the heart of the military-industrial complex is a book by long-time Highlands Forum delegate, Dr. Thomas Barnett, The Pentagon's New Map. Barnett was assistant for strategic futures in the Pentagon's Office of Force Transformation from 2001 to 2003, and had been recommended to Richard O'Neill by his boss Vice Admiral Arthur Cebrowski. Apart from becoming a New York Times bestseller, Barnett's book had been read far and wide in the US military, by senior defense officials in Washington and combatant commanders operating on the ground in the Middle East.

Barnett first attended the Pentagon Highlands Forum in 1998, then was invited to deliver a briefing about his work at the Forum on December 7th 2004, which was attended by senior Pentagon officials, energy experts, internet entrepreneurs, and journalists. Barnett received a glowing review in the Washington Post from his Highlands Forum buddy David Ignatius a week later, and an endorsement from another Forum friend, Thomas Friedman, both of which helped massively boost his credibility and readership.

Barnett's vision is neoconservative to the root. He sees the world as divided into essentially two realms : The Core, which consists of advanced countries playing by the rules of economic globalization (the US, Canada, UK, Europe and Japan) along with developing countries committed to getting there (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and some others); and the rest of the world, which is The Gap, a disparate wilderness of dangerous and lawless countries defined fundamentally by being "disconnected" from the wonders of globalization. This includes most of the Middle East and Africa, large swathes of South America, as well as much of Central Asia and Eastern Europe. It is the task of the United States to "shrink The Gap," by spreading the cultural and economic "rule-set" of globalization that characterizes The Core, and by enforcing security worldwide to enable that "rule-set" to spread.

These two functions of US power are captured by Barnett's concepts of "Leviathan" and "System Administrator." The former is about rule-setting to facilitate the spread of capitalist markets, regulated via military and civilian law. The latter is about projecting military force into The Gap in an open-ended global mission to enforce security and engage in nation-building. Not "rebuilding," he is keen to emphasize, but building "new nations."

For Barnett, the Bush administration's 2002 introduction of the Patriot Act at home, with its crushing of habeas corpus, and the National Security Strategy abroad, with its opening up of unilateral, pre-emptive war, represented the beginning of the necessary re-writing of rule-sets in The Core to embark on this noble mission. This is the only way for the US to achieve security, writes Barnett, because as long as The Gap exists, it will always be a source of lawless violence and disorder. One paragraph in particular sums up his vision:

"America as global cop creates security. Security creates common rules. Rules attract foreign investment. Investment creates infrastructure. Infrastructure creates access to natural resources. Resources create economic growth. Growth creates stability. Stability creates markets. And once you're a growing, stable part of the global market, you're part of the Core. Mission accomplished."

Much of what Barnett predicted would need to happen to fulfill this vision, despite its neoconservative bent, is still being pursued under Obama. In the near future, Barnett had predicted, US military forces will be dispatched beyond Iraq and Afghanistan to places like Uzbekistan, Djibouti, Azerbaijan, Northwest Africa, Southern Africa and South America.

Barnett's Pentagon briefing was greeted with near universal enthusiasm. The Forum had even purchased copies of his book and had them distributed to all Forum delegates, and in May 2005, Barnett was invited back to participate in an entire Forum themed around his "SysAdmin" concept.

The Highlands Forum has thus played a leading role in defining the Pentagon's entire conceptualization of the 'war on terror.' Irving Wladawsky-Berger, a retired IMB vice president who co-chaired the President's Information Technology Advisory Committee from 1997 to 2001, described his experience of one 2007 Forum meeting in telling terms:

"Then there is the War on Terror, which DoD has started to refer to as the Long War, a term that I first heard at the Forum. It seems very appropriate to describe the overall conflict in which we now find ourselves. This is a truly global conflict the conflicts we are now in have much more of the feel of a battle of civilizations or cultures trying to destroy our very way of life and impose their own."

The problem is that outside this powerful Pentagon-hosted clique, not everyone else agrees. "I'm not convinced that Barnett's cure would be any better than the disease," wrote Dr. Karen Kwiatowski, a former senior Pentagon analyst in the Near East and South Asia section, who blew the whistle on how her department deliberately manufactured false information in the run-up to the Iraq War. "It would surely cost far more in American liberty, constitutional democracy and blood than it would be worth."

Yet the equation of "shrinking The Gap" with sustaining the national security of The Core leads to a slippery slope. It means that if the US is prevented from playing this leadership role as "global cop," The Gap will widen, The Core will shrink, and the entire global order could unravel. By this logic, the US simply cannot afford government or public opinion to reject the legitimacy of its mission. If it did so, it would allow The Gap to grow out of control, undermining The Core, and potentially destroying it, along with The Core's protector, America. Therefore, "shrinking The Gap" is not just a security imperative: it is such an existential priority, that it must be backed up with information war to demonstrate to the world the legitimacy of the entire project.

Based on O'Neill's principles of information warfare as articulated in his 1989 US Navy brief, the targets of information war are not just populations in The Gap, but domestic populations in The Core, and their governments: including the US government. That secret brief, which according to former senior US intelligence official John Alexander was read by the Pentagon's top leadership, argued that information war must be targeted at: adversaries to convince them of their vulnerability; potential partners around the world so they accept "the cause as just"; and finally, civilian populations and the political leadership so they believe that "the cost" in blood and treasure is worth it.

Barnett's work was plugged by the Pentagon's Highlands Forum because it fit the bill, in providing a compelling 'feel good' ideology for the US military-industrial complex.

But neoconservative ideology, of course, hardly originated with Barnett, himself a relatively small player, even though his work was extremely influential throughout the Pentagon. The regressive thinking of senior officials involved in the Highlands Forum is visible from long before 9/11, which was ceased upon by actors linked to the Forum as a powerful enabling force that legitimized the increasingly aggressive direction of US foreign and intelligence policies.

[Aug 26, 2017] Poroshenko has asked the UN to send peacekeepers to the Donbass

Aug 26, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

August 22, 2017

Moscow Exile , August 22, 2017 at 12:55 pm

Порошенко попросит ООН ввести миротворцев в Донбасс

Poroshenko has asked the UN to send peacekeepers to the Donbass

During the session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, the Ukraine is to present to the UN an initiative that it enter the Donbass. This was stated by the Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko during a visit to the Lugansk region, reports the Ukraine leader's website.

He noted that the issue of launching a UN peacekeeping mission and an OSCE armed mission into the zone of armed conflict in the southeast of the Ukraine "is making rather difficult progress". Poroshenko observed that this was due to the fact that Russia "categorically" does not want to "establish peace in the Donbass" and does not want to "leave the Ukraine alone".

"But I'm sure that water wears away a stone", said Poroshenko. He announced that he will present the idea of the introduction of peacekeepers in the Donbass at the session of the UN General Assembly that is to be held in New York in September.

UN "boots on the ground" in the Donbass?

No way, Porky!

marknesop , August 22, 2017 at 1:09 pm
You never know – one source at least believes the USA wants to substitute Ukraine for Syria in its determination to fight proxy wars with Russia until one ignites outright international conflict between the two powers.
Cortes , August 22, 2017 at 5:57 pm
Back door for Syria/NK programmes on regime change still ajar:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/22/two-north-korean-shipments-to-syria-intercepted-in-six-months-un-told

Chemical weapons alert!!!

kirill , August 22, 2017 at 8:56 pm
They are running out of locations to stage these false flags. But it sure is incredible what a load of credulous saps constitute most of NATO's population and even the rest of the world. This transparent chemical weapons "Assad attack" BS does not stand up to even the most superficial scrutiny. For example, if you take any of the alleged events and add them up, then they have contributed exactly zero to the Syrian government's military operations. But these events sure have been useful of Syria's enemies. So why would Assad keep doing them? Because he is like Putin who shoots down civilian airliners for sport?
marknesop , August 23, 2017 at 12:48 pm
One more time – chemical weapons are what you have recourse to as a last resort when you are losing and about to be overrun. Or, I suppose, if you want to clean out an area which might prove very costly to you in terms of manpower, and you don't want to pay too dearly to take it. But neither is the scenario for the government in Syria at present, and it would be abysmally stupid, not to mention completely unnecessary, for them to use chemical weapons. It was the last two times the west tried to pull the same stunt, as well.
marknesop , August 22, 2017 at 1:05 pm
Coal from the USA will cost more than twice as much – inconsequential, as we have discussed, when western taxpayers are giving Ukraine the money to buy it – and take several weeks to arrive . Don't wait – hire Ukraine now to plan your country's foreign policy, and avoid the rush to its door.
kirill , August 22, 2017 at 5:12 pm
America can wish, but that does not mean it will get. Ukraine is in the process of collapsing and unlike Syria, the jihadis are not the horde taking over. In fact, it will be the quiet majority that will be pushing the US stooges out. So I doubt Uncle Scumbag is all too keen on undermining its puppet regime in Kiev.
marknesop , August 23, 2017 at 12:43 pm
But that's something that really pisses me off. Washington gets its meddling fingers into the pie, and in short order everything is wrecked and it takes a decade or so for the country to recover its balance, accompanied by some serious sacrifices by its leadership and its people. And the first envoy to call when things recover their balance is Uncle Sam, and before you know it, trade ties are re-established and the process starts all over again.

Besides that, Ukraine is of no concern to the USA whatsoever, except as a Trojan horse against Russia. Russia is the target, and if Ukraine is ruined in the process Washington will shed no tears.

[Aug 24, 2017] Adding kerisine to fire: US approves $175 million arms supply deal to Ukraine

Aug 24, 2017 | www.fort-russ.com

The Head of the Pentagon, James Mattis is on currently a visit to Kiev.
"If we talk about defensive lethal weapons, we are considering this issue," he said.
According to the US Secretary of Defense, recommendations on this issue will be presented following the visit.
"I will now return to my place of work, and based on what I saw and what I learned, I will, of course, inform the country's leadership about very specific things that I will recommend to implement," he said.
He also said that the US has already approved the supply of military equipment to the Ukraine for $ 175 million.
Earlier, US Senator John McCain said that Mattis's visit to Ukraine opens up the possibility for Washington to begin deliveries of lethal weapons to Kiev. According to McCain, the Ukrainian authorities need such assistance to "protect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country."
The senator also said that US President Donald Trump took the first "significant step" to contain Russia by imposing new sanctions against it.

[Aug 24, 2017] McCain renews calls for Trump to send weapons to Ukraine

Notable quotes:
"... During his visit to Kiev, Mattis is expected to reassure the country's leaders that the U.S. remains opposed to Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea, according to The Associated Press . ..."
Aug 24, 2017 | thehill.com
John McCain (R-Ariz.) is again urging President Trump to provide lethal aid to Ukraine as Defense Secretary James Mattis arrives in the country for a meeting with its president and top defense official.

"It is long past time for the United States to provide Ukraine the defensive lethal assistance it needs to deter and defend against further Russian aggression," McCain, the chairman of the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a statement Wednesday.

The senator's renewed calls for the U.S. to provide lethal weaponry to Ukraine as it battles pro-Russia separatists in the eastern Donbas region comes two days after Trump announced a new broad strategy for Afghanistan.

With the change of course in Afghanistan, McCain said, Trump "now has the same opportunity with regard to Ukraine."

The senior Arizona Republican argued that providing weapons to Ukraine "is not opposed to a peaceful resolution of this conflict -- it is essential to achieving it."

"As long as the status quo remains, Russia has no reason to change its behavior, and we should only expect more violence and more death," he said.

Russia has denied providing support to the separatists, but U.S. officials have claimed otherwise.

The president already has the authority to send lethal assistance to Ukraine under the annual defense policy bill. But former President Barack Obama chose instead to send only nonlethal assistance to the country.

During his visit to Kiev, Mattis is expected to reassure the country's leaders that the U.S. remains opposed to Russia's 2014 annexation of Crimea, according to The Associated Press .

Trump entered office in January with hopes of improving the relationship between the U.S. and Russia. But ties have grown tense amid ongoing investigations into Russia's role in the 2016 election and possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Moscow.

Also fueling tensions between the two countries is a sanctions package signed into law earlier this month that penalizes Russia for its efforts to meddle in the election. Trump reluctantly signed the measures after they were overwhelmingly passed by Congress.

[Aug 20, 2017] Trump Loses Anti-War Aide In Bannon The Daily Caller

Aug 20, 2017 | dailycaller.com

Bannon supported Blackwater founder Erik Prince's plan to use military contractors in the war in Afghanistan and was against National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster's plan to deploy tens of thousands of more troops to the Afghan conflict, according to a source with knowledge of the deliberations.

While saying he would "bomb the s**t" out of ISIS, Trump ran on a largely non-interventionist campaign. He attacked President Bush for invading Iraq and cautioned against toppling the Assad regime in Syria.

His White House, however, is not populated with like-minded thinkers. Even the most Trump-like senior adviser left, Stephen Miller, was a strong supporter of the Iraq War and primarily focuses on domestic policy issues.

Trump does have the habit of speaking to outside advisers on the phone and calls with Bannon and Roger Stone might be the only times Trump hears war-weary voices.

John C Durham 2 days ago
Trump's power grows. And, his people don't speak first. (Trump speaks what The People are thinking. Offend Trump and you have offended almost everybody.)

Bye, by)e Democrats. You can't win WITHOUT a Revolution...and not very many of the real People are really interested in efforts to get one going.

Remember the CENTER of it all (ISIS, RIOTS) is London/Wall Street.
Everything since last Summer, has been coming out of MI5/6 to our FBI, CIA, NSA Business Intelligence Empire.

The People are not going to go against Lincoln and they aren't
going to stand for anyone to take down the "States Rights" statues.

People are for a Strong Central Government and for a Strong State Government. It isn't "either/or". It's BOTH. For Mob Rule...uh, not so much... Trump's power is growing steadily.

The People are sometimes for Left, sometimes for Right. It isn't "either/or". It's BOTH.

If you don't know this, you don't know anything about Americans.
These killings and riots are highly organized by both assets and AGENTS of the Anti forces of Deep State, Deep Business. None of this is "from" WE, The People.

Guy Smith1 a day ago
"Bannon is back at Breitbart--awesome!," Lee Stranahan, 8/18/17
https://www.periscope.tv/w/...

Hillary Clintub • 2 days ago

Bannon is now in a better position to expose the deep state. McMaster is probably soiling his diapers.

Jesse4 > Hillary Clintub • 2 days ago

The deep state just kicked Bannon's incredibly huge butt.

lorsarah > Jesse4 • 2 days ago

The Deep State oligarchs and hacks may have won a small battle but their days are numbered. The movement that Bannon is part of is growing.

oknow • 2 days ago

This whole intervention crap is for the birds and a waste of money as the years have shown.

If the Germans and Japanese were Islamic or international religious armies it would have never ended. Maybe it is time that the great oil powers man up and fight.

Trump not backing down from the NK is what strength is. Not this crap of 15 years in foreign nations.

T100C1970 > oknow • 2 days ago

This bravo sierra warfare did not start with Muzzies. It started with Commies. The Korean war was the first war the US did not win. We got a tie with the pathetic Norks. Then in the era in which I served as an Army Officer we managed to LOSE to the Cong + NVA.. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are so far more like "ties" ... assuming you can call it a tie to spend billions and lose thousands of troops to preserve a sort of status quo.

lorsarah > oknow • 2 days ago

"Not backing down from North Korea" IS foreign intervention, as everyone with a brain knows that NK, which can't even keep its lights on, is not a threat.

11B30L • 2 days ago

President Trump is allowing his "little tiny ego" to get in the way of White House staffing decisions, according to conservative commentator Ann Coulter.

Burrito Jackson • 2 days ago

Trump just sent his generals proposal back to the drawing board to keep us in Afghanistan. Trump hasn't changed. Tired of hearing everyone controls Trump like he is a puppet.

lorsarah > Burrito Jackson • 2 days ago

Why are we there AT ALL? To protect our freedom? Of course not. Self-defense? Of course not. It's lunacy, just as Vietnam was. But the military-industrial complex makes big money on lunacy such as Afghanistan.

wars r u.s. • a day ago

Trump is a dove? He bombed Syria with no evidence that Assad did the chemical attack. He dropped the MOAB on Afghanistan and his only real problem with that war is that we're not winning. We continue to back the Saudi's in their onslaught of Yemen. Trump wants to decertify Iran's compliance to the nuke deal even though Iran is in compliance which could lead to the war the neocons and liberal hawks(Israeli firsters) have been salivating over for decades. He threatens NK with "fire ad fury" and even recently threatened Venezuela...

[Aug 19, 2017] Vassal Aristocracies Increasingly Resist Control by US Aristocracy by Eric Zuesse

Notable quotes:
"... the ultimate driving force behind today's international news is the aristocracy that the MIC represents, the billionaires behind the MIC, because theirs is the collective will that drives the MIC ..."
"... The MIC is their collective arm, and their collective fist. It is not the American public's global enforcer; it is the American aristocracy's fist, around the world. ..."
"... The MIC (via its military contractors such as Lockheed Martin) also constitutes a core part of the U.S. aristocracy's wealth (the part that's extracted from the U.S. taxpaying public via the U.S. government), and also (by means of those privately-owned contractors, plus the taxpayer-funded U.S. armed forces) it protects these aristocrats' wealth in foreign countries. Though paid by the U.S. government, the MIC does the protection-and-enforcement jobs for the nation's super-rich. ..."
"... So, the MIC is the global bully's fist, and the global bully is the U.S. aristocracy -- America's billionaires, most especially the controlling stockholders in the U.S.-based international corporations. These are the people the U.S. government actually represents . The links document this, and it's essential to know, if one is to understand current events. ..."
"... This massacre didn't play well on local Crimean television. Immediately, a movement to secede and to again become a part of Russia started, and spread like wildfire in Crimea. (Crimea had been only involuntarily transferred from Russia to Ukraine by the Soviet dictator Khrushchev in 1954; it had been part of Russia for the hundreds of years prior to 1954. It was culturally Russian.) Russia's President, Vladimir Putin, said that if they'd vote for it in a referendum, then Russia would accept them back into the Russian Federation and provide them protection as Russian citizens. ..."
"... The latest round of these sanctions was imposed not by Executive Order from a U.S. President, but instead by a new U.S. law, "H.R.3364 -- Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act" , which in July 2017 was passed by 98-2 in the Senate and 419-3 in the House , and which not only stated outright lies (endorsed there by virtually everyone in Congress), but which was backed up by lies from the U.S. Intelligence Community that were accepted and endorsed totally uncritically by 98 Senators and 419 Representatives . (One might simply assume that all of those Senators and Representatives were ignorant of the way things work and were not intentionally lying in order to vote for these lies from the Intelligence Community, but these people actually wouldn't have wrangled their ways into Congress and gotten this far at the game if they hadn't already known that the U.S. Intelligence Community is designed not only to inform the President but to help him to deceive the public and therefore can't be trusted by anyone but the President . ..."
"... Good summary of where we're at, but please don't call the ruling goons aristocrats. The word, "aristocrat," is derived from the Ancient Greek ἄριστος (áristos, "best"), and the ruling thugs in this country have never been the best at anything except lies, murder and theft ..."
"... I realize that calling them violent bloodthirsty sociopathic parasites is a mouthful, and that "plutacrats" doesn't have quite the appropriate sting, but perhaps it's more accurate. ..."
"... They also -- through the joint action of Rating Agencies, the Anglosaxon media, the vassal vassal states' media, make national debt's yield spreads skyrocket. It's been the way to make entire governments tumble in Europe, as well as force ministers for economics to resign. After obeisance has been restored -- and an "ex Goldman Sachs man" put on the presidential/ministerial chair, usually -- investors magically find back their trust in the nation's economic stability, and yield spreads return to their usual level. ..."
"... First, he delineates the American Elites well. The USA forged by Abe Lincoln is not a real democracy, not a real republic. It is the worst kind of oligarchy: one based on love of money almost exclusively (because if a man does not love money well enough to be bribed, then he cannot be trusted by plutocrats) while proclaiming itself focused on helping all the little guys of the world overcome the power of the rich oppressors. ..."
Aug 14, 2017 | www.unz.com

The tumultuous events that dominate international news today cannot be accurately understood outside of their underlying context, which connects them together, into a broader narrative -- the actual history of our time . History makes sense, even if news-reports about these events don't. Propagandistic motivations cause such essential facts to be reported little (if at all) in the news, so that the most important matters for the public to know, get left out of news-accounts about those international events.

The purpose here will be to provide that context, for our time.

First, this essential background will be summarized; then, it will be documented (via the links that will be provided here), up till the present moment -- the current news: America's aristocracy controls both the U.S. federal government and press , but (as will be documented later here) is facing increasing resistance from its many vassal (subordinate) aristocracies around the world (popularly called "America's allied nations"); and this growing international resistance presents a new challenge to the U.S. military-industrial complex (MIC), which is controlled by that same aristocracy and enforces their will worldwide. The MIC is responding to the demands of its aristocratic master. This response largely drives international events today (which countries get invaded, which ones get overthrown by coups, etc.), but the ultimate driving force behind today's international news is the aristocracy that the MIC represents, the billionaires behind the MIC, because theirs is the collective will that drives the MIC. The MIC is their collective arm, and their collective fist. It is not the American public's global enforcer; it is the American aristocracy's fist, around the world.

The MIC (via its military contractors such as Lockheed Martin) also constitutes a core part of the U.S. aristocracy's wealth (the part that's extracted from the U.S. taxpaying public via the U.S. government), and also (by means of those privately-owned contractors, plus the taxpayer-funded U.S. armed forces) it protects these aristocrats' wealth in foreign countries. Though paid by the U.S. government, the MIC does the protection-and-enforcement jobs for the nation's super-rich.

Furthermore, the MIC is crucial to them in other ways, serving not only directly as their "policeman to the world," but also indirectly (by that means) as a global protection-racket that keeps their many subordinate aristocracies in line, under their control -- and that threatens those foreign aristocrats with encroachments against their own territory, whenever a vassal aristocracy resists the master-aristocracy's will. (International law is never enforced against the U.S., not even after it invaded Iraq in 2003.) So, the MIC is the global bully's fist, and the global bully is the U.S. aristocracy -- America's billionaires, most especially the controlling stockholders in the U.S.-based international corporations. These are the people the U.S. government actually represents . The links document this, and it's essential to know, if one is to understand current events.

For the first time ever, a global trend is emerging toward declining control of the world by America's billionaire-class -- into the direction of ultimately replacing the U.S. Empire, by increasingly independent trading-blocs: alliances between aristocracies, replacing this hierarchical control of one aristocracy over another. Ours is becoming a multi-polar world, and America's aristocracy is struggling mightily against this trend, desperate to continue remaining the one global imperial power -- or, as U.S. President Barack Obama often referred to the U.S. government, "The United States is and remains the one indispensable nation. That has been true for the century passed and it will be true for the century to come." To America's aristocrats, all other nations than the U.S. are "dispensable." All American allies have to accept it. This is the imperial mindset, both for the master, and for the vassal. The uni-polar world can't function otherwise. Vassals must pay (extract from their nation's public, and then transfer) protection-money, to the master, in order to be safe -- to retain their existing power, to exploit their given nation's public.

The recently growing role of economic sanctions (more accurately called "Weaponization of finance" ) by the United States and its vassals, has been central to the operation of this hierarchical imperial system, but is now being increasingly challenged from below, by some of the vassals. Alliances are breaking up over America's mounting use of sanctions, and new alliances are being formed and cemented to replace the imperial system -- replace it by a system without any clear center of global power, in the world that we're moving into. Economic sanctions have been the U.S. empire's chief weapon to impose its will against any challengers to U.S. global control, and are thus becoming the chief locus of the old order's fractures .

This global order cannot be maintained by the MIC alone; the more that the MIC fails (such as in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, ), the more that economic sanctions rise to become the essential tool of the imperial masters. We are increasingly in the era of economic sanctions. And, now, we're entering the backlash-phase of it.

A turning-point in escalating the weaponization of finance was reached in February 2014 when a Ukrainian coup that the Obama Administration had started planning by no later than 2011, culminated successfully in installing a rabidly anti-Russian government on Russia's border, and precipitated the breakaway from Ukraine of two regions (Crimea and Donbass) that had voted overwhelmingly for the man the U.S. regime had just overthrown . This coup in Ukraine was the most direct aggressive act against Russia since the Cold War had 'ended' (it had actually ended on the Russian side, but not on the American side, where it continues ) in 1991. During this coup in Kiev, on February 20th of 2014, hundreds of Crimeans, who had been peacefully demonstrating there with placards against this coup (which coup itself was very violent -- against the police, not by them -- the exact opposite of the way that "the Maidan demonstrations" had been portrayed in the Western press at the time), were attacked by the U.S.-paid thugs and scrambled back into their buses to return home to Crimea but were stopped en-route in central Ukraine and an uncounted number of them were massacred in the Ukrainian town of Korsun by the same group of thugs who had chased them out of Kiev .

This massacre didn't play well on local Crimean television. Immediately, a movement to secede and to again become a part of Russia started, and spread like wildfire in Crimea. (Crimea had been only involuntarily transferred from Russia to Ukraine by the Soviet dictator Khrushchev in 1954; it had been part of Russia for the hundreds of years prior to 1954. It was culturally Russian.) Russia's President, Vladimir Putin, said that if they'd vote for it in a referendum, then Russia would accept them back into the Russian Federation and provide them protection as Russian citizens.

On 6 March 2014, U.S. President Obama issued "Executive Order -- Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Situation in Ukraine" , and ignored the internationally recognized-in-law right of self-determination of peoples (though he recognized that right in Catalonia and in Scotland), and he instead simply declared that Ukraine's "sovereignty" over Crimea was sacrosanct (even though it had been imposed upon Crimeans by the Soviet dictator -- America's enemy -- in 1954, during the Soviet era, when America opposed, instead of favored and imposed, dictatorship around the world, except in Iran and Guatemala, where America imposed dictatorships even that early). Obama's Executive Order was against unnamed "persons who have asserted governmental authority in the Crimean region without the authorization of the Government of Ukraine." He insisted that the people who had just grabbed control of Ukraine and massacred Crimeans (his own Administration's paid far-right Ukrainian thugs, who were racist anti-Russians ), must be allowed to rule Crimea, regardless of what Crimeans (traditionally a part of Russia) might -- and did -- want. America's vassal aristocracies then imposed their own sanctions against Russia when on 16 March 2014 Crimeans voted overwhelmingly to rejoin the Russian Federation . Thus started the successive rounds of economic sanctions against Russia, by the U.S. government and its vassal-nations . (As is shown by that link, they knew that this had been a coup and no authentic 'democratic revolution' such as the Western press was portraying it to have been, and yet they kept quiet about it -- a secret their public would not be allowed to know.)

The latest round of these sanctions was imposed not by Executive Order from a U.S. President, but instead by a new U.S. law, "H.R.3364 -- Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act" , which in July 2017 was passed by 98-2 in the Senate and 419-3 in the House , and which not only stated outright lies (endorsed there by virtually everyone in Congress), but which was backed up by lies from the U.S. Intelligence Community that were accepted and endorsed totally uncritically by 98 Senators and 419 Representatives . (One might simply assume that all of those Senators and Representatives were ignorant of the way things work and were not intentionally lying in order to vote for these lies from the Intelligence Community, but these people actually wouldn't have wrangled their ways into Congress and gotten this far at the game if they hadn't already known that the U.S. Intelligence Community is designed not only to inform the President but to help him to deceive the public and therefore can't be trusted by anyone but the President .

It's basic knowledge about the U.S. government, and they know it, though the public don't.) The great independent columnist Paul Craig Roberts headlined on August 1st, "Trump's Choices" and argued that President Donald Trump should veto the bill despite its overwhelming support in Washington, but instead Trump signed it into law on August 2nd and thus joined participation in the overt stage -- the Obama stage -- of the U.S. government's continuation of the Cold War that U.S. President George Herbert Walker Bush had secretly instituted against Russia on 24 February 1990 , and that, under Obama, finally escalated into a hot war against Russia. The first phase of this hot war against Russia is via the "Weaponization of finance" (those sanctions). However, as usual, it's also backed up by major increases in physical weaponry , and by the cooperation of America's vassals in order to surround Russia with nuclear weapons near and on Russia's borders , in preparation for a possible blitz first-strike nuclear attack upon Russia -- preparations that the Russian people know about and greatly fear, but which are largely hidden by the Western press, and therefore only very few Westerners are aware that their own governments have become lying aggressors.

Some excellent news-commentaries have been published about this matter, online, by a few 'alternative news' sites (and that 'alt-news' group includes all of the reliably honest news-sites, but also includes unfortunately many sites that are as dishonest as the mainstream ones are -- and that latter type aren't being referred to here), such as (and only the best sites and articles will be linked-to on this):

All three of those articles discuss how these new sanctions are driving other nations to separate themselves, more and more, away from the economic grip of the U.S. aristocracy, and to form instead their own alliances with one-another, so as to defend themselves, collectively, from U.S. economic (if not also military) aggression. Major recent news-developments on this, have included (all here from rt dot com):

"'US, EU meddle in other countries & kill people under guise of human rights concerns' – Duterte", and presented Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte explaining why he rejects the U.S. aristocracy's hypocritical pronouncements and condemnations regarding its vassals among the world's poorer and struggling nations, such as his. Of course, none of this information is publishable in the West -- in the Western 'democracies'. It's 'fake news', as far as The Empire is concerned. So, if you're in The (now declining) Empire, you're not supposed to be reading this. That's why the mainstream 'news'media (to all of which this article is being submitted for publication, without fee, for any of them that want to break their existing corrupt mold) don't publish this sort of news -- 'fake news' (that's of the solidly documented type, such as this). You'll see such news reported only in the few honest newsmedia. The rule for the aristocracy's 'news'media is: report what happened, only on the basis of the government's lies as to why it happened -- never expose such lies (the official lies). What's official is 'true' . That, too, is an essential part of the imperial system.

The front cover of the American aristocracy's TIME magazine's Asian edition, dated September 25, 2016, had been headlined "Night Falls on the Philippines: The tragic cost of President Duterte's war on drugs" . The 'news'-story, which was featured inside not just the Asian but all editions, was "Inside Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's War On Drugs" , and it portrayed Duterte as a far-right demagogue who was giving his nation's police free reign to murder anyone they wished to, especially the poor. On 17 July 2017, China's Xinhua News Agency bannered "Philippines' Duterte enjoys high approval rating at 82 percent: poll" , and reported: "A survey by Pulse Asia Inc. conducted from June 24 to June 29 showed that 82 percent of the 1,200 people surveyed nationwide approved the way Duterte runs the country. Out of all the respondents, the poll said 13 percent were undecided about Duterte's performance, while 5 percent disapproved Duterte's performance. Duterte, who assumed the presidency in June last year, ends his single, six-year term in 2022." Obviously, it's not likely that the TIME cover story had actually been honest. But, of course, America's billionaires are even more eager to overthrow Russia's President, Putin.

Western polling firms can freely poll Russians, and do poll them on lots but not on approval or disapproval of President Putin , because he always scores above 80%, and America's aristocrats also don't like finding that confirmed, and certainly don't want to report it. Polling is routinely done in Russia, by Russian pollsters, on voters' ratings of approval/disapproval of Putin's performance. Because America's aristocrats don't like the findings, they say that Russians are in such fear of Putin they don't tell the truth about this, or else that Russia's newsmedia constantly lie about him to cover up the ugly reality about him.

However, the Western academic journal Post-Soviet Affairs (which is a mainstream Western publication) included in their January/February 2017 issue a study, "Is Putin's Popularity Real?" and the investigators reported the results of their own poll of Russians, which was designed to tap into whether such fear exists and serves as a distorting factor in those Russian polls, but concluded that the findings in Russia's polls could not be explained by any such factor; and that, yes, Putin's popularity among Russians is real. The article's closing words were: "Our results suggest that the main obstacle at present to the emergence of a widespread opposition movement to Putin is not that Russians are afraid to voice their disapproval of Putin, but that Putin is in fact quite popular."

The U.S. aristocracy's efforts to get resistant heads-of-state overthrown by 'democratic revolutions' (which usually is done by the U.S. government to overthrow democratically elected Presidents -- such as Mossadegh, Arbenz, Allende, Zelaya, Yanukovych, and attempted against Assad, and wished against Putin, and against Duterte -- not overthrowing dictators such as the U.S. government always claims) have almost consistently failed, and therefore coups and invasions have been used instead, but those techniques demand that certain realities be suppressed by their 'news'media in order to get the U.S. public to support what the government has done -- the U.S. government's international crime, which is never prosecuted. Lying 'news' media in order to 'earn' the American public's support, does not produce enthusiastic support, but, at best, over the long term, it produces only tepid support (support that's usually below the level of that of the governments the U.S. overthrows). U.S. Presidents never score above 80% except when they order an invasion in response to a violent attack by foreigners, such as happened when George W. Bush attacked Afghanistan and Iraq in the wake of 9/11, but those 80%+ approval ratings fade quickly; and, after the 1960s, U.S. Presidential job-approvals have generally been below 60% .

President Trump's ratings are currently around 40%. Although Trump is not as conservative -- not as far-right -- as the U.S. aristocracy wants him to be, he is fascist ; just not enough to satisfy them (and their oppostion isn't because he's unpopular among the public; it's more the case that he's unpopular largely because their 'news'media concentrate on his bads, and distort his goods to appear bad -- e.g., suggesting that he's not sufficiently aggressive against Russia). His fascism on domestic affairs is honestly reported in the aristocracy's 'news'media, which appear to be doing all they can to get him replaced by his Vice President, Mike Pence. What's not reported by their media is the fascism of the U.S. aristocracy itself, and of their international agenda (global conquest). That's their secret, of which their public must be (and is) constantly kept ignorant. America's aristocracy has almost as much trouble contolling its domestic public as it has controlling its foreign vassals. Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of They're Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010 , and of CHRIST'S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity .

Recently from Author

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Fidelios Automata > , August 19, 2017 at 2:22 am GMT

Fascism is defined as a system that combines private monopolies and despotic government power. It is sometimes racist but not necessarily so. By the correct definition, every President since at least Herbert Hoover has been fascist to some degree.

exiled off mainstreet > , August 19, 2017 at 4:21 am GMT

One bit of silver lining in the deep-state propaganda effort to destabilise the Trump regime is the damage to the legitimacy of the yankee imperium it confers, making it easier for vassal states to begin to jump ship. The claims of extraterritorial power used for economic warfare might confer a similar benefit, since the erstwhile allies will want to escape the dominance of the yankee dollar to be able to escape the economic extortion practised by the yankee regime to achieve its control abroad.

WorkingClass > , August 19, 2017 at 4:43 am GMT

Good news – The beast is dying. Bad news – We Americans are in its belly.

Wally > , August 19, 2017 at 6:00 am GMT

"America's aristocracy" = lying Israel First Zionists. Why doesn't Eric Zuesse just say the truth? What is he afraid of?

Must read:

jilles dykstra > , August 19, 2017 at 6:31 am GMT

" America's aristocracy has almost as much trouble controlling its domestic public as it has controlling its foreign vassals. "

These foreign vassals had a cozy existence as long as the USA made it clear it wanted to control the world. Dutch minister of Foreign Affairs Ben Bot made this quite clear whan the Netherlands did not have a USA ambassador for three months or so, Ben Bot complained to the USA that there should be a USA ambassador.
He was not used to take decisions all by himself.

Right now Europe's queen Merkel has the same problem, unlike Obama Trump does not hold her hand.

Grandpa Charlie > , August 19, 2017 at 6:38 am GMT

Fidelios,

Yes, of course. I don't know about before Herbert Hoover, but certainly during the 50s, business -- monopolistic or oligopolistic (like the old Detroit auto industry) -- and government (including the MIC) were closely integrated. Such was, indeed, as aspect of progressivism. It was considered by most to be a good thing, or at least to be the natural and normal state of affairs. Certainly, the system back then included what amounted to price-fixing as a normal business practice.

On the other hand, the "despotic" thing is less clear. Some assert that since FDR was effectively a dictator during World War II, that therefore the Democratic Party represented despotism ever since FDR (or maybe ever since Wilson).

Having lived through that period of time, I have to say that I am not so sure about that: if it was despotism, it was a heavily democratic and beneficent despotism. However, it is evident that there was a fascist skein running through the entirety of USA's political history throughout the 20th Century.

jilles dykstra > , August 19, 2017 at 6:40 am GMT

@Fidelios Automata

Fascism originates from Mussolini's Italy. It was anti socialist and anti communist, it of course was pro Italian, Italy's great deeds in antiquity, the Roman empire, were celebrated.

One can see this as racist, but as Italy consisted of mostly Italians, it was not racist in the present meaning of the word at all. Italy was very hesitant in persecuting jews, for example. Hitler depised Mussolini, Mussolini was an ally that weakened Germany. Hitler and Mussolini agreed in their hatred of communism.

Calling Hitler a fascist just creates confusion. All discussions of what nowadays fascism is, our could mean, end like rivers in the desert.

Priss Factor > , August 19, 2017 at 7:52 am GMT

Come on

'Aristocracy' and 'fascist' are all weasel words. (I'm the only true fascist btw, and it's National Humanism, National Left, or Left-Right.)

US is an ethnogarchy, and that really matters. The Power rules, but the nature of the Power is shaped by the biases of the ruling ethnic group.

It is essentially ruled by Jewish Supremacists.

Now, if not for Jews, another group might have supreme power, and it might be problematic in its own way. BUT, the agenda would be different.

Suppose Chinese-Americans controlled much of media, finance, academia, deep state, and etc. They might be just as corrupt or more so than Jews, BUT their agenda would be different. They would not be hateful to Iran, Russia, Syria, or to Palestinians. And they won't care about Israel.

They would have their own biases and agendas, but they would still be different from Jewish obsessions.

Or suppose the top elites of the US were Poles. Now, US policy may be very anti-Russian BUT for reasons different from those of Jews.

So, we won't learn much by just throwing words like 'fascist' or 'aristocrat' around.

We have to be more specific. Hitler was 'fascist' and so was Rohm. But Hitler had Rohm wiped out.

Surely, a Zionist 'fascist' had different goals than an Iranian 'fascist'.

One might say the Old South African regime was 'fascist'. Well, today's piggish ANC is also 'fascist', if by 'fascist' we mean power-hungry tyrants. But black 'fascists' want something different from what white 'fascists' wanted.

It's like all football players are in football. But to understand what is going on, we have to know WHICH team they play for.

Jewish Elites don't just play for power. They play for Jewish power.

jacques sheete > , August 19, 2017 at 11:42 am GMT

Good summary of where we're at, but please don't call the ruling goons aristocrats. The word, "aristocrat," is derived from the Ancient Greek ἄριστος (áristos, "best"), and the ruling thugs in this country have never been the best at anything except lies, murder and theft.

I realize that calling them violent bloodthirsty sociopathic parasites is a mouthful, and that "plutacrats" doesn't have quite the appropriate sting, but perhaps it's more accurate.

Or maybe we should get into the habit of calling them the "ruling mafiosi." I'm open to suggestions.

"Goonocrats"?

Anon > , Disclaimer August 19, 2017 at 12:56 pm GMT

and that threatens those foreign aristocrats with encroachments against their own territory, whenever a vassal aristocracy resists the master-aristocracy's will.

They also -- through the joint action of Rating Agencies, the Anglosaxon media, the vassal vassal states' media, make national debt's yield spreads skyrocket. It's been the way to make entire governments tumble in Europe, as well as force ministers for economics to resign. After obeisance has been restored -- and an "ex Goldman Sachs man" put on the presidential/ministerial chair, usually -- investors magically find back their trust in the nation's economic stability, and yield spreads return to their usual level.

jacques sheete > , August 19, 2017 at 1:42 pm GMT

@jilles dykstra

These foreign vassals had a cozy existence

No doubt about it. That's how thugs rule; there are plenty of quivering sell outs to do the rulers' bidding. Look at the sickening standing ovations given to Netanyahoo by supposed "US" congresscreeps.

Jake > , August 19, 2017 at 1:46 pm GMT

@Fidelios Automata Abraham Lincoln's economic policy was to combine private monopolies with the Federal Government under a President like him: one who ordered the arrests of newspaper editors/publishers who opposed his policies and more 'despotic' goodies.

Joe Hide > , August 19, 2017 at 1:47 pm GMT

While the article favorably informs, and was written so as to engage the reader, it lacks reasonable solutions to its problems presented. One solution which I never read or hear about, is mandated MRI's, advanced technology, and evidence supported psychological testing of sitting and potential political candidates. The goal would be to publicly reveal traits of psychopathy, narcissism, insanity, etc. Of course, the most vocal opposition would come from those who intend to hide these traits. The greatest evidence for the likelyhood of this process working, is the immense effort those who would be revealed have historically put into hiding what they are.

SolontoCroesus > , August 19, 2017 at 3:04 pm GMT

@jacques sheete

"ruling mafiosi."

No way. How about Jewish terrorists ? Very few Italians in the ruling "aristocracy." Lots of Jews.

Jake > , August 19, 2017 at 3:05 pm GMT

Eric Zuesse is a nasty, hardcore leftist in the senses that matter most. Often, he reveals his Leftism to be based on his hatred of Christianity and his utter contempt for white Christians. But there is that dead clock being correct twice per day matter. In this article, Zuesse gets a good deal right.

First, he delineates the American Elites well. The USA forged by Abe Lincoln is not a real democracy, not a real republic. It is the worst kind of oligarchy: one based on love of money almost exclusively (because if a man does not love money well enough to be bribed, then he cannot be trusted by plutocrats) while proclaiming itself focused on helping all the little guys of the world overcome the power of the rich oppressors.

It is the Devil's game nearly perfected by the grand alliance of WASPs and Jews, with their Saudi hangers-on.

Second, it is fair to label America's Deep State fascist , Elite Fascist. And we should never forget that while Jews are no more than 3% of the American population, they now are at least 30% (my guess would be closer to 59%) of the most powerful Deep Staters. That means that per capita Jews easily are the fascist-inclined people in America.

The most guilty often bray the loudest at others in hope of getting them blamed and escaping punishment. And this most guilty group – Deep State Elites evolved from the original WASP-Jewish alliance against Catholics – is dead-set on making the majority of whites in the world serfs.

Third, the US 'weaponization of finance' seems to have been used against the Vatican to force Benedict XVI to resign so that Liberal Jesuit (sorry for the redundancy) Jorge Bergolgio could be made Pope. The Jesuits are far and away the most Leftist and gay part of the Catholic Church, and the American Deep State wanted a gay-loving, strongly pro-Jewish, strongly pro-Moslem 'immigrant' as Pope.

Fourth, that America's Leftists of every stripe, America's Neocons, and America's 'compassionate conservatives' all hate Putin is all you should need to know that Putin is far, far better for Russia's working class, Russia's non-Elites, than our Elites are for us.

jacques sheete > , August 19, 2017 at 3:36 pm GMT

@Brabantian Good comments.They apply to a few others around here as well, particularly this.

who mixes some truth with big lies

Priss Factor > , Website August 19, 2017 at 3:44 pm GMT

Charlottesville, Occupy Wall St And The Neoliberal Police State. Charlottesville was a Neoliberal ambush designed to crush the Alt Right once and for all. This story must be told.

https://altright.com/2017/08/19/charlottesville-occupy-wall-st-and-the-neoliberal-police-state/

jacques sheete > , August 19, 2017 at 3:46 pm GMT

@SolontoCroesus

"ruling mafiosi."
No way. How about Jewish terrorists ? Very few Italians in the ruling "aristocracy." Lots of Jews.

Very few Italians in the ruling "aristocracy."

Another common misconception is to associate the mafia with Italians mostly. The Italian mafiosi are pikers compared to the American ones of Eastern European descent. The real bosses are not the Italians.

Bugsy Siegel, Louis "Lepke" Buchalter, Longy Zwillman, Moe Dalitz, Meyer Lansky and many many others.

Even the Jewish Virtual Library admits to some of it.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jewish-gangsters-in-america

New York, Chicago, Las Vegas, LA, Miami, and many others all dominated by non-Italian mobsters, not to mention the US government.

[Aug 16, 2017] Smashing Statues, Seeding Strife

Notable quotes:
"... Trump is attacked. The ACLU is attacked. Peace activists opposed to the CIA's regime change operation in Syria are attacked. Tucker Carlson is attacked. Everyone attacked that the CIA and various other aspects of the Deep State want attacked as if the MSM were all sent the same talking points memo. ..."
Aug 16, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

In the aftermath of competing protests in Charlottesville a wave of dismantling of Confederate statues is on the rise. Overnight Baltimore took down four Confederate statues. One of these honored Confederate soldiers and sailors, another one Confederate women. Elsewhere statues were toppled or defiled .

The Charlottesville conflict itself was about the intent to dismantle a statue of General Robert E. Lee, a commander of the Confederate forces during the American Civil War. The activist part of the political right protested against the take down, the activist part of the political left protested against those protests. According to a number of witnesses quoted in the LA Times sub-groups on both sides came prepared for and readily engaged in violence.

In 2003 a U.S. military tank pulled down the statue of Saddam Hussein on Firdos Square in Baghdad. Narrowly shot TV picture made it look as if a group of Iraqis were doing this. But they were mere actors within a U.S. propaganda show . Pulling down the statue demonstrated a lack of respect towards those who had fought under, worked for or somewhat supported Saddam Hussein. It helped to incite the resistance against the U.S. occupation.

The right-wing nutters who, under U.S. direction, forcefully toppled the legitimate government of Ukraine pulled down hundreds of the remaining Lenin statues in the country. Veterans who fought under the Soviets in the second world war took this as a sign of disrespect. Others saw this as an attack on their fond memories of better times and protected them . The forceful erasement of history further split the country:

"It's not like if you go east they want Lenin but if you go west they want to destroy him," Mr. Gobert said. "These differences don't only go through geography, they go through generations, through social criteria and economic criteria, through the urban and the rural."

Statues standing in cities and places are much more than veneration of one person or group. They are symbols, landmarks and fragments of personal memories:

"One guy said he didn't really care about Lenin, but the statue was at the center of the village and it was the place he kissed his wife for the first time," Mr. Gobert said. "When the statue went down it was part of his personal history that went away."

(People had better sex under socialism . Does not Lenin deserves statues if only for helping that along?)

Robert Lee was a brutal man who fought for racism and slavery. But there are few historic figures without fail. Did not George Washington "own" slaves? Did not Lyndon B. Johnson lie about the Gulf of Tonkin incident and launched an unjust huge war against non-white people under false pretense? At least some people will think of that when they see their statues. Should those also be taken down?

As time passes the meaning of a monument changes. While it may have been erected with a certain ideology or concept in mind , the view on it will change over time:

[The Charlottesville statue] was unveiled by Lee's great-granddaughter at a ceremony in May 1924. As was the custom on these occasions it was accompanied by a parade and speeches. In the dedication address, Lee was celebrated as a hero, who embodied "the moral greatness of the Old South", and as a proponent of reconciliation between the two sections. The war itself was remembered as a conflict between "interpretations of our Constitution" and between "ideals of democracy."

The white racists who came to "protect" the statue in Charlottesville will hardly have done so in the name of reconciliation. Nor will those who had come to violently oppose them. Lee was a racist. Those who came to "defend" the statue were mostly "white supremacy" racists. I am all for protesting against them.

But the issue here is bigger. We must not forget that statues have multiple meanings and messages. Lee was also the man who wrote :

What a cruel thing is war: to separate and destroy families and friends, and mar the purest joys and happiness God has granted us in this world; to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbors, and to devastate the fair face of this beautiful world.

That Lee was a racist does not mean that his statue should be taken down. The park in Charlottesville, in which the statue stands, was recently renamed from Lee Park into Emancipation Park. It makes sense to keep the statue there to reflect on the contrast between it and the new park name.

Old monuments and statues must not (only) be seen as glorifications within their time. They are reminders of history. With a bit of education they can become valuable occasions of reflection.

George Orwell wrote in his book 1984: "The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history." People do not want to be destroyed. They will fight against attempts to do so. Taking down monuments or statues without a very wide consent will split a society. A large part of the U.S. people voted for Trump. One gets the impression that the current wave of statue take downs is seen as well deserved "punishment" for those who voted wrongly - i.e. not for Hillary Clinton. While many Trump voters will dislike statues of Robert Lee, they will understand that dislike the campaign to take them down even more.

That may be the intend of some people behind the current quarrel. The radicalization on opposing sides may have a purpose. The Trump camp can use it to cover up its plans to further disenfranchise they people. The fake Clintonian "resistance" needs these cultural disputes to cover for its lack of political resistance to Trump's plans.

Anyone who wants to stoke the fires with this issue should be careful what they wish for.

Merasmus | Aug 16, 2017 12:42:12 PM | 1

"That Lee was a racist does not mean that his statue should be taken down."

How about the fact that he was a traitor?

"George Orwell wrote in his book 1984: 'The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.'"

The only reason statues of traitors like Lee exist is because the South likes to engage in 'Lost Cause' revisionism; to pretend these were noble people fighting for something other than the right to own human beings as pets.

james | Aug 16, 2017 12:42:57 PM | 2
isn't taking down statues what isis does?

erasing history seems part of the goal.. i feel the usa has never really addressed racism.. the issue hasn't gone away and remains a deep wound that has yet to heal.. events like this probably don't help.

DMC | Aug 16, 2017 12:45:04 PM | 3
The statues of Lee and his ilk should come down because they are TRAITORS who deserve no honor. Washington and Jefferson may have owned slaves but they were PATRIOTS. Its really that simple.
RUKidding | Aug 16, 2017 1:03:54 PM | 4
I don't want to get derailed into the rights or wrongs of toppling statues. I wonder whose brilliant idea it was to start this trend right at this particular tinder box moment.

That said, the USA has never ever truly confronted either: 1) the systemic genocide of the Native Americans earlier in our history; and b) what slavery really meant and was. NO reconciliation has ever really been done about either of these barbarous acts. Rather, at best/most, we're handed platitudes and lip service that purports that we've "moved on" from said barbarity - well I guess WHITES (I'm one) have. But Native Americans - witness what happened to them at Standing Rock recently - and minorities, especially African Americans, are pretty much not permitted to move on. Witness the unending police murders of AA men across the country, where, routinely, most of the cops get off scott-free.

To quote b:

The Trump camp can use it to cover up its plans to further disenfranchise they people. The fake Clintonian "resistance" needs these cultural disputes to cover for its lack of political resistance to Trump's plans.

While I dislike to descend into the liturgy of Both Siderism, it's completely true that both Rs and Ds enjoy and use pitting the rubes in the 99% against one another because it means that the rapine, plunder & pillaging by the Oligarchs and their pet poodles in Congress & the White House can continue apace with alacrity. And: That's Exactly What's Happening.

The Oligarchs could give a flying fig about Heather Heyer's murder, nor could they give a stuff about US citizens cracking each other's skulls in a bit of the old ultra-violence. Gives an opening for increasing the Police State and cracking down on our freedumbs and liberties, etc.

I heard or read somewhere that Nancy Pelosi & Chuck Schumer are absolutely committed to not impeaching Donald Trump because it means all the Ds have to do is Sweet Eff All and just "represent" themselves as the Anti-Trump, while, yes, enjoying the "benefits" of the programs/policies/legislation enacted by the Trump Admin. I have no link and certainly cannot prove this assertion, but it sure seems likely. Just frickin' great.

kgw | Aug 16, 2017 1:09:10 PM | 5
Lee was not a racist; I'd say you are addressing your own overblown egos. The U.S. Civil War was long in coming. During the 1830's during Andrew Jackson's presidency, and John Calhoun's vice-presidency, at an annual state dinner, the custom of toasts was used to present political views. Jackson toasted the Union of the states, saying "The Union, it must be preserved." Calhoun's toast was next, "The Union, next to our liberty, most dear."

Calhoun was a proponent of the Doctrine of Nullification, wherein if a national law inflicted harm on any state, the state could nullify the law, until such time as a negotiation of a satisfactory outcome could come about. The absolute Unionists were outraged by such an idea.

Curtis | Aug 16, 2017 1:27:39 PM | 6
My memory tells me that the invention of the cotton gin made cotton a good crop, but that you needed the slaves. Slaves represented the major money invested in this operation. Free the slaves and make slave holders poor. Rich people didn't like that idea. I think maybe the cotton was made into cloth in the factories up north. Just saying.
dh | Aug 16, 2017 1:27:57 PM | 7
How would 'addressing the problem' actually work? Should all native Americans and people of colour go to Washington to be presented with $1 million each by grovelling white men?
joeymac | Aug 16, 2017 1:34:24 PM | 8
Did not George Washington "own" slaves?
But, the memorials to GW, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, et al , does not honor them for owning slaves. Memorials of Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Jefferson Davis, et al , is because they took up arms against a legitimate government simply to support of a vile system.
kgw | Aug 16, 2017 1:37:23 PM | 9
@6
The manufacturing states put export duties on the agricultural states, and tariffs on British imported cloth. The English mills were undercutting the U.S. mills prices for a number of reasons, not the least of which was they were more experienced in the industry.
therevolutionwas | Aug 16, 2017 1:46:02 PM | 10
The civil war in the US was not really started because of slavery. Robert E. Lee did not join the south and fight the north in order to preserve slavery, in his mind it was state's rights. Lincoln did not start the civil war to free the slaves. See https://ixquick-proxy.com/do/show_picture.pl?l=english&rais=1&oiu=https%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fen%2Fc%2Fc9%2FThe_Real_Lincoln_cover_art.jpg&sp=b359dec0befbd12fc479633d5b6c6de4
Dan Lynch | Aug 16, 2017 1:49:57 PM | 11
The difference between a statue of Lee vs. a statue of Washington, Jefferson, LBJ, etc., is that Washington, Jefferson, and LBJ did some good things to earn our respect even though they did a lot of bad things, too. The Confederacy did no good things. It would be like erecting a statue to honor Hitler's SS.

If there were statues honoring the SS, would anyone be surprised if Jews objected? Why then does anyone fail to understand why blacks object to Confederate symbols?

I would, however, support statues that depict a Confederate surrendering. Perhaps the statue of Lee on a horse could be replaced with a statue of Lee surrendering to Grant?

I am not a fan of the "counter-protests." Martin Luther King never "counter-protested" a KKK rally. A counter-protest is a good way to start a fight, but a poor way to win hearts and minds. It bothers me when the 99% fight among themselves. Our real enemy is the 1%.

fi | Aug 16, 2017 1:56:38 PM | 12


George Washington "the father of our country" was a slave owner, a rapist and a murderer. What do we expect from his descendants?
should we remove his face of the dollar bill and destroy his statues?

The civil war was due to economic reasons, free labor is good business.
Now cheap Mexican-labor ( the new type of slavery) is good business to the other side.
when will the new civil war in the US start?


maningi | Aug 16, 2017 2:00:24 PM | 13
@b
Many years ago, within the leadership of my student organization, I initiated to rename the University I was attending, which was named after a communist ideological former state acting figure, with very bloody hands, co-responsible for the death of tenths of thousands and thousands of people. Today I still think, that educational and cultural institutions (and many more) should be named either neutral, or by persons with cultural background and with impeccable moral history, no many to be found. On the other side, I opposed the removal of the very statue of the same person at a nearby public plaza - and there it stands today - as a rather painful reminder of the past bloody history of my country, that went through a conflict, that today seems so bizarre. Wherever I go, I look into black abyss, knowing, that the very culture I belong to (the so called Christian Liberal Free Western World) has inflicted so many horrors and crimes against other nations and ethnic groups, its even difficult to count. Karlheinz Deschner wrote 10 books, titled "The Criminal History of Christianity (Kriminalgeschichte des Christentums - on YT you can find videos him reading from it). Yes, this is the very civilization, we Westerners originate from. It was deadly for centuries - and its about time to change this. And keeping the memory of our so bloody history, will help us to find the right and hopefully more peaceful solutions in the future. Don`t tear down monuments or change street names, but give them the so often shameful meaning, they had in history.
Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 2:03:05 PM | 14
Then southern states have no business being part of United States of America since their history and customs are not honored. That is good overall I think. Best for the world. Southern states are very unlikely to attack any other sovereign state thousands of miles away, but all united as unitary state, we can see how persistent in their aggression on the rest of the world they are. 222 years out of its 239 years US has been aggressor:
https://www.infowars.com/america-has-been-at-war-93-of-the-time-222-out-of-239-years-since-1776/
Time to break US lust for attacking, invading and raiding other countries.
james | Aug 16, 2017 2:05:07 PM | 15
what little of this history i know - which is to say very little - kgw reflects what i have read.. the problem is way deeper.. if you want to address racism, you are going to have to pull down most of the statues in the usa today of historical figures..
james | Aug 16, 2017 2:06:35 PM | 16
if - that is why way you think it will matter, lol.. forgot to add that.. otherwise, forget pulling down statues and see if you can address the real issue - like @4 rukidding and some others here are addressing..
ben | Aug 16, 2017 2:10:18 PM | 17
A little false equivalency anyone? I'm sure Adolph Hitler had some reasonable remarks at some point in his life, so, I guess we should tolerate a few statues of him also? States rights as the cause for the U$A's civil war? baloney, it was about the murder and enslavement of millions of humans.
Grieved | Aug 16, 2017 2:12:25 PM | 18
Bob Dylan's "Only a Pawn in Their Game" still spells out unsurpassed the divide and rule strategy, to my mind. Powers that be are rubbing their hands with satisfaction at this point, one would think.

I like your observation, b, that statues don't necessarily represent what they did when they were erected. It's an important point. It meant something at the time, but now it's a part of today's heritage, and has often taken on some of your own meaning. To destroy your own heritage is a self-limiting thing, and Orwell's point is well taken. Perhaps people without history have nowhere in the present to stand.

Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 2:12:50 PM | 19
Have to add, slavery wasn't the cause for the war. It was centralization, rights of the states. Yankees wanted strong central government with wide array of power, Southerners didn't. Yankees were supported by London banking families and their banking allies or agents in the US, Southerners were on their own. I personally think Southerners were much better soldiers, more honorable and courageous, but we lacked industrial capacity and financial funds. I could be biased having Southern blood, but my opinion anyway.
PavewayIV | Aug 16, 2017 2:13:51 PM | 20
therevolutionwas@10 - Have to agree. The events leading up to the US Civil War and the war itself were for reasons far more numerous and complex then slavery. Emancipation was a fortunate and desirable outcome and slavery was an issue, but saying the entire war was about ending slavery is the same as saying WW II was mostly about stopping Nazis from killing jews. Dumbing down history serves nobody.
dh | Aug 16, 2017 2:14:02 PM | 21
Still wondering how specifically the 'real issue' can be addressed. I don't think any amount of money will compensate plains Indians .actually some are quite well off due to casinos. But the days of buffalo hunting are gone and white people will not be going back where they came from. As for blacks in urban ghettos you could build them nice houses in the suburbs but I doubt if that will fix the drugs/gangs problem.
michaelj72 | Aug 16, 2017 2:15:36 PM | 22
"That Lee was a racist does not mean that his statue should be taken down."

If the sole criteria for taking down any statues was that a man was a 'racist', meaning that he hated people of color/hated black people, can we assume then that all those who owned slaves were also racist?

Then all the statues in the whole country of Jefferson, Washington, Madison, Monroe and perhaps all the Founding Daddies who owned slaves, should be removed. I am playing devil's advocate here.

Fashions come and go.... and so the vices of yesterday are virtues today; and the virtues of yesterday are vices today.


Bernard is correct at the end: "The fake Clintonian "resistance" needs these cultural disputes to cover for its lack of political resistance to Trump's plans." The Demos have nothing, so they tend to fall back on their identity politics.


FYI
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Presidents_of_the_United_States_who_owned_slaves

....In total, twelve presidents owned slaves at some point in their lives, eight of whom owned slaves while serving as president. George Washington was the first president to own slaves, including while he was president. Zachary Taylor was the last president to own slaves during his presidency, and Ulysses S. Grant was the last president to have owned a slave at some point in his life.


psychohistorian | Aug 16, 2017 2:17:06 PM | 23
Pitting people against people by inciting and validating fringe groups is a tried and true social manipulation ploy.....and it seems to be working as intended.

Focus is on this conflict gets folks riled up and myopic about who the real enemies of society really are.....and then that riled up energy is transferred to bigger conflicts like war between nations.....with gobs of "our side is more righteous" propaganda

Humanity has been played like this for centuries now and our extinction would probably be a kinder future for the Cosmos since we don't seem to be evolving beyond power/control based governance.

And yes, as Dan Lynch wrote just above: "It bothers me when the 99% fight among themselves. Our real enemy is the 1%"

ben | Aug 16, 2017 2:20:12 PM | 24
The U$A was conceived in genocide. I think we should throw out much of our history
woogs | Aug 16, 2017 2:27:34 PM | 25
Robert E. Lee a racist? No, he was a man of his time. B, you blew it with this one. You have confused what you don't know with what you think you know.

Now, if Lee was a racist, what about this guy?

From Lincoln's Speech, Sept. 18, 1858.

"While I was at the hotel to-day, an elderly gentleman called upon me to know whether I was really in favor of producing a perfect equality between the negroes and white people. While I had not proposed to myself on this occasion to say much on that subject, yet as the question was asked me I thought I would occupy perhaps five minutes in saying something in regard to it. I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the black and white races -- that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making VOTERS or jurors of negroes, NOR OF QUALIFYING THEM HOLD OFFICE, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any of her man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."

ben | Aug 16, 2017 2:36:31 PM | 26
@ 25: Leading an army to perpetuate a system that enslaves and murders millions, is just a bit different than being a racist. More false equivalency?
b | Aug 16, 2017 2:38:38 PM | 27
All states who joined the confederation cited the "need" and "right" to uphold slavery in their individual declarations. To say that the civil war was not about this point is strongly misleading. Like all wars there were several named and unnamed reasons. Slavery was the most cited point.

The argument of rather unlimited "state rights" is simply the demand of a minority to argue for the right to ignore majority decisions. With universal state rights a union can never be a union. There is no point to it. What is needed (and was done) is to segregate certain fields wherein the union decides from other policy fields that fall solely within the rights of member states. The conflict over which fields should belong where hardly ever ends.

P. S.--If it were up to me, I'd tear down monuments to most of the U$A's presidents for perpetuating and abetting the rise of an empire who has enslaved and murdered millions around the globe, simply for profits for the few. Economic slavery has replaced the iron shackles, but the murder is still murder...

Posted by: ben | Aug 16, 2017 2:45:29 PM | 28

P. S.--If it were up to me, I'd tear down monuments to most of the U$A's presidents for perpetuating and abetting the rise of an empire who has enslaved and murdered millions around the globe, simply for profits for the few. Economic slavery has replaced the iron shackles, but the murder is still murder...

Posted by: ben | Aug 16, 2017 2:45:29 PM | 28 /div

Jackrabbit | Aug 16, 2017 2:48:00 PM | 29
Northern Lights @19 is right.

The Northern manufacturers were exploiting the South and wanted to continue doing so. They didn't much care that the raw materials came from slave labor.

Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation to encourage slave rebellion (meaning fewer white Southern men available for military service) and to punish the South.

Yet, while slavery ended when the North won, we all know how that turned out. For nearly 100 years (and some might say, even today) , many black people were still virtual slaves due to discrimination and poor education.

woogs | Aug 16, 2017 2:53:03 PM | 30
B@27: you're missing a couple of very basic points.

First, not all states that seceded issued declarations. Virginia, for example, of which the 'racist' Robert E. Leehailed, only seceded after Lincoln made his move on fort sumter. In fact, Virginia had voted against secession just prior but, as with 3 other southern states, seceded when Lincoln called for them to supply troops for his war.

Speaking of declarations of causes, have a look at the cherokee declaration. Yes, united indian tribes fought for the confederacy.

Finally, the causes for secession are not the causes for war. Secession is what the southerners did. War is what Lincoln did. One should not have automatically led to the other.

Oilman2 | Aug 16, 2017 3:09:32 PM | 31
Well, just reading the comments here it is obvious that there are several versions of history taught at different times in the last century. If not, then all of us would "know" the real reason for the CW - there would be no need for discussion. What is also obvious is that this delving back into a muddied history, the defacing of formerly meaningful objects, the thrusting of certain "rights" into the face of anyone even questioning them - all of it is working. It is working extremely well in distracting us from things like the numerous economic bubbles, the deep state scratching at war or chaos everywhere, politicians who are at best prevaricating prostitutes and at worst thieves enriching themselves at our expense as we struggle to maintain in the face of their idiocy.

It simply doesn't MATTER what started the Civil War - it ought to be enough to look at the death toll on BOTH sides and know we don't need to go there again.

Who stands to gain from this? Because it surely isn't the historically ignorant antifa bunch, who are against everything that includes a moral boundary. It isn't the alt-right, who get nothing but egg on their face and decimation of position by virtue of many being "white". CUI BONO?

The single answer is threefold: media, the government and the military - who continue to refuse to address any of our problems - and feed us a diet of revolting pablum and double-speak.

Honestly, congress passed a law legalizing propaganda - did anyone notice? Did anyone factor in that they allowed themselves freedom to lie to anyone and everyone? It wasn't done for show - it was done to deny future accountability.

Don't let this site get bogged down in history that is being constantly rewritten on Wikipedia. Don't buy into the left/right division process. Don't let your self identify with either group, as they are being led by provocateurs.

The lies we know of regarding Iraq, Syria, Libya - aren't they enough to force people to disbelieve our media completely? The HUGE lies in our media about what is going on in Venezuela should be quite enough (bastante suficiente) to make most people simply disbelieve. But they cannot because they are only allowed to see and hear what our government approves - and for our government, lying is quite legal now.

Let the emotions go - they are pushed via media to force you to think in white or black, right or left, old vs young - any way that is divisive. Getting beaten for a statue would likely make the guy who posed for it laugh his butt off most likely...

Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 3:14:42 PM | 32
Speaking of Lincoln's quotes, here is a good one to dispel the myth about slavery being the cause of war.
Pres. Abraham Lincoln: "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."

I the civil war was for the most part connected with the federal reserve central bank charter right which unionist Yankees frightful about possible restraints of bankers rights were keen to give London banking families unrestricted rights to do whatever they please in the US. Other reasons exclusively included expanding federal government powers. Adding personal income tax would be unimaginable prior to CW. Creation of all those fed gov agencies too. It was all made possible by London bankers' servants Yankees.

MRW | Aug 16, 2017 3:18:49 PM | 33
Posted by: therevolutionwas | Aug 16, 2017 1:46:02 PM | 10
The civil war in the US was not really started because of slavery. Robert E. Lee did not join the south and fight the north in order to preserve slavery, in his mind it was state's rights. Lincoln did not start the civil war to free the slaves.

You're right. The Emancipation Act was an afterthought really because Europe had turned against the idea of slavery before the Civil War broke out, in fact was repelled by it, and Lincoln knew that it would hurt commerce.
Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 3:19:39 PM | 34
@29
Jack the South was right. The South was always right.
woogs | Aug 16, 2017 3:21:37 PM | 35
The southern states felt they had a right to secede, using the tenth amendment as the legal basis. It states simply " The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.".

Furthermore, the union of states was referred to many times by the founders as a compact. Under the theory of compacts, when one party doesn't honor said compact, it is rendered null.

Slavery, regardless of how we may feel today, was a legal and federally protected institution. With the rise of the republican party, a campaign of agitation towards the south and slavery had begun. It is this agitation towards a legal institution that rankled southerners.

The south saw this coming well before the election of Lincoln. William seward, the favorite to win the election, gave a speech in l858 called "the irrepressible conflict". The south well knew of this and saw the writing on the wall if a republican was elected president.

When reading the declarations of causes, this background should be kept in mind if one wants to understand the southern position. Or, one can just count how many times the word 'slavery' appears like a word cloud.

Probably the best articulated statement on the southern position was south Carolina's "address to the slaveholding states".


Lea | Aug 16, 2017 3:29:49 PM | 36
I'm afraid if you go back in time, no US president can be saved from a well-deserved statue toppling. Including Abraham Lincoln, the hypocrite who DID NOT, and I repeat, DID NOT abolish slavery. The U.S "elite" has always been rotten through and through, so good luck with those statues.
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2017/06/the-clintons-had-slaves
woogs | Aug 16, 2017 3:33:55 PM | 37
Northern Lights@32:

You used Lincoln's inaugural address to show that the war was not over slavery. It's plain enough coming from the horse's mouth, so to speak.

Lincoln, in that same inaugural address, stated what the war would be fought over ...... and it was revenue.

Here's the quote:

The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the Government and to collect the duties and imposts; but beyond what may be necessary for these objects, there will be no invasion, no using of force against or among the people anywhere.

historicus | Aug 16, 2017 3:35:02 PM | 38
As a rare book dealer and history buff with thirty-odd years of experience reading and studying original civil war era periodicals and documents, a fact stands out for me about these now-controversial statues. None is from the civil war period. Many, like the Lee statue in this article, date to the 1920's, which was the era of the second Ku Klux Klan. The infamous movie "Birth of a Nation" inspired the nationwide revival of that faded terrorist group. The year that statue was dedicated a hundred thousand Klansmen paraded in full regalia in the streets of Washington.

The children and grandchildren of the men who had taken up arms against the United States had by then completed a very flattering myth about 1861 - 1865. Consider too that romanticized lost cause mythology was integral to the regional spirit long before the rebellion. The Scots Irish who settled the American south carried with them the long memory their forebears' defeats at the Boyne and Culloden, at the hands of the English – the very ancestors of the hated Yankees living to the north of their new homeland.

Note also that many more CSA statues and memorials were built in the 1960s, as symbols of defiance of the civil rights movement of that era. The War for the Union was fought at its heart because the elite of the old south refused to accept the result of a fair and free democratic election, but for those who came after, white supremacy became the comforting myth that rationalized their ancestors' incredibly foolish treason.

I.W. | Aug 16, 2017 3:35:32 PM | 39
"Robert Lee was a brutal man who fought for racism and slavery."

Would this have been written in his time? Would it be written today in other countries (Africa included) where slavery (aka human trafficking) is big business today?

I'm disappointed that Moon of Alabama, usually so astute in its presentations, would print this article.

Don Wiscacho | Aug 16, 2017 3:37:30 PM | 40
A whole lot of false equivalence goin' on.

That the many statutes of America's founding fathers should be re-evaluated is actually a great idea. Many of these people were simply oligarchs who wanted to be the top of the pyramid instead of the British. Many owned slaves and perpetuated slavery. Others, like Andrew Jackson were legitimate psychopaths. Pretty much all of them cheered the genocide of Native Americans. So maybe we *should* have different heros.

Using the logic b spells out above, one could argue that statues of Nazis should be allowed too, after all they did come up with the Autobahn (modern highways), jet engines, and viable rockets, all technology used all over the world. Some patriotic, well meaning Germans fought in the Wehrmacht, don't they deserve statues, too? What about the Banderists and Forest Brothers? The Imperial Japanese? Don't those well-meaning fascists deserve to celebrate their heritage?

But simply saying that idea out loud is enough to realize what a crock that notion is. Nazis and fascists don't deserve statues, neither do confederates. Neither do most Americans, for that matter.

Trying to make some moral equivalence between NeoNazis and the leftists who oppose them is about as silly as it gets. I don't support violence against these idiots, and they have the same rights as anyone else in expressing their opinion. But to paint legit NeoNazis and the leftists opposing them (admittedly in a very juvenile manner) in the same brush ("Both sides came prepared for violence") is utter hogwash. We don't give Nazis a pass in Ukraine, don't give them a pass in Palestine, and we sure as hell don't give them a pass in the US. It doesn't matter what hypocritical liberal snowflake is on the other side of the barricade, the Nazi is still a f*****g Nazi.

Joe | Aug 16, 2017 3:39:00 PM | 41
"Robert Lee was a brutal man who fought for racism and slavery."

b, you have just displayed your ignorance of the character of Robert E. Lee, why he fought, and what he fought for. To give you the short n sweet of it, General Lee was a Christian gentleman respected by those in the North as well as the South. He fought the Federal leviathan as it had chosen to make war on what he considered to be his home and country--the State of Virginia. The issue at hand was not racism and slavery but Federal tyranny. Lincoln himself said he had no quarrel with slavery and as long as the South paid the Federal leviathan its taxes, the South was free to go. Make a visit to Paul Craig Roberts site for his latest essay which explains the world of the 1860s American scene much more eloquently than I can ...

folktruther | Aug 16, 2017 3:41:47 PM | 42
b is completely wrong in thread. The USA has been a highly racist power system historically where killing non-Whites has been a major historical policy. Lee is not merely a racist, he epitomizes this policy and is a symbol of it. Attacking racist symbols is essential to destroying racism.
woogs | Aug 16, 2017 3:45:05 PM | 43
Historicus@38: that 'fair and free democratic election' was replete with Lincoln supporters printing counterfeit tickets to the convention in order to shut out seward supporters.

The gambit worked and the rest, as they say, is history.

Ian | Aug 16, 2017 3:45:37 PM | 44
I suggest reading this article for some perspective:

http://takimag.com/article/carved_upon_the_landscape_steve_sailer#axzz4pwMfiSP8

karlof1 | Aug 16, 2017 3:51:18 PM | 45
Wow! What to write? Craig Murray wrote a very intriguing piece related to Charlottesville while putting the event somewhat into the context of the Scottish Independence Movement; it and the many comments are well worth the time to read and reflect upon, https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2017/08/americans-irish-uzbeks-ukrainians-pakistanis-balls-scots/

james @2--You are 1000000000% correct. And given the current state-of-affairs, will continue to fester for another century if not more thanks to historical ignorance and elite Machiavellian maneuvering.

Southern Extremist self-proclaimed Fire Eaters were the ones that started the war as they took the bait Lincoln cunningly offered them. If they'd been kept away from the coastal artillery at Charlestown, the lanyard they pulled may have remained still and war avoided for the moment. The advent of the US Civil War can be blamed totally on the Constitution and those who wrote it, although they had no clue as to the fuse they lit.

Chattel Slavery was introduced in the Western Hemisphere because the enslaved First Peoples died off and the sugar plantations needed laborers. Rice, tobacco, indigo, "Naval Stores," and other related cash crops were the next. Cotton only became part of the mix when the cotton gin made greatly lessened the expense of its processing. But, cotton wore out the thin Southern soils, so it cotton plantations slowly marched West thus making Mexican lands attractive for conquest. But slaves were used for so much more--particularly the draining of swamps and construction of port works. The capital base for modern capitalism was made possible by slavery--a sentence you will NOT read in any history textbook. There are a great many books written on the subject; I suggest starting with Marcus Rediker's The Slave Ship: A Human History , followed by Eric Williams's classic Capitalism and Slavery , Edward Baptist's The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism , and John Clarke's Christopher Columbus and the Afrikan Holocaust: Slavery and the Rise of European Capitalism .

There are even more books published about the war itself. But as many have pointed out, it's learning about the reasons for the war that's most important. Vice President Henry Wilson was the first to write a very detailed 3 volume history of those reasons, Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America beginning in 1872, and they are rare books indeed; fortunately, they've been digitized and can be found here, https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Wilson%2C+Henry%2C+1812-1875%22 Perhaps the most complete is Allan Nevins 8 volume Ordeal of the Union , although for me it begins too late in 1847, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordeal_of_the_Union Finally, no study of the period's complete without examining the unraveling and utter dysfunction of the political process that occurred between 1856 and 1860 that allowed Lincoln to win the presidency, Roy Nichols's The Disruption of American Democracy illustrates that best.

The US Civil War can't be boiled down to having just one cause; it's causes were multiple, although slavery--being an economic and social system--resides at its core. As an historian, I can't really justify the removal of statues and other items of historical relevance, although displaying the Confederate Flag on public buildings I see as wrong; better to display the Spirit of '76 flag if stars and stripes are to be displayed. (I wonder what will become of the UK's Union Jack if Scotland votes to leave the UK.) Personal display of the Stars and Bars for me amounts to a political statement which people within the Outlaw US Empire still have the right to express despite the animus it directs at myself and other non-Anglo ethnicities. (I'm Germanic Visigoth with Spanish surname--people are surprised at my color when they hear my name.)

The current deep dysfunction in the Outlaw US Empire's domestic politics mirrors that of the latter 1850s somewhat but the reasons are entirely different yet solvable--IF--the populous can gain a high degree of solidarity.

ruralito | Aug 16, 2017 4:01:10 PM | 46
There's also the school of thought that holds that Honest Abe freed the slaves in order that northern industrialists could acquire replacements for workers lost in the war.
Pareto | Aug 16, 2017 4:05:35 PM | 47
"racism" i.e., when a white person notices demographic patterns lol.
Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 4:06:37 PM | 48
@37
Aye Woogs. All about expanding fed gov powers, most of which was focused on permanent central banking charter. Many forget that central banking charter had been in place before CW in the US and that great statesman Andrew Jackson repelled it. The first central banking charter caused terrible economic suffering, which is why it was repelled. People had more sense then. Not so much now.

"Gentlemen! I too have been a close observer of the doings of the Bank of the United States. I have had men watching you for a long time, and am convinced that you have used the funds of the bank to speculate in the breadstuffs of the country. When you won, you divided the profits amongst you, and when you lost, you charged it to the bank. You tell me that if I take the deposits from the bank and annul its charter I shall ruin ten thousand families. That may be true, gentlemen, but that is your sin! Should I let you go on, you will ruin fifty thousand families, and that would be my sin! You are a den of vipers and thieves. I have determined to rout you out, and by the Eternal I will rout you out!"
~Andrew Jackson

ken | Aug 16, 2017 4:11:20 PM | 49
It saddens me that so many buy into the South fought for slavery. That story line was used in the same manner that Weapons of Mass Destruction was used to war with Iraq. The difference is the internet was able to get the truth out. Doesn't do much good to argue as most believe the Confederate slavery propaganda. The US is done as a nation. A thousand different groups that hate each other preaching no hate. Yes it will limp along for a while but it's done for.
michaelj72 | Aug 16, 2017 4:23:39 PM | 50
@46 karlof1

many thanks for the history, and the books. I read Murray's essay and consider it a good take....


".... As an historian, I can't really justify the removal of statues and other items of historical relevance, although displaying the Confederate Flag on public buildings I see as wrong..."

I have to agree.


& there is at least one sane (african american) person in LA, as per below article

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-hollywood-forever-monument-20170815-story.html

"....Los Angeles resident Monique Edwards says historical monuments, like the Confederate statue removed from Hollywood Forever Cemetery, need to be preserved and used as teachable moments...."

joeymac | Aug 16, 2017 4:24:42 PM | 51
@Northern Lights (19)
Yankees wanted strong central government with wide array of power, Southerners didn't. Yankees were supported by London banking families and their banking allies or agents in the US, Southerners were on their own.

I recall that it was the slavers that wanted the central government to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act even in states that outlawed slavery; it was the slavers that insisted that slavery be legal in the new territories, regardless of the wishes of the settlers.

Also, the London industrial and banking interest strongly supported the breakaway slavers because:
(1) It was the slave produced cotton that fueled the textile industry in England.
(2) Imported British ¨prestige¨ items found a ready market with the nouveau riche planters grown fat on stolen labor.
(3) A Balkanized NA would be more subject to pressure from the ¨Mother Country.¨
(4) Lincoln refused to borrow from the bankers and printed ¨greenbacks¨ to finance the war; this infuriated the bankers.

Neo-Confederate revisionism creates mythical history, in a large part, by attempting to deify vile human beings.

Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 4:26:38 PM | 52
Me too Ken. Used to say to those I would like to offer them fairy dust to buy. Half of them didn't catch the meaning.
somebody | Aug 16, 2017 4:30:53 PM | 53
7
How about memorials for red indians and slaves.

Like this one .

somebody | Aug 16, 2017 4:34:53 PM | 54
51
I would say a country that cannot agree on its history has a huge problem.
woogs | Aug 16, 2017 4:35:22 PM | 55
Ben@26: Lincoln stated that he would only use force to collect imposts and duties.

The first battle of the war (actually more a skirmish) was the battle of Phillipi in western Virginia in early June, l86l.

To the best of my knowledge, there were no customs houses in western Virginia as it was not a port of entry. This was simply an invasion by the union army at Lincoln's command that revealed his true colors. The war was Lincoln's war, plain and simple.

Northern Lights | Aug 16, 2017 4:36:10 PM | 56
@51
Joey, I would like yo offer you fairy dust to buy. Interested? Luckily we should part our ways soon. Should have happened ages ago if you ask me. Your history is not our own. You were aggressors fighting for foreign entity. Time for us to part I think. have your own history and say whatever you want there. We will have ours.
NemesisCalling | Aug 16, 2017 4:40:58 PM | 57
In my view, b is comparing a modern sensibility on race relations with that of a mid 19th century confederate leader and so with this bad thesis it is quite easy to dismiss this post entirely. Was the north that much more enlightened on the treatent of blacks? I think not. Was the emancipation proclamation largely a political gesture to incite ire and violence not only among southerners but also slaves living in these states towards their owners? Meanwhile, the effect of such a proclamation was exempt on states where said effect would not "pinch" the south. The north, if anything, was even more racist using blacks as a means towards the end to consolidate power even more centrally.

It honestly reads like most neutral apologetic drivel out of the "other" msm which is on the ropes right now from an all-out wholly political assault. If you truly wanted to educate people on their history you would stand up for fair and honest discourse. Make no mistake, this is all about obscuration and historical-revisionism. Globalists gotta eat.

"Slavery as an institution, is a moral &political evil in any Country... I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the black race... The blacks are immeasurably better off." Robert E. Lee

Sounds like a man with opinions, but without the burning fire to see that evil enshrined in a state-policy towards blacks. Basically, one condemns him for sharing a popular view of the day. CALL THE THOUGHT POLICE!

Clueless Joe | Aug 16, 2017 4:43:56 PM | 58
From a British point of view, Washington and Jefferson were traitors as well.
As for Lee, he was racist, but doesn't seem to have been more racist than the average Yankee. No more racist than Sherman or Lincoln, and less racist than many of the Confederate top guys, for instance.

Then, there's the nutjob idea that forcefully taking down other statues in the South will make these guys "win". At least, the Lee statue had a more or less legal and democratic process going on, which is the only way to go if you don't want to look like a Taliban.
Really, did these idiots not understand that bringing down Confederate statues without due process will massively piss off most of the locals? Do they really want the local hardliners to come armed and ready to use their guns, one of these days? Is this the plan all along, to spark another civil war for asshat reasons?

(Like B, toppling Saddam and communist statues was the very first thing I thought of. As if these poor fools had just been freed from a terrible dictatorship, instead of nothing having changed or been won at all in the last months)

john | Aug 16, 2017 4:51:09 PM | 59
ben says:

I think we should throw out much of our history

Paul Craig Roberts thinks so too

Mithera | Aug 16, 2017 4:54:03 PM | 60
I agree with Woogs (25). How stoopid are we ? History has been re-written and manipulated going back a long way. Most of the readers here know that our "masters" , and their versions of history are not accurate. Yet here we are arguing and such ... " he was good...NO He was bad...." acting as if we know truth from fiction. Back then, as now, it was all planned. Divide and conquer. Slavery was the "excuse" for war. The Power Elite" were based in Europe at that time and saw America as a real threat to their global rule. It was becoming too strong and so needed to be divided. Thus the people of those times were played....just as we are today. Manipulated into war. Of course America despite the Civil War , continued to grow and prosper so the elite devised another plan. Plan "B" has worked better than they could have ever imagined. They have infected the "soul" of America and the infection is spreading rapidly.Everyone , please re-read oilman2 comments (31)
Pnyx | Aug 16, 2017 5:16:11 PM | 61
Thanks B, precisely my thinking. It has a smell of vendetta. And I believe this sort of old testament thinking is very common in the u.s. of A. What's currently happening will further alienate both sides and lead to even more urgent need to externalize an internal problem via more wars.
virgile | Aug 16, 2017 5:18:00 PM | 62
If We Erase Our History, Who Are We?
Pat Buchanan • August 15, 2017
somebody | Aug 16, 2017 5:19:47 PM | 63
There is a reason for this craze to get rid of confederate statues.

Dylann Roof who photographed himself at confederate landmarks before he shot nine black people in a church .

It is futile to discuss what the confederacy was then, when white supremacy groups consider them their home today.

These monuments were not built after or during the civil war. And the reason for building them was racism .

In 2016, the Southern Poverty Law Center estimated that there were over 1,500 "symbols of the Confederacy in public spaces" in the United States. The majority of them are located, as one might expect, in the 11 states that seceded from the union, but as Vice aptly points out, some can be found in Union states (New York, for example has three, Pennsylvania, four) and at least 22 of them are located in states that didn't even exist during the Civil War.

How can that be possible? Because largely, Confederate monuments were built during two key periods of American history: the beginnings of Jim Crow in the 1920s and the civil rights movement in the early 1950s and 1960s.

To be sure, some sprung up in the years following the Confederacy's defeat (the concept of a Confederate memorial day dates back to back to 1866 and was still officially observed by the governments of Alabama, Mississippi, and South Carolina, as of the publication of the Southern Poverty Law Center's report), and some continue to be built!USA Today notes that 35 Confederate monuments have been erected in North Carolina since 2000.

But when these statues!be they historical place markers, or myth-building icons of Lee or Stonewall Jackson!were built seems to suggest these monuments have very little to do with paying tribute to the Civil War dead and everything to do with erecting monuments to black disenfranchisement, segregation, and 20th-century racial tension.

I don't know if b. realizes how many German monuments got destroyed because people did not wish to recall this particular part of history, the bomb raids of the allies helped, of course, but there are cemeteries of Marx, Engels and Lenin statues, and only revisionists recall what was destroyed after WWII .

Young people need some space to breath. They don't need monuments of war heros.

47 | Aug 16, 2017 5:20:32 PM | 64
b wrote "Statues standing in cities and places are much more than veneration of one person or group. They are symbols, landmarks and fragments of personal memories..."

Symbols indeed, traits in cultural landscapes. This piece may add another dimension to the importance of cultural landscape in the context of this conversation:
"To this day, the question remains: why would the Southerners remember and celebrate a losing team, and how come the non-Southerners care about it so passionately? A convenient answer revolves around the issue of slavery; i.e., a commemoration of the era of slavery for the former, and, for the latter, the feeling that the landscape reminders of that era should be entirely erased."
and
"In the past two decades, the American(s)' intervention has brought down the statues of Hussein, Gaddafi, Davis, and Lee respectively. Internationally, the work seems to be completed. Domestically, the next stage will be removing the names of highways, libraries, parks, and schools of the men who have not done an illegal act. Eventually, all such traits in the cultural landscape of Virginia may steadily disappear, because they are symbols of Confederacy."
http://www.zokpavlovic.com/conflict/the-war-between-the-states-of-mind-in-virginia-and-elsewhere/

virgile | Aug 16, 2017 5:20:37 PM | 65
What about the statues of the American "heroes" who massacred the Indians?
Robert Browning | Aug 16, 2017 5:24:32 PM | 66
It warms my heart that you are not a racist. But who really gives a fuck? And what makes you think not favoring your own kind like every other racial and ethnic group does makes you a better than those of your own racial group?? Something is wrong with you.
Bill | Aug 16, 2017 5:33:25 PM | 67
Statues are kim jong un like silly and useless anyway. Put up a nice obelisk or rotunda instead.
joeymac | Aug 16, 2017 5:33:44 PM | 68
@Clueless Joe (58)
From a British point of view, Washington and Jefferson were traitors as well.
Kindly correct me if i´m wrong, but, to my knowledge, there are no monuments to Washington or Jefferson on Trafalgar Square.
did these idiots not understand that bringing down Confederate statues without due process will massively piss off most of the locals?
It is my understanding that ¨due process¨ was underway because of pressure from the locals when the neo-Nazis sought to short circuit this process.
joeymac | Aug 16, 2017 5:47:36 PM | 69
@Northern Lights
Your history is not our own.

You are certainly entitled to your attitudes, hatreds, memories, affinities and such. You are not entitled to your own history. History is what happened. Quit lying about it!

Anonymous | Aug 16, 2017 5:59:02 PM | 70
Lee is the past. Obama is the present. The 'Nobel Peace Prize' winner ran more concurrent wars than any other president. He inaugurated the state execution of US citizens by drone based on secret evidence presented in secret courts. He was in charge when ISIS was created by the US Maw machine. What about removing his Nobel Peace Prize?
Erlindur | Aug 16, 2017 5:59:30 PM | 71
A long time ago Christians destroyed the old god's statues because they were pagan and didn't comply with their religion (or is it ideology?). Muslims followed and did the same on what was left. They even do that now when ISIS blows up ancient monuments.

What is next? Burning books? Lets burn the library of Alexandria once again...

aaaa | Aug 16, 2017 6:02:53 PM | 72
Just posting to say that I'm done with this place - will probably read but am not posting here anymore. Have fun
Clueless Joe | Aug 16, 2017 6:11:39 PM | 73
Joeymac 69:
I didn't mean the Charlottesville mess was done without due process. I refer to the cases that have happened these last few days - a trend that won't stop overnight.
Extremists from both sides aren't making friends on the other ones, and obviously are only making matters worse.

Somebody 63:
"It is futile to discuss what the confederacy was then, when white supremacy groups consider them their home today."
That's the whole fucking problem. By this logic, nobody should listen to Wagner or read Nietzsche anymore. Screw that. Assholes and criminals from now should be judged according to current values, laws and opinions, based on their very own crimes. People, groups, states, religions from the past should be judged according to their very own actions as well, and not based on what some idiot would fantasize they were 1.500 years later.

Merasmus | Aug 16, 2017 6:38:35 PM | 74
Looks like the Lee apologetics and claims that the war was about state's rights (go read the CSA constitution, it tramples the rights of its own member states to *not* be slave holding) or tariffs are alive and well in these comments. That's what these statues represent: the utter perversion of the historical record. And as pointed out @38, none of these statues are from anywhere near the Civil War or Reconstruction era.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/the-myth-of-the-kindly-general-lee/529038/

https://www.civilwar.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states

http://www.americancivilwarforum.com/five-myths-about-secession-169444.html?PageSpeed=noscript

https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/the-great-civil-war-lie/?mcubz=3

Hoarsewhisperer | Aug 16, 2017 6:43:32 PM | 75
I think anyone and everyone who instigates a successful campaign to destroy a memorial which glorifies war should be awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace & Sanity and be memorialised in bronze, nearby, as a permanent reminder that war WAS a racket, until Reason prevailed.
No offense intended.
Anonymous | Aug 16, 2017 6:49:20 PM | 76
Arch-propagandist Rove said "[Those] in what we call the reality-based community, [who] believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality. That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality [e.g Russia hacked the election]. And while you're studying that reality!judiciously, as you will!we'll act again, creating other new realities [e.g. Neo-Nazi White Supremacism], which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

There is a coup underway to get rid of Trump [who's 'unpardonable crime' seems to be that he isn't going along with the War Party]. The War Party will try anything, anything, if there is a hope that it will work to get rid of him. When Trump launched the cruise missiles against Syria, there was a moment's silence, totally spooky given all the bs that was flying ... Would he start a war with Russia? Would Trump go all the way with that, as Clinton probably would have done? When the attack fizzled out, the chorus resumed their attacks as though nothing had happened.

Their tactical attacks change as they are revealed to be fakes. The current attack, probably using War Party provacateurs operating on both sides, is the next tactical phase - out with 'Russian Hacking the Election', in with 'Trump White Supremacist Nazi'. If there is the standard CIA regime change plan behind this (as outlined by John Perkins and seen in Ukraine, Libya, Syria)] and the relatively passive actions don't work, they will ultimately resort to hard violence. At that stage, they resort to using snipers to kill people on both sides.

The anti-fas' are supposedly liberal, anti-gun, but there already have been stories of them training with weapons, even working with the Kurds in Syria so the ground is laid for their use of weapons. There are those on the Trump side who would relish the excuse for gun violence irrespective on consequence so the whole thing could spiral out of control very rapidly and very dangerously.

Disclosure - I do not support Trump [or any US politico for that matter]. The whole US political system is totally corrupt and morally bankrupt. Those that rise [or more accurately those that are allowed to rise] to the top reflect that corruption and bankruptcy. This could get very very messy.

Lemur | Aug 16, 2017 6:50:58 PM | 77
There's nothing wrong with being racist. Racism is simply preference for one's extended family. 'b' calls the admittedly rather goony lot at C'ville 'white supremacists'. But do they want to enslave blacks or rule over non-whites? No. In fact most of the alt-right lament the slave trade and all its ills, including mixing two groups who, as Lincoln pointed out, had no future together. What the left wants to do is reduce Confederate American heritage and culture down to the slavery issue, despite the fact only a few Southerners owned slaves.

Now, within ethnic European countries, should whites be supreme? You're goddamn right they should. Just as the Japanese should practice 'yellow supremacy', and so on and so forth. Most of you lot here, being liberals, will be in favour of no fault divorce. You understand there can be irreconcilable differences which in way suggest either person is objectively bad. The same applies to disparate ethnicities. If white Slovaks and Czechs can't get one, why would white and non-white groups?

You lefties need to have a serious moral dialogue over your rejection of ethno-nationalism! Time to get on the right side of history! Have you noticed the alt-right, despite being comprised of 'hateful bigots', is favourably disposed toward Iran, Syria, and Russia? That's because we consistently apply principles which can protect our racially, culturally, religiously, and ethnically diverse planet, and mitigate conflict. But the woke woke left (not a typo) meanwhile has to 'resist' imperialism by constantly vilifying America. ITS NOT THAT I'M IN FAVOUR OF ASSAD OR PUTIN, ITS JUST THAT AMERICA IS SO NAUGHTY! OH, HOW BASE ARE OUR MOTIVES. OH, WHAT A POX WE ARE. Weak tea. You have no theoretical arguments against liberal interventionism or neoconservativism.

Newsflash folks. Hillary Clinton doesn't fundamentally differ from you in principle. She merely differs on what methods should be employed to achieve Kojeve's universal homogeneous state. Most of you just want to replace global capitalism with global socialism. Seen how occupy wall street turned out? Didn't make a dent. See how your precious POCs voted for the neoliberal war monger? Diversity increases the power of capital. The only force which can beat globalization is primordial tribalism.

I suggest you all start off your transition to nationalism by reading up on 'Social Democracy for the 21st Century'. http://socialdemocracy21stcentury.blogspot.co.nz/

Seamus Padraig | Aug 16, 2017 6:57:50 PM | 78
All in all, b, a pretty brave post -- especially in these dark times. Only a few minor points to add:
Robert Lee was a brutal man who fought for racism and slavery.

Lee wasn't known for being brutal. You're probably confusing him with Nathan Bedford Forrest, who had a notorious mean streak: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathan_Bedford_Forrest

Lee actually thought the Civil War an awful tragedy. He was asked to choose between his state and his country. That's not much different from being asked to choose between your family and your clan.

Lee was a racist.

That might be true, depending on one's definition of a racist. But then, why should Abraham Lincoln get a pass? It's well known that he did not start the Civil War to end slavery -- that idea only occurred to him halfway through the conflict. But there's also the fact that, while he was never a great fan of slavery, he apparently did not believe in the natural equality of the races, and he even once professed to have no intention of granting blacks equality under the law:
"While I was at the hotel to-day, an elderly gentleman called upon me to know whether I was really in favor of producing a perfect equality between the negroes and white people. While I had not proposed to myself on this occasion to say much on that subject, yet as the question was asked me I thought I would occupy perhaps five minutes in saying something in regard to it. I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the black and white races -- that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making VOTERS or jurors of negroes, NOR OF QUALIFYING THEM HOLD OFFICE, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any of her man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race."

It turns out that history's a complicated thing! To bad it wasn't all written by Hollywood with a bunch of cartoon villains and heroes ...
One gets the impression that the current wave of statue take downs is seen as well deserved "punishment" for those who voted wrongly - i.e. not for Hillary Clinton. While many Trump voters will dislike statues of Robert Lee, they will understand that dislike the campaign to take them down even more.

You nailed it, b. The way things are headed, I now wonder if I will someday be arrested for owning Lynard Skynard albums (the covers of which usually had Confederate battle flags) or for having watched Dukes of Hazard shows as a child. It's starting to get that crazy.

Anyway, thanks for running a sane blog in a mad world!

jdmckay | Aug 16, 2017 6:58:20 PM | 79
Good interview with a Black, female pastor in Charlottsville who was in church when the march began Friday night. They caught a lot that wasn't on network news.

http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/trump-is-lying-about-charlottesville-says-witness-1025515075632

George Smiley | Aug 16, 2017 6:58:29 PM | 80
"Don't let this site get bogged down in history that is being constantly rewritten on Wikipedia. Don't buy into the left/right division process. Don't let your self identify with either group, as they are being led by provocateurs.

The lies we know of regarding Iraq, Syria, Libya - aren't they enough to force people to disbelieve our media completely? The HUGE lies in our media about what is going on in Venezuela should be quite enough (bastante suficiente) to make most people simply disbelieve. But they cannot because they are only allowed to see and hear what our government approves - and for our government, lying is quite legal now.

Let the emotions go - they are pushed via media to force you to think in white or black, right or left, old vs young - any way that is divisive. Getting beaten for a statue would likely make the guy who posed for it laugh his butt off most likely..."

Posted by: Oilman2 | Aug 16, 2017 3:09:32 PM | 31

Well said. Hope to see your thoughts in the future.

And as always, Karlof1 you have some insights I rarely get ever else (especially not in a comment section)

______________________________

"The US Civil War can't be boiled down to having just one cause; it's causes were multiple, although slavery--being an economic and social system--resides at its core. As an historian, I can't really justify the removal of statues and other items of historical relevance, although displaying the Confederate Flag on public buildings I see as wrong; better to display the Spirit of '76 flag if stars and stripes are to be displayed. (I wonder what will become of the UK's Union Jack if Scotland votes to leave the UK.) Personal display of the Stars and Bars for me amounts to a political statement which people within the Outlaw US Empire still have the right to express despite the animus it directs at myself and other non-Anglo ethnicities. (I'm Germanic Visigoth with Spanish surname--people are surprised at my color when they hear my name.)

The current deep dysfunction in the Outlaw US Empire's domestic politics mirrors that of the latter 1850s somewhat but the reasons are entirely different yet solvable--IF--the populous can gain a high degree of solidarity."

Posted by: karlof1 | Aug 16, 2017 3:51:18 PM | 45

____________________________

Also, somebody @63, very poignant to mention. While I could care less whether about some statues stand or fall (it helps living outside the empire), to deny that they are (generally) symbols of racism, or were built with that in mind, is a little off base in my eyes. Going to repost this quote because I think it had quite a bit of value in this discussion.

"In 2016 the Southern Poverty Law Center estimated that there were over 1,500 "symbols of thE Confederacy in public spaces" in the United States. The majority of them are located, as one might expect, in the 11 states that seceded from the union, but as Vice aptly points out, some can be found in Union states (New York, for example has three, Pennsylvania, four) and at least 22 of them are located in states that didn't even exist during the Civil War.

How can that be possible? Because largely, Confederate monuments were built during two key periods of American history: the beginnings of Jim Crow in the 1920s and the civil rights movement in the early 1950s and 1960s.

To be sure, some sprung up in the years following the Confederacy's defeat (the concept of a Confederate memorial day dates back to back to 1866 and was still officially observed by the governments of Alabama, Mississippi, and South Carolina, as of the publication of the Southern Poverty Law Center's report), and some continue to be built!USA Today notes that 35 Confederate monuments have been erected in North Carolina since 2000.

But when these statues!be they historical place markers, or myth-building icons of Lee or Stonewall Jackson!were built seems to suggest these monuments have very little to do with paying tribute to the Civil War dead and everything to do with erecting monuments to black disenfranchisement, segregation, and 20th-century racial tension."

Peter AU 1 | Aug 16, 2017 6:59:17 PM | 81
@77

Racism means zero understanding or tolerance of other people/cultures, an attitude that ones own culture or skin colour or group is far superior to those 'others'.

NemesisCalling | Aug 16, 2017 7:01:45 PM | 82
@77 lemur

Hear, hear. Generally, a resurgence of American nationalism WILL take the form of populist socialism because it will mark a turning away from the global police state which America is leading currently and will replace it with nationalistic spending on socialist programs with an emphasis on decreased military spending. This will continue ideally until a balance of low taxation and government regulation form a true economy which begins at a local level from the ground up.

annie | Aug 16, 2017 7:05:36 PM | 83
the city council, elected by the people, voted to remove the monument.

Where are America's memorials to pain of slavery, black resistance?

In 1861, the vice-president of the Confederacy, Alexander H. Stephens, offered this foundational explanation of the Confederate cause: "Its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. "

how much public space in the US should be dedicated to monuments honoring these people in the coming century? and for the children and grandchildren of slaves walking by them every day? what about their heritage? and the public monuments to the indigenous people of this land who we genocided? oh right, as a country we have still not even officially recognized that genocide. monuments should not be solely a reflection of the past, but of the future, of who we want to be. who we choose to recognize in our public spaces says a lot about us.

anon | Aug 16, 2017 7:06:12 PM | 84
It's pretty fair too say several of the "alt-right" leaders who planned this event agent are provocateurs or Sheep Dipped assets running honeypot "white nationalist" operations.

You can see from the make-up of the phony "Nazis" in the groups and their continued use of various propaganda that serves only to tie people and movements OPPOSED by the Deep State to "Nazis" and racist ideology, you can see how on the ground level, this event has psyop planners' fingerprints all over it.


It's also fair too say the complicit media's near universal take on the event signals a uniform, ready-made reaction more than likely dictated to them from a single source.

Trump is attacked. The ACLU is attacked. Peace activists opposed to the CIA's regime change operation in Syria are attacked. Tucker Carlson is attacked. Everyone attacked that the CIA and various other aspects of the Deep State want attacked as if the MSM were all sent the same talking points memo.

And keep in mind, this all comes right after the news was starting to pick up on the story that the Deep State's bullshit narrative about a "Russian hack" was falling apart.

Also keep in mind it comes at a time when 600,000 Syrians returned home after the CIA's terrorist regime change operation fell apart.

(from Scott Creighton's blog)

Zico the musketeer | Aug 16, 2017 7:11:22 PM | 85
Is there a left in America?
I think is really fun to watch those burgers call an US citizen a lefties.

From outside US you ALL looks like ULYRA right wing.
This is ridiculous!

Sigil | Aug 16, 2017 7:21:33 PM | 86
The statues were erected when the KKK was at its peak, to keep the blacks in their place. They started getting torn down after the 2015 massacre of black churchgoers by a Nazi. For once, don't blame Clinton.
Vas | Aug 16, 2017 7:28:08 PM | 87
as the country becomes less and less white
more and more symbols of white supremacy
have to go..
perry | Aug 16, 2017 7:51:05 PM | 88
Karlof1@45

My only argument with your post is "Chattel Slavery was introduced in the Western Hemisphere"
Chattel = movable property as opposed to your house. In that day and long before women and children were chattel.

Thinking about what might have been might help. If the south had won would we have had a strong enough central government to create and give corporate charters and vast rights of way to railroads which then cross our nation. Would states have created their own individual banking systems negating the need for the all controlling Federal reserve? Would states have their own military units willing to join other states to repel an attack instead of the MIC which treats the rest of the world like expendable slaves?

Before our constitution there was the Articles of Confederation. Article 1,2+3.....
Article I. The Stile of this Confederacy shall be "The United States of America."

Article II. Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every Power, Jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.

Article III. The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever.

This first set of laws in the new world was later undone in a secret convention with Madison, input from Jefferson and others found on our money and other honorariums. 1868 gave us the 14th amendment to the constitution that freed all who are born within this nation and were given equal rights. (Not saying that this worked for all slaves. Within a few years this was used to create corporate persons with access to the bill of rights.

I am thinking there were many reasons that people who lived in those times had to fight for what they did. We today are not in a position to judge why individuals fought. Certainly many poor white southerners who owned no slaves at all fought and died. Was it to keep slaves they did not own enslaved or did they fight and die for issues around protection of local or state rights, freedoms and way of life?

Histories are written and paid for by the winners who control that particular present time for the glorification of those rulers. A vast removal of historical artifacts speaks of a weak nation fading into the west's need to clean up some points from history of mean and brutal behaviors which we as a nation support now in the present but try and make it about others.

Peter AU 1 | Aug 16, 2017 8:01:00 PM | 89
A paragragh here from lemur 77 comment...
"Now, within ethnic European countries, should whites be supreme? You're goddamn right they should. Just as the Japanese should practice 'yellow supremacy', and so on and so forth. Most of you lot here, being liberals, will be in favour of no fault divorce. You understand there can be irreconcilable differences which in way suggest either person is objectively bad. The same applies to disparate ethnicities. If white Slovaks and Czechs can't get one, why would white and non-white groups?"

What is the United States of America? It is made up of British, French, Spanish and Russian territories aquired or conquered, the original colonists in turn taking them from the native inhabitants. The US has had a largley open imigration policy, people of all cultures, languages and skin colours and religions.
Why should white Europeans be supreme in the US lemur?

psychohistorian | Aug 16, 2017 8:01:58 PM | 90
The following is the guts of a posting from Raw Story that I see as quite related.
"
White House senior strategist Steve Bannon is rejoicing at the criticism President Donald Trump is receiving for defending white nationalism.

Bannon phoned The American Prospect progressive writer and editor Robert Kuttner Tuesday, according to his analysis of the interview.

In the interview, Bannon dismissed ethno-nationalists as irrelevant.

"Ethno-nationalism!it's losers. It's a fringe element," Bannon noted.

"These guys are a collection of clowns," he added.

Bannon claimed to welcome the intense criticism Trump has received.

"The Democrats," he said, "the longer they talk about identity politics, I got 'em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats."

Kuttner described Bannon as being in "high spirits" during the call

"You might think from recent press accounts that Steve Bannon is on the ropes and therefore behaving prudently. In the aftermath of events in Charlottesville, he is widely blamed for his boss's continuing indulgence of white supremacists," Kuttner explained. "But Bannon was in high spirits when he phoned me Tuesday afternoon to discuss the politics of taking a harder line with China, and minced no words describing his efforts to neutralize his rivals at the Departments of Defense, State, and Treasury."

"They're wetting themselves," Bannon said of opponents he planned to oust at State and Defense.
"

Curtis | Aug 16, 2017 8:25:00 PM | 91
Curtis 6 isn't me. However, I somewhat agree with the point.

Joe 41
Very true. Lee saw himself as defending Virginia. Slavery was the chief issue used in the states declarations of secession. But the end goal was a separate govt (that actually banned the importation of new slaves).

Nemesis 57
Excellent. Racism was bad in the North, too.

Alexander Grimsmo | Aug 16, 2017 8:37:55 PM | 92
Strange how the left are pulling down statues of democrats, and the right are fighting to have them stand. The confederates were democrats, but nobody seem to remember that now anymore.
sigil | Aug 16, 2017 8:51:24 PM | 93
Nothing strange about it. The Democrats dropped the southern racists and the Republicans picked them up with the Southern Strategy. It's all pretty well documented. The current Republicans are not heirs to Lincoln in any meaningful way.
michaelj72 | Aug 16, 2017 8:53:14 PM | 94
some may consider this interesting.. at the end of Robert Kuttner's conversation with Steve Bannon, Bannon says:

http://prospect.org/article/steve-bannon-unrepentant

...."The Democrats," he said, "the longer they talk about identity politics, I got 'em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats.".....

Petra | Aug 16, 2017 9:11:29 PM | 95
Those who make silly talk about "Patriots and Traitors" (Swallows and Amazons?) are being obtuse about their history. The whole system was racist through and through, depended upon it and was built upon it, starting with the very first rapacious sorties inland from the swampy coast.

Some excellent commentary here, including james's percipient notes, Grieved's point, RUKidding's and karlof1's, perry's observations and speculations.

Aside, this "99% v.1%" discourse is disempowering and one has to ask whose interests such talk and attendant disempowerment serve.

Krollchem | Aug 16, 2017 9:33:38 PM | 96
Both sides of this ideological issue are frooty and do not see the invisible hands that manipulate their weak minds. See Mike Krieger On Charlottesville: "Don't Play Into The Divide & Conquer Game"
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-08-14/mike-krieger-charlottesville-dont-play-divide-conquer-game

Please note that slavery persisted in some Northern States after the end of the Civil War. The slave trade was even a profit center in the North:

http://www.tracingcenter.org/resources/background/northern-involvement-in-the-slave-trade/

VietnamVet | Aug 16, 2017 9:40:12 PM | 97
This is a meaningful post on a touchy subject. Global Brahmins are looting the developed world. Color revolutions and ethnic rifts make great fire sales. In a sane world, old monuments would molder away in obscurity. Instead a faux resistance to divide and conquer the little people has commenced. But, it is careening out of control due to austerity and job loss. Deplorable Bushwhackers are fighting for tribalism and supremacy. After the 27 year old war in Iraq, subjected Sunnis turned to their ethnic myths and traditions to fight back; obliterating two ancient cities and themselves. The Chaos is coming west.
John Merryman | Aug 16, 2017 9:43:21 PM | 98
The problem is that people focus on the effects of history, like slavery and the holocaust, but if you go into the causes and context of these events, then you get accused of rationalizing them. Yet being ignorant of the causes is when history gets repeated. By the time another seriously bad effect rises, it's too late.
As for slavery, it's not as though peoples lives haven't been thoroughly commodified before and continue to be. Yes, slavery in the early part of this country was horrendous and the resulting racism arose from the more reptilian parts of people's minds, but that part still exists and needs to be better understood, not dismissed.
It should also be noted that if it wasn't for slavery, the African American population would otherwise only be about as large as the Arab American population. It is a bit like being the offspring of a rape. It might the absolute worst aspect of your life, but you wouldn't be here otherwise. It's the Native Americans who really got screwed in the deal, but there are not nearly enough of them left, to get much notice.
John Merryman | Aug 16, 2017 9:47:52 PM | 99
PS,
For those who know their legal history, no, I'm not using a pseudonym. There is a lot of family history in this country, from well before it was a country.

[Aug 12, 2017] Who Is the Hidden Hand at the NSC

Aug 12, 2017 | talkingpointsmemo.com

Josh Marshall

Mike Flynn has been out at the White House for more than four months. He is, we are told, in the most serious kind of legal trouble. Yet the political ghost of Mike Flynn still seems to be a hidden hand driving outcomes in the Trump White House. Maybe it's even Flynn himself.

Allow me to explain.

On Friday, Foreign Policy published an article explaining that the White House is pushing for widening the war in Syria over Pentagon objections. Look into the details and you see it's more specific than 'widening the war'. It's moving from a near exclusive focus on defeating ISIS to pushing a broader confrontation with Iran, which is of course heavily involved in Syria.

Not only does this run the risk of a major and damaging military confrontation with Iran. It almost certainly complicates or hurts the campaign against ISIS since Iran is itself extremely hostile to ISIS and fighting it on the ground in Iraq and Syria.

So who exactly is "the White House" here?

According to the Foreign Policy piece, it's principally two people. Ezra Cohen-Watnick and Derek Harvey, respectively the chief intelligence adviser at the NSC and the chief Middle East advisor. If that first name rings a bell, it should: Cohen-Watnick is the Flynn protege who was behind the Devin Nunes, Susan Rice "un-masking" nonsense caper. While Cohen-Watnick was up to that mischief, McMaster, as one of his first orders of business was trying to can him .

But he was blocked by Trump and Bannon.

Dereck Harvey is clearly a hawk but he at least seems to be respected within the military and intelligence establishments beyond just Mike Flynn. David Patraeus had him as an advisor and he appears to have held Harvey in high esteem.

There's an additional element to the story that bears directly on the Russia probe.

Remember that the most plausible read of what Cohen-Watnick was doing in that case was trying to surveil the investigation into his boss and mentor, Flynn, and the larger Russia probe. White House Counsel Don McGahn appears to have realized that as soon as Cohen-Watnick brought the "findings" of his "review" to the Counsel's office. McGahn told Cohen-Watnick to stand down. That prompted Cohen-Watnick to pull an end run by going to Nunes.

Here's what I wrote in early April

As even Lake concedes, Rice's alleged actions – if the report is accurate – were almost certainly legal. Most national security experts say they were not only legal but entirely proper. Moreover, the kind of snooping around that Cohen-Watnick was apparently doing could very plausibly be interpreted as an attempt to monitor or interfere with the on-going counter-intelligence probe of Trump associates' ties to Russia. The White House Counsel's job is to protect and look after the legal interests of the President. A good lawyer would likely want to shut that kind of freelancing down right away, especially if what Cohen-Watnick had found didn't amount to anything that helped the President or the White House.

My basic question is: why does Cohen-Watnick still have a job? Maybe McMaster couldn't fire him on day one. But he's had months to establish himself and place his stamp on the NSC.

Who is opposing this at the Pentagon? According to Foreign Policy , it's principally Secretary of Defense Mattis and Joint Chiefs Chair Dunford. Foreign Policy is less clear on where McMaster stands but assumes (I think rightly based on other published reports) he is in the latter (Pentagon) group. (Remember, that Mattis is considered a major Iran hawk; the fact that he opposes this speaks volumes.)

Now, conflicts between Departments (State, Defense, CIA, et al.) and the NSC are common in American foreign policy. The NSC often wins them. That is not odd in itself. What is odd is that in this case the "NSC" is not clearly being driven by the President's National Security Advisor. That's highly odd.

Indeed, if we look at the current NSC it seems to still be stocked in many cases by Mike Flynn's people. Again, not entirely out of the norm. A new boss isn't really in a position to fire everyone at once. But Mike Flynn isn't any former NSC boss. He resigned in disgrace and is at the center of an investigation that is consuming the whole country. Copious reporting says that he has not been permitted to fire a number of Flynn people.

Who exactly is keeping Cohen-Watnick and others like him in place? Remember, this isn't my imagination or speculation. McMaster tried to fire him as soon as he took over the NSC. More than not being fired, what juice does he have that is allowing him to carry on major inter-agency battles to which the NSC chief, his nominal boss, is either a bystander or an opponent? You don't stay in a position like that against that kind of opposition – and certainly not with that much power – unless someone very powerful is on your side.

There is some unseen power center at work here. Is it the President? Is it Steve Bannon? Is it Flynn? From what I can tell it's not clear. But it seems pretty important to find out.

[Aug 11, 2017] Ukrainian population is shrinking. alread shrunk from 48 to 42 millions

Aug 11, 2017 | turcopolier.typepad.com

UKRAINE. The disaster continues.

In 2001 its population was 48.5 million. Latest official estimate is 42.5. Examination of various consumption statistics suggest that this estimate is too high.

About 2.5 million are in Russia and another 1.5 million in Poland .

At some point, for a country constructed out of bits and pieces of other states, depopulation will become geopolitically significant.

[Aug 07, 2017] Us dollar is the focal point of the US military adventures

Notable quotes:
"... Very true. In fact, US military (in its conventional iteration) is one of the main (if not the main) pillar of the US Dollar as a main reserve currency, hence of US economy. It is, in effect, a business enterprise -- that is why US strategic (and military-doctrinal) though becomes increasingly incoherent -- one can formulate "global power" memes only for so long, at some point the sheer idiocy and futility of such "thinking" becomes evident even to those who believe in it. ..."
Aug 07, 2017 | www.unz.com

Andrei Martyanov, Website

@Sergey Krieger
Us$ is being main focal point. While wrong perception maintained about usa military conventional superiority over anyone was critical to mantain us$ status, us$ status as major reserve currency is the only thing that allowing united States to mantain her military at current levels and basically USA status as major global power. Take us$ status away and the king is naked USA would become very local power with vastly reduced if not ruined military and great issues at home. Everything that undermines us$ status is well come including showing USA military impotence vs major nations that are challenging the status quo.

Take us$ status away and the king is naked USA would become very local power with vastly reduced if not ruined military and great issues at home.

Very true. In fact, US military (in its conventional iteration) is one of the main (if not the main) pillar of the US Dollar as a main reserve currency, hence of US economy. It is, in effect, a business enterprise -- that is why US strategic (and military-doctrinal) though becomes increasingly incoherent -- one can formulate "global power" memes only for so long, at some point the sheer idiocy and futility of such "thinking" becomes evident even to those who believe in it.

Only complete crazies remain. Plus, inability to realize itself as a real continental power is akin to acute sexual frustration.

[Aug 07, 2017] Us dollar is the focal point of the US military adventures

Notable quotes:
"... Very true. In fact, US military (in its conventional iteration) is one of the main (if not the main) pillar of the US Dollar as a main reserve currency, hence of US economy. It is, in effect, a business enterprise -- that is why US strategic (and military-doctrinal) though becomes increasingly incoherent -- one can formulate "global power" memes only for so long, at some point the sheer idiocy and futility of such "thinking" becomes evident even to those who believe in it. ..."
Aug 07, 2017 | www.unz.com

Andrei Martyanov, Website

@Sergey Krieger
Us$ is being main focal point. While wrong perception maintained about usa military conventional superiority over anyone was critical to mantain us$ status, us$ status as major reserve currency is the only thing that allowing united States to mantain her military at current levels and basically USA status as major global power. Take us$ status away and the king is naked USA would become very local power with vastly reduced if not ruined military and great issues at home. Everything that undermines us$ status is well come including showing USA military impotence vs major nations that are challenging the status quo.

Take us$ status away and the king is naked USA would become very local power with vastly reduced if not ruined military and great issues at home.

Very true. In fact, US military (in its conventional iteration) is one of the main (if not the main) pillar of the US Dollar as a main reserve currency, hence of US economy. It is, in effect, a business enterprise -- that is why US strategic (and military-doctrinal) though becomes increasingly incoherent -- one can formulate "global power" memes only for so long, at some point the sheer idiocy and futility of such "thinking" becomes evident even to those who believe in it.

Only complete crazies remain. Plus, inability to realize itself as a real continental power is akin to acute sexual frustration.

[Aug 04, 2017] Is Trump's Russia Policy Being Hijacked

While the US is clearly not omnipotent, Ukraine was sliding into Baltic model for a long time, probably since independence. So while the Maydan coup was organized and implemented by the USA, the coming to power of right wing Western Ukrainian nationalists was probably given. The USA actually only speeded the events by a year or two. During the next Presidential election far right Ukrainian nationalist my impression is that they would depose Yanukovich anyway. so the coup was probably more the result of incompetence and hubris of staunch neocon (and former Cheney associate) Nuland then a real necessity. If we consider neocons to be a flavor of political psychopaths such a result is not surprising.
Putin has a chance to prevent Maydan by using the same dirty methods as the USA, but iether had chosen not to do this, or was slightly distracted by Olympics (please not that Georgian invasion of South Ossetia also happened during Olympic events). After the coup he has one or two days -- a small window of opportunity for deposing right wing nationalist by recognizing Yanukovich government and sending groups to restore "the legitimate government", which was actually corrupt (although probably to lesser level the subsequent government of Poroshenko, where each minister became a millionaire) and hated by a lot of Ukrainians. So the population reaction to restoration of Yanukovich regime by force might be quite hostile. Putin and his government had chosen not to do it and gave the victory to the USA: Russia completely lost the geopolitical game for Ukraine to the USA and now need to suffer the new cold war2 (which also was given, the the global hegemon which accepts only vassals, the USA needed only the pretext to squash attempts of Russia to conduct independent foreign policy). But in a decade from now the USA probably will pay the price for this as the alliance of Russia and China is now more of a reality then even before. Also the end of "cheap oil" automatically will drive the US economy into perma stagnation. The current artificial low price can't last forever.
Destruction on Ukraine and its economic potential started at this point in full force and in addition to the necessity of handing huge refugees flow to Russia, Russian economic suffered huge losses from braking cooperation with Ukraine (which was part of the USSR economics and were closely connected to Russian).
So Barack Obama got a huge geopolitical victory, the main victory of his presidency (along with his Libyan adventure). But Ukrainians now need to suffer and there is no light at the end of the tunnel. they are now just pawns in Washington geopolitical game against Russia and have no choice but fight.
Notable quotes:
"... In crafting the platform in Cleveland on which Donald Trump would run, America Firsters inflicted a major defeat on the War Party. The platform committee rejected a plank to pull us deeper into Ukraine, by successfully opposing new U.S. arms transfers to Kiev. ..."
"... As pro-Russia rebels in East Ukraine have armored vehicles, Kiev wants U.S. tank-killing Javelin missiles, as well as antiaircraft weapons. State and Defense want Trump to send the lethal weapons. This is a formula for a renewed war, with far higher casualties in Ukraine than the 10,000 dead already suffered on both sides. And it is a war Vladimir Putin will not likely allow Kiev to win. ..."
"... If Ukraine's army, bolstered by U.S. weaponry, re-engages in the east, it could face a Moscow-backed counterattack and be routed, and the Russian army could take permanent control of the Donbass. ..."
"... Is President Trump losing control of Russia policy? Has he capitulated to the neocons? These are not academic questions. For consider the architect of the new arms package, Kurt Volker, the new U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations. ..."
"... If the following is true it is worth reading: https://www.rt.com/news/398490-us-main-global-threat-survey/ ..."
"... Dear Mr. Buchanan, Had the Journal one small moment of "truth telling" then its goal would be crystal clear not to bleed Russia but to bleed the United States to utter insolvency through their endless stupid wars.. Just look at our nation's balance sheet to see the truth. Nearly FIFTEEN TRILLION DOLLARS of debt generated in a mere seventeen years. ..."
"... Volker envisions a deepening U.S. involvement in a Ukrainian civil war that can bleed and break Russia's Ukrainian allies and convince Putin to back down and accept what we regard as a just settlement ..."
"... On the contrary, I think that Volker and others driving US policy are very well aware that Putin won't back down, and this is indeed what they want. A direct, permanent conflict with Russia which will leave it isolated from the "Western" world. A bit like track and field, where it increasingly looks like Russia will be permanently excluded from international competitions, and where Russian athletes will only be allowed to compete as "neutrals", under pain of exclusion if they as so much as sing the Russian national anthem in their hotel. And once the conflict heats up in Ukraine, look for a call to boycott the 2018 World Cup in Russia (as per the 1980 Olympics). The recent Confederations Cup in Russia was widely viewed as a considerable success, and received favorable reporting in much of the Western press, and this clearly can't be allowed to happen with the World Cup, the World's premier sporting event. ..."
"... And of course conflict with Russia has nothing to do with the proclaimed goal of containing an "agressive" Putin and Russia, which is a fallacious representation of Russia's actions and motives, and everything to do with maintaining the seemingly absolute World hegemony the USA gained after the collapse of the USSR. This fantasy of absolute hegemony is hard to let go for Neocons and Deep state, and they will cling to it with all their claws, even risking nuclear war for it ..."
"... The latest sanctions on Russia are an attempt to bleed Russia in another way, by pushing it out of the World economy, with the naive conviction that it would all end well if that plan succeeded ..."
"... It's a confusion of the Soviet experience in Afghanistan with the defense of ethnic Russians standing up to a Yankee Puppet Regime trying to subjugate them. The coffins might well secure a landslide election for Putin in such a cause. The US may have seriously misunderestimated the situation there. ..."
"... I'd say the neocons have Trump on the ropes. Perhaps he figures if he buys enough of their guns he can pacify them long enough to get some control back, I doubt he has any intention of firing those guns but hey, shit happens! ..."
"... a previous puppet of US, Yushchenko, was installed in Kiev with the help of the State Dept. and the CIA-supported and educated organizations like The National Endowment for Democracy (NED). http://www.fort-russ.com/2017/08/killing-europe-us-launches-sanctions.html ..."
"... Monsanto is already in charge of the Ukraine' agricultural lands. Splendid. http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2526593/ukraine_opens_up_for_monsanto_land_grabs_and_gmos.html ..."
Aug 04, 2017 | www.unz.com

In crafting the platform in Cleveland on which Donald Trump would run, America Firsters inflicted a major defeat on the War Party. The platform committee rejected a plank to pull us deeper into Ukraine, by successfully opposing new U.S. arms transfers to Kiev.

Improved relations with Russia were what candidate Trump had promised, and what Americans would vote for in November.

Yet, this week, The Wall Street Journal reports:

"The U.S. Pentagon and State Department have devised plans to supply Ukraine with antitank missiles and other weaponry and are seeking White House approval as Kiev battles Russia-backed separatists Defense Secretary Mattis has endorsed the plan."

As pro-Russia rebels in East Ukraine have armored vehicles, Kiev wants U.S. tank-killing Javelin missiles, as well as antiaircraft weapons. State and Defense want Trump to send the lethal weapons. This is a formula for a renewed war, with far higher casualties in Ukraine than the 10,000 dead already suffered on both sides. And it is a war Vladimir Putin will not likely allow Kiev to win.

If Ukraine's army, bolstered by U.S. weaponry, re-engages in the east, it could face a Moscow-backed counterattack and be routed, and the Russian army could take permanent control of the Donbass.

Indeed, if Trump approves this State-Defense escalation plan, we could be looking at a rerun of the Russia-Georgia war of August 2008.

Then, to recapture its lost province of South Ossetia, which had seceded in 1992, after Georgia seceded from Russia, Georgia invaded.

Putin sent his army in, threw the Georgians out, and recognized South Ossetia, as John McCain impotently declaimed, "We are all Georgians now!"

Wisely, George W. Bush ignored McCain and did nothing.

But about this new arms deal questions arise.

As the rebels have no aircraft, whose planes are the U.S. antiaircraft missiles to shoot down? And if the Russian army just over the border can enter and crush the Ukrainian army, why would we want to restart a civil war, the only certain result of which is more dead Ukrainians on both sides?

The Journal's answer: Our goal is to bleed Russia.

"The point of lethal aid is to raise the price Mr. Putin pays for his imperialism until he withdraws or agrees to peace. The Russians don't want dead soldiers arriving home before next year's presidential election."

Also going neocon is Mike Pence. In Georgia this week, noting that Russian tanks are still in South Ossetia, the vice president not only declared, "We stand with you," he told Georgians the U.S. stands by its 2008 commitment to bring them into NATO.

This would mean, under Article 5 of the NATO treaty, that in a future Russia-Georgia clash the U.S. could find itself in a shooting war with Russia in the South Caucasus.

Russia's security interests there seem clear. What are ours?

Along with Trump's signing of the new sanctions bill imposed by Congress, which strips him of his authority to lift those sanctions without Hill approval, these developments raise larger questions.

Is President Trump losing control of Russia policy? Has he capitulated to the neocons? These are not academic questions. For consider the architect of the new arms package, Kurt Volker, the new U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations.

A former CIA agent, member of the National Security Counsel, and envoy to NATO, Volker believes Russian troops in Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk are all there illegally -- and U.S. policy should be to push them out.

A former staffer of Sen. McCain, Volker was, until July, executive director of the neocon McCain Institute. He has called for the imposition of personal sanctions on Putin and his family and European travel restrictions on the Russian president. In the Journal this week, "officials" described his strategy:

"Volker believes that a change in Ukraine can be brought only by raising the costs for Moscow for continued intervention in Ukraine. In public comments, he has played down the notion that supplying weapons to Ukraine would escalate the conflict with Russia."

In short, Volker believes giving antitank and antiaircraft missiles to Ukraine will bring Putin to the negotiating table, as he fears the prospect of dead Russian soldiers coming home in caskets before his 2018 election. As for concerns that Putin might send his army into Ukraine, such worries are unwarranted. Volker envisions a deepening U.S. involvement in a Ukrainian civil war that can bleed and break Russia's Ukrainian allies and convince Putin to back down and accept what we regard as a just settlement.

Does Trump believe this? Does Trump believe that confronting Putin with rising casualties among his army and allies in Ukraine is the way to force the Russian president to back down and withdraw from Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk, as Nikita Khrushchev did from Cuba in 1962?

What if Putin refuses to back down, and chooses to confront?

Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of a new book, "Nixon's White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever."

Copyright 2017 Creators.com.

Ace , August 4, 2017 at 5:28 am GMT

E. Ukraine and Crimea would be part controlled by Ukraine and there would be no fighting in E. Ukraine today if Obama and Nuland had not interfered in Ukraine. Period.

The upheaval and deaths there are entirely our responsibility.

jilles dykstra , August 4, 2017 at 5:42 am GMT

If the following is true it is worth reading: https://www.rt.com/news/398490-us-main-global-threat-survey/

Wally , August 4, 2017 at 6:45 am GMT

@reiner Tor "Interestingly, it's never explained why Putin would fear his soldiers being killed before the election if he really was a dictator. Either he doesn't care much for the election or he's not really a dictator." Well said.

Wally , August 4, 2017 at 6:47 am GMT

@Taras77 Forget "neo con", call them what they are, Israel First

alexander , August 4, 2017 at 7:07 am GMT

Dear Mr. Buchanan, Had the Journal one small moment of "truth telling" then its goal would be crystal clear not to bleed Russia but to bleed the United States to utter insolvency through their endless stupid wars.. Just look at our nation's balance sheet to see the truth. Nearly FIFTEEN TRILLION DOLLARS of debt generated in a mere seventeen years.

What an utter disaster and total disgrace to our nation.

for-the-record , August 4, 2017 at 7:14 am GMT

Volker envisions a deepening U.S. involvement in a Ukrainian civil war that can bleed and break Russia's Ukrainian allies and convince Putin to back down and accept what we regard as a just settlement .

On the contrary, I think that Volker and others driving US policy are very well aware that Putin won't back down, and this is indeed what they want. A direct, permanent conflict with Russia which will leave it isolated from the "Western" world. A bit like track and field, where it increasingly looks like Russia will be permanently excluded from international competitions, and where Russian athletes will only be allowed to compete as "neutrals", under pain of exclusion if they as so much as sing the Russian national anthem in their hotel. And once the conflict heats up in Ukraine, look for a call to boycott the 2018 World Cup in Russia (as per the 1980 Olympics). The recent Confederations Cup in Russia was widely viewed as a considerable success, and received favorable reporting in much of the Western press, and this clearly can't be allowed to happen with the World Cup, the World's premier sporting event.

Captain Nemo , August 4, 2017 at 7:30 am GMT

And of course conflict with Russia has nothing to do with the proclaimed goal of containing an "agressive" Putin and Russia, which is a fallacious representation of Russia's actions and motives, and everything to do with maintaining the seemingly absolute World hegemony the USA gained after the collapse of the USSR. This fantasy of absolute hegemony is hard to let go for Neocons and Deep state, and they will cling to it with all their claws, even risking nuclear war for it .

The latest sanctions on Russia are an attempt to bleed Russia in another way, by pushing it out of the World economy, with the naive conviction that it would all end well if that plan succeeded

Anyone with an ounce of common sense realises that it would end terribly bad for all the parties involved.

The Alarmist , August 4, 2017 at 7:50 am GMT

@reiner Tor It's a confusion of the Soviet experience in Afghanistan with the defense of ethnic Russians standing up to a Yankee Puppet Regime trying to subjugate them. The coffins might well secure a landslide election for Putin in such a cause. The US may have seriously misunderestimated the situation there.

Priss Factor , Website August 4, 2017 at 8:22 am GMT

Ozzie done it. http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/03/jfk-assassination-lone-gunman-cia-new-files-215449

Renoman , August 4, 2017 at 9:10 am GMT

I'd say the neocons have Trump on the ropes. Perhaps he figures if he buys enough of their guns he can pacify them long enough to get some control back, I doubt he has any intention of firing those guns but hey, shit happens!

Sergey Krieger , August 4, 2017 at 9:22 am GMT

Expecting Russia to back down fearing causalities? It would be wise to check who has been backing down due to causalities first before making such conclusions. Here Russia security is concerned and causalities are acceptable. USA should be very worried not to take too much responsibilities along Russian borders because things can get hot and this is not the war USA can win. Lose it even small way and USA days as great power are over.

jacques sheete , August 4, 2017 at 9:36 am GMT

@Taras77

and never be held accountable

That's a huge flaw in "our" system. We really need to find good answers to that problem.

JL , August 4, 2017 at 9:51 am GMT

Both this article, and the problems it proposes to address, are based on deep and fundamental misunderstandings of Russia and its domestic politics. Russia has escalation dominance in the Ukrainian theater and will not only match, but exceed, any American provocation there, including the delivery of arms to the UAF. I believe Russia would have no problem with this development, as it would give them cover to increase, and perhaps make official, its support for the NDF.

As an aside, before their civil war, the Ukraine was perennially among the top five of the world's largest arms exporters. So lack of arms is not clearly not the problem. No, the problem is that those who are trained to use them are not particularly enthusiastic about fighting, and those that are enthusiastic about fighting are not particularly well trained. Not to mention that a lot of them are dead already.

As for Putin and the elections, the real risk for him is not soldiers coming home in bodybags. Russian mentality, and their general attitudes towards war, allow them to take losses perhaps like no one else in the world. No, the real political risk to Putin is not appearing to react strongly enough.

As it is, Russian public opinion would like him to take a tougher stance in facing down the Empire. The world should really be glad that Russia has such a patient and tolerant leader. Russia's next leader will lack the political capital that Putin has developed over the years, and will likely be much more aggressive in the defense of Russia's national interests. Those dreaming of Putin's exit should really be careful of what they wish for.

Randal , August 4, 2017 at 11:13 am GMT

@reiner Tor Silence, boy. The Emperor's suit is of surpassing magnificence, as all respectable folk agree.

isthatright , August 4, 2017 at 11:34 am GMT

@reiner Tor good point

War for Blair Mountain , August 4, 2017 at 11:42 am GMT

The Democratic Party

Mass murder of Conservative Christian Russians in the name of Homosexual-Pedophile-Tranny Rights

Democratic Party Family Values ..

War for Blair Mountain , August 4, 2017 at 11:47 am GMT

If Putin backs down to the neocons .he will very likely be overthrown by the Russian Military .I would like to know Comrade Saker's and Comrade SmothieX1′s view on this matter since they are both by many orders of magnitude more qualified to comment on this point that I have raised

Andoheb , August 4, 2017 at 12:03 pm GMT

Wonder if Russians could respond by arming Taliban

neutral , August 4, 2017 at 12:11 pm GMT

@for-the-record

look for a call to boycott the 2018 World Cup in Russia

That would never work, the USA could prevent their team from going and nobody would care, but there is no way they could make the rest of the world do this, to deprive people of such a big event would create an epic backfire for the neocons, even vassal states such as Germany or UK being told by the USA not to go with get the middle finger.

Astuteobservor II , August 4, 2017 at 12:11 pm GMT

putin will 100% not back down. this is not 1962. same reason why china would never allow NK to be taken over.

anonymous , Disclaimer August 4, 2017 at 12:34 pm GMT

Well, at least we're spared in his latest Mr. Buchanan's witlessly carrying around a bucket of "Russian hacking" BS.

But he still serves the Establishment. Note his habitual use of "we" in reference to the USG. People who self-identify with their rulers are essential for the warmongers. Isn't that why Americans are subjected to camouflage uniforms and "thank you for your service" spectacles at athletic events?

I can appreciate the author's desire to see himself and to be lauded as a "true conservative." But the fact is that he was part of the regime that was more successful only because it picked on Grenada and other relative weaklings. 99% of the people who live in this country shouldn't care less about who governs Ukraine, Korea, or any other place outside the lawful territory of the United States

More of us every day realize that the beat has been rolling on, no matter who is in nominal power in Washington, for a long, long time. Mr. Buchanan should take a couple more steps back. Maybe he will see that, too.

Andrei Martyanov , Website August 4, 2017 at 12:55 pm GMT

In short, Volker believes giving antitank and antiaircraft missiles to Ukraine will bring Putin to the negotiating table, as he fears the prospect of dead Russian soldiers coming home in caskets before his 2018 election.

1.There are NO cohesive Russian Armed Forces units (formations) in Donbass. Volunteers (aka "vacationers") from regular Russian Army? Sure, they are being paid well, plus Northern Wind. But it seems even Ukrainian Army's top brass admission that there are no Russian troops in Ukraine falls on a deaf ear. Evidently those in the "West" who continue to repeat this baloney have very little understanding of how real wars are fought and how real formations from company up to battalion and regiment level, not to speak of brigades or divisions, are deployed. Per personnel–neither DNR nor LNR have issues with mobilizing numbers.

2. Volker continues, if that are his real intentions, to demonstrate a complete lack of any strategic vision and following dead beat cliches–which are defining characteristics of D.C. "elites" who are completely removed from everyday realities, which actually matter, of the world. Nor are they competent in their assessments of the scale of the resources required for "bringing Putin to negotiating table". Even giving some Javelins (not to speak of TOWs) and Stinger-type weapons will only accelerate a demise of the Ukrainian Army and with it, of the current Kiev regime. But then again, considering level of US "diplomacy" in general, and Volker's in particular one can reasonably expect another FUBAR with dire consequences for both US and its clients.

Andrei Martyanov , Website August 4, 2017 at 1:02 pm GMT

@Astuteobservor II

putin will 100% not back down. this is not 1962. same reason why china would never allow NK to be taken over.

It has nothing, zilch, to do with Putin. It has everything to do with overwhelming majority of Russian people, whose blood was spilled on US and EU (NATO) money. The combined West and especially its pathetic Russian "academe" have no clue about cultural suicide West (US especially) has committed in Russia. It is my academic contention that US Russia's "scholarship" (with some few exceptions) knows next to zero about Russia and especially her 20th and 21st century history. It is an established scientific fact now. Overwhelming empirical evidence to support my claim is in place and easily accessible. It is also a major reason why US "power elites" are so dangerous–they miscalculate constantly, because they are incompetent.

Michael Kenny , August 4, 2017 at 1:08 pm GMT

If I have understood Mr Buchanan's writings correctly, his primary goal is the destruction of the EU, which he sees as a threat to US global hegemony. Putin is merely an American stooge to be used to promote that end in return for which he is to get such reward as the hegemonic US vouchsafes to grant him. The conundrum for the US hegemonists is that if Putin wins in Ukraine, then US global hegemony is irreversibly destroyed but if he loses, the hated EU is enormously strengthened, which in its turn destroys US global hegemony! Heads, the EU wins, tails, the US loses! The argument Mr Buchanan is challenging seems to be that taking Putin out will do less damage to US hegemony than allowing him to win. As for Putin, he has two choices. He can capitulate in return for some face-saving fudge that will fool nobody. That will probably destroy him politically with his elderly Soviet-generation supporters at home. Or he can start WWIII and lose or start WWIII, go nuclear and then lose. That too will destroy him at home. Thus, for US hegemonists who haven't yet accepted that Putin has "blown it" and can no longer serve as a battering ram to destroy the EU (and has, indeed, become a liability to the very US groups that initially backed him), the logical thing is to try to get the US to capitulate to Putin in the mistaken belief the the European members of NATO are incapable of fending off Putin's rickety military machine by themselves. That wholly misunderstands the strength of nationalism in Europe, the very same nationalism that the US hegemonists have been trying to whip up as (yet another!) battering ram to destroy the EU!

Harold Smith , August 4, 2017 at 1:27 pm GMT

"Is President Trump losing control of Russia policy? Has he capitulated to the neocons? [OR ARE WE NOW FORCED TO CONCLUDE THAT TRUMP'S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN WAS A CALCULATED FRAUD FROM THE BEGINNING]?"

There; I fixed it for you.

Ludwig Watzal , Website August 4, 2017 at 1:31 pm GMT

Political morons are running the US. Trump is not in control of any of his agencies or departments. All of them are hostile to him not to speak to Congress. which blocks any of his initiatives. What Vice President Mike Pence is talking about his trip in the Baltics or the other US satellite states, is irresponsible. It shows that Trump has lost control that is what the war party and the Republicans want. They will push Trump out of office and if it doesn't work some hired crazy will kill him like JFK. The real political gangsters are the members of the Deep State such as the CIA, NSA, the wider intelligence community, and the Clinton and Obama political mafia.

The suggestions made by Kurt Volker, the new U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations, are just beyond the pale for the Russians. For what Volker suggested, Trump should replace him. President Putin should not accept being fooled by the US any longer and just take the Donbas, period as he did with South Ossetia. If the US war-mongers in Washington want to go to war over Ukraine, they should try it. Putin should not allow the US to blackmail him further on.
Putin is not an imperialist or an aggressor, but the US Empire and its NATO satellites are.

Having conquered 75 per cent of the world's territories through over 700 US military bases, the real perpetrator is obvious. Putin should not back down against US aggression and provocation. Why should the US risk its destruction for a corrupt and criminal political leadership in Ukraine? Perhaps there are still some sane people within the Belt Way, although they are thin on the ground.

Seward , August 4, 2017 at 2:04 pm GMT

@JL As I've proposed in other fora, a simple, effective Russian response would be to proclaim a temporary protectorate over the Donbas republics of the Ukraine until such time as the Minsk II agreement is fulfilled, or renegotiated to the agreement to the concerned parties. (I.E., temporarily permanent.) A precedent would be the French protectorates Tunisia and Morocco, and the various analogous protectorates still exercised around the world (see Wikipedia). The proclamation should proclaim that Russia will retaliate against any artillery, missile, air, or naval attacks on the Donbas using forces located in Russian; and also against any ground attack across the cease-fire line using ground forces presently deployed in Russia, at the request of either Donbas republic. The U.S. and Nato would scream bloody murder of course, Congress would vote more meaningless sanctions, but the situation would stabilize permanently IMHO, perhaps after a few retaliatory barrages. It would be like the Crimea, a frozen conflict the Ukraine and the West know they cannot win short of WW3.

Sergey Krieger , August 4, 2017 at 2:10 pm GMT

@Andrei Martyanov And because they have not been hurt yet and have no clue as to what real hubris after failure coming home looks like.

anon , Disclaimer August 4, 2017 at 2:14 pm GMT

@Wally You are deluded. It's almost hopeless – but one last try- the policy of US global hegemony has nothing to do with Israel. It's been the goal of almost the entire foreign policy elite- including the WASP elite- since 1945. If you mistakenly insist on blaming Israel or its supporters for everything that is happening, you can't identify the real ideas and forces that are propelling us to disaster. That's why anti- Semitisn is such a disabling disease- it mentally cripples those who go down that path. But you won't listen or try to get out, so I'm wasting my breath.

anon , Disclaimer August 4, 2017 at 2:18 pm GMT

@Captain Nemo Your analysis is correct. Add in the liberal interventionists to the foreign policy groups seeking US global hegemony.

anon , Disclaimer August 4, 2017 at 2:20 pm GMT

@Captain Nemo Your analysis is correct. Add in the liberal interventionists to the foreign policy groups seeking US global hegemony.

Quartermaster , August 4, 2017 at 2:29 pm GMT

This is a formula for a renewed war, with far higher casualties in Ukraine than the 10,000 dead already suffered on both sides.

last I looked there is already a war. Nothing would be "renewed," as it is ongoing.

Volker envisions a deepening U.S. involvement in a Ukrainian civil war that can bleed and break Russia's Ukrainian allies and convince Putin to back down and accept what we regard as a just settlement.

It is not a civil war. That is a Putinist lie. Russian units are already on the ground in the Donbas and their casualties have been quite heavy. Russian troops have been captured, and they were in possession of their military ID and internal passports. "Cargo 200″ shipments have been rather heavy over the last 3 years, and parents of the troops killed have been asking about their kids.

The Ukrainians are willing to fight for themselves. They simply need the tools. Putin may not like the fact that the Ukrainians don't want any part of his renewed Russian Empire, but it need not involve our troops when the people are their are willing to fight.

annamaria , August 4, 2017 at 2:51 pm GMT

@Taras77 "The stupidity of Volker is astonishing but he is in keeping with his neo con associates "

This is not stupidity. This is the zioncon-inspired treason against US citizenry at large. McCain father, an admiral, got his fame for whitewashing the USSLiberty "accident," thus insulting the memory of American sailors who were wounded and died during the despicable Israeli attack. John McCain moniker, "Tokyo Rose," is not for nothing. Similarly, his open fraternization with Ukrainian neo-Nazis (on a cue from ziocons) is just a family tradition of profitable betrayal. McCain has been loyal to ziocons because the Lobby has become all-powerful in the US.
https://www.dailystormer.com/senile-traitor-john-mccain-claims-america-was-stronger-under-obama/ "McCain's entire political career has been based off of doing what's best for Israel and not America."

http://america-hijacked.com/2011/09/02/john-mccain-praises-fathers-whitewashing-of-israels-attack-on-the-uss-liberty/

http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-right/john-mccain-most-hypocritical-opportunistic-and-untrustworthy-senator

As for Volker, he is a regular opportunist who would sell the US for a right amount of money and power. Like boss, like servant.

Wally , Website August 4, 2017 at 2:52 pm GMT

@anon Another desperate hasbarist has spoken.

'Antisemitism' is simply a logical reaction to the lies, thievery, violence, destruction, and hate that is perpetrated and advocated by Jewish supremacists.

The '6M Jews' crap is falling part, BDS is breathing down their neck, & "that shitty little country" is doomed. Excellent.

"Alone the fact that one may not question the Jewish "holocaust" and that Jewish pressure has inflicted laws on democratic societies to prevent questions!while incessant promotion and indoctrination of the same averredly incontestable 'holocaust' occur!gives the game away. It proves that it must be a lie. Why else would one not be allowed to question it? Because it might offend the "survivors"? Because it "dishonors the dead"? Hardly sufficient reason to outlaw discussion. No, because the exposure of this leading lie might precipitate questions about so many other lies and cause the whole ramshackle fabrication to crumble."

- Gerard Menuhin / righteous Revisionist Jew, son of famous violinist

Must reads:
Holocaust Handbooks & Documentaries

http://holocausthandbooks.com/index.php?main_page=1

The '6M Jews, 5M others, & gas chambers' are scientifically impossible frauds.
see the 'holocaust' scam debunked here:

http://codoh.com

No name calling, level playing field debate here:

http://forum.codoh.com

The True Cost of Parasite Israel
Forced US taxpayers money to Israel goes far beyond the official numbers.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-true-cost-of-israel/

Israel's Dirty Little Secret
How it drives US policies exploiting a spineless Congress and White House

http://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/israels-dirty-little-secret/

Rurik , August 4, 2017 at 2:54 pm GMT

@Seward

proclaim a temporary protectorate over the Donbas republics of the Ukraine until such time as the Minsk II agreement is fulfilled, or renegotiated to the agreement to the concerned parties

but that all presumes the existence of some adherence to some principle of International Law or respect for such notions. When from the West, there are none anymore. The zio-West now destroys entire nations based on what everyone knows and accepts are blatant lies. The charade is over. Even the trappings of the illusion have been tossed aside, and the snarling zio-face of 'might = right' is now menacing the world.

A precedent would be the French protectorates

you're using the language of codified law, when there isn't any anymore

Russia will retaliate against any artillery, missile, air, or naval attacks on the Donbas using forces located in Russian;

the zio-fiend is salivating for any pretext it can use to act outraged and shocked, shocked! that today it has been proven true! Putin is Adolf Hitler and threatens the world with military tyranny! He must be stopped at all costs! John McCain and Lindsey Graham were right all along!! This man is a menace! and France and Germany and England are joining the ZUSA with immediate calls for Russia to desist and respect International Law and sovereign borders!!

'THIS WILL NOT STAND!'

blah, blah, blah

What Putin should do is tell the West/NATO to stop fomenting war on his borders, and if they really are going to keep pushing until Russia accepts its status as vassal state to Tel Aviv, (like the ZUSA and England and France and Germany obviously are), that before that happens, everyone should know that there's a certain 'shitty little state' in the middle east that can expect to be visited by a couple of Satan II ambassadors before Russia bows down like a mangy dog to the Jewish supremacist$ in Israel.

anonymous , Disclaimer August 4, 2017 at 3:01 pm GMT

@neutral ZioUSA did everything in its power to derail Sochi.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-burnett/boycott-the-winter-olympi_b_4439037.html

U.S. skeleton athletes seek boycott of Sochi championships
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-sport-doping-skeleton-usa-idUSKBN13U01H

U.S. Athletes Weigh a Boycott Over Russian Doping – The New York

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/04/sports/russian-doping-boycott-us-athletes.html

Should the US have boycotted the Sochi Olympics
http://www.debate.org › Opinions › Politics

Latvia skeleton team to boycott world championships in Russia | Sport
https://www.theguardian.com › Sports › Russia doping scandal

U.S. men's hockey players may boycott world championships in
http://www.chicagotribune.com/ /ct-us-men-may-boycott-hockey-world-championships-2 ;

U.S. women's hockey players to boycott world championships
http://www.chicagotribune.com/ /ct-womens-hockey-world-championships-boycott-20170 ;

Boycott the Winter Olympics | HuffPost
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-burnett/boycott-the-winter-olympi_b_4439037.html

Canada and U.S. should consider boycott of men's hockey in Sochi
archives.cerium.ca/Canada-should-boycott-men-s-hockey

for-the-record , August 4, 2017 at 3:02 pm GMT

@neutral That would never work, the USA could prevent their team from going and nobody would care, but there is no way they could make the rest of the world do this, to deprive people of such a big event would create an epic backfire for the neocons, even vassal states such as Germany or UK being told by the USA not to go with get the middle finger.

My point was that there will be a call to boycott the World Cup, hopefully you are right as to the outcome. After decades of being subservient vassals, it would be truly ironic if the ultimate wedge between the US and the "coalition of the willing" were to be sports, showing what is truly important in life

for-the-record , August 4, 2017 at 3:08 pm GMT

@Andrei Martyanov Nor are they competent in their assessments of the scale of the resources required for "bringing Putin to negotiating table".

Following up on an earlier post, I think you are misinterpreting Volker's objective (and those of his "fellow travelers"). They know very well that Putin won't "come to the table", in fact they don't want him to. What they want is to force him to intervene directly and openly, as in Syria, and then use this "invasion" to justify permanent pariah status for Russia. They don't care at all what happens to Ukraine, only that Russia is forced to act in a manner that will allow them to demonize it.

Rurik , August 4, 2017 at 3:17 pm GMT

They don't care at all what happens to Ukraine, only that Russia is forced to act in a manner that will allow them to demonize it.

bingo!

Mulegino1 , August 4, 2017 at 3:31 pm GMT

As Volker so trenchantly illustrates, corruption, stupidity, recklessness and ignorance are indispensable prerequisites for the wielding of influence in the Washington D.C. "national security" establishment. It is not so much a swamp as an open sewer.

Trump should have let the Russian sanctions bill become law without his signature. One of his major weaknesses is his being bedazzled by flag officers and brass. His chief national security adviser is a dead ringer for Aleister Crowley.

Andrei Martyanov , Website August 4, 2017 at 3:35 pm GMT

What they want is to force him to intervene directly and openly, as in Syria, and then use this "invasion" to justify permanent pariah status for Russia. They don't care at all what happens to Ukraine, only that Russia is forced to act in a manner that will allow them to demonize it.

It would have been a valid point should what you propose as a rationale hasn't been tried before–to no avail. Russia DOES have a proxy force in LDNR and, if and when necessary, may drastically "improve" its fighting capabilities. Considering the (what's known) present state of the Ukrainian Army (obviously a "strongest one in Europe(c)", wink, wink) I think the forces LDNR field currently are enough to prevent Kiev from attempting any large scale offensive. Having said all that, Poroshenko is desperate and he may try anything but political fallout for Russia, if to consider Russia's direct involvement, which will be very short and very bad for Ukraine, is being increasingly mitigated by Russia's Asian dynamics. Once Power of Siberia is operational (among other serious infrastructure projects at the Far East)–Europe can go to hell. But I am sure there are more aces and trump cards (no pun intended) up Russia's "sleeve". As per demonization: is it possible to demonize even more? I think Clapper has already established the fact that Russians are genetically inferior. So, concentration camps for Russians are in order at some point of time.

Harold Smith , August 4, 2017 at 4:03 pm GMT

@Ludwig Watzal "Political morons are running the US. Trump is not in control of any of his agencies or departments. All of them are hostile to him not to speak to Congress."

Would you agree with me that this pathetic situation obviously didn't happen by "accident"? It must be concluded that the Trump "presidency" is a Trojan horse. Trump's whole campaign was a calculated fraud from the beginning. That is, presidential poseur Trump ran with the intention of turning most general policy decisions, especially foreign policy, over to his Jewish-supremacist handlers, and letting them pick most if not all of his subordinates (or at least letting them have veto power over his choices).

Hood Canal Gardner , August 4, 2017 at 4:08 pm GMT

What has The Donald got for a 'good deal swap' for Afghanistan, ie Putin to pick up where they left-off in the 70s?

virgile , August 4, 2017 at 4:25 pm GMT

What is the USA's Achilleus heel where Russia, Iran or North Korea can inflict it the maximum pain?
Iraq? Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia? the Gulf countries? Japan? Israel?
It seems that North Korea already won as Tillerson now strongly denies that the USA is seeking a regime change there. It seems that the threat of nuclear is very effective in making the USA back down. Iran has proven on the ground in Syria that its missiles can easily reach Israel, that is why the USA rushed to inflict new sanctions. The USA seems to be building up a pretext ( or a false flag) to destroy Iran's missile development capabilities to protect Israel. Is Iran staying idle, or covertly threaten USA's local allies, the Gulf countries of possible retaliation? The Gulf countries are probably trying to prevent any attack on Iran. Japan did the same about North Korea, resulting in offers of negotiations. Will the Gulf countries have the same weight or the USA will take the chance of an all out war where it would have to intervene militarily again?
Now Russia will be watching Trump weakening and the neocons taking over. Is it a done game? who will rescue Trump? The American people who voted for him? will the USA fall into a civil war if Trump is threatened of impeachment?
I trust Trump will reach to the American people and win back his power.

Alden , August 4, 2017 at 5:36 pm GMT

@Harold Smith Hasn't every president since Johnson been an Israeli/APAIC front man?

jacques sheete , August 4, 2017 at 6:02 pm GMT

@Harold Smith

[OR ARE WE NOW FORCED TO CONCLUDE THAT TRUMP'S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN WAS A CALCULATED FRAUD FROM THE BEGINNING]?"

There; I fixed it for you.

You certainly did!

aaaa returns , August 4, 2017 at 6:03 pm GMT

@Michael Kenny The EU are doing a good job of destroying themselves. If the Central and Eastern countries continue to be bullied over migrants and bad economic deals, then maybe they'll rightly cut and run.

USA's soft-war against Europe was evident right after the 2008 economic bust, with Greece CDS's being targeted until capitulation. Then Hillary or whomever conned Europe into wrecking Libya, then Ukraine, then Syria, then the wave of migrants began..

It might sound ridiculous, but I am starting to think Erdogan has been a far better leader than Merkel or the clown car carousel of France. He's totally ruthless, and has been a supporter of terrorists, but his moves have been somewhat logical in the face of extreme crisis. Now he seems to have oriented Turkey to a relatively solid footing as far as I can see.

annamaria , August 4, 2017 at 6:07 pm GMT

@Rurik The destruction and rape of Ukraine had been planned already by the ZUSA when a previous puppet of US, Yushchenko, was installed in Kiev with the help of the State Dept. and the CIA-supported and educated organizations like The National Endowment for Democracy (NED). http://www.fort-russ.com/2017/08/killing-europe-us-launches-sanctions.html

"Back in 2010, Russia proposed creating a joint venture with Ukraine and unifying Gazprom's fields and Ukraine's gas pipelines. However, the pro-American leadership of Ukraine at the time (when Viktor Yushchenko, who led the country as a result of a color revolution, was president) rejected the project, seeing such as a "threat" to "national dignity", i.e., Ukraine's GTS [gas transport system]. The plan for "increasing Ukraine's energy security" contained in HR 3364 [concocted in the US] means turning Ukraine into a transit monopolist under the control of American companies. Accepting the Americans' conditions is economically disadvantageous to Russia and renders it politically dependent on the unpredictable transit that is Ukraine. If this act is implemented, American energy companies will be able to participate in the privatization of Ukraine's GTS (as provided by the Third Energy Package) and profit off of the transport of gas across Ukrainian territory. Thus, the main revenue from transiting Russian gas would not go to the Ukrainians, but to their overseas overlord."

Very clear. The natives can go die out peacefully without making any unnecessary noise re "sovereignty," "national interests" and other trifles that are of no interests for the US corporations.

Monsanto is already in charge of the Ukraine' agricultural lands. Splendid. http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2526593/ukraine_opens_up_for_monsanto_land_grabs_and_gmos.html

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has been chaired by Carl Gershman, the ziocon who has been president since NED was founded in 1983.

http://www.voltairenet.org/article192992.html

https://journal-neo.org/2015/08/03/national-endowment-for-democracy-is-now-officially-undesirable-in-

SolontoCroesus , August 4, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMT

@Alden

Hasn't every president since Johnson been an Israeli/APAIC front man?

technicalities.

Woodrow Wilson was under control of zionists, most notably, in the person of Louis Brandeis & his claque.

Franklin D Roosevelt was most certainly under the control of zionists/Jews -- Felix Frankfurter, Bernard Baruch, and the Morgenthaus, pater et fil plus their acolytes and syanim, exerted enormous power over FDR. Eisenhower owed most of his power/authority to doing things that pleased zionist/Jewish string-pullers who maneuvered FDR

as you say, LBJ for sure was more committed to keeping the gawd's chozen happy than to protecting the interests of the American people.

Based on a review on "The American Empire Project" of a book by Nathan Thrall, titled "The Only Language they Understand," http://americanempireproject.com/blog/the-only-language-they-understand-by-nathan-thrall/ , Jimmy Carter probably did more to turn USA over to the zionists than even LBJ: this is surprising because, as the review notes, Carter initially took a hard line on Israel, demanding early on that Israel halt settlement-building, and arguing forcefully that Palestinians deserved protection of their territorial and all other rights.

When Carter's other activities vis a vis Jews are correlated with the actions Thrall describes, I think -- should say speculate -- that Carter was out-maneuvered by the zionists: it was Carter who gave Jews the opening to create the holocaust museum in Washington, DC -- in other words, it may be that Carter allowed the Trojan Horse to be rolled through the gates of the USA and to stand at USA's front door.
The Jews got what they wanted, but Carter's demands were not only ignored, they -- and he -- were cast aside.

Harold Smith , August 4, 2017 at 6:57 pm GMT

@Alden "Hasn't every president since Johnson been an Israeli/APAIC front man?"

Obviously. But the tenor of Ludwig Watzal's post seems to be that Trump, other than perhaps being "weak" or "incompetent" is not at fault.

I agree with him that technically, Trump probably isn't "in control", but that's apparently what Trump agreed to when he and his handlers set out to defraud all of us.

annamaria , August 4, 2017 at 7:02 pm GMT

What made Mueller such a great asset for the deep state?

https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/06/08/comey-and-mueller-russiagates-mythical-heroes/

"Long before he became FBI Director, serious questions existed about Mueller's role as Acting U.S. Attorney in Boston in effectively enabling decades of corruption and covering up of the FBI's illicit deals with mobster Whitey Bulger and other "top echelon" informants who committed numerous murders and crimes. When the truth was finally uncovered through intrepid investigative reporting and persistent, honest judges, U.S. taxpayers footed a $100 million court award to the four men framed for murders committed by (the FBI-operated) Bulger gang . Mueller's FBI was also severely criticized by Department of Justice Inspector Generals finding the FBI overstepped the law improperly serving hundreds of thousands of "national security letters" to obtain private (and irrelevant) metadata on citizens, and for infiltrating nonviolent anti-war groups under the guise of investigating "terrorism."

Mueller knew that Vice President Dick Cheney's claims connecting 9/11 to Iraq were bogus yet he remained quiet. Mueller didn't speak the truth about a war he knew to be unjustified. He didn't speak out against torture. He didn't speak out against unconstitutional surveillance. And he didn't tell the truth about 9/11.
He is just "their man."

EugeneGur , August 4, 2017 at 7:35 pm GMT

@Quartermaster You sound like you copied this statement from a Ukrainian propaganda site.

Sure thing, thousands of Donbass people fighting in the militia do not exists but Russia troops nobody has been able to see or photograph do. I have the utmost respect for the Russian military capabilities but I do not think they've developed a clocking device as yet.

And, of course, going to a secret military mission, you should never forget to bring along you internal passport and military ID. Heavy losses, really? We know people who died in Donbass by name – and they aren't Russia soldiers. Oh, you forgot about buryats – no picture of the Russia invasion could be complete without byuryat motorized divisions invading Donbass.

You may not like it but this is a civil war brought about by the idiotic policies of the scumbags the West put in charge of Ukraine. As to the tools, bring them over – they'll end up in the hands of the Donbass militia in no time. You see, "Ukrainians are willing to fight for themselves" mostly on the pages of Facebook. Those that do go to the Army, mostly do it for money. The situation in today's Ukraine is so desperate, killing one's former compatriots is about the only way for a man to make a living.

Rurik , August 4, 2017 at 7:36 pm GMT

@annamaria all true anna

they've had their devil's tentacles in Ukraine for quite some time. When you mentioned the word 'trifles', I was reminded of what the Israeli/"Ukrainian" oligarch said about the people on MH17. He called their deaths a 'trifle', as he mentions that the wrong plane was shot down. Presumably his merc was sent up to shoot Putin's plane down and he shot the wrong one down (which would explain the machine gun holes).

this video has been scrubbed from most of the internet, and most of the ones you click on will say 'this video has been removed'

https://youtu.be/-TmarLwobzs

yeah , August 4, 2017 at 7:57 pm GMT

@reiner Tor Interestingly, it's never explained why Putin would fear his soldiers being killed before the election if he really was a dictator. Either he doesn't care much for the election or he's not really a dictator. Good catch! The pity is that people who have made up their minds (or have had theirs made up for them) about Putin being a dictator will not see the wit and logical beauty of your argument. They are quite likely to write you off as another Russian-stooge and dig in their heels even further. Here is a short farcical satire about our times.

Good, obedient citizen: Please Guvm'nt, help me. I can't sleep at night 'cause I fear there may be a red under my bed waiting to choke me to death.

Guvm'nt: Don't worry lad. We watch your house, we monitor your mail. We watch you and yours. We know when you pee and we watch who comes in and out of your house. No one can even breathe without our being in the know.

Good citizen: Ah thank God! Thanks for preventing a red under my bed. I can now sleep in peace.

[Jul 30, 2017] If Western Ukrainian nationalists armed squads would have entered Crimea, and it would have been just as bad as Donetsk, etc., with thousands killed. If you research the US/UK techniques used during the 1953 Iranian coup, you'll see that the 2013-14 Ukrainian coup was very close to being an exact duplicate.

Notable quotes:
"... I don't care about Russians or Ukrainians, but this is a strange law without any value however "no part of the country can decide it's parting without the voting of the whole country". So if I command an independence movement and we gain freedom by armed fighting, under Ukranien law we will still not be free even if there is no chance for state to recover what he lost. So I need to wait until Ukrainian Parliament vote. Is like saying US is not free from UK despite beating the British, because UK Parliament never voted to give independence to US. ..."
"... According to Soviet laws any republic that is leaving USSR must hold referendum in its autonomous regions if they quit USSR or quit this republic. Not only Ukraine failed to hold it, when Crimeans started preparation Ukraine violently squashed them. That started illegal Ukrainian occupation of Crimea 1992-2014. ..."
"... If you research the US/UK techniques used during the 1953 Iranian coup, you'll see that the 2013-14 Ukrainian coup was very close to being an exact duplicate. ..."
Jul 30, 2017 | nationalinterest.org
АТО -> Willem Post , July 29, 2017 7:06 PM

Willem Post:: "Crimea already was an independent state within Ukraine"

haha! One more moron arrived! What a crap! Crimea wasn't independent, it was an autonomy within Ukraine. Crimea's annexation was prepared by Putin since 2004, i.e. 10 years earlier before it happened in real! And this is told to the world not by Ukrainians, but the Putin's former adviser Andrey Illarionov.

Steve James -> АТО , July 29, 2017 11:23 PM

The day the coup took over Kiev and abolished the Ukrainian Constitution, Crimea became independent. And voted for independence. Crimea wanting to be part of Russia since 1991. Crimea was giving to Ukraine under the USSR illegally, there is no VOTE under the DUMA that voted Crimea to be part of Ukraine. The fall of the USSR, Crimea people wanted to be Russian. And they voted this in 1991 and again in 1994. V. Putin wasnt in office until 1999. Crimea today is far better under Russia, because nearly 25 years under Ukraine it was neglected. Crimea is Russia...move. Ukraine ought to stop bombing Donbass or they'll be independent from Ukraine as well.

Michael DeStefano -> АТО , July 30, 2017 12:40 AM

Splitting hairs, are we now? au·ton·o·mous: (of a country or region) having self-government, at least to a significant degree.

Octavian Matei -> АТО , July 29, 2017 8:14 PM

I don't care about Russians or Ukrainians, but this is a strange law without any value however "no part of the country can decide it's parting without the voting of the whole country". So if I command an independence movement and we gain freedom by armed fighting, under Ukranien law we will still not be free even if there is no chance for state to recover what he lost. So I need to wait until Ukrainian Parliament vote. Is like saying US is not free from UK despite beating the British, because UK Parliament never voted to give independence to US.

Michael DeStefano -> Octavian Matei , July 30, 2017 12:35 AM

"no part of the country can decide it's parting without the voting of the whole country"

When Yugoslavia was dismantled under US encouragement and with little consequence, if any, to the civil wars that would follow, such laws as the above ceased to exist.

It did the same in Ukraine. A coup d'etat using banderite thugs for the final coup de grace. Did Nuland or McCain or anyone else in Washington care if it led to a bloody aftermath that frankly, any schoolboy could have predicted? They cared about their agenda, period and d@mn the consequences.

Willem Post Michael DeStefano , July 30, 2017 12:02 PM

Their agenda, since 1945, has been to get Russia out of East Europe and the Caucasus, and have the Black Sea become a NATO lake.

The Arioch -> АТО , July 29, 2017 11:25 AM

According to Soviet laws any republic that is leaving USSR must hold referendum in its autonomous regions if they quit USSR or quit this republic. Not only Ukraine failed to hold it, when Crimeans started preparation Ukraine violently squashed them. That started illegal Ukrainian occupation of Crimea 1992-2014.

And that is not mentioning Sevastopole city.

Swiss_Talk -> The Arioch , July 29, 2017 2:44 PM

Tell me what happened to Chechen referendum

VadimKharichkov -> Swiss_Talk , July 29, 2017 6:39 PM

The Khasavyurt Accord granted vast amount of independence to Chechen Republic back in 1996. But infact Chenchnya broke apart into regions held by local clan warlords, who were making money on contraband, crudely refining petroleum into gasoline, kidnapping people for ransom from neighboring Russian regions. The republic has also become a hotbed of religious extremism that culmitated in Shamil Basaev's invasion into Dagestan region.

Do some research before mentioning things, because these two cases are hardly compatible.

Michael DeStefano -> VadimKharichkov , July 30, 2017 12:51 AM

Yep, the Saudis enthusiastically sought to turn Chechnya into what they've managed to turn Syria into today, with more than a little help from its 'friends'.

shmaktastic -> Swiss_Talk , July 29, 2017 4:13 PM

there were none.

Michael DeStefano -> Swiss_Talk , July 30, 2017 1:04 AM

Tell me what happened to the Ukrainian referendum that decided to oust the old president by force instead of waiting a few months to vote him out or at the least, impeach him constitutionally. Hmmm? Cat got your tongue now? Thought so.

Steve James -> Swiss_Talk , July 29, 2017 11:27 PM

Chechen had a referendum, and it was successful. Not only Chechnya has more autonomy power, but they have a elected office to represent Chechnya in Moscow. Today, Chechnya has been peaceful with Gronzy growing. Not to mention, many Chechen soldiers are fighting side by side with the Russian government in Syria.

Michael DeStefano -> The Arioch , July 30, 2017 12:47 AM

I've always wondered why the US seems always to rush to uphold the edicts of previous Soviet rulers as sacrosanct. Stalin with S. Ossetia and Krushchev with Crimea.

I've also always wondered why all of the nations of Eastern Europe, sans Poland, that the US seems to favor are those who were enthusiastic collaborators and co-combatants with Hitler's troops in WWII. Croatia, Bosnia, Albania, the Baltic States and now Ukraine.

Seems rather odd to me, maybe even a bit telling.

АТО The Arioch , July 29, 2017 11:44 AM

The Arioch: "According to Soviet laws..." What a crap! Ukraine as well as Russia and Belarus founded the USSR! And all the three listed above discontinued it.

As for soviet laws...Just well known thing: Hitler came to power absolutely legally and what he ended up with?

Once more: USSR was founded under machine guns (the same with Crimea so-called referendum)

grumpy_carpenter -> АТО , July 29, 2017 1:02 PM

"USSR was founded under machine guns (the same with Crimea so-called referendum)"

This is refreshing. The USSR was indeed founded by un-godly terrorists ..... I mean what country can claim legitimacy unless founded peacefully on rule of law.

Now that this is clear I expect the USA to return the thirteen colonies to Britain as at the earliest possible convenience and we can begin discussion reparations.

Willem Post -> АТО , July 29, 2017 5:04 PM

The US was founded with guns as well. It is called the Revolutionary War.

shmaktastic -> АТО , July 29, 2017 4:14 PM

You don't even understand what kind of crap you wrote do you?

The Arioch -> АТО , July 29, 2017 11:54 AM

They could be among ones who founded it. But they were not only members of it. There was legal and illegal way to exit USSR. Ukraine, Russia and Belarus chosen illegal way. For Kiev it was a tool to press illegal occupation over Sevastopole and Crimea. Which lasted more long that it was needed, but ended in 2014.

And you are correct about Hitler. When finally breaking out of that Lenin built jail of nations called Ukraine, Crimeans were to give Poroshenko's laws about as much respect as Hitler's laws were worth.

АТО -> The Arioch , July 29, 2017 3:23 PM

The Arioch: "Lenin built jail of nations called Ukraine" What a crap again! Lenin built jail of nations called USSR, that's right! "Crimeans were to give Poroshenko's laws about as much respect as Hitler's laws were worth."

You're just a moron!

Poroshenko became an Ukrainian president after Russia annexed Crimea

DAVE -> АТО , July 30, 2017 9:46 AM

AMERICAN.MEXICAN .WAR.1846 THE LAND GRAB BY THE AMERICANS ALMOST HALF OF THE U.S.A. TODAY.

shmaktastic -> АТО , July 29, 2017 10:35 PM

Lenin actually is the guy who created Ukraine, No Lenin, no Ukraine.

VadimKharichkov -> АТО , July 30, 2017 12:41 PM

By stating this you're implying Soviets usurped the power. This is not true. To begin with, Soviets, or Councils were trade unions and they formed themselves as an alternative to czarist ruling institutions during WW1 and February and October Revolutions. They were grassroots all right. Both Soviets and Bolsheviks enjoyed high appeal among regular people because they offered solutions to very tough questions regarding land ownership (taking it from aristocrats) and large business (taking it from oligarchs into collective ownership).

Eventually the Red Army managed to defeat 17 armies during the Civil War. That wouldn't have been possible without wide support among the people. Sure there was the Red Terror unleashed after several assasination attempts on Soviet leadership. But frankly, as tragic as it is, tough times demand tough measures.

Michael DeStefano -> АТО , July 30, 2017 12:56 AM

So, if you don't recognize Soviet laws, then you don't recognize Soviet edicts and you cannot legitimately recognize Krushchev's edict handing Crimea to Ukraine's jurisdiction, which btw..his son has explained that it was just a simple transfer to Ukraine of full management of construction of the water canal to Crimea. A water canal which, along with electricity, has now been dammed by Ukraine, so apparently, the job is finished.

АТО -> Michael DeStefano , July 30, 2017 5:17 AM

Michael DeStefano: "A water canal which, along with electricity, has now been dammed by Ukraine"

The next moron arrived!

Crimea is occupied by Russian troops, (proved by Putin himself).

Tell yourself, Russian troll: did Stalin supplied the territories occupied by Hitler during WWII? Maybe Stalin sent there foods, electricity etc?

So, why does Ukraine should supply the territories occupied by Russia with any resources?

Willem Post АТО , July 30, 2017 12:09 PM

ATO,
Russia and Ukraine have an agreement that allows Russia to have 22,000 armed services members in Crimea. The Russia presence before the annexing was LEGAL by treaty.

Errick458 -> АТО , July 29, 2017 7:25 PM

Under Ukrainian law Viktor Yanukovych was never legally removed from office. His removal and replacement was a violation of the Ukrainian Constitution.

Willem Post -> Errick458 , July 30, 2017 12:02 PM

Russia picked up phone call traffic that was planning his assassination. He fled to save his life.

Strategem -> АТО , July 30, 2017 1:00 PM

Remember Texas ? A century in history of diplomatic relations means nothing. Right of self determination can not be selective.

Michael DeStefano -> Willem Post , July 29, 2017 10:14 AM

If you research the US/UK techniques used during the 1953 Iranian coup, you'll see that the 2013-14 Ukrainian coup was very close to being an exact duplicate.

[Jul 28, 2017] New victims of Ukrainian civil war. Nuland should be proud of her accomplishments and Obama for sure deserves his Novel Peace price now

Jul 28, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Pavlo Svolochenko , July 25, 2017 at 8:09 pm

http://www.russiadefence.net/t5484p900-the-situation-in-the-ukraine-26#200208

In short, some sort of battle in the Krasnogorovka sector, which the Ukrainian forces lost:

"Here is a chronicle of events:

On the night from Thursday to Friday, from 13 to 14 July, the APU opened a mortar shell at Staromikhaylovka. I emphasize, not our positions, namely residential buildings. Two houses were damaged. One civilian was wounded. In the morning there was a report of the correspondent of VGTRK Alexander Sladkov.
– On the night from Friday to Saturday from 14 to 15 July, the shelling was repeated, but already more powerful, artillery worked.
– On Saturday evening, July 15, again, there was artillery shelling.
– On Sunday evening, July 16, again shelling and again destroyed houses in Staromikhaylovki.
– In the morning there was a report about the press service of the NM DNR.
– In the night from Monday to Tuesday 17 on 18 July, a civilian died in Staromikhaylovka, one more civilian was killed and another two were injured, another civilian was injured in Kuibyshev district.
– On Tuesday, July 18th, that part of the front was quiet.
– But on Wednesday July 19, Thursday July 20 and until Friday July 21, every evening and night Petrovsky district, Staromikhailovka Kirov district and the Kuibyshev district was subjected to strong mortar and artillery strikes. Every day there were wounded civilians, as well as destroyed houses and infrastructure.

Most likely, from 19 to 20 July, an order was given to suppress the mortar and artillery batteries of the APU with available means, which have been killing civilians and military republics for a week already. The next day, Ukrainian media filled the news with the fact that Novorussians attacked their positions and even beaten something there. Reported about the many dead servicemen of the Armed Forces and so on. Although according to the information provided by the Ukrainian media, 9 soldiers were quoted, and only 4 were killed in the Krasnogorovka district.

Notice in the Svetlodarsk arc area in December 2016, they had killed 80 soldiers and injured more than 200, but there was a silence in the Ukrainian media. The same situation occurred with the exacerbation of the YaBP in January 2017, there were also many deaths of about 60 servicemen and about 120 were wounded and were also quiet.

And here 9 was lost on all 450 km to the front and such attention."

As always, not the least indication that the Ukrainian forces have upped their game since February 2015...

[Jul 27, 2017] Kaboom! Exposion at Ukranian Ammo Depot at Balsklea, neat Kharkiv

Jul 27, 2017 | youtu.be

The ammo dump is just 60 miles from the Russian/Ukrainian border, where fighting recently took place.

https://youtu.be/MpwEZ_9VLD8

a series of titanic explosions at Balakliya, a military base in Eastern Ukraine.

Amateur video of the incident posted on YouTube shows a raging fire spewing out of control artillery rockets, and an explosion and shockwave that sent civilians nearby reeling.

[Jul 26, 2017] America or Israel by Philip Giraldi

Notable quotes:
"... I find it troublesome that the US military or associated agencies are so interwoven with Israeli state forces and institutions. In my assessment, such intense interrelationships violate George Washington's counsels in his Farewell Address, just as surely as Mast's attitudes invert the counsels of Christianity. ..."
"... Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump 28 Dec 2016 "We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect. They used to have a great friend in the U.S., but not anymore. The beginning of the end was the horrible Iran deal, and now this (U.N.)! Stay strong Israel, January 20th is fast approaching! " ..."
"... I'm neither Disaspora-Jewish nor Evangelical Christian, and I'm behind Israel 100 percent. The problem in the Holy Land is this: two objects occupying--or claiming to occupy--the same space. That's impossible, so you have to pick one. I pick Israel. ..."
"... Our youth are often sacrificed to foreign wars fought for immoral causes - witness Vietnam and Iraq. ..."
"... George Washington and his fellow European settler-colonists did to the indigenous people of North America what Jewish European settler-colonists did to the indigenous people of the Levant. (To be fair, though, the Zionists, if only for lack of opportunity, did not capture, import, and permanently enslave millions of people from another land.) ..."
"... It's noteworthy that both Zionists and Nazis invoked the "American" treatment of the indigenous population to justify their own crimes. As Israeli historian Benny Morris said back in 2004, "Even the great American democracy could not have been created without the annihilation of the Indians." ..."
"... So invoking the settler-colonial nationalism of the slave owner and murdering land-stealer, George Washington, is something Zionists, not their opponents, can do honestly. ..."
"... This is a ridiculous, and all too common argument from Jews – the land of the U.S. was stolen from the natives so Americans can't say anything about Israel stealing Palestine from Palestinians. ..."
"... First of all, the native people of North America were literally living in the stone age when Whites showed up and their lives have been made immeasurably better thanks to the inventions and largesse of the White man. In contrast, Palestinians have done nothing but suffer under Israeli rule. ..."
"... Second, native North Americans are subsidized to the point of billions of dollars every year and receive every possible benefit from the government (and taxpaying Whites). Free health care, education and every form of affirmative action that's ever been dreamt up are all theirs for the taking. Tell us friend, does the Jewish state extend this to Palestinians as it does to Jews? ..."
Jan 04, 2017 | www.unz.com

I am reluctant to write about the "Israel problem" at the heart of U.S. foreign policy two weeks in a row but it seems that the story just will not go away as the usual suspects pile on the Barack Obama Administration over its alleged betrayal of America's "best and greatest friend and ally in the whole world."

Even as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his gaggle of war criminals continue to foam at the mouth over the United Nations vote it is, in truth, difficult to blame Israel for what is happening. The Israelis are acting on what they see as their self interest in dominating their neighbors militarily and having a free hand to deal with the Palestinians in any way they see fit. And as for their relationship with Washington, what could be better than getting billions of dollars every year, advanced weapons and unlimited political cover in exchange for absolutely nothing?

Surely even Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knows that the settlements are illegal under international law and are an impediment to any peaceful resolution with the Palestinians, which is what Resolution 2334 says. It has been U.S. policy to oppose them since they first starting popping up like mushrooms, but Netanyahu has encouraging their expansion in full knowledge that he is creating facts on the ground that will be irreversible. He has also pledged to his voters that he will not permit the creation of a Palestinian state, so why should anyone be confused about his intentions?

Daniel Larison over at The American Conservative summed up the situation perfectly, observing that "Calling out Israel for its ongoing illegal behavior becomes unavoidable when there is no progress in resolving the conflict, and the current Israeli government has made it very clear that there won't be any progress Israel isn't actually an ally, much less a 'vital' one, and it certainly isn't 'critical' to our security. The U.S. isn't obliged to cater to some of the worst policies of a client government that has increasingly become a liability. The real problem with the U.S. abstention on the resolution is that it came many years after it might have done some significant good, and it comes so late because Obama wasted his entire presidency trying to 'reassure' a government that undermined and opposed him time and again."

So stop blaming Israel for acting selfishly, since that is the nature of the beast, as in the fable of the frog and the scorpion. More to the point, it is the American Quislings who should be the focus of any examination of what is taking place as they are deliberately misrepresenting nearly every aspect of the discussion and flat out lying about what might actually be at stake due to Washington's being shackled to Netanyahu's policies. I will leave it to the reader to decide why so many U.S. politicians and media talking heads have betrayed their own country's interests in deference to the shabby arguments being put forward on behalf of an openly apartheid theocracy, but I might suggest that access to money and power have a lot to do with it as the Israel Lobby has both in spades.

The Quislings are making two basic arguments in their defense of surrendering national sovereignty to a troublesome little client state located half a world away. First, they are claiming that any acknowledgement that the Israelis have behaved badly is counterproductive because it will encourage intransigence on the part of the Arabs and thereby diminish prospects for a viable peace agreement, which has to be negotiated between the two parties. Second, the claim is being made that the abstention on the U.N. vote violates established U.S. policy on the nature of the conflict and, in so doing, damages both Israeli and American interests. Bloomberg's editorial board has conjoined the two arguments, adroitly claiming in an over-the-top piece entitled "Obama's Betrayal of Israel at the U.N. Must Not Stand" that the abstention "breaks with past U.S. policy, undermines a vital ally and sets back the cause of Middle East peace."

Citing the damaged peace talks argument, which is what the Israeli government itself has been mostly promoting, Donald Trump denounced the U.N. resolution from a purely Israeli perspective, stating that "As the United States has long maintained, peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians will only come through direct negotiations between the parties, and not through the imposition of terms by the United Nations. This puts Israel in a very poor negotiating position and is extremely unfair to all Israelis." He subsequently added "We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect," a comment that just might be regarded as either tongue in cheek or ironic because that is precisely how Israel treats Washington. It is reported, however, that Trump does not do irony.

The pundits who most often scream the loudest in defense of Israel are often themselves Jewish, many having close ties to the Netanyahu government. They would undoubtedly argue that their ethno-religious propinquity to the problem they are discussing does not in any way influence their views, but that would be nonsense. One of those persistently shouting the loudest regarding the "peace" canard is the ubiquitous Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz, who has never seen anything in Israel that he dislikes. He commented that Obama had stabbed Israel in the back and had made "peace much more difficult to achieve because the Palestinians will now say 'we can get a state through the U.N.'"

Syndicated columnist and fellow Israeli zealot Charles Krauthammer added his two cents , noting that the resolution abstention had meant that Washington had "joined the jackals at the U.N." Observing that the U.N. building occupies "good real estate in downtown New York City Trump ought to find a way to put his name on it and turn it into condos." Iran-Contra's own Elliot Abrams, who opposes Jews marrying non-Jews, meanwhile repeats the Krauthammer "jackals" meme and also brays about the "abandonment of Israel at the United Nations."

But the prize for pandering to Jewish power and money has to go to the eminent John Bolton, writing on December 26 th about "Obama's Parting Betrayal of Israel" in The Wall Street Journal (there is a subscription wall but if you go to Google and search you can get around it). Bolton, an ex-Ambassador to the U.N under the esteemed George W. Bush, is a funny looking guy who reportedly did not get a position with the Trump administration because of his Groucho Marx moustache. He currently pontificates from the neocon American Enterprise Institute (AEI) where he is something called a senior fellow. He has written a book "Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad," which is available for 6 cents used on Amazon, plus shipping. There is another John Bolton who wrote "Marada the She-Wolf," but they are apparently not related.

In his piece, Bolton hit on both the peace talks and the "I'm backing Israel arguments." He uniquely starts out by claiming that Barack Obama "stabbed Israel in the front" by failing to stop Resolution 2334, which he then describes as "clearly intended to tip the peace process towards the Palestinians abandon[ing] any pretense that the actual parties to the conflict must resolve their differences." That's the peace argument plus the negotiations fiction rolled together. He then goes on to argue that Obama has betrayed Israel by "essentially endors[ing] the Palestinian politico-legal narrative about territory formerly under League of Nations' mandate."

Bolton concedes that the damage has already been done by Obama's complicity "in assaulting Israel" and the opening can be exploited by what he describes as the "anti-Israeli imagineers" at the United Nations. He calls on Donald Trump to work to "mitigate or reverse" such consequences and specifically "move to repeal the resolution, giving the 14 countries that supported it a chance to correct their error." That they cheered loudly when the resolution passed apparently will have to also be somehow expunged, though Bolton does not mention that. Nations that refuse to go along with the repeal "would have their relations with Washington adjusted accordingly" while "the main perpetrators in particular should face more tangible consequences."

Bolton is unhesitatingly placing Israeli priorities ahead of American interests by his willingness to punish actual U.S. allies like Britain, Germany and France, as well as major powers Russia and China, out of pique over their vote against the settlements. He also recommends withholding the U.S. contributions to the U.N., which amount to over 20% of the budget. Bolton then goes on to reject any Palestinian state of any kind, recommending instead that a rump version of territory where the bulk of the Palestinians will be allowed to live be transferred to Jordanian control.

As always, there is scant attention paid by any of the Israel boosters for actual American interests in continuing to perform proskynesis in front of Netanyahu and whatever reptile might succeed him. American values and needs are invisible, quite rightly, because they are of no interest to John Bolton and his fellow knee jerkers at AEI, the Hudson Institute, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), Brookings, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and the rest of the alphabet soup that depends on the generosity of pro-Israel donors to keep the lights on.

Bolton provides precisely one short sentence relating to Washington's stake in the game being played, noting that the U.N. abstention poses "major challenges for American interests." He never says what those interests are because there are none, or at least none that matter, apart from godfathering a viable two state solution which Israel has basically made impossible. And that is only an interest because it would lessen much of the world's disdain for U.S. hypocrisy while mitigating the radicalization of young Muslims turned terrorists who are in part enraged by the Israeli treatment of the Palestinians, blaming it correctly on American connivance. In reality having the U.S. finally vote on the side of sanity and fairness is really a good thing for Americans and hopefully will lead to severing a bizarre "special relationship" that supports a kleptocracy in Asia that has been nothing but trouble.

Randal , January 3, 2017 at 12:06 pm GMT

The pundits who most often scream the loudest in defense of Israel are often themselves Jewish, many having close ties to the Netanyahu government. They would undoubtedly argue that their ethno-religious propinquity to the problem they are discussing does not in any way influence their views

And their disingenuous declarations are now arguably backed by force of law in the UK, where referring to the potential for mixed loyalties on the part of jewish people in relation to the jewish nation falls within the "official definition of anti-Semitism" recently adopted as a result of despicable pandering by politicians at the very highest levels.

n230099 . January 3, 2017 at 12:57 pm GMT

" and it comes so late because Obama wasted his entire presidency "

LOL!! And yet still a God to some. He was supposed to get the U.S. out of the region. Now the trail he and the war criminals Bush, Rumsfeld, Clinton, Kerry, Rice and Power leave is lined with more dead civilians than have died on either side in Palestine and Israel since 48. Israeli/Palestinian issues are not without some significance but pale in the scope of the war crimes of the U.S in the past 16 years. Millions dead and all we hear is 'f'n Jews' .

• Replies: @uslabor US General Wesley Clark said in 2002 he was given a memo "that describes how we're going to take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran." Every one of those countries a potential enemy of Israel.

I think, in addition to the obvious oil resources, the US attacked those countries for the benefit of Israel.

It ain't so much, as you say "f'n Jews". For me it is F*cking Zionist Israelis and their Neoconservative enablers in Washington.

Patriot says: Show Comment Next New Comment January 3, 2017 at 1:11 pm GMT

Philip,

You are a brave man. It is very dangerous to critize Israel or Jews. Please be safe. Thanks for having the courage to speak truth to power.

• Replies: @Junior Amen to that! Courage indeed!

Even when an assault is caught on camera like what occured to Alison Weir at the National Press Club, of all places, there are no consequences for attacks on those that have the courage to criticize Israel.

I filed a pollice report and then waited and waited. Finally, the detective in charge of determining whether or not to prosecute Murray decided not to do so. The detective's name is in another notebook somewhere. As I recall, it was Rosenbaum or something similar.
http://alisonweir.org/journal/2011/5/23/israel-is-not-alone-member-knocks-phone-out-of-my-hand-press.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BZ-Ye0nTGo

Hrw-500 says: Show Comment Next New Comment January 3, 2017 at 1:13 pm GMT

That reminds me of a very politically incorrect cartoon made by a guy nicknamed A. Wyatt Mann.

http://afloweroutofstone.tumblr.com/post/110285737337/on-nuance

• Replies: @SolontoCroesus re the first cartoon, "Join the US Army, Fight for Israel"

This morning C Span Washington Journal interviewed new members of US Congress.

Among them was Brian Mast, a Republican who defeated Patrick Murphy in Florida's 18th district, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen's former district. https://www.c-span.org/video/?419267-3/interview-representativeelect-brian-mast-rfl

Mast was a bomb detonations expert in US military who lost both legs and an arm in Afghanistan. Mast said he'd never thought about running for congress until he wound up at Walter Reed hospital; he said he had thought he'd spend his career doing what he loved -- "jumping out of airplanes and kicking in doors and roping out of helicopters." He said it was "very difficult for him to lose that purpose" he'd had in life.
In the process of "finding another battlefield to fight on," many congressmen & staffers visited him.
He eventually went to work for various US counterterrorism agencies in addition to
"spending some time in the Israeli army . . . of which I'm very very proud. . . . I'm probably the only congressman who has been in the Israeli military . . .

According to wikipedia, Mast attended Christian schools and identifies as a Christian; no denomination is mentioned. Whatever denomination it is, apparently their Jesus counsels: "Blessed are they who kick in doors, for they shall be called peacemakers;" and "Seek and ye shall find, kick and the door shall open . . ."

Mast said he applied his military, mission-oriented training to preparing himself to function in congress. He moved seamlessly from military to counterterrorism,

With the Israeli military he worked in a role that Mast identified as SAREL (?), "which allows individuals from around the world to work with the Israeli military . . . a program they rely on quite heavily to accomplish a lot of what they need to go on with their military, as they don't have nearly as large a military as the United States."

(The closest I could find to "SAREL" was an Israeli medical and pharmaceutical research, development and production corporation,
Israel's largest private supplier under one roof of goods and services to healthcare and medical institutions.
)

I find it troublesome that the US military or associated agencies are so interwoven with Israeli state forces and institutions. In my assessment, such intense interrelationships violate George Washington's counsels in his Farewell Address, just as surely as Mast's attitudes invert the counsels of Christianity.

The unity of Government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very Liberty, which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that, from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment, that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the Palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion, that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.

For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of american, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations.

, @Alden What's the official song of the Israeli army?

Onward Christian Soldiers

Lot says: Show Comment Next New Comment January 4, 2017 at 3:15 am GMT • 100 Words

as the usual suspects pile on the Barack Obama Administration over its alleged betrayal of America's "best and greatest friend and ally in the whole world."

"Usual suspects" = Vast majority of American voters. Once again the tiresome fringely Israel bashers have lost an election.

http://imgur.com/a/3neon

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump 28 Dec 2016 "We cannot continue to let Israel be treated with such total disdain and disrespect. They used to have a great friend in the U.S., but not anymore. The beginning of the end was the horrible Iran deal, and now this (U.N.)! Stay strong Israel, January 20th is fast approaching! "

Donald J. Trump ‏@realDonaldTrump 22 Dec 2016

The resolution being considered at the United Nations Security Council regarding Israel should be vetoed

Astuteobservor II says: Show Comment Next New Comment January 4, 2017 at 3:37 am GMT @Charlotte Allen

Love all you Joo-obsessors coming out of the woodwork.

I'm neither Disaspora-Jewish nor Evangelical Christian, and I'm behind Israel 100 percent. The problem in the Holy Land is this: two objects occupying--or claiming to occupy--the same space. That's impossible, so you have to pick one. I pick Israel.

Israel is the West--and it's the way the West ought to be but isn't, at least so far in Europe: a bulwark against Islam, which is the real menace to Western civilization, not some crazy haredim in yarmulkes living out in the middle of nowhere. Israel stands up to Islam. We don't. At least till now (Trump). I don't care if everything you say about the Jews, the Jewish lobby, or whatever, is true. I stand for Israel, because I don't stand for the Dar al-Islam. Have any of you ever been to Israel? I have. Where would you rather live: Israel (a beautiful and prosperous country) or an Islamic hellhole (pick any Muslim country--hey, pick Turkey! See you at the next Istanbul nightclub!)?

The settlements are Israel's way of saying: We won. It's what the victors in wars do. Want to have no settlements in your country? Try actually winning one of the three stupid wars plus God knows how many intifadas you've started with the aim of driving the Israelis to the sea. "International law"? You actually believe the U.N. ought to be running the world? What are you--a bunch of lefties?

How sorry do I feel for the poor, poor Palestinians? Hey--not sorry at all! They've spent, what, six decades sitting on their behinds and whining when not 1) lobbing rockets at Israelis; 2) bombing school buses and restaurants; and 3) dancing in the streets over stuff like 9/11. Plus making life miserable for the few Christians left in the Holy Land. That alone puts me on the side of the Israelis.

Yeah, yeah, most American Jews are irritating liberals, and I wish they'd cut it out. Especially the victimology stuff with the country clubs, since they're America's most successful ethnic group. And I don't buy neocon foreign policy, since there's no reason for Americans to be fighting wars and dying in them in the Mideast, period. Israel does an excellent job of furthering its own interests, such as staying in existence, and Bibi strikes me as an excellent behind-the-scenes power player--you know he's got lines into both Syria and Russia.

If Israel gets attacked, I'm all for aiding Israel, but that hasn't happened yet, and probably won't--unless the Muslims would like to see even more settlements.

And finally, I can't stand John Bolton's mustache. Neither can Trump, I'm told. Meanwhile, yay for Trump! When I think "quisling," I think Obama, not Trump--sorry.

you called it "holy land" :P that tells me more than enough.

Charlotte Allen says: • Website Show Comment Next New Comment January 4, 2017 at 3:39 am GMT @paratrop

Our youth are often sacrificed to foreign wars fought for immoral causes - witness Vietnam and Iraq. I am sure that Rachel Corrie's parents will continue to grieve all their lives for their beautiful daughter but at least they have the comfort and pride that she died for a truly moral reason and has become a worldwide beacon of the cause. Vale Rachel.

Oh yeah, she died for being an idiot who thought it was kind of like the Sixties: stuffing daisies into gun muzzles. Her parents should have had the sense to tell her that war is serious business.

Johnny Smoggins says: Show Comment Next New Comment January 4, 2017 at 4:17 am GMT • 100 Words @Aaron Aarons

George Washington and his fellow European settler-colonists did to the indigenous people of North America what Jewish European settler-colonists did to the indigenous people of the Levant. (To be fair, though, the Zionists, if only for lack of opportunity, did not capture, import, and permanently enslave millions of people from another land.)

It's noteworthy that both Zionists and Nazis invoked the "American" treatment of the indigenous population to justify their own crimes. As Israeli historian Benny Morris said back in 2004, "Even the great American democracy could not have been created without the annihilation of the Indians."

So invoking the settler-colonial nationalism of the slave owner and murdering land-stealer, George Washington, is something Zionists, not their opponents, can do honestly.

This is a ridiculous, and all too common argument from Jews – the land of the U.S. was stolen from the natives so Americans can't say anything about Israel stealing Palestine from Palestinians.

First of all, the native people of North America were literally living in the stone age when Whites showed up and their lives have been made immeasurably better thanks to the inventions and largesse of the White man. In contrast, Palestinians have done nothing but suffer under Israeli rule.

Second, native North Americans are subsidized to the point of billions of dollars every year and receive every possible benefit from the government (and taxpaying Whites). Free health care, education and every form of affirmative action that's ever been dreamt up are all theirs for the taking. Tell us friend, does the Jewish state extend this to Palestinians as it does to Jews?

[Jul 26, 2017] The Economist How the Jews control Congress Eylon A. Levy The Blogs The Times of Israel

Notable quotes:
"... The Seal of the United States Congress tells an observer a number of salient facts about American politics: the olive branch stands for America's commitment to peace; the arrows represent its readiness for war; and the Star of David, which The Economist has helpfully added to the original design, symbolises the control of Jews and/or Israel over America's policies of war and peace. ..."
"... Peter Schrank's cartoon, which accompanies an article on negotiations with Iran in this week's Economist, depicts President Obama with his ankle shackled to the Judaised seal of the US Congress, thereby prevented from shaking hands with Iran's President Rouhani, who is being restrained by his nefarious-looking, US-flag-burning compatriots. ..."
Jul 26, 2017 | blogs.timesofisrael.com

The Seal of the United States Congress tells an observer a number of salient facts about American politics: the olive branch stands for America's commitment to peace; the arrows represent its readiness for war; and the Star of David, which The Economist has helpfully added to the original design, symbolises the control of Jews and/or Israel over America's policies of war and peace.

Peter Schrank's cartoon, which accompanies an article on negotiations with Iran in this week's Economist, depicts President Obama with his ankle shackled to the Judaised seal of the US Congress, thereby prevented from shaking hands with Iran's President Rouhani, who is being restrained by his nefarious-looking, US-flag-burning compatriots.

The message is that either American Jews or Israel (and it is unclear which, because the Star of David is both a Jewish and Israeli symbol) are holding the United States back from making peace with Iran – and moreover, that they are doing so through their control of the machinery of the American government, since the Star of David is incorporated into the official insignia of the US, alongside the stars and stripes. The Israel Lobby, as the cartoon rather nefariously hints, is not a separate influence on the US government – it is a constituent part of it.

Schrank's previous cartoons have hardly been kind towards Israel, but one can only wonder what was going through the mind of his editors: there are questions about the impartiality of the magazine's coverage of Israel , but as last week's very fair and reasonable "Who is a Jew?" feature suggests, The Economist is hardly an anti-Semitic publication.

Intentionally or not, however, Schrank's cartoon is now an addition to the disturbing trend of cartoons hinting at the sinister control of Western governments by Israel or Jews, following Steve Bell's Guardian cartoon showing Netanyahu as a puppeteer with Tony Blair and William Hague as finger-puppets, and a cartoon in the Qatari Al-Watan newspaper depicting an Orthodox Jew driving with Obama's head as a gearstick and the UN logo as his steering wheel.

I shan't accuse The Economist directly of anti-Semitism, but it bears repeating that the EUMC Working Definition , adopted by the British government, covers "stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective -- such as the myth of Jews controlling the government" and also covers "using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism to characterise Israel or Israelis". Readers are invited to draw their own conclusions.

The notion that Jews control the world's major institutions of power, including governments, media and banks, is one of the most established and pernicious myths peddled against Jews, and it is difficult not to see continuity between contemporary hints about "Zionist" control of world governments and nineteenth-century cartoons depicting a Jewish octopus with its tentacles over the globe.

In France, 29% believe Jews have too much control of international financial markets; in Italy, 39% believe Jews have too much power in the business world; and in Hungary, Poland and Spain, well over half of the population believes at least one of these propositions. In the United States , 14% believe that "Jews have too much power in the U.S. today", and that's from the most philo-Semitic of countries out there.

Anti-Semitic tropes enjoy even greater vibrancy in the Muslim world, where the Elders of Zion is taken as gospel, Jewish conspiracies are more common than Jews, and The Economist is available too – subtly, and quite probably unintentionally, reinforcing such prejudices.

The Economist's readership might be more intelligent than the general public, but it should not flatter itself. Even if its readers believe the myth of Jewish power in proportions far lower than is average, their perceptions are hardly likely to be dispelled by such cartoons, which contribute towards a toxic drip-drip in public discourse, confirming the unarticulated suspicions about Jewish power of those who find that such beliefs are neither rare nor taboo.

It may well be that the cartoon was intended only as a nod to the influence of Israel or AIPAC in Washington's policy-making on Iran; and perhaps the cartoonist had good reasons not to include a Tricolore and shahada , despite similar pressure from the French and Saudis. Nevertheless, it does not take a Professor in Anti-Semitism Studies to understand how such an image can reinforce the myth of the Jewish conspiracy in the minds of those already convinced of its veracity, and for whom the words "Jewish lobby" trip too easily off the tongue.

Cartoons work by using images and symbols familiar to readers in order to induce them to read between the lines and infer a particular unspoken message from the image. The best that can be said about Schrank's cartoon is that it is ambiguous, but this ambiguity is precisely what makes it so noxious: the Economist can dissociate itself from the most toxic of interpretations, but still the process of "wink wink, nudge nudge" will continue to encourage readers, quite reasonably, to jump to conclusions about Jewish control over Capitol Hill from the incorporation of the Star of David into official US symbols.

Belief in a Jewish conspiracy is sufficiently prevalent worldwide that for the Economist to buttress them, even unintentionally, is negligent at best and utterly reckless at worst. If there is nuance, the Economist cannot protest innocence when it is lost in translation.

Update The Economist has pulled the cartoon from its website, explaining: "The print edition of this story had a cartoon which inadvertently caused offence to some readers, so we have replaced it with a photograph." Given that the article makes no mention of AIPAC, the Israel Lobby, or indeed Israel (bar a passing reference in brackets to Benjamin Netanyahu), this was probably a wise move.

[Jul 24, 2017] Bill making it a federal crime to support BDS sends shockwaves through progressive community

Notable quotes:
"... But now, a group of 43 senators -- 29 Republicans and 14 Democrats -- wants to implement a law that would make it a felony for Americans to support the international boycott against Israel, which was launched in protest of that country's decades-old occupation of Palestine. The two primary sponsors of the bill are Democrat Ben Cardin of Maryland and Republican Rob Portman of Ohio. Perhaps the most shocking aspect is the punishment: Anyone guilty of violating the prohibitions will face a minimum civil penalty of $250,000 and a maximum criminal penalty of $1 million and 20 years in prison . ..."
"... The bill's co-sponsors include the senior Democrat in Washington, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, his New York colleague Kirsten Gillibrand, and several of the Senate's more liberal members, such as Ron Wyden of Oregon, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, and Maria Cantwell of Washington. ..."
"... The likes of Schiff have "high reputations" because they do the bidding of elites in promoting the interventionist and militarist foreign policies that serve the interests of foreign powers and of minority and other lobby groups. So much for the "liberals" as a supposed anti-establishment force. ..."
Jul 24, 2017 | www.unz.com

There is only one story in the news, for followers of the Israel/Palestine conflict, and that is Glenn Greenwald and Ryan Grim's report at the Intercept yesterday on new legislation in the Congress that would criminalize support for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS).

The bill is such a crude example of overreach by the Israel lobby that it is sure to backfire on its supporters as Greenwald and Grim's report ricochets around the Democratic Party:

But now, a group of 43 senators -- 29 Republicans and 14 Democrats -- wants to implement a law that would make it a felony for Americans to support the international boycott against Israel, which was launched in protest of that country's decades-old occupation of Palestine. The two primary sponsors of the bill are Democrat Ben Cardin of Maryland and Republican Rob Portman of Ohio. Perhaps the most shocking aspect is the punishment: Anyone guilty of violating the prohibitions will face a minimum civil penalty of $250,000 and a maximum criminal penalty of $1 million and 20 years in prison .

The proposed measure, called the Israel Anti-Boycott Act (S. 720), was introduced by Cardin on March 23. The Jewish Telegraphic Agency reports that the bill "was drafted with the assistance of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee." Indeed, AIPAC, in its 2017 lobbying agenda , identified passage of this bill as one of its top lobbying priorities for the year:

The bill's co-sponsors include the senior Democrat in Washington, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, his New York colleague Kirsten Gillibrand, and several of the Senate's more liberal members, such as Ron Wyden of Oregon, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, and Maria Cantwell of Washington.

Randal, July 21, 2017 at 12:36 pm GMT

Adam Schiff is worthy of special mention, as David Bromwich points out to me. "He is among the scores of obedient Democrats co-sponsoring the bill. Schiff has a high reputation in liberal circles, but he voted for the Iraq war, supported the Saudi intervention in Yemen, said the assassination of Qaddafi was 'an end to the first chapter of another popular revolution,' and approved of Trump's bombing of Syria.

On foreign policy he is a believer in the conventional wisdom of the Cold War and the War on Terror, that's all; but his opinions have taken on an outsize importance since he is now routinely accepted as the party's outstanding authority on Russia. He knows Russia about as well as he knew Iraq and Libya."

The likes of Schiff have "high reputations" because they do the bidding of elites in promoting the interventionist and militarist foreign policies that serve the interests of foreign powers and of minority and other lobby groups. So much for the "liberals" as a supposed anti-establishment force.

hyperbola, July 21, 2017 at 2:10 pm GMT

So Gillibrand was bludgeoned into sponsoring anti-American, police-state legislation by the lobby. The rest seem to be the usual suspects – primary loyalty to a foreign country/sect.

Controversy Over Prominent BDS Activist Linda Sarsour Reaches New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand

https://www.algemeiner.com/2017/04/26/controversy-over-prominent-bds-activist-linda-sarsour-reaches-new-york-senator-kirsten-gillibrand/

Jewish leaders and pro-Israel activists have expressed concern over a contribution to Time Magazine by New York Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand that praised Linda Sarsour – a Palestinian-American political activist and vocal advocate for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement targeting Israel.

In a short piece accompanying the magazine's "100 most influential people" list for 2017, Gillibrand paid tribute to "four extraordinary women -- Tamika Mallory, Bob Bland, Carmen Perez and Linda Sarsour" for organizing the Women's March on Washington, DC on January 21 ..

rec1man, July 22, 2017 at 1:19 am GMT

Here is why BDS wont work, will never work

Israel is rapidly diversifying its trade with India and China, both of which are growing segments of world economy

Narendra Modi of the BJP supports Israel screwing the Palestinians due to shared enemy of islam.
When he visited Israel last month, he didnt even visit Palestinian Authority and instead visited Holocaust museum

41% of Israeli defense exports go to India

The only people interested in BDS are muslims and leftist liberals ; as Muslim immigrants do more terrorism and no-go areas and mass rapes in Eurabia, there is less and less public support for BDS bcos the public supports anyone who hits back at islam

lavoisier, Website July 22, 2017 at 11:27 am GMT

The most disturbing aspect of this story is the fact that so many of our elected representatives are willing to pass a law that is clearly a violation of all that this nation supposedly treasures -- free speech and freedom of conscience. I know, I know that the Zionists are behind this mischief. But my God our leaders are traitorous scum!

What has happened to our nation?

I hope that all the blue pilled Americans realize the depth of depravity necessary for our so called leaders to craft such legislation and to support it.

Perhaps they might wake up and realize that America–the land of the free and home of the brave–is long gone. Then they might do something to try and get it back.

Seamus Padraig, July 24, 2017 at 12:30 am GMT

@rec1man

Shalom, Bibi.

exiled off mainstreet > , July 24, 2017 at 5:19 am GMT

I recall a comedy film from the 1980s with Robin Williams on a Caribbean island describing the constitution there as being "written in pencil". That now seems to apply to the USA. How could such an obvious breach of the First Amendment even be considered? It seems that a sort of primary loyalty to a foreign country has metastasized to the point that free speech itself is under threat. Once a law like this is enacted, the final shreds of legitimacy of the yankee state which, after all, claims its legitimacy by following constitutional legal forms, will have vanished.

I should add that the same people demanding this law, which is at the behest of provable foreign interests, are many of the same ones propagating the phony propaganda anti-Russian conspiracy theory. Real treason and sedition seem to be the order of the day to these people.

[Jul 20, 2017] Truth of Ukraine War Revealed: Watchdog Media Releases Definitive Chronological Timeline Video of Ukrainian War From Euromaidan to MH-17

Jul 20, 2017 | moonofalabama.org

Liam | Jul 19, 2017 9:22:07 PM | 34

Just released and there is nothing else like it - Truth of Ukraine War Revealed: Watchdog Media Releases Definitive Chronological Timeline Video of Ukrainian War From Euromaidan to MH-17

https://clarityofsignal.com/2017/07/19/truth-of-ukraine-war-revealed-watchdog-media-institute-releases-definitive-chronological-timeline-video-of-ukrainian-war-from-euromaidan-to-mh-17/

[Jul 20, 2017] It was Nuland-Kagan who brought the treats to Kiev. It was the (former) Director of CIA Brennan who came to Kiev (supposedly in secret) on the eve of the Kiev' military actions against the civilian population of the pro-federalist east Ukraine.

Jul 20, 2017 | www.unz.com

annamaria > , July 19, 2017 at 8:46 pm GMT

@Mr. Hack Why are you going on a childish offensive by defending the US-installed junta in Kiev and demanding others to provide you with evidence that the neo-nazis and Banderites have nothing to do with Yatz and Poroshenko and Nuland-Kagan?
Google "neo-Nazi parades in Ukraine" and enjoy the show. If you still have doubts about the direct responsibility of Poroschenko for the neo-Nazi presence in the government of Ukraine, read about Pravyj sector and its role in the Maidan revolution. Also, Proschenko had been in contact with the State Dept for years before the Maidan revolution. Your take on this?
The main point is the US-orchestrated regime change in Kiev. Or you want to convince the UNZ reader that Nuland was a virtual reality and nothing has changed in Ukraine since Mrs. Nuland-Kagan' and Mr. Brennan's visit to Kiev? http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-04-14/white-house-admits-cia-director-brennan-was-secretly-kiev?page=7
Do you realize that the US has brought a range of US officials to Kiev – including the Director of the CIA – to "improve" a democratic process there by removing a lawfully elected and acting president?
Yes, the US intervention has brought neo-Nazis and Banderites to the positions of influence in Ukraine. What could be more natural than a combination of the name "Kagan" and the word "neo-Nazis?" https://consortiumnews.com/2015/03/20/a-family-business-of-perpetual-war/

https://consortiumnews.com/2017/03/15/the-kagans-are-back-wars-to-follow/

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/31887-the-ukraine-mess-that-nuland-made

annamaria > , July 20, 2017 at 2:46 am GMT

" they served up a lot more than just milk and cookies"
It was Nuland-Kagan who brought the treats to Kiev. It was the (former) Director of CIA Brennan who came to Kiev (supposedly in secret) on the eve of the Kiev' military actions against the civilian population of the pro-federalist east Ukraine. And you want to convince the UNZ readers that the Maidan was organized by Russians? What is the name of your new Prime Minister? – Mr. Groysman? "Groysman was born in Vinnytsia into a Jewish family " How come that the predominantly anti-semitic Ukraine has elected this nonety with the proper ethnic background? – Sure you know how to explain that this is also the Russians' fault. How about the US-enforced appointment of Misha Saakashvilli to the governorship of Ukraine's Odessa? – Kremlin's affair? Ukraine has lost its independence with the regime change in 2014.

"From what I've read " – You mean the presstituting MSM? None of the respectable sources, from consortium.com to Sic Semper Tyrannus ( http://turcopolier.typepad.com ) have ever suggested that the coup d'etat involved – in any capacity – Russian government. Keep in mind that the above-mentioned sources present the analyses of the principled and patriotic Americans who dedicated their lives to the US nationals security. For obvious reasons, they are hated by ziocons.

[Jul 17, 2017] Tucker Carlson Goes to War Against the Neocons by Curt Mills

Highly recommended!
max Book is just anothe "Yascha about Russia" type, that Masha Gessen represents so vividly. The problem with him is that time of neocon prominance is solidly in the past and now unpleasant question about the cost from the US people of their reckless foreign policies get into some newspapers and managines. They cost the USA tremedous anount of money (as in trillions) and those money consititute a large portion of the national debt. Critiques so far were very weak and partially suppressed voices, but defeat of neocon warmonger Hillary signify some break with the past.
Notable quotes:
"... National Interest ..."
"... Carlson's record suggests that he has been in the camp skeptical of U.S. foreign-policy intervention for some time now and, indeed, that it predates Donald Trump's rise to power. (Carlson has commented publicly that he was humiliated by his own public support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.) According to Carlson, "This is not about Trump. This is not about Trump. It's the one thing in American life that has nothing to do with Trump. My views on this are totally unrelated to my views on Donald Trump. This has been going since September 11, 2001. And it's a debate that we've never really had. And we need to have it." He adds, "I don't think the public has ever been for the ideas that undergird our policies." ..."
"... National Interest ..."
"... But the fight also seems to have a personal edge. Carlson says, "Max Boot is not impressive. . . . Max is a totally mediocre person." Carlson added that he felt guilty about not having, in his assessment, a superior guest to Boot on the show to defend hawkishness. "I wish I had had someone clear-thinking and smart on to represent their views. And there are a lot of them. I would love to have that debate," Carlson told me, periodically emphasizing that he is raring to go on this subject. ..."
"... New York Observer ..."
"... National Interest ..."
"... Weekly Standard ..."
"... Weekly Standard ..."
"... Though he eschews labels, Carlson sounds like a foreign-policy realist on steroids: "You can debate what's in [the United States'] interest. That's a subjective category. But what you can't debate is that ought to be the basic question, the first, second and third question. Does it represent our interest? . . . I don't think that enters into the calculations of a lot of the people who make these decisions." Carlson's interests extend beyond foreign policy, and he says "there's a massive realignment going on ideologically that everybody is missing. It's dramatic. And everyone is missing it. . . . Nobody is paying attention to it, " ..."
"... : Flickr/Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0. ..."
Jul 14, 2017 | nationalinterest.org

This week's primetime knife fights with Max Boot and Ralph Peters are emblematic of the battle for the soul of the American Right.

To be sure, Carlson rejects the term "neoconservatism," and implicitly, its corollary on the Democratic side, liberal internationalism. In 2016, "the reigning Republican foreign-policy view, you can call it neoconservatism, or interventionism, or whatever you want to call it" was rejected, he explained in a wide-ranging interview with the National Interest Friday.

"But I don't like the term 'neoconservatism,'" he says, "because I don't even know what it means. I think it describes the people rather than their ideas, which is what I'm interested in. And to be perfectly honest . . . I have a lot of friends who have been described as neocons, people I really love, sincerely. And they are offended by it. So I don't use it," Carlson said.

But Carlson's recent segments on foreign policy conducted with Lt. Col. Ralph Peters and the prominent neoconservative journalist and author Max Boot were acrimonious even by Carlsonian standards. In a discussion on Syria, Russia and Iran, a visibly upset Boot accused Carlson of being "immoral" and taking foreign-policy positions to curry favor with the White House, keep up his ratings , and by proxy, benefit financially. Boot says that Carlson "basically parrots whatever the pro-Trump line is that Fox viewers want to see. If Trump came out strongly against Putin tomorrow, I imagine Tucker would echo this as faithfully as the pro-Russia arguments he echoes today." But is this assessment fair?

Carlson's record suggests that he has been in the camp skeptical of U.S. foreign-policy intervention for some time now and, indeed, that it predates Donald Trump's rise to power. (Carlson has commented publicly that he was humiliated by his own public support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.) According to Carlson, "This is not about Trump. This is not about Trump. It's the one thing in American life that has nothing to do with Trump. My views on this are totally unrelated to my views on Donald Trump. This has been going since September 11, 2001. And it's a debate that we've never really had. And we need to have it." He adds, "I don't think the public has ever been for the ideas that undergird our policies."

Even if Carlson doesn't want to use the label neocon to describe some of those ideas, Boot is not so bashful. In 2005, Boot wrote an essay called "Neocons May Get the Last Laugh." Carlson "has become a Trump acolyte in pursuit of ratings," says Boot, also interviewed by the National Interest . "I bet if it were President Clinton accused of colluding with the Russians, Tucker would be outraged and calling for impeachment if not execution. But since it's Trump, then it's all a big joke to him," Boot says. Carlson vociferously dissents from such assessments: "This is what dumb people do. They can't assess the merits of an argument. . . . I'm not talking about Syria, and Russia, and Iran because of ratings. That's absurd. I can't imagine those were anywhere near the most highly-rated segments that night. That's not why I wanted to do it."

But Carlson insists, "I have been saying the same thing for fifteen years. Now I have a T.V. show that people watch, so my views are better known. But it shouldn't be a surprise. I supported Trump to the extent he articulated beliefs that I agree with. . . . And I don't support Trump to the extent that his actions deviate from those beliefs," Carlson said. Boot on Fox said that Carlson is "too smart" for this kind of argument. But Carlson has bucked the Trump line, notably on Trump's April 7 strikes in Syria. "When the Trump administration threw a bunch of cruise missiles into Syria for no obvious reason, on the basis of a pretext that I question . . . I questioned [the decision] immediately. On T.V. I was on the air when that happened. I think, maybe seven minutes into my show. . . . I thought this was reckless."

But the fight also seems to have a personal edge. Carlson says, "Max Boot is not impressive. . . . Max is a totally mediocre person." Carlson added that he felt guilty about not having, in his assessment, a superior guest to Boot on the show to defend hawkishness. "I wish I had had someone clear-thinking and smart on to represent their views. And there are a lot of them. I would love to have that debate," Carlson told me, periodically emphasizing that he is raring to go on this subject.

Boot objects to what he sees as a cavalier attitude on the part of Carlson and others toward allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election, and also toward the deaths of citizens of other countries. "You are laughing about the fact that Russia is interfering in our election process. That to me is immoral," Boot told Carlson on his show. "This is the level of dumbness and McCarthyism in Washington right now," says Carlson. "I think it has the virtue of making Max Boot feel like a good person. Like he's on God's team, or something like that. But how does that serve the interest of the country? It doesn't." Carlson says that Donald Trump, Jr.'s emails aren't nearly as important as who is going to lead Syria, which he says Boot and others have no plan for successfully occupying. Boot, by contrast, sees the U.S. administration as dangerously flirting with working with Russia, Iran and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. "For whatever reason, Trump is pro-Putin, no one knows why, and he's taken a good chunk of the GOP along with him," Boot says.

On Fox last Wednesday, Boot reminded Carlson that he originally supported the 2003 Iraq decision. "You supported the invasion of Iraq," Boot said, before repeating, "You supported the invasion of Iraq." Carlson conceded that, but it seems the invasion was a bona fide turning point. It's most important to parse whether Carlson has a long record of anti-interventionism, or if he's merely sniffing the throne of the president (who, dubiously, may have opposed the 2003 invasion). "I think it's a total nightmare and disaster, and I'm ashamed that I went against my own instincts in supporting it," Carlson told the New York Observer in early 2004. "It's something I'll never do again. Never. I got convinced by a friend of mine who's smarter than I am, and I shouldn't have done that. . . . I'm enraged by it, actually." Carlson told the National Interest that he's felt this way since seeing Iraq for himself in December 2003.

The evidence points heavily toward a sincere conversion on Carlson's part, or preexisting conviction that was briefly overcome by the beat of the war drums. Carlson did work for the Weekly Standard , perhaps the most prominent neoconservative magazine, in the 1990s and early 2000s. Carlson today speaks respectfully of William Kristol, its founding editor, but has concluded that he is all wet. On foreign policy, the people Carlson speaks most warmly about are genuine hard left-wingers: Glenn Greenwald, a vociferous critic of both economic neoliberalism and neoconservatism; the anti-establishment journalist Michael Tracey; Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor of the Nation ; and her husband, Stephen Cohen, the Russia expert and critic of U.S. foreign policy.

"The only people in American public life who are raising these questions are on the traditional left: not lifestyle liberals, not the Williamsburg (Brooklyn) group, not liberals in D.C., not Nancy Pelosi." He calls the expertise of establishment sources on matters like Syria "more shallow than I even imagined." On his MSNBC show, which was canceled for poor ratings, he cavorted with noninterventionist stalwarts such as Ron Paul , the 2008 and 2012 antiwar GOP candidate, and Patrick J. Buchanan. "No one is smarter than Pat Buchanan," he said last year of the man whose ideas many say laid the groundwork for Trump's political success.

Carlson has risen to the pinnacle of cable news, succeeding Bill O'Reilly. It wasn't always clear an antiwar take would vault someone to such prominence. Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio or Mitt Romney could be president (Boot has advised the latter two). But here he is, and it's likely no coincidence that Carlson got a show after Trump's election, starting at the 7 p.m. slot, before swiftly moving to the 9 p.m. slot to replace Trump antagonist Megyn Kelly, and just as quickly replacing O'Reilly at the top slot, 8 p.m. Boot, on the other hand, declared in 2016 that the Republican Party was dead , before it went on to hold Congress and most state houses, and of course take the presidency. He's still at the Council on Foreign Relations and writes for the New York Times (this seems to clearly annoy Carlson: "It tells you everything about the low standards of the American foreign-policy establishment").

Boot wrote in 2003 in the Weekly Standard that the fall of Saddam Hussein's government "may turn out to be one of those hinge moments in history" comparable to "events like the storming of the Bastille or the fall of the Berlin Wall, after which everything is different." He continued, "If the occupation goes well (admittedly a big if ), it may mark the moment when the powerful antibiotic known as democracy was introduced into the diseased environment of the Middle East, and began to transform the region for the better."

Though he eschews labels, Carlson sounds like a foreign-policy realist on steroids: "You can debate what's in [the United States'] interest. That's a subjective category. But what you can't debate is that ought to be the basic question, the first, second and third question. Does it represent our interest? . . . I don't think that enters into the calculations of a lot of the people who make these decisions." Carlson's interests extend beyond foreign policy, and he says "there's a massive realignment going on ideologically that everybody is missing. It's dramatic. And everyone is missing it. . . . Nobody is paying attention to it, "

Carlson seems intent on pressing the issue. The previous night, in his debate with Peters, the retired lieutenant colonel said that Carlson sounded like Charles Lindbergh, who opposed U.S. intervention against Nazi Germany before 1941. "This particular strain of Republican foreign policy has almost no constituency. Nobody agrees with it. I mean there's not actually a large group of people outside of New York, Washington or L.A. who think any of this is a good idea," Carlson says. "All I am is an asker of obvious questions. And that's enough to reveal these people have no idea what they're talking about. None."

Curt Mills is a foreign-affairs reporter at the National Interest . Follow him on Twitter: @CurtMills .

Image : Flickr/Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0.

[Jul 17, 2017] Tucker Carlson Goes to War Against the Neocons by Curt Mills

Highly recommended!
max Book is just anothe "Yascha about Russia" type, that Masha Gessen represents so vividly. The problem with him is that time of neocon prominance is solidly in the past and now unpleasant question about the cost from the US people of their reckless foreign policies get into some newspapers and managines. They cost the USA tremedous anount of money (as in trillions) and those money consititute a large portion of the national debt. Critiques so far were very weak and partially suppressed voices, but defeat of neocon warmonger Hillary signify some break with the past.
Notable quotes:
"... National Interest ..."
"... Carlson's record suggests that he has been in the camp skeptical of U.S. foreign-policy intervention for some time now and, indeed, that it predates Donald Trump's rise to power. (Carlson has commented publicly that he was humiliated by his own public support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.) According to Carlson, "This is not about Trump. This is not about Trump. It's the one thing in American life that has nothing to do with Trump. My views on this are totally unrelated to my views on Donald Trump. This has been going since September 11, 2001. And it's a debate that we've never really had. And we need to have it." He adds, "I don't think the public has ever been for the ideas that undergird our policies." ..."
"... National Interest ..."
"... But the fight also seems to have a personal edge. Carlson says, "Max Boot is not impressive. . . . Max is a totally mediocre person." Carlson added that he felt guilty about not having, in his assessment, a superior guest to Boot on the show to defend hawkishness. "I wish I had had someone clear-thinking and smart on to represent their views. And there are a lot of them. I would love to have that debate," Carlson told me, periodically emphasizing that he is raring to go on this subject. ..."
"... New York Observer ..."
"... National Interest ..."
"... Weekly Standard ..."
"... Weekly Standard ..."
"... Though he eschews labels, Carlson sounds like a foreign-policy realist on steroids: "You can debate what's in [the United States'] interest. That's a subjective category. But what you can't debate is that ought to be the basic question, the first, second and third question. Does it represent our interest? . . . I don't think that enters into the calculations of a lot of the people who make these decisions." Carlson's interests extend beyond foreign policy, and he says "there's a massive realignment going on ideologically that everybody is missing. It's dramatic. And everyone is missing it. . . . Nobody is paying attention to it, " ..."
"... : Flickr/Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0. ..."
Jul 14, 2017 | nationalinterest.org

This week's primetime knife fights with Max Boot and Ralph Peters are emblematic of the battle for the soul of the American Right.

To be sure, Carlson rejects the term "neoconservatism," and implicitly, its corollary on the Democratic side, liberal internationalism. In 2016, "the reigning Republican foreign-policy view, you can call it neoconservatism, or interventionism, or whatever you want to call it" was rejected, he explained in a wide-ranging interview with the National Interest Friday.

"But I don't like the term 'neoconservatism,'" he says, "because I don't even know what it means. I think it describes the people rather than their ideas, which is what I'm interested in. And to be perfectly honest . . . I have a lot of friends who have been described as neocons, people I really love, sincerely. And they are offended by it. So I don't use it," Carlson said.

But Carlson's recent segments on foreign policy conducted with Lt. Col. Ralph Peters and the prominent neoconservative journalist and author Max Boot were acrimonious even by Carlsonian standards. In a discussion on Syria, Russia and Iran, a visibly upset Boot accused Carlson of being "immoral" and taking foreign-policy positions to curry favor with the White House, keep up his ratings , and by proxy, benefit financially. Boot says that Carlson "basically parrots whatever the pro-Trump line is that Fox viewers want to see. If Trump came out strongly against Putin tomorrow, I imagine Tucker would echo this as faithfully as the pro-Russia arguments he echoes today." But is this assessment fair?

Carlson's record suggests that he has been in the camp skeptical of U.S. foreign-policy intervention for some time now and, indeed, that it predates Donald Trump's rise to power. (Carlson has commented publicly that he was humiliated by his own public support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.) According to Carlson, "This is not about Trump. This is not about Trump. It's the one thing in American life that has nothing to do with Trump. My views on this are totally unrelated to my views on Donald Trump. This has been going since September 11, 2001. And it's a debate that we've never really had. And we need to have it." He adds, "I don't think the public has ever been for the ideas that undergird our policies."

Even if Carlson doesn't want to use the label neocon to describe some of those ideas, Boot is not so bashful. In 2005, Boot wrote an essay called "Neocons May Get the Last Laugh." Carlson "has become a Trump acolyte in pursuit of ratings," says Boot, also interviewed by the National Interest . "I bet if it were President Clinton accused of colluding with the Russians, Tucker would be outraged and calling for impeachment if not execution. But since it's Trump, then it's all a big joke to him," Boot says. Carlson vociferously dissents from such assessments: "This is what dumb people do. They can't assess the merits of an argument. . . . I'm not talking about Syria, and Russia, and Iran because of ratings. That's absurd. I can't imagine those were anywhere near the most highly-rated segments that night. That's not why I wanted to do it."

But Carlson insists, "I have been saying the same thing for fifteen years. Now I have a T.V. show that people watch, so my views are better known. But it shouldn't be a surprise. I supported Trump to the extent he articulated beliefs that I agree with. . . . And I don't support Trump to the extent that his actions deviate from those beliefs," Carlson said. Boot on Fox said that Carlson is "too smart" for this kind of argument. But Carlson has bucked the Trump line, notably on Trump's April 7 strikes in Syria. "When the Trump administration threw a bunch of cruise missiles into Syria for no obvious reason, on the basis of a pretext that I question . . . I questioned [the decision] immediately. On T.V. I was on the air when that happened. I think, maybe seven minutes into my show. . . . I thought this was reckless."

But the fight also seems to have a personal edge. Carlson says, "Max Boot is not impressive. . . . Max is a totally mediocre person." Carlson added that he felt guilty about not having, in his assessment, a superior guest to Boot on the show to defend hawkishness. "I wish I had had someone clear-thinking and smart on to represent their views. And there are a lot of them. I would love to have that debate," Carlson told me, periodically emphasizing that he is raring to go on this subject.

Boot objects to what he sees as a cavalier attitude on the part of Carlson and others toward allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election, and also toward the deaths of citizens of other countries. "You are laughing about the fact that Russia is interfering in our election process. That to me is immoral," Boot told Carlson on his show. "This is the level of dumbness and McCarthyism in Washington right now," says Carlson. "I think it has the virtue of making Max Boot feel like a good person. Like he's on God's team, or something like that. But how does that serve the interest of the country? It doesn't." Carlson says that Donald Trump, Jr.'s emails aren't nearly as important as who is going to lead Syria, which he says Boot and others have no plan for successfully occupying. Boot, by contrast, sees the U.S. administration as dangerously flirting with working with Russia, Iran and Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. "For whatever reason, Trump is pro-Putin, no one knows why, and he's taken a good chunk of the GOP along with him," Boot says.

On Fox last Wednesday, Boot reminded Carlson that he originally supported the 2003 Iraq decision. "You supported the invasion of Iraq," Boot said, before repeating, "You supported the invasion of Iraq." Carlson conceded that, but it seems the invasion was a bona fide turning point. It's most important to parse whether Carlson has a long record of anti-interventionism, or if he's merely sniffing the throne of the president (who, dubiously, may have opposed the 2003 invasion). "I think it's a total nightmare and disaster, and I'm ashamed that I went against my own instincts in supporting it," Carlson told the New York Observer in early 2004. "It's something I'll never do again. Never. I got convinced by a friend of mine who's smarter than I am, and I shouldn't have done that. . . . I'm enraged by it, actually." Carlson told the National Interest that he's felt this way since seeing Iraq for himself in December 2003.

The evidence points heavily toward a sincere conversion on Carlson's part, or preexisting conviction that was briefly overcome by the beat of the war drums. Carlson did work for the Weekly Standard , perhaps the most prominent neoconservative magazine, in the 1990s and early 2000s. Carlson today speaks respectfully of William Kristol, its founding editor, but has concluded that he is all wet. On foreign policy, the people Carlson speaks most warmly about are genuine hard left-wingers: Glenn Greenwald, a vociferous critic of both economic neoliberalism and neoconservatism; the anti-establishment journalist Michael Tracey; Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor of the Nation ; and her husband, Stephen Cohen, the Russia expert and critic of U.S. foreign policy.

"The only people in American public life who are raising these questions are on the traditional left: not lifestyle liberals, not the Williamsburg (Brooklyn) group, not liberals in D.C., not Nancy Pelosi." He calls the expertise of establishment sources on matters like Syria "more shallow than I even imagined." On his MSNBC show, which was canceled for poor ratings, he cavorted with noninterventionist stalwarts such as Ron Paul , the 2008 and 2012 antiwar GOP candidate, and Patrick J. Buchanan. "No one is smarter than Pat Buchanan," he said last year of the man whose ideas many say laid the groundwork for Trump's political success.

Carlson has risen to the pinnacle of cable news, succeeding Bill O'Reilly. It wasn't always clear an antiwar take would vault someone to such prominence. Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio or Mitt Romney could be president (Boot has advised the latter two). But here he is, and it's likely no coincidence that Carlson got a show after Trump's election, starting at the 7 p.m. slot, before swiftly moving to the 9 p.m. slot to replace Trump antagonist Megyn Kelly, and just as quickly replacing O'Reilly at the top slot, 8 p.m. Boot, on the other hand, declared in 2016 that the Republican Party was dead , before it went on to hold Congress and most state houses, and of course take the presidency. He's still at the Council on Foreign Relations and writes for the New York Times (this seems to clearly annoy Carlson: "It tells you everything about the low standards of the American foreign-policy establishment").

Boot wrote in 2003 in the Weekly Standard that the fall of Saddam Hussein's government "may turn out to be one of those hinge moments in history" comparable to "events like the storming of the Bastille or the fall of the Berlin Wall, after which everything is different." He continued, "If the occupation goes well (admittedly a big if ), it may mark the moment when the powerful antibiotic known as democracy was introduced into the diseased environment of the Middle East, and began to transform the region for the better."

Though he eschews labels, Carlson sounds like a foreign-policy realist on steroids: "You can debate what's in [the United States'] interest. That's a subjective category. But what you can't debate is that ought to be the basic question, the first, second and third question. Does it represent our interest? . . . I don't think that enters into the calculations of a lot of the people who make these decisions." Carlson's interests extend beyond foreign policy, and he says "there's a massive realignment going on ideologically that everybody is missing. It's dramatic. And everyone is missing it. . . . Nobody is paying attention to it, "

Carlson seems intent on pressing the issue. The previous night, in his debate with Peters, the retired lieutenant colonel said that Carlson sounded like Charles Lindbergh, who opposed U.S. intervention against Nazi Germany before 1941. "This particular strain of Republican foreign policy has almost no constituency. Nobody agrees with it. I mean there's not actually a large group of people outside of New York, Washington or L.A. who think any of this is a good idea," Carlson says. "All I am is an asker of obvious questions. And that's enough to reveal these people have no idea what they're talking about. None."

Curt Mills is a foreign-affairs reporter at the National Interest . Follow him on Twitter: @CurtMills .

Image : Flickr/Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0.

[Jul 16, 2017] Why the USA hollowing themselves out by promoting to key diplomatic posts semi-talented gobshites like Nikki Haley instead of career diplomats and experts? Is connection to the security agencies a key factor?

Notable quotes:
"... Samantha ' Genocide ' Powers, former US Ambassador to the UN and Spoxhole started out as a journalist too. They just can't seem to get professional diplomats to take the job, or maybe they are simply not offered it. We've been around this particular bush many times before. ..."
"... Are western institutions hollowing themselves out by promoting semi-talented gobshites instead of career diplomats and experts and does that stop people going in to the diplomatic service thus leave less and less available for top jobs as the real experts have either already retired or will soon? ..."
Jul 16, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com
Samantha ' Genocide ' Powers, former US Ambassador to the UN and Spoxhole started out as a journalist too. They just can't seem to get professional diplomats to take the job, or maybe they are simply not offered it. We've been around this particular bush many times before.

Are western institutions hollowing themselves out by promoting semi-talented gobshites instead of career diplomats and experts and does that stop people going in to the diplomatic service thus leave less and less available for top jobs as the real experts have either already retired or will soon?

The House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee report on UK-Russia relations that I posted about above highlights this lack of expertise, but is it also the case that mass surveillance though technology has become the magpie politicians shiny jewels to the detriment of promoting human resource capital?

Meanwhile, the head of British Intelligence outfit MI6 gave an interview to the British press about being 'inclusive' and now trying to personally recruit new members from all backgrounds with the traditional 'tap on the shoulder'. Yup, when you lock down the internet – for your own safety of course – you keep full records of every citizens electronic movements, and you allow over 30 government departments almost full access to that information at the tap of a couple of buttons with minimum oversight, what's left? Ah yes, spies in every community to report back so no minority is left behind, including the LBQ-GTI brigade (who have always been in British Intelligence, but officialdom previously looked the other way). But don't call it a Police State, 'coz that is bad . Managed British democracy and freedoms are good .

Here are a few of the headlines:

And two pieces by 'The Friends of Snowden', the Guardian!

What this smacks of is damage repair and promotion PR exercise. I bet this boilerplate interview was slated for earlier release but when it was discovered that former MI6 agent Christopher Steele prepared the Trump 'Dodgy Dossier', not to mention his past in the famous Moscow 'Spy Rock' episode, so they waited a little while to let the news how MI6 treats its former/agents to cool off.

Moscow Exile , March 3, 2017 at 2:45 am
I never got a tap on the shoulder -- not even an inkling of one.

Hardly surprising, really being a fully signed and paid up member of the "Enemies Within".

And the Russians have never approached me ither.

Bloody no use to anyone, me!

Jen , March 3, 2017 at 3:24 am
Do MI6 really tap people on the shoulder if they want to recruit them? I'd have thought their methods involved press-ganging people and threatening blackmail by posting fake videos of their victims engaged in terrorist or paedophilic acts if they refused to cooperate.
http://www.nelsonsnavy.co.uk/broadside7.html
Moscow Exile , March 3, 2017 at 3:33 am
Don't be daft! That's what the FSB does. The British Secret Intelligence Service invites you round for a cup of tea and a little chat.
Jen , March 3, 2017 at 4:32 am
Was that how James Bond was recruited to work for Her Maj Betty Windsor's Secret Service: being invited to a cup of tea, a Vesper Martini and a chat with Misses Moneypenny and Goodnight somewhere in Mayfair in London?
Moscow Exile , March 3, 2017 at 5:48 am
Nah, they used Miss Moneypenny as a honeytrap. He was always after shagging her, but I don't think he ever did; she was far too classy for Bond.
Moscow Exile , March 3, 2017 at 3:41 am
GCHQ to recruit social media savvy teenage girls as next-gen female spies

[Jul 16, 2017] It's called cutting one's losses,

Jul 16, 2017 | gravatar.com
  1. Moscow Exile says: March 4, 2017 at 3:14 am
  1. The Committee on Appropriations of the House of Representatives of the US Congress has drafted a bill to cut US military aid to Ukraine to just $150 million, which is less than half of the $350 million Kiev received from Washington in 2016.

    Under the proposed bill, the Pentagon can spend funds "for training, equipment, weapons of a defensive nature, logistics, and intelligence."

    Washington has ignored Kiev's persistent calls for the supply of offensive weapons for its "counterterrorism operation" in Donbass.

    See: Why is US Slashing Military Aid to Ukraine?

    It's called cutting one's losses, I think.

[Jul 16, 2017] Ukraine periodically tries sweet talk to lure the east back, but the time to do that was immediately after the Maidan – instead, nationalist fervor gripped the capital and giddy nationalists went hard the other way with proclamations that they would delegitimize the Russian language.

Jul 16, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

marknesop , July 16, 2017 at 8:35 am

Ukraine periodically tries sweet talk to lure the east back, but the time to do that was immediately after the Maidan – instead, nationalist fervor gripped the capital and giddy nationalists went hard the other way with proclamations that they would delegitimize the Russian language. If anything about those lunatic days can be said to have been the catalyst which set subsequent events in motion, the fatal mistake, that was it. The mayor of Lvov, no less, made a speech the very next day – in perfect colloquial Russian – in which he tried to walk back the disaster and reassure the easterners that there would not be legal action to discriminate against them because of their habitual language, but the die was cast and it was too late.

Had the nationalists not had their way or had they not given in to the temptation to indulge their hatred of Russia and everything about it, there is every chance regime change would have succeeded in gathering Ukraine to the EU's bosom. Russia might still have made a grab for Crimea, and for me it would still have been legitimate since it was once part of Russia and was never ceded legally to Ukraine as its other territories were. But the stab in the back over the use of Russian, which once again was only a treat the nationalists foolishly allowed themselves as a reward for victory, provided a perfect catalyst for rebellion and the rapid decision-making it entails. I would be willing to bet Washington and the State Department are still cursing over that tactical blunder, since they are now lumbered with the great corrupt mass of Ukraine, with an active rebellion simmering on its eastern edge, but without the sparkling prize of Crimea. I don't know if Putin actually said he did not want to be welcomed by NATO sailors in Sevastopol, as he is reputed to have done, but that most certainly was part of the plan.

likbez , July 16, 2017 at 8:09 pm
This is a very good comment. I think you caught the essence of what happened. Nationalists first destroyed the country territorial integrity, and after that, they destroyed its economics. Essentially acting as US stooges, helping the USA to achieve its geopolitical goals (and Ukraine remains the major geopolitical victory of Obama administration).

Now the majority of Ukrainians exist on around $2 a day. So the social explosion is possible. And they continue digging the hole deeper and deeper. This is a real Ukrainian tragedy: they managed to replicate all the horrors of 90th again.

I still remember Bush the older speech about "suicidal Ukrainian nationalism" (Chicken Kiev speech https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_Kiev_speech ). It proved to be pretty prophetic.

Also, idealization of the West promoted by nationalists serves as a trap, consequences of which are yet to come. Being Germany resource base is not a walk in the park. Ask Bulgarians about this experience. Or Greece.

At the same time Donbas tragedy was partially the result of Putin's policy (or lack thereof) because there was a vague promise that if on the referendum they vote for joining Russia they will be accepted like Crimea. But he decided not do that. Or, most probably, somebody helped Putin to decide that way. Of course, after Yeltsin drunk orgy Russia remains weak and can't challenge the USA directly. And that would do just that. But truth be told after Odessa civilians burning in the building all Eastern Ukraine up to Kiev was probably ready to accept Russians as liberators. At least nationalists in Kharkov felt that the city has been already lost.

I talked with a couple of Ukrainian refugees from Donbas area and they were not actually too exited about Putin's policy and think that he shares the blame with nationalists.

This was a trap that helped to provoke the civil war: the USA pushed for the military solution. May be in order to destabilize the region, and by extension, Russia, which they incorrectly consider the main geopolitical enemy after China. But as a result, they destroyed remnants of Ukrainian economics, and now somebody needs to pick the bill. This process of deindustrialization is continuing as Ukraine lost the major market for its production. 300% devaluation of grivna reflects just that. Just think about it: 300% in three years: from 8 to a dollar to 26

In essence, the USA position on Donbas conflict was to the right of Ukrainian nationalists. Especially US neocons like Nuland and McCain. I remember Yatsenyuk speech (in Russian) at this time in which he backtracked from "Ukrainian language uber alles" position; might be a tactical maneuver, but still

In any case, Ukraine remains the worst defeat of Putin in foreign policy area for his whole term in office (Libya was under Medvedev). And the major geopolitical victory for the USA. Nobody cares if Ukrainians will starve. And if Russia stops transiting of gas as they plan to do, the economic situation in Ukraine will become much worse. At this point they might arrive as close to the failed state as one can get.

marknesop , July 16, 2017 at 9:10 pm
Thank you, likbez. Yes, Putin several times referred carelessly to 'Novorossiya', which created the impression that Russia was considering accepting it. Also, he obtained the advance approval of the Duma to conduct military operations as he saw fit in order to protect eastern-Ukrainian ethnic Russians. That was perhaps the biggest mistake he ever made, and he withdrew it, but it was too late and it very much played into western hands. Washington was able to portray Russia as ready to invade Ukraine, and it was convincing.

I think Putin has known all along that eastern Ukraine would be an asset as a frozen conflict, like Abkhazia and South Ossetia are in Georgia, whereas if Russia were to take them in they would be a liability, as Russia would be forced to defend them. But those former Donbas residents who grumble because Putin did not absorb eastern Ukraine should ask themselves if they would be better off if Kiev won and subjugated them, and they joined the people who are living on a couple of bucks a day. Russian commerce still goes on with the east, but not with the rest of Ukraine.

And it's true Ukraine represents a major defeat for Russia, but there was little Russia could have done to stop it. Russia was not going to go to war against NATO to prevent it from seizing Ukraine, but NATO is not likely to go to war to hold on to it, either. Russia played by the rules and stayed out of what it labeled Ukraine's business, but the west had no such scruples, and it meddled, meddled, meddled and instigated a coup. Only a coup will take it back.

[Jul 14, 2017] Tucker Carlson, Neocon Slayer by Justin Raimondo

Notable quotes:
"... Oh, it was glorious fun, yielding the kind of satisfaction that us anti-interventionists rarely get to enjoy: not one but two prominent neoconservatives who have been wrong about everything for the past decade – yet never held accountable – getting taken down on national television. Tucker Carlson, whose show is a shining light of reason in a fast-darkening world, has performed a public service by demolishing both Ralph Peters and Max Boot on successive shows. But these two encounters with evil weren't just fun to watch, they're also highly instructive for what they tell us about the essential weakness of the War Party and its failing strategy for winning over the American people. ..."
"... For the neocons, it's always 1938. The enemy is always the reincarnation of Hitler, and anyone who questions the wisdom of war is denounced as an "appeaser" in the fashion of Neville Chamberlain or Lindbergh. ..."
"... Reprinted with permission from Antiwar.com . ..."
Jul 14, 2017 | ronpaulinstitute.org

Oh, it was glorious fun, yielding the kind of satisfaction that us anti-interventionists rarely get to enjoy: not one but two prominent neoconservatives who have been wrong about everything for the past decade – yet never held accountable – getting taken down on national television. Tucker Carlson, whose show is a shining light of reason in a fast-darkening world, has performed a public service by demolishing both Ralph Peters and Max Boot on successive shows. But these two encounters with evil weren't just fun to watch, they're also highly instructive for what they tell us about the essential weakness of the War Party and its failing strategy for winning over the American people.

Tucker's first victim was Ralph Peters , an alleged "military expert" who's been a fixture on Fox News since before the Iraq war, of which he was a rabid proponent. Tucker starts out the program by noting that ISIS "caliph" Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi may have been killed in a Russian airstrike and that the talk in Washington is now moving away from defeating ISIS and focusing on Iran as the principal enemy. He asks why is this? Why not take a moment to celebrate the death of Baghdadi and acknowledge that we have certain common interests with the Russians?

Peters leaps into overstatement, as is his wont: "We can't have an alliance with terrorists, and the Russians are terrorists. They're not Islamists, but they are terrorists." He then alleges that the Russians aren't really fighting ISIS, but instead are bombing hospitals, children, and "our allies" (i.e. the radical Islamist Syrian rebels trained and funded by the CIA and allied with al-Qaeda and al-Nusra). The Russians "hate the United States," and "we have nothing in common with the Russians" –nothing!" The Russians, says Peters, are paving the way for the Iranians – the real evil in the region – to "build up an empire from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean." Ah yes, the " Shia crescent " which the Israelis and their amen corner in the US have been warning against since before the Iraq war. Yet Tucker points out that over 3,000 Americans have been killed by terrorists in the US, and "none of them are Shi'ites: all of [these terrorists] have been Sunni extremists who are supported by the Saudis who are supposed to be our allies." And while we're on the subject: "Why," asks Tucker, "if we're so afraid of Iran did we kill Saddam Hussein, thereby empowering Iran?"

"Because we were stupid," says Peters.

Oh boy! Peters was one of the most militant advocates of the Iraq war: we were "stupid," I suppose, to listen to him. Yet Tucker lets this ride momentarily, saving his big guns for the moment when he takes out Peters completely. And Peters walks right into it when Tucker wonders why we can't cooperate with Russia, since both countries are under assault from Sunni terrorists:

PETERS: You sound like Charles Lindbergh in 1938 saying Hitler hasn't attacked us.

TUCKER: I beg your pardon? You cannot compare me to somebody who makes apologies for Hitler. And I don't think Putin is comparable.

PETERS: I think Putin is.

TUCKER: I think it is a grotesque overstatement actually. I think it's insane.

PETERS: Fine, you can think it's insane all you want.

For the neocons, it's always 1938. The enemy is always the reincarnation of Hitler, and anyone who questions the wisdom of war is denounced as an "appeaser" in the fashion of Neville Chamberlain or Lindbergh. Yet no one ever examines and challenges the assumption behind this rhetorical trope, which is that war with the enemy of the moment – whether it be Saddam Hussein, the Iranian ayatollahs, or Vladimir Putin – is inevitable and imminent. If Putin is Hitler, and Russia is Nazi Germany, then we must take the analogy all the way and assume that we'll be at war with the Kremlin shortly.

After all, Charles Lindbergh's opponents in the great debate of the 1940s openly said that Hitler, who posed an existential threat to the West, had to be destroyed, and that this goal could not be achieved short of war. Of course, Franklin Roosevelt pretended that this wasn't so, and pledged repeatedly that we weren't going to war, but secretly he manipulated events so that war was practically inevitable. Meanwhile, the more honest elements of the War Party openly proclaimed that we had to aid Britain and get into the war.

Is this what Peters and his gaggle of neocons are advocating – that we go to war with nuclear-armed Russia and annihilate much of the world in a radioactive Armageddon? It certainly seems that way. The Hitler-Lindbergh trope certainly does more than merely imply that.

Clearly riled by the attempt to smear him, Tucker, the neocon slayer, then moves in for the kill:

I would hate to go back and read your columns assuring America that taking out Saddam Hussein will make the region calmer, more peaceful, and America safer, when in fact it has been the opposite and it has empowered Russia and Iran, the two countries you say you fear most – let's be totally honest, we don't always know the outcomes.

They are not entirely predictable so maybe we should lower that a little bit rather than calling people accommodationist.

This is what the neocons hate: reminding them of their record is like showing a vampire a crucifix. Why should we listen to Peters, who's been wrong about everything for decades? Peters' response is the typical neocon riposte to all honest questions about their policies and record: you're a traitor, you're "cheering on Vladimir Putin!" To which Tucker has the perfect America Firster answer:
I'm cheering for America as always. Our interests ought to come first and to the extent that making temporary alliances with other countries serves our interests, I'm in favor of that. Making sweeping moral claims – grotesque ones – comparing people to Hitler advances the ball not one inch and blinds us to reality.
Peters has no real argument, and so he resorts to the method that's become routine in American politics: accuse your opponent of being a foreign agent. Tucker, says Peters, is an "apologist" not only for Putin but also for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Again, Tucker answers smears with cold logic:
So because I'm asking rational questions about what's best for America I'm a friend to strongmen and dictators? That is a conversation stopper, not a beginning of a rational conversation. My only point is when Syria was run by Assad 10% of the population was Christian and they lived in relative peace.
And that's really the whole point: the War Party wants to stop the conversation. They don't want a debate – when, really, have we ever had a fair debate in this country over foreign policy? They depend on fear, innuendo, and ad hominem "arguments" to drag us into war after war – and Tucker is having none of it.

So why is any of this important? After all, it's just a TV show, and as amusing as it is to watch a prominent neocon get creamed, what doe it all mean in the end? Well, it matters because Tucker didn't start out talking sense on foreign policy. He started out, in short, as a conventional conservative, but then something happened. As he put it to Peters at the end of the segment:

I want to act in America's interest and stop making shallow, sweeping claims about countries we don't fully understand and hope everything will be fine in the end. I saw that happen and it didn't work.
What's true isn't self-evident, at least to those of us who aren't omniscient. Many conservatives, as well as the country as a whole, learned something as they saw the disasters in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria unfold. On the right, many have rejected the neoconservative "idealism" that destroyed the Middle East and unleashed ISIS. When Donald Trump stood before the South Carolina GOP debate and told the assembled mandarins that we were lied into the Iraq war, the chattering classes declared that he was finished – yet he won that primary, and went on to win the nomination, precisely because Republican voters were ready to hear that message.

Indeed, Trump's "America First" skepticism when it comes to foreign wars made the crucial difference in the election , as a recent study shows : communities hard hit by our endless wars put him over the top in the key states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. This, and not "Russian meddling," handed him the White House.

Tucker Carlson's ideological evolution limns the transformation of the American right in the age of Trump: while Trump is not, by a long shot, a consistent anti-interventionist, Tucker comes pretty close. He is, at least, a realist with a pronounced antipathy for foreign adventurism, and that is a big step forward from the neoconservative orthodoxy that has bathed much of the world in blood.

If the demolition of Ralph Peters was the cake, then the meltdown of neoconservative ideologue Max Boot the next evening was the frosting, with ice cream on the side.

Perhaps the neocons, having been trounced in round one, thought Boot could do better: they were mistaken. Tucker took him apart simply by letting him talk: Boot didn't answer a single question put to him, and, in the course of it all, as Boot resorted to the typical ad hominems, Tucker made a cogent point:

[T]o dismiss people who disagree with you as immoral – which is your habit – isn't a useful form of debate, it's a kind of moral preening, and it's little odd coming from you, who really has been consistently wrong in the most flagrant and flamboyant way for over a decade. And so, you have to sort of wonder, like –

BOOT: What have I been wrong about, Tucker? What have I been wrong about?

CARLSON: Well, having watch you carefully and known you for a long time, I recall vividly when you said that if we were to topple the governments of Afghanistan and Iraq, the region will be much safer and the people who took their place would help us in the global war on terror. Of course it didn't happen –

Boot starts to completely melt down at this point, screeching "You supported the Iraq war!" To which Tucker trenchantly replies:
I've been wrong about a ton of things, you try to learn your lesson. But when you get out there in the New York Times and say, we really should have done more to depose Qaddafi, because you know, Libya is going to be better when that happens. And then to hear you say we need to knock off the Assad regime and things will be better in Syria, he sort of wonder like, well, maybe we should choose another professions. Selling insurance, something you're good at. I guess that's kind of the point. Are there no sanctions for being as wrong as you have?
Why oh why should we listen to Peters and Boot and their fellow neocons, who have been – literally – dead wrong about everything: their crackbrained ideology has led to untold thousands of deaths since September 11, 2001 alone. And for what?

In the end, Boot falls back on the usual non-arguments: Tucker is "immoral" because he denies that Trump is a Russian agent, and persists in asking questions about our foreign policy of endless intervention in the Middle East. Tucker keeps asking why Boot thinks Russia is the main threat to the United States, and Boot finally answers: "Because they are the only country that can destroy us with a nuclear strike."

To a rational person, the implications of this are obvious: in that case, shouldn't we be trying to reach some sort of détente, or even achieve a degree of cooperation with Moscow? Oh, but no, because you see the Russians are inherently evil, we have "nothing" in common with them – in which case, war is inevitable.

At which point, Tucker avers: "Okay. I am beginning to think that your judgment has been clouded by ideology, I don't fully understand where it's coming from but I will let our viewers decide."

I know where it's coming from. Tucker's viewers may not know that Boot is a Russian immigrant, who – like so many of our Russophobic warmongers – arrived on our shores with his hatred of the motherland packed in his suitcase. There's a whole platoon of them: Cathy Young, who recently released her polemic arguing for a new cold war with Russia in the pages ofReason magazine; Atlantic writer and tweeter of anti-Trump obscenities Julia Ioffe, whose visceral hatred for her homeland is a veritable monomania; Gary Kasparov, the former chess champion who spends most of his energy plotting revenge against Vladimir Putin and a Russian electorate that has consistently rejected his hopeless presidential campaigns, and I could go on but you get the picture.

As the new cold war envelopes the country, wrapping us in its icy embrace and freezing all rational discussion of foreign policy, a few people stand out as brave exceptions to the groupthinking mass of the chattering classes: among the most visible and articulate are Tucker Carlson, Glenn Greenwald, journalist Michael Tracey, Prof. Stephen Cohen, and of course our own Ron Paul. I tip my hat to them, in gratitude and admiration, for they represent the one thing we need right now: hope. The hope that this madness will pass, that we'll beat back this latest War Party offensive, and enjoy a return to what passes these days for normalcy.

Tucker Carlson Most Instense Interview EVER - SJW vs LOGIC - YouTube

Reprinted with permission from Antiwar.com .

[Jul 13, 2017] Porky as Kwame Nkrumah and other similarities between Banderastan and post colonial African history

Jul 13, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Cortes , July 12, 2017 at 1:59 pm

Porky as Kwame Nkrumah and other similarities between Banderastan and post colonial African history:

https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/07/12/postcolonial-ukraine-why-federalization-is-not-an-option-for-kiev/

Northern Star , July 12, 2017 at 2:44 pm
"Only in the case of Crimea Moscow acted in a more open way. The hostile rejection to this step by close allies like Belarus and Kazakhstan shows that Putin indeed acted against the established consensus of the post-Soviet world."

WTF!!!!!! Any rejection-hostile or not-of the formal incorporation of Crimea into the Russian'state would be a rejection of the overwhelmingly expressed will of the people of Crimea to join with Russia as was show in the referendum.

[Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Cohen's appearance on Carlson's show last night demonstrated again at what a blistering pace public opinion in the West about Putin and Russia is shifting, for the better. ..."
"... Cohen is always good, but last night he nailed it, calling the media's coverage of Hamburg 'pornography'. ..."
"... It was just a year ago, pre-Trump, that professor Cohen was banned from all the networks, from any major media outlet, and being relentlessly pilloried by the neocon media for being a naive fool for defending Putin and Russia. ..."
"... "The first thing you notice is just how much the press is rooting for this meeting between our president and the Russian President to fail. It's a kind of pornography. Just as there's no love in pornography, there's no American national interest in this bashing of Trump and Putin. ..."
"... Carlson tried to draw Cohen out about who exactly in Washington is so against Assad, and why, and Cohen deflected, demurring - 'I don't know - I'm not an expert'. Of course he knows, as does Carlson - it is an unholy alliance of Israel, Saudi Arabia and their neocon friends in Washington and the media who are pushing this criminal policy, who support ISIS, deliberately. But they can't say so, because, ... well, because. Ask Rupert Murdoch. ..."
Jul 12, 2017 | russia-insider.com
Cohen's appearance on Carlson's show last night demonstrated again at what a blistering pace public opinion in the West about Putin and Russia is shifting, for the better.

Cohen is always good, but last night he nailed it, calling the media's coverage of Hamburg 'pornography'.

Ahh, the power of the apt phrase.

It was just a year ago, pre-Trump, that professor Cohen was banned from all the networks, from any major media outlet, and being relentlessly pilloried by the neocon media for being a naive fool for defending Putin and Russia.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/5L2F4ocEIZw

Last night he was the featured guest on the most watched news show in the country, being cheered on by the host, who has him on as a regular. And Cohen isn't remotely a conservative. He is a contributing editor at the arch-liberal Nation magazine, of which his wife is the editor. It doesn't really get pinker than that.

Some choice quotes here, but the whole thing is worth a listen:

"The first thing you notice is just how much the press is rooting for this meeting between our president and the Russian President to fail. It's a kind of pornography. Just as there's no love in pornography, there's no American national interest in this bashing of Trump and Putin.

As a historian let me tell you the headline I would write instead:

"What we witnessed today in Hamburg was a potentially historic new detente. an anti-cold-war partnership begun by Trump and Putin but meanwhile attempts to sabotage it escalate." I've seen a lot of summits between American and Russian presidents, ... and I think what we saw today was potentially the most fateful meeting ... since the Cold War.

The reason is, is that the relationship with Russia is so dangerous and we have a president who might have been crippled or cowed by these Russiagate attacks ... yet he was not. He was politically courageous. It went well. They got important things done. I think maybe today we witnessed president Trump emerging as an American statesman."

Cohen goes on to say that the US should ally with Assad, Iran, and Russia to crush ISIS, with Carlson bobbing his head up and down in emphatic agreement.

Carlson tried to draw Cohen out about who exactly in Washington is so against Assad, and why, and Cohen deflected, demurring - 'I don't know - I'm not an expert'. Of course he knows, as does Carlson - it is an unholy alliance of Israel, Saudi Arabia and their neocon friends in Washington and the media who are pushing this criminal policy, who support ISIS, deliberately. But they can't say so, because, ... well, because. Ask Rupert Murdoch.

Things are getting better in the US media, but we aren't quite able to call a spade a spade in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

[Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Cohen's appearance on Carlson's show last night demonstrated again at what a blistering pace public opinion in the West about Putin and Russia is shifting, for the better. ..."
"... Cohen is always good, but last night he nailed it, calling the media's coverage of Hamburg 'pornography'. ..."
"... It was just a year ago, pre-Trump, that professor Cohen was banned from all the networks, from any major media outlet, and being relentlessly pilloried by the neocon media for being a naive fool for defending Putin and Russia. ..."
"... "The first thing you notice is just how much the press is rooting for this meeting between our president and the Russian President to fail. It's a kind of pornography. Just as there's no love in pornography, there's no American national interest in this bashing of Trump and Putin. ..."
"... Carlson tried to draw Cohen out about who exactly in Washington is so against Assad, and why, and Cohen deflected, demurring - 'I don't know - I'm not an expert'. Of course he knows, as does Carlson - it is an unholy alliance of Israel, Saudi Arabia and their neocon friends in Washington and the media who are pushing this criminal policy, who support ISIS, deliberately. But they can't say so, because, ... well, because. Ask Rupert Murdoch. ..."
Jul 12, 2017 | russia-insider.com
Cohen's appearance on Carlson's show last night demonstrated again at what a blistering pace public opinion in the West about Putin and Russia is shifting, for the better.

Cohen is always good, but last night he nailed it, calling the media's coverage of Hamburg 'pornography'.

Ahh, the power of the apt phrase.

It was just a year ago, pre-Trump, that professor Cohen was banned from all the networks, from any major media outlet, and being relentlessly pilloried by the neocon media for being a naive fool for defending Putin and Russia.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/5L2F4ocEIZw

Last night he was the featured guest on the most watched news show in the country, being cheered on by the host, who has him on as a regular. And Cohen isn't remotely a conservative. He is a contributing editor at the arch-liberal Nation magazine, of which his wife is the editor. It doesn't really get pinker than that.

Some choice quotes here, but the whole thing is worth a listen:

"The first thing you notice is just how much the press is rooting for this meeting between our president and the Russian President to fail. It's a kind of pornography. Just as there's no love in pornography, there's no American national interest in this bashing of Trump and Putin.

As a historian let me tell you the headline I would write instead:

"What we witnessed today in Hamburg was a potentially historic new detente. an anti-cold-war partnership begun by Trump and Putin but meanwhile attempts to sabotage it escalate." I've seen a lot of summits between American and Russian presidents, ... and I think what we saw today was potentially the most fateful meeting ... since the Cold War.

The reason is, is that the relationship with Russia is so dangerous and we have a president who might have been crippled or cowed by these Russiagate attacks ... yet he was not. He was politically courageous. It went well. They got important things done. I think maybe today we witnessed president Trump emerging as an American statesman."

Cohen goes on to say that the US should ally with Assad, Iran, and Russia to crush ISIS, with Carlson bobbing his head up and down in emphatic agreement.

Carlson tried to draw Cohen out about who exactly in Washington is so against Assad, and why, and Cohen deflected, demurring - 'I don't know - I'm not an expert'. Of course he knows, as does Carlson - it is an unholy alliance of Israel, Saudi Arabia and their neocon friends in Washington and the media who are pushing this criminal policy, who support ISIS, deliberately. But they can't say so, because, ... well, because. Ask Rupert Murdoch.

Things are getting better in the US media, but we aren't quite able to call a spade a spade in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

[Jul 11, 2017] Ambassador Nikki Haley vs. President Trump by Daniel McAdams

Notable quotes:
"... As The Hill correctly pointed out, "Haley's description runs counter to the versions offered by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson , Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Trump himself ." ..."
"... But Hurricane Haley was not finished. She poured ice water on President Trump's agreement with President Putin to work together on cyber-security, telling CNN, "[w]e can't trust Russia, and we won't ever trust Russia. But you keep those that you don't trust closer so that you can always keep an eye on them and keep them in check." ..."
"... It is absolutely clear that hyper-neocon Nikki Haley has gone rogue and is actively undermining the foreign policy of her boss and President, Donald Trump. From her embarrassing, foaming-at-the-mouth tirades in the UN Security Council to this latest bizarre effort to sabotage President Trump's first attempt to fulfill his campaign pledge to find a way to get along better with Russia, President Trump's own Ambassador has become the biggest enemy of his foreign policy. ..."
Jul 11, 2017 | original.antiwar.com

Donald Trump came to the White House with a reputation as a top notch businessman. He built an international real estate empire and is worth billions. He then went into reality television, where his signature line as he dismissed incompetent potential employees was, "you're fired!"

On Friday, President Trump held a long-awaited face-to-face meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. The meeting was scheduled to be a brief, 30 minute meet and greet, but turned into a two-plus hour substantive session producing a ceasefire agreement for parts of Syria and a plan to continue working together in the future. After the extended session, which was cordial by all accounts, President Trump said the meeting was "tremendous."

President Trump indicated that the issue of Russian interference in the US elections came up in conversation and that Putin vehemently denied it. It obviously was not a make or break issue in the conversation. President Trump's latest statement on the issue is that "we don't know for sure" who was behind any meddling.

Later on Friday, President Trump's Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, said of the Syria agreement that, "I think this is our first indication of the U.S. and Russia being able to work together in Syria."

On Sunday, President Trump Tweeted in praise of the Syria ceasefire agreement, adding that, "now it is time to move forward in working constructively with Russia!"

It suddenly appeared that the current reprise of a vintage 1950s US/Soviet face-off in relations had turned the corner back to sanity. Perhaps we will be pulling back from the edge of WWIII with thermonuclear weapons!

Then President Trump's Ambassador to the United Nations, the notorious neocon Nikki Haley, showed up on the weekend talk shows.

To CNN's Dana Bash, she directly contradicted her boss, Donald Trump, and undermined his official position regarding Russian involvement in the US election.

Said Ambassador Haley of Trump's meeting with Putin:

One, he wanted to basically look him in the eye, let him know that, yes, we know you meddled in our elections. Yes, we know you did it, cut it out. And I think President Putin did exactly what we thought he would do, which is deny it. This is Russia trying to save face. And they can't. They can't. Everybody knows that Russia meddled in our elections.

As The Hill correctly pointed out, "Haley's description runs counter to the versions offered by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson , Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Trump himself ."

But Hurricane Haley was not finished. She poured ice water on President Trump's agreement with President Putin to work together on cyber-security, telling CNN, "[w]e can't trust Russia, and we won't ever trust Russia. But you keep those that you don't trust closer so that you can always keep an eye on them and keep them in check."

It is absolutely clear that hyper-neocon Nikki Haley has gone rogue and is actively undermining the foreign policy of her boss and President, Donald Trump. From her embarrassing, foaming-at-the-mouth tirades in the UN Security Council to this latest bizarre effort to sabotage President Trump's first attempt to fulfill his campaign pledge to find a way to get along better with Russia, President Trump's own Ambassador has become the biggest enemy of his foreign policy.

Surely the President – who as an enormously successful businessman has hired and fired thousands – can see the damage she is doing to his Administration by actively undermining his foreign policy.

President Trump needs to reprise his signature television line. He needs to pick up the phone, ask for Nikki, and shout "you're FIRED!" into the telephone.

Daniel McAdams is director of the The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity . Reprinted from The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity.

Read more by Daniel McAdams Manchester Bomber Was Product of West's Libya/Syria Intervention – May 24th, 2017 Is That All There Is? Intel Community Releases Its Russia 'Hacking' Report – January 8th, 2017 McCain to Trump: Don't You Dare Make Peace With Russia! – November 16th, 2016 The End of Interventionism? – October 26th, 2016 Jennifer Rubin: Hillary Must Stop Peace With Iran at All Costs! – August 18th, 2016

[Jul 11, 2017] Trump Putin Talk, But US-Russia Confrontation Lingers

Notable quotes:
"... Tillerson is basically echoing the Obama Administration's talking points and I think for a lot of foreign policy types who were hopeful that President Trump would take a more realist approach to foreign policy, they're hopes have been disappointed and I think that Tillerson's rhetoric and Tillerson's appointment of former NATO Ambassador, Kurt Volker, the administration's point man on Ukraine, are all very troubling signs. ..."
"... Well, Ukraine is historically. It's one country, but it really is two nations. There's the Russian speaking East, which has traditionally looked towards Moscow and then there are the former Habsburg Provinces in the West, which are traditionally Ukrainian speaking. The country has a history of dual nationalities. The recent history of U.S. involvement in Ukraine, it does not inspire a lot of confidence. ..."
"... When protests broke out in the winter of 2013, 2014, sitting U.S. Senators Chris Murphy and John McCain traveled to the Maidan to egg on the protests. The U.S. Ambassador at the time, Geoffrey Pyatt, and the Assistant Secretary of State, Victoria Nuland, also traveled and to support the protests. Nuland rudely famously handed out cookies to the protestors, the U.S. has been deeply involved in the effort to wrench Ukrainian out of Moscow's orbit. We see what has resolved it. The democratically-elected Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown on the night of February 21 ..."
"... The U.S. wasn't a party to the deal. It was a deal between the European Union; the representatives of the European Union and the Ukrainian Government. That deal didn't last 24 hours before the protests really turned violent and Yanukovych had to flee. Soon after that, Russia annexed Crimea and then a full blown civil war started in and around April 6th, in the east. ..."
"... To quote the esteemed University of Chicago Political Scientist John Mearsheimer, "NATO expansion is the Taproot of the Ukrainian crisis." What Mearsheimer means by that is that NATO's expansion beginning in the 1990's under Bill Clinton who saw the borders of the alliance move ever eastward right up to Russia's western border. The Russians find that, I think for fairly understandable reasons, rather alarming. ..."
"... What we need to keep in mind is the Ukraine crisis really was over the EU Association Agreement. The problem from the Russian perspective is that the EU Association Agreement had specific foreign policy and security protocols embedded in it. Basically setting the stage for Ukraine's entry into NATO. I find it deeply troubling that Poroshenko and Tillerson are now broaching the subject of Ukrainian membership into NATO. That really, I think, spark a very serious reaction on the part of the Russians as possibly the worst possible thing that Ukraine could do at the moment. ..."
"... Well, it's a good question. I mean I think there's very little evidence that the alliance would be strengthened by Ukrainian membership. I think that there's really little evidence that the alliance has been strengthened by the addition of Romania and Bulgaria, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania. I find the entire concept of expanding the alliance up to the borders of Russia. It seems to me to be quite a dangerous and destabilizing move, but our foreign policy establishment is very slow to learn lessons from past mistakes. We see that now with discussion regarding Syria, for instance. These people, I don't know, were they asleep in 2003 when we went to war with Iraq? ..."
"... I mean there were people in the think tank world here who continually write [inaudible 00:10:20] saying, for instance, that the Libya intervention in 2011 was a success. It seems to me that ... I think they tend to believe their own myths and propaganda. They're so ideologically tied to this narrative of American Democracy Promotion that it really crowds out any room for rational thinking. ..."
"... The question is why is there this unique obsession with him and demonization to the point where, as Richard Engle does, he's talking about Putin playing chess and checkers and he's talking about Putin's body language and how Putin looks into people's eyes and makes you see what he wants you to see as if he's some super villain. ..."
"... It's basically Russia coverage without facts, evidence or logic. This isn't anything new, of course, but the intense demonization of this Russian leader is something that we didn't even see when Joseph Stalin ruled the USSR. This is something sort of new and really, really pretty dangerous. I think that it has its sources in a certain pent-up frustration on the part of a lot of Democrats that their candidate lost fairly and squarely to this rather bizarre fellow who sits in the Oval Office today. They can't get over it. This was, of course, something that the Clinton campaign actually. It was part of their post-election strategy. There's a new book out called, "Shattered" by Amie Parnes and, I think, Jonathan Martin ..."
"... Of course, I have this very troubling feeling that this is all in order to set the stage for Hillary Clinton to return as the nominee in four years time because then she can say well, I didn't really lose even though I outspent Donald Trump 2 to 1. I didn't really lose because it was stolen from me. The Russians stole it from me. I think there are a lot of Democrats who are willing to believe that and they're willing to absolve her for running a horrible, horrible campaign. ..."
"... Democratic partisans in the media might already be setting the stage for that return by warning of Russia sending over new spies to the U.S. in advance of 2018 and 2020, which if Clinton runs again and loses or if another Democrat runs again and loses, with a similar campaign, they could then go ahead and blame Russia again for that, too. ..."
"... Democratic partisans in the media might already be setting the stage for that return by warning of Russia sending over new spies to the U.S. in advance of 2018 and 2020, which if Clinton runs again and loses or if another Democrat runs again and loses, with a similar campaign, they could then go ahead and blame Russia again for that, too. ..."
Jul 11, 2017 | therealnews.com

JAMES CARDEN: Thank you very much.

AARON MATE: Thanks for joining us. Let's start with Ukraine. Immediately following this historic meeting between Trump and Putin, Tillerson lays down the line that Russian behavior in Ukraine has to change. Can you talk about what's at stake here for both sides of this?

JAMES CARDEN: There's quite a bit at stake considering the fact that the war in the [inaudible 00:01:53] Donbass region continues to this day. It's a war that is taken nearly 10,000 lives. It's displaced over a million people and both parties to the Minsk Accord have a long way to go in implementing the agreement. Though I fear, that Minsk is probably a non-starter as far as Kiev goes and here's why. According to the United Nations, the Ukrainian government has to hold a vote on decentralization for the East. It's yet to do that yet. That vote was meant to be a pre-cursor to the agreement and I don't think they're going to hold that vote. Here's why. If they hold that vote, I believe the far right militias will try to come to power and try to overthrow Petro Poroshenko. Petro Poroshenko doesn't have a death wish. The country is currently ruled by Ukrainian oligarchs in a tacit alliance with far right figures like the speaker of Rada, Andriy Parubiy who founded the neo-Nazi party right sector.

Tillerson is basically echoing the Obama Administration's talking points and I think for a lot of foreign policy types who were hopeful that President Trump would take a more realist approach to foreign policy, they're hopes have been disappointed and I think that Tillerson's rhetoric and Tillerson's appointment of former NATO Ambassador, Kurt Volker, the administration's point man on Ukraine, are all very troubling signs.

AARON MATE: James, for those who aren't familiar with the recent history of Ukraine, can you talk a bit more about that internal split that you're talking about between the Donbass part of the country and the western part of Ukraine, where Kiev is and also what the U.S. role has been going back to the Obama administration as you mentioned.

JAMES CARDEN: Well, Ukraine is historically. It's one country, but it really is two nations. There's the Russian speaking East, which has traditionally looked towards Moscow and then there are the former Habsburg Provinces in the West, which are traditionally Ukrainian speaking. The country has a history of dual nationalities. The recent history of U.S. involvement in Ukraine, it does not inspire a lot of confidence.

When protests broke out in the winter of 2013, 2014, sitting U.S. Senators Chris Murphy and John McCain traveled to the Maidan to egg on the protests. The U.S. Ambassador at the time, Geoffrey Pyatt, and the Assistant Secretary of State, Victoria Nuland, also traveled and to support the protests. Nuland rudely famously handed out cookies to the protestors, the U.S. has been deeply involved in the effort to wrench Ukrainian out of Moscow's orbit. We see what has resolved it. The democratically-elected Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was overthrown on the night of February 21 and soon after, Russia-

AARON MATE: Hey, James, just to cut in. Before he was overthrown, he actually, along with Russia, had negotiated a deal with the U.S., right? To-

JAMES CARDEN: Deal?

AARON MATE: Yeah.

JAMES CARDEN: The U.S. wasn't a party to the deal. It was a deal between the European Union; the representatives of the European Union and the Ukrainian Government. That deal didn't last 24 hours before the protests really turned violent and Yanukovych had to flee. Soon after that, Russia annexed Crimea and then a full blown civil war started in and around April 6th, in the east.

AARON MATE: Just to set some context, some further context here, just right now we're talking about Ukraine in the context of Russia gate here in the U.S., where the alleged Russian meddling through fake news and email hacks is deemed by many people a threat to U.S. National Security so it's interesting to compare that with what happened in Ukraine whereas you talked about there was a heavy U.S. role in this protest movement against Yanukovych, leading to his ouster and now you have a country on Russia's borders, which is talking about joining NATO. Can you talk about how that factors into Putin's thinking here and what he's doing inside Ukraine?

JAMES CARDEN: Yeah, sure. To quote the esteemed University of Chicago Political Scientist John Mearsheimer, "NATO expansion is the Taproot of the Ukrainian crisis." What Mearsheimer means by that is that NATO's expansion beginning in the 1990's under Bill Clinton who saw the borders of the alliance move ever eastward right up to Russia's western border. The Russians find that, I think for fairly understandable reasons, rather alarming.

AARON MATE: In part because they were promised by the first President Bush that would never happen.

JAMES CARDEN: That's correct. What we need to keep in mind is the Ukraine crisis really was over the EU Association Agreement. The problem from the Russian perspective is that the EU Association Agreement had specific foreign policy and security protocols embedded in it. Basically setting the stage for Ukraine's entry into NATO. I find it deeply troubling that Poroshenko and Tillerson are now broaching the subject of Ukrainian membership into NATO. That really, I think, spark a very serious reaction on the part of the Russians as possibly the worst possible thing that Ukraine could do at the moment.

AARON MATE: Why do you think it's taken for granted across so much of a foreign policy establishment here that Ukraine falling into the Western orbit as opposed to being neutral would be a positive thing?

JAMES CARDEN: Well, it's a good question. I mean I think there's very little evidence that the alliance would be strengthened by Ukrainian membership. I think that there's really little evidence that the alliance has been strengthened by the addition of Romania and Bulgaria, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania. I find the entire concept of expanding the alliance up to the borders of Russia. It seems to me to be quite a dangerous and destabilizing move, but our foreign policy establishment is very slow to learn lessons from past mistakes. We see that now with discussion regarding Syria, for instance. These people, I don't know, were they asleep in 2003 when we went to war with Iraq?

I mean there were people in the think tank world here who continually write [inaudible 00:10:20] saying, for instance, that the Libya intervention in 2011 was a success. It seems to me that ... I think they tend to believe their own myths and propaganda. They're so ideologically tied to this narrative of American Democracy Promotion that it really crowds out any room for rational thinking.

... ... ...

AARON MATE: Okay. Going back to Russia and its borders. On its Western border, you have right now thousands of NATO troops. Can you talk about that context as it hangs over the prospects for improved US-Russia relations?

JAMES CARDEN: Well, again, I mean lets ... take a step further back and look at the context of this new cold war that were in with Russia. It's essentially, I believe, a forefront war. You have the Baltic Theater, where, as you say, U.S. and NATO have thousands of troops on Russia's border. There have been many close calls between Russian and NATO aircraft in the skies above the Baltic Sea.

The second front is as we spoke about Ukraine, where the Russians are supporting the Russian-speaking rebels in the east and the U.S. and NATO have a military base in western Ukraine from which they train Ukrainian soldiers to fight the Russian backed soldiers in the east. The third front is, as we were just talking about, Syria, and the fourth front, I believe it's safe to say, is unfolding in cyberspace. We have, at any moment, an accident can happen and this cold war could turn hot. I think that we're being distracted by the sideshow of Russia hacking and the left's rather odd obsession with Vladimir Putin.

AARON MATE: On that front, that segways perfectly to a clip I want to play for you. Just talking about how Putin is discussed in the U.S. media. I want to play for you a clip. This is Richard Engel, the chief foreign correspondent for NBC News.

Voice of Rich E: American presidents come and go, but Putin has outlasted them all. He's perfected the art of controlling every detail to achieve his own goals. All you really see when you look Putin in the eye is exactly what he wants you to see. So far, he's been winning every round in the long game he's playing against the U.S., but what is that game? Foreign policy analyst like to say that Trump is playing checkers while Putin is playing chess.

AARON MATE: That's Richard Engle, the chief foreign correspondent for NBC News. This was in a special he did on Friday night about Putin and Russia. I find that clip so striking because Engle is talking about Putin winning every round of a long game against the U.S., but then in the next sentence he asks what is the long game? James, your thoughts.

JAMES CARDEN: I can't put it any better than my Editor-in-Chief put it on Twitter when she was watching the Engle documentary the other night. I think she said something like it reminded her of Soviet propaganda. Any of this stuff coming out of. I assume this was on MSNBC?

AARON MATE: Yeah. It took the place of Rachel Maddow Show on Friday night and Maddow whose been a source of similar kind of stuff.

JAMES CARDEN: Right, as you've covered very well. Yeah, so MSNBC is. I mean, it's not even worth watching anymore. I mean it's just become an American version of. I would say R.T., but I think R.T. actually has higher editorial standards than MSNBC. I don't know quite what it is anymore except ... it gives space for these anti-Russian, anti-Putin hysterics.

This isn't to say by the way that Vladimir Putin is my kind of politician and if he was an American politician here, I certainly wouldn't vote for him. He's far too nationalistic and he would probably cozy up to the American image's right. I certainly wouldn't be happy about an American politician raiding the treasury like he and his associates have done. The problem is that that's an issue for the Russian people. They seem perfectly happy with Mr. Putin as president. I think he has something along the lines of 80% approval rating so if they're okay with it, I'm okay with it. But the idea that he is a puppet master pulling the strings, it is just beyond ridiculous.

AARON MATE: Yeah, James, I mean the question is not why criticize Putin because as you point out there's plenty to criticize him for. The question is why is there this unique obsession with him and demonization to the point where, as Richard Engle does, he's talking about Putin playing chess and checkers and he's talking about Putin's body language and how Putin looks into people's eyes and makes you see what he wants you to see as if he's some super villain.

JAMES CARDEN: Yes.

AARON MATE: Out of the cartoon.

JAMES CARDEN: He's a Svengali. It's basically Russia coverage without facts, evidence or logic. This isn't anything new, of course, but the intense demonization of this Russian leader is something that we didn't even see when Joseph Stalin ruled the USSR. This is something sort of new and really, really pretty dangerous. I think that it has its sources in a certain pent-up frustration on the part of a lot of Democrats that their candidate lost fairly and squarely to this rather bizarre fellow who sits in the Oval Office today. They can't get over it. This was, of course, something that the Clinton campaign actually. It was part of their post-election strategy. There's a new book out called, "Shattered" by Amie Parnes and, I think, Jonathan Martin [crosstalk 00:22:08].

AARON MATE: Jonathan Allen. Yeah.

JAMES CARDEN: Jonathan Allen. They report that the morning after the election, the team met at the headquarters in Brooklyn and they said okay, let's make Russia the cornerstone of our post-election strategy. That plays a big part of it. Of course, I have this very troubling feeling that this is all in order to set the stage for Hillary Clinton to return as the nominee in four years time because then she can say well, I didn't really lose even though I outspent Donald Trump 2 to 1. I didn't really lose because it was stolen from me. The Russians stole it from me. I think there are a lot of Democrats who are willing to believe that and they're willing to absolve her for running a horrible, horrible campaign.

AARON MATE: Yeah, James, and on that point, Democratic partisans in the media might already be setting the stage for that return by warning of Russia sending over new spies to the U.S. in advance of 2018 and 2020, which if Clinton runs again and loses or if another Democrat runs again and loses, with a similar campaign, they could then go ahead and blame Russia again for that, too.

We have to leave it there though 'cause we're way over time. James Carden, contributing writer at The Nation, Executive Editor for The American Committee for East-West Accord. He has also served as an advisor on Russia policy at the U.S. State Department. James, thank you.

JAMES CARDEN: Thank you.

AARON MATE: And thanks for joining us on The Real News. Democratic partisans in the media might already be setting the stage for that return by warning of Russia sending over new spies to the U.S. in advance of 2018 and 2020, which if Clinton runs again and loses or if another Democrat runs again and loses, with a similar campaign, they could then go ahead and blame Russia again for that, too.

[Jul 10, 2017] Trump core opinions and attitudes can reverse 180 degrees in mere hours. Thus worrying about his getting violently demised is probably unfounded. He will consistently perform for his Zionist handlers and dance for his Deep State controllers.

Notable quotes:
"... It could also be that he is just being "smart" -- saying what needs to be said ad hoc to appease -- with the intention of eventually, when the time is right, carrying out his strategic vision. We'll see. ..."
"... what about the 59 missiles its all kiss and make up? What a load of bollocks. ..."
Jul 10, 2017 | sputniknews.com
Dimitri Ledkovsky · Works at It's not what you do. It's who you are. 23 hrs

It's likely that Trump is mind controlled since his seemingly core opinions and attitudes can reverse 180 degrees in mere hours. Thus worrying about his getting violently demised is probably unfounded. He will consistently perform for his Zionist handlers and dance for his Deep State controllers.

Steven Hudson · Creative Director at Neoideograms.wordpress.com

I don't know about that. His expressing contrary opinions could be interpreted as his having some independence--a hopeful thing. It could also be that he is just being "smart" -- saying what needs to be said ad hoc to appease -- with the intention of eventually, when the time is right, carrying out his strategic vision. We'll see.

Robert Smiley · West Vancouver, British Columbia 23 hrs

A case can be made that the so called deep state is committing treason on a daily basis. Unfortunately its constituent parts are stronger than the President and his allies.

Robert Sinclair

what about the 59 missiles its all kiss and make up? What a load of bollocks. They both love israel. if you look carefully you can see the strings

ARG Asia
I did know "Deep State" was powerful, but I had no idea they could do whatever they wanted and interfere in nearly every of President Trump staff members with the exemption of the former Goldman Sachs appointees. Is the US really a democracy?

Here in Asia we see the US bullying and revolver diplomacy has insulted many countries, not only the Philippines. If the US want to have a future in Asia they have to be more respectful, stop interfering in domestic issues, and stop all these regimes change attempts.

[Jul 08, 2017] Haley boldly undermines Trump foreign policy toward Russia

This is pretty schizoid administration with officials contradicting each other and the President. This is a clear multiple personalities disorder. Of course it is clear who butter Haley bread. It's not trump.
Jul 08, 2017 | www.msn.com

Original title Haley on consequences for Russian meddling 'Ask the president'

The U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, was asked Saturday what consequences Russia will face as a result of its interference in the 2016 election , and she declined to specify, telling Face the Nation moderator John Dickerson, "I think you're going to have to ask the president."

Haley spoke to Face the Nation as President Trump concluded a three day trip to Europe for the G-20 summit. While he was there, Mr. Trump came face to face with Russian President Vladimir Putin -- the two men have spoken on the phone, but this was their first in-person encounter. During their meeting, which was scheduled to last only 30 minutes but stretched to over two hours, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Mr. Trump pressed Putin on Russia's meddling. But the Russians offered a different account - both Putin and the Russian foreign minister said they believed Mr. Trump accepted Putin's denial of Russian involvement .

Haley discussed the apparent disparity between the Russian and American accounts, saying, "I think we need to be realistic about what happened."

"You had two men walk into the room. You had two men who knew the exact same thing, which is Russia did meddle in the elections. I think President Trump wanted to make sure that President Putin was aware that he was acknowledging it, that he knew it. I think President Putin did what we all expected him to do, which was deny it. And I think that is what it is," Haley said. "President Trump still knows that they meddled. President Putin knows that they meddled, but he is never going to admit to it. And that's all that happened."

Dickerson asked Haley what consequences Russia will face as a result of its meddling.

"Not just Russia," she replied. "Any country needs to know that there are consequences when they get involved in our elections. And I think that's why it's good that the investigations are going on and we're analyzing and we're looking into all of that, and I think we need to manage it accordingly. The one thing we don't want is for our political process to ever be influenced or tainted in any way. And I think that we have to make sure that we're always strong on that point and let everyone know that we're not going to put up with it."

"But given that the president, as you said, knows that the Russians meddled," Dickerson pressed, "what consequences will they face as a result of that action?"

"I think you're going to have to ask the president," the ambassador responded. "I think that's one of the things is -- first is confronting them, letting them know that we know this happened, letting them know it can't happen again. I know that they had quite a bit of cyber conversation in terms of cyber meddling or cyber abuse during not just political situations, but also from a security situation, and they talked quite a bit on the cyber-attack risk. And so I think we'll see what happens there. You know, keep in mind -- yesterday's meeting was all about talk, but at the end of the day, this is all going to be about actions. We now have to see where we go from there."

For more of Dickerson's interview with Haley, plus all of the latest news and analysis, tune into Face the Nation this Sunday . Check your local listings for airtimes.

[Jul 07, 2017] Why Is Nikki Haley Still Trumps UN Ambassador by Philip Giraldi

Notable quotes:
"... My own little list of "society's offenders" consists largely of the self-described gaggle of neoconservative foreign-policy "experts." Unfortunately, the neocons have proven to be particularly resilient in spite of repeated claims that their end was nigh, most recently after the election of Donald Trump last November. ..."
"... Yet as most of the policies the neocons have historically espoused are indistinguishable from what the White House is currently trying to sell, one might well wake up one morning and imagine that it is 2003 and George W. Bush is still president. ..."
"... Number one on my little list is Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, who is particularly dangerous as she is holding a position where she can do bad things. Haley has been shooting from the lip since she assumed office and, it has become clear, much of what she says goes without any vetting by the Trump administration. It is never clear whether she is speaking for herself or for the White House. That issue has reportedly been dealt with by having the State Department clear in advance her comments on hot button issues, but, if that is indeed the case, the change has been difficult to discern in practice. ..."
"... Haley is firmly in the neocon camp, receiving praise from Senators like South Carolina's Lindsey Graham and from the Murdoch media as well as in the opinion pages of National Review and The Weekly Standard. Her speechwriter is Jessica Gavora, who is the wife of the leading neoconservative journalist Jonah Goldberg. Haley sees the United Nations as corrupt and bloated, in itself not an unreasonable conclusion, but she has tied herself closely to a number of other, more debatable issues. ..."
"... But Haley sometimes goes far beyond trying to "tell the truth." In February, she blocked the appointment of former Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to a diplomatic position at the United Nations because he is a Palestinian. ..."
"... Haley responded yes, that the administration is "supporting Israel" by blocking any Palestinian from any senior UN position because Palestine is not recognized by Washington as an independent state. ..."
"... She has never challenged the Israeli occupation of the West Bank as well as the recent large expansion of settlements, which are at least nominally opposed by the State Department and White House. ..."
"... Haley is inevitably a hardliner on Syria, reflecting the Israeli bias, and consistently hostile to Russia. ..."
"... Haley's analysis of who is doing what to whom in Syria is certainly questionable at a minimum. And her language is hardly supportive of possible administration diplomatic attempts to mend fences with the Russians and can also be seen as quite dangerous as they increase the likelihood of an "accidental encounter" over the skies of Syria as both sides harden their positions and seek to expand the areas they control. ..."
"... Regarding Ukraine, Haley has taken an extreme position that guarantees Russian hostility. In February, she addressed the UN Security Council regarding the Crimean conflict, which she appears not to understand very well. She warned that sanctions against Russia would not be lifted until Moscow returned control over the peninsula to Kiev. On June 4, she doubled down, insisting that the United States would retain "sanctions strong and tough when it comes to the issue in Ukraine." ..."
"... Haley very much comes across as the neoconservatives' dream ambassador to the United Nations -- full of aggression, a staunch supporter of Israel, and assertive of Washington's preemptive right to set standards for the rest of the world. ..."
"... If Donald Trump really wants to drain the Washington swamp and reduce interference in other nations, he might well continue that program by firing Nikki Haley. He could then appoint someone as UN ambassador who actually believes that the United States has to deal with other countries respectfully, not by constant bullying and threats. In the lyrics of Gilbert and Sullivan, she's on my list and "she will never be missed ..."
Jul 07, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com

I went to a meeting the other night with some Donald Trump supporters who, like me, had voted for him based on expectations of a more rational foreign policy. They were suggesting that the president's attempts to move in that direction had been sabotaged by officials inside the administration who want to maintain the current warfare state. Remove those officials and Trump might just keep his pledge to leave Bashar al-Assad alone while improving relations with Russia. I was somewhat skeptical, noting that the White House had unilaterally initiated the April 7 cruise missile attack on a Syrian airbase as well as the more recent warning against an alleged "planned" chemical attack, hardly moves that might lead to better relations with Damascus and Moscow. But there are indeed some administration figures who clearly are fomenting endless conflict in the Middle East and elsewhere.

One might reasonably start with Generals James Mattis and H.R. McMaster, both of whom are hardliners on Afghanistan and Iran, but with a significant caveat. Generals are trained and indoctrinated to fight and win wars, not to figure out what comes next. General officers like George Marshall or even Dwight Eisenhower who had a broader vision are extremely rare, so much so that expecting a Mattis or McMaster to do what falls outside their purview is perhaps a bit too much. They might be bad choices for the jobs they hold, but at least they employ some kind of rational process, based on how they perceive national interests, to make judgements. If properly reined in by a thoughtful civilian leadership, which does not exist at the moment, they have the potential to be effective contributors to the national-security discussion.

But several other notable figures in the administration deserve to be fired if there is to be any hope of turning Trump's foreign policy around. In Arthur Sullivan's and W. S. Gilbert's The Mikado , the Lord High Executioner sings about the "little list" he is preparing of people who "never will be missed" when he finally gets around to fulfilling the requirements of his office. He includes "apologetic statesmen of a compromising kind," indicating that the American frustration with the incompetence of its government is not unique, nor is it a recent phenomenon.

My own little list of "society's offenders" consists largely of the self-described gaggle of neoconservative foreign-policy "experts." Unfortunately, the neocons have proven to be particularly resilient in spite of repeated claims that their end was nigh, most recently after the election of Donald Trump last November.

Yet as most of the policies the neocons have historically espoused are indistinguishable from what the White House is currently trying to sell, one might well wake up one morning and imagine that it is 2003 and George W. Bush is still president. Still, hope springs eternal, and now that the United States has celebrated its 241st birthday, it would be nice to think that in the new year our nation might be purged of some of the malignancies that have prevailed since 9/11.

Number one on my little list is Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, who is particularly dangerous as she is holding a position where she can do bad things. Haley has been shooting from the lip since she assumed office and, it has become clear, much of what she says goes without any vetting by the Trump administration. It is never clear whether she is speaking for herself or for the White House. That issue has reportedly been dealt with by having the State Department clear in advance her comments on hot button issues, but, if that is indeed the case, the change has been difficult to discern in practice.

Haley is firmly in the neocon camp, receiving praise from Senators like South Carolina's Lindsey Graham and from the Murdoch media as well as in the opinion pages of National Review and The Weekly Standard. Her speechwriter is Jessica Gavora, who is the wife of the leading neoconservative journalist Jonah Goldberg. Haley sees the United Nations as corrupt and bloated, in itself not an unreasonable conclusion, but she has tied herself closely to a number of other, more debatable issues.

As governor of South Carolina, Haley became identified as an unquestioning supporter of Israel . She signed into law a bill to restrict the activities of the nonviolent pro-Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, the first legislation of its kind on a state level. Haley has also stated that "nowhere has the UN's failure been more consistent and more outrageous than in its bias against our close ally Israel." On a recent visit to Israel, she was applauded by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, stating "You know, all I've done is to tell the truth, and it's kind of overwhelming at the reaction if there's anything I have no patience for, it's bullies, and the UN was being such a bully to Israel, because they could."

But Haley sometimes goes far beyond trying to "tell the truth." In February, she blocked the appointment of former Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to a diplomatic position at the United Nations because he is a Palestinian. In a congressional hearing this past week, she was asked about the decision: "Is it this administration's position that support for Israel and support for the appointment of a well-qualified individual of Palestinian nationality to an appointment at the UN are mutually exclusive?" Haley responded yes, that the administration is "supporting Israel" by blocking any Palestinian from any senior UN position because Palestine is not recognized by Washington as an independent state.

At various UN meetings Haley has repeatedly and uncritically complained of institutional bias towards Israel, asserting that the "days of Israel bashing are over," without ever addressing the issue that Israeli treatment of the Palestinians might in part be responsible for the criticism leveled against it. Her description of Israel as an "ally" is hyperbolic and she tends to be oblivious to actual American interests in the region when Israel is involved. She has never challenged the Israeli occupation of the West Bank as well as the recent large expansion of settlements, which are at least nominally opposed by the State Department and White House.

Haley is inevitably a hardliner on Syria, reflecting the Israeli bias, and consistently hostile to Russia. She has said that regime change in Damascus is a Trump administration priority. Her most recent foray involves the White House warning that it had "identified potential preparations for another chemical weapons attack by the Assad regime." Haley elaborated in a tweet, " further attacks will be blamed on Assad but also on Russia and Iran who support him killing his own people." Earlier, on April 12, after Russia blocked a draft UN resolution intended to condemn the Khan Shaykhun chemical attack, Haley said , "We need to see Russia choose to side with the civilized world over an Assad government that brutally terrorizes its own people."

Haley's analysis of who is doing what to whom in Syria is certainly questionable at a minimum. And her language is hardly supportive of possible administration diplomatic attempts to mend fences with the Russians and can also be seen as quite dangerous as they increase the likelihood of an "accidental encounter" over the skies of Syria as both sides harden their positions and seek to expand the areas they control. She has also said that , "We're calling [Russia] out [and] I don't think anything is off the table at this point. I think what you're going to see is strong leadership. You're going to continue to see the United States act when we need to act." Regarding Moscow's role on the UN Security Council, she complained that, "All they've done is seven times veto against Syria every time they do something to hurt their own people. And so Russia absolutely has not done what they're supposed to do."

Regarding Ukraine, Haley has taken an extreme position that guarantees Russian hostility. In February, she addressed the UN Security Council regarding the Crimean conflict, which she appears not to understand very well. She warned that sanctions against Russia would not be lifted until Moscow returned control over the peninsula to Kiev. On June 4, she doubled down, insisting that the United States would retain "sanctions strong and tough when it comes to the issue in Ukraine."

Haley is also increasingly highly critical of Iran, which she sees as the instigator of much of the unrest in the Middle East, again reflecting the Israeli viewpoint. She claimed on April 20, during her first session as president of the UN Security Council, that Iran and Hezbollah had "conducted terrorist acts" for decades within the Middle East, ignoring the more serious terrorism support engaged in by U.S. regional allies Saudi Arabia and Qatar. She stated last week that the Security Council's praise of the Iran Nuclear Agreement honored a state that has engaged in "illicit missile launches," "support for terrorist groups," and "arms smuggling," while "stok[ing] regional conflicts and mak[ing] them harder to solve." All are perspectives that might easily be challenged.

Haley is also much given to rhetoric reminiscent of George W. Bush during his first term. Regarding North Korea, on May 16 she told reporters that, "We have to turn around and tell the entire international community: You either support North Korea or you support us," echoing George W. Bush's sentiment that, "There's a new sheriff in town and you're either with us or against us."

So Haley very much comes across as the neoconservatives' dream ambassador to the United Nations -- full of aggression, a staunch supporter of Israel, and assertive of Washington's preemptive right to set standards for the rest of the world. That does not necessarily make her very good for the rest of us, who will have to bear the burdens of imperial hubris. Nor is her tendency to overstate her case a plus for the Trump administration itself, which is clearly seeking to work its way through Russiagate–and just might be considering how to establish some kind of modus vivendi with Vladimir Putin.

If Donald Trump really wants to drain the Washington swamp and reduce interference in other nations, he might well continue that program by firing Nikki Haley. He could then appoint someone as UN ambassador who actually believes that the United States has to deal with other countries respectfully, not by constant bullying and threats. In the lyrics of Gilbert and Sullivan, she's on my list and "she will never be missed ."

Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer, is executive director of the Council for the National Interest.

[Jul 07, 2017] US, Russia Agree on Ceasefire in Southwestern Syria by Jason Ditz

Notable quotes:
"... While this is not the first US-Russia ceasefire brokered in Syria, it's the first in quite some time, as recent Syrian ceasefires have been brokered mostly by Russia, Turkey, and Iran, with the US insisting that the deals don't apply to their ongoing military operations. ..."
"... Putin and Trump agree to cease fire in Southern Syria. This means that Putin has surrendered the central principle of his Syria policy - territorial integrity of Syria. The carve up continues. Will some ostensible federal arrangement in Ukraine be the quid pro quo? ..."
"... I think it's better to say that the Syrian government and whatever counts as opposition in Daraa have come to an agreement, which means an end to the fighting in the Southwest - and that is in place since a few days already. ..."
"... This agreement between 'Putin' and 'Trump' only means that Russia will guarantee that the US doesn't do any dirty tricks when the Jordan-Syria reopens for business ..."
"... As Cockburn says, anything Trump comes out with is meaningless. he'll say the opposite tomorrow. However engage in a major war in Syria, particularly if against the Russians, that's another matter. His electoral base wouldn't tolerate it, if it were likely to lead to American deaths. ..."
Jul 07, 2017 | news.antiwar.com
Tillerson: US Still Insists on Ouster of Assad

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has announced that the United States and Russia have agreed on a ceasefire in southwestern Syria, aiming to halt all fighting in the area, and according to US officials allowing the rebels to shift their focus to fighting against ISIS.

Details are still scant on this, and it's not clear how far east the ceasefire is intended to extend. US officials say the entire goal is to stop attacks against the rebels, while Russia clearly wants the US to stop attacking pro-government forces in the region. There has also been mention of humanitarian aid being allowed in, but past ceasefires have almost uniformly failed at that goal.

The ceasefire is to begin at noon on Sunday, and is open-ended. Tillerson said it could be a first step which, if successful, would be spread to other parts of the country. He also, however, added that the US still insists upon Syrian President Assad and his entire family being removed from any positions of power in Syria.

While this is not the first US-Russia ceasefire brokered in Syria, it's the first in quite some time, as recent Syrian ceasefires have been brokered mostly by Russia, Turkey, and Iran, with the US insisting that the deals don't apply to their ongoing military operations.

paul | Jul 7, 2017 2:08:20 PM | 1

Putin and Trump agree to cease fire in Southern Syria. This means that Putin has surrendered the central principle of his Syria policy - territorial integrity of Syria. The carve up continues. Will some ostensible federal arrangement in Ukraine be the quid pro quo?

Jeff | Jul 7, 2017 2:22:18 PM | 2

@1

I think it's better to say that the Syrian government and whatever counts as opposition in Daraa have come to an agreement, which means an end to the fighting in the Southwest - and that is in place since a few days already.

This agreement between 'Putin' and 'Trump' only means that Russia will guarantee that the US doesn't do any dirty tricks when the Jordan-Syria reopens for business

karlof1 | Jul 7, 2017 2:51:58 PM | 6

Jeff @2--

Yes, you have a good handle on what's transpired. Negotiations for reconciliation have carried on since the last quarter of 2016, and it was becoming clear that a positive resolution was soon to occur.

As for G-20 action, much has occurred, including the BRICS heads-of-state sideline meeting, from which a communique was issued, http://en.kremlin.ru/supplement/5221 which echoes Putin's address, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/55001

Only the most basic of info's been released about the Putin/Trump meet; I expect more to be available later, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/55006

Putin also met with South Korean President Moon, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/55005

Hopefully, b will gain lots of onsite info and share it with us. Otherwise, it's a Friday, and news is slow.

Temporarily Sane | Jul 7, 2017 3:07:09 PM | 9
Patrick Cockburn, in his most recent article for the Independent, quotes a former US State Department official who said that: "[W]e don't have a policy in Syria, everybody in the Middle East knows that whatever is said by the Pentagon, State Department or National Security Council lacks authority because whatever assurances they give may be contradicted within the hour by a presidential tweet or by one of the factions in the White House."

Cockburn adds: "the ex-official lamented that it was like living in an arbitrary and unpredictable dictatorship."

While this may very well be true as far as operational details are concerned, it is apparent that "regime change" (orchestrating a coup d'etat) is the overarching goal the US is pursuing, however haphazardly, in Syria with Iran next in line. When was the last time the US military got involved somewhere and then just packed up and went back home? Cockburn is missing an important detail and he is one of the few MSM journalists who is not acting as a propagandist for Western interests.

The media is extremely allergic to telling it like it is and I wonder if MSM journalists like Cockburn and Robert Fisk deliberately avoid mentioning certain things in order to safeguard their jobs? I find it hard to believe that Cockburn, in this case, is not aware that "regime change" was never really taken off the table. In the same article he goes on to mention US plans for Iran so it is almost certain he knows what is going on in Syria. It is actually a decent piece but readers who may not be aware of the state of affairs in Syria are getting an incomplete snapshot of the situation there. Is holding the US and its "coalition" to full account an MSM "red-line" that even the charmingly named "Independent" is unwilling to cross?

Laguerre | Jul 7, 2017 3:16:08 PM | 10

re 1
This means that Putin has surrendered the central principle of his Syria policy - territorial integrity of Syria. The carve up continues.
I rather doubt that interpretation.

The expression is "south-west Syria". That means the Israeli front. Maybe calming the shooting at Israel, in order to remove the need for Israeli reactions?

I don't actually know whether the Amman-Damascus road is open for traffic, but given that I saw recently that there are still busses from Damascus to Raqqa, dangerous as that may seem, I wouldn't be surprised to hear that busses are making the transit between Amman and Damascus, no doubt with innumerable stops for inspection by one militia or another.

These dangerous trips do occur. Just to give you a flavour, a Syrian I know, a Druze, had to go to Aleppo. They were stopped by Da'ish. As a Druze, instant death if discovered. He was taken before the Amir. Are you Sunni? yes. Then prove it by reciting the Surat al-Baqara (the longest chapter of the Qur'an). He didn't know it other than the beginning. He started, and then quickly figured out that they didn't know it either, so he continued reciting Quranic style rubbish, until the Amir got bored and fell asleep, At which point he was released. He described them as slitty-eyed thus Turkic.

Laguerre | Jul 7, 2017 3:41:13 PM | 17

re 9

As Cockburn says, anything Trump comes out with is meaningless. he'll say the opposite tomorrow. However engage in a major war in Syria, particularly if against the Russians, that's another matter. His electoral base wouldn't tolerate it, if it were likely to lead to American deaths.

[Jul 02, 2017] Nikki Haley Wants Everyone to Know That She Finally Learned How to Read

Notable quotes:
"... didn't even know how to read? ..."
"... The Scorpion and the Frog ..."
Jul 02, 2017 | russia-insider.com

Nikki Haley is hooked on phonics - and bombing Iran

RI Staff 63 Haley presents book report to UN Security Council

Nikki Haley is widely considered to be the greatest diplomat to have ever lived. But did you know that up until just a few days ago, Nikki Haley didn't even know how to read?

Washington's rookie UN ambassador to the United Nations has been checkmating Russia for months, but last week she finally found the time to finish her first children's story, The Scorpion and the Frog , which tells the tale of two animal companions who are drone-bombed by the US military while attending a wedding in Afghanistan.

As you can probably imagine, Nikki is very proud of her accomplishment and wants to let everyone know that she read a story about animals and really, really enjoyed it.

But recently she's been yapping about frogs and scorpions at totally inappropriate times.

Nikki Haley literally can't stop talking about this dumb pop-up book that she read.

Even when she recites her daily prayers to Moloch at the Security Council, frog tales inevitable get added into the mix:

me title=

But as RT pointed out : "While the allusion might seem novel, it was actually used before in an op-ed by Chaim Shacham for the Miami Herald in 2015, titled 'Iran nuclear pact: Tale of the scorpion and the frog.'"

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https://lockerdome.com/lad/9533801169000550?pubid=ld-1806-5338&pubo=http%3A%2F%2Frussia-insider.com&width=731

That'll do, Nikki. That'll do.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/Wvh5fFeRX5Q?wmode=transparent&jqoemcache=yraHB

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[Jul 02, 2017] Quite interesting Guardian piece encouraging to hate Russia and Putin while droning on about Hate Week in Orwell

Notable quotes:
"... "The use of fraudulent or forged documents should be-there's absolutely zero tolerance from us on this. If we find people submitting documents that are forged or fraudulent or they haven't disclosed full facts to us , we will not only refuse their application, they then risk a ban of 10 years from the UK if they make a subsequent application," Mackie said. ..."
Jul 02, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Pavlo Svolochenko ,

June 30, 2017 at 8:19 pm
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/30/russia-putin-protests-police-arrests-tv-show?utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fzen.yandex.com

Dumb Guardian article or dumbest Guardian article?

marknesop , June 30, 2017 at 8:37 pm
There you go – he's received the ultimate shock; time to go home to the Pearl of Empire and spend his dotage rambling the moors in his wellies, or watching the sea thrash the Cornish coast, or something. Time to leave Russia, in any event; he's been studying it for 45 years, and this is the best he can come up with, while he plainly does not understand it. Why does he spend his time there, if everyone is a thug and a hate leader – why, in the name of God, does he spend time in a country where people live who have never heard of George Orwell?

By the bye, if you enter the UK on a visitor's visa and then work as a journalist, you might be looking at a 10-year ban on a subsequent re-application , you parrot-faced wazzock.

"The use of fraudulent or forged documents should be-there's absolutely zero tolerance from us on this. If we find people submitting documents that are forged or fraudulent or they haven't disclosed full facts to us , we will not only refuse their application, they then risk a ban of 10 years from the UK if they make a subsequent application," Mackie said.

Pavlo Svolochenko , July 1, 2017 at 3:32 am
If he didn't pad it out with invective, the article would be one or two paragraphs at most.

The undeleted comments are the real hoot – the average guardian reader appears to be a human being who failed the Turing test.

Cortes , July 1, 2017 at 6:23 am
I wonder how the comment by "timiengels" of a day ago evaded the cull:

"Quite interesting a piece encouraging to hate Russia and Putin while droning on about 'Hate Week' in Orwell."

Reply

[Jun 30, 2017] White House Encouraged After Elephants Abstain From Climbing Trees

Notable quotes:
"... There are plenty of reasons why the U.S. would want to accuse the Syrian government of using chemical weapons but zero sane reasons for the Syrian government to use such. Russia and Syria have long insisted on sending chemical weapon inspectors to the airbase the Trump administration claims is at the center of its "chemical" fairy tale. The U.S. has held the inspectors back. The claims make thereby zero sense to any objective observer. ..."
"... UN peacekeepers are often an instrument of U.S. foreign policy. By cutting them down the U.S. and Haley are limiting their own political options. The White House "warning", which had to be defused within a day, has a similar effect. People will become less inclined to believe any U.S. claims or to follow up on U.S. demands. Both statements have limited future policy options. ..."
"... So Sayeth Nimrata Randhawa Haley, she who was paid US$110,000 a year as a fundraiser for Lexington Medical Center back in 2008, at a time when the average salary of her peers doing similar work for non-profit organisations of similar size and with similar budgets as her employer was just over US$44,000. Moreover Haley expected to be paid US$125,000 for the work. http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/latest-news/article16614233.html ..."
"... Something about the way Nikki Haley handled her parents' company Exotica International's finances while she was accountant there is also very fishy, not least the fact that she consistently filed her own tax returns and those of the parents' business late. ..."
"... "I will never apologize for the United States - I don't care what the facts are... I'm not an apologize-for-America kind of guy." Statement as Vice-president, during a presidential campaign function (2 Aug 1988), commenting on the Navy warship USS Vincennes having shot down Iran Air Flight 655 in a commercial air corridor on July 3, killing 290 civilians, as quoted in "Perspectives", the quote of the week section of Newsweek (15 August 1988[1]) p. 15; also quoted in "Rally Round the Flag, Boys" by Michael Kingsley in TIME magazine (12 September 1988). Newsweek cites this phrase as said about the downing of the Iranian airliner to the group of the Republican ethnic leaders ... ..."
"... psychopaths - or the criminally, terminally inattentive - have no regrets. they leave regrets to the rest of the world for their psychopathic / acts of depraved indifference. ..."
"... Adolf Hitler is my conscience - last words of Nazi governer general - Poland ww2 ..."
"... The utter contempt for the public and its level of intelligence is astounding. ..."
"... There are two views that make limited military force seem like a good idea: one is the perceived invincibility of the U.S. military within Versailles and the other is the perception of Russia as the land of Yakov Smirnov. Trump doesn't want a major war. I'll agree, and outside of McCains of the world, no one does. This doesn't mean Trump and his circle aren't under the impression they can skip the back nine and paunch a few cruise missiles to win a limited war. ..."
"... Nikki Hailey wants a few scalps for her future Presidential run just like Hillary with Gaddafi or how Rummy lame Ted the absence of targets in Afghanistan he could run on CNN. ..."
"... Noted lunatic, Fareed Zakaria pronounced Trump as officially the President when he launched cruise missiles against Syria. Thugs look for victims when they need to establish their power. ..."
"... Nikki Haley is one of many "leaders" that were created using Newt Gingrich's "Republican in an Can" kits. These kits were tweaked and perfected by Karl Rove. It is required of the candidate to be completely malleable and to contain no original thoughts. The only skill requirement is that the candidate must be capable of memorizing canned sound bites and patriotic slogans which are to be repeated and used as answers to any and all questions. The candidate must never, ever waver from these sound bites. When they do, they get in trouble. Nikki Haley is a standout, Marco Rubio is another prime example. ..."
"... Yes, I realize that Haley is nominally a "diplomat", so you already covered that territory. But it struck me that the requirements you list apply more generally. As I recently commented elsewhere: beginning a few years ago, watching news videos of Putin helped me see through the Western propaganda profile characterizing Vladimir Putin as a ruthless, utterly self-serving reptilian dictator and ex-KGB thug. I was also impressed by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Both men comport themselves like authentic, sober professionals, albeit that they still labor under the misapprehension that the West has retained an appreciation of, and (potential) competence in, the indispensable art of diplomacy. ..."
"... The collective Western political mind, possibly due to capitalism-induced dementia, has lost its capacity for understanding and practicing diplomacy. When one abandons an art, it's like abandoning an industry: over time, the basic knowledge and understanding of the craft is lost. ..."
Jun 29, 2017 | www.moonofalabama.org

Trump administration officials are walking back the White House announcement of its plans to fake another "chemical weapon attack" in Syria.

There are plenty of reasons why the U.S. would want to accuse the Syrian government of using chemical weapons but zero sane reasons for the Syrian government to use such. Russia and Syria have long insisted on sending chemical weapon inspectors to the airbase the Trump administration claims is at the center of its "chemical" fairy tale. The U.S. has held the inspectors back. The claims make thereby zero sense to any objective observer.

The walk back, as well as the statement itself, may not be serious at all. This White House seems unpredictable and the U.S. military, the intelligence services and the White House itself have no common view or policy. One day they claim the U.S. will leave Syria after ISIS is defeated, the next day they announce new bases and eternal support for the Syrian Kurds.

The way the White House statement came out, without knowledge of the relevant agencies and little involvement of the agency principals, was not cynical but just dumb . It sounds like the idea was dropped by Natanyahoo to his schoolboy Jared Kushner who then convinced his father in law to issue the crazy statement. Now officials are send out with the worst argument ever to claim that the White House "warning" made sense.

"The elephants did not climb up the trees. Warning them off was successful," they say. "The trees were saved!"

" It appears that they took the warning seriously," Mattis said. "They didn't do it," he told reporters flying with him to Brussels for a meeting of NATO defense ministers.

He offered no evidence other than the fact that an attack had not taken place.

---
" I can tell you that due to the president's actions, we did not see an incident," [U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki] Haley told the House Foreign Affairs Committee during a hearing Tuesday.[..]
[...]
"I would like to think that the president saved many innocent men, women and children," Haley continued.

Haley "would like to think" a lot of stuff - unfortunately she is not capable of such. A bit later she issued an egocentric tweet about UN peacekeeping that will surely increase U.S. political standing in the world (not):

I can even agree with Haley that UN peacekeeping has gotten way out of hand. To have UN mandated troops spreading Cholera in Haiti and raping their way through various countries does not help anyone. But the way to end this is to stop handing out mandates for such missions. To (re-)mandate undertrained/underpaid peacekeeping forces in the UN Security Council while cutting the budget for them is irresponsible. It will corrupt the troops and their behavior even more.

UN peacekeepers are often an instrument of U.S. foreign policy. By cutting them down the U.S. and Haley are limiting their own political options. The White House "warning", which had to be defused within a day, has a similar effect. People will become less inclined to believe any U.S. claims or to follow up on U.S. demands. Both statements have limited future policy options.

Will the Trump administration come to regret such moves?

Ghostship | Jun 29, 2017 7:08:52 AM | 12
Jen | Jun 29, 2017 7:46:08 AM | 13 "Just 5 months into our time here, we've cut over half a billion $$$ from the UN peacekeeping budget & we're only getting started."

So Sayeth Nimrata Randhawa Haley, she who was paid US$110,000 a year as a fundraiser for Lexington Medical Center back in 2008, at a time when the average salary of her peers doing similar work for non-profit organisations of similar size and with similar budgets as her employer was just over US$44,000. Moreover Haley expected to be paid US$125,000 for the work. http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/latest-news/article16614233.html

Something about the way Nikki Haley handled her parents' company Exotica International's finances while she was accountant there is also very fishy, not least the fact that she consistently filed her own tax returns and those of the parents' business late.

https://fredericacade.wordpress.com/2014/02/23/nikki-haley-was-accountant-and-according-to-south-carolina-data-would-suggest-the-family-business-closed-in-2010-reinstatement-in-2011-and-closure-in-2013-involved-paying-back-money-still-owed/

jfl | Jun 29, 2017 4:21:52 AM | 3
b, 'Will the Trump administration come to regret such moves?'

i think this runs along the lines of george xli ...

"I will never apologize for the United States - I don't care what the facts are... I'm not an apologize-for-America kind of guy." Statement as Vice-president, during a presidential campaign function (2 Aug 1988), commenting on the Navy warship USS Vincennes having shot down Iran Air Flight 655 in a commercial air corridor on July 3, killing 290 civilians, as quoted in "Perspectives", the quote of the week section of Newsweek (15 August 1988[1]) p. 15; also quoted in "Rally Round the Flag, Boys" by Michael Kingsley in TIME magazine (12 September 1988). Newsweek cites this phrase as said about the downing of the Iranian airliner to the group of the Republican ethnic leaders ...
... psychopaths - or the criminally, terminally inattentive - have no regrets. they leave regrets to the rest of the world for their psychopathic / acts of depraved indifference.
ashley albanese | Jun 29, 2017 5:15:07 AM | 7
jfl 4

Adolf Hitler is my conscience - last words of Nazi governer general - Poland ww2 .

AtaBrit | Jun 29, 2017 8:27:05 AM | 18
@harrylaw 14

The utter contempt for the public and its level of intelligence is astounding.

Laguerre | Jun 29, 2017 9:04:47 AM | 20
What I said at the end of the last thread seems to me still the probable explanation of what happened, and why there's walking back:
The White House warning to Asad was a sort of official version of a Trump 3 am tweet, wasn't it? He heard about (I won't say read, as it's unlikely) Hersh's article, and got in a rage. He'll show 'em, he's serious. And had Spicer put out the warning, rather than tweeting it - to show he's really, really, serious, and not someone who just tweets at 3 in the morning in a rage.
There never was a serious plan (difficult as though that would be for many commenters here to accept). It was just a blast of rage from Trump. I doubt if Trump wants serious war, even if there are forces trying to push him into it.
Willy2 | Jun 29, 2017 9:06:54 AM | 21
I regard Mrs. Nikki Haley to be a sock puppet of the Trump administration and was chosen because she has no spine/backbone.
- Judging by her previous statements she isn't "the brighest bulb in the chandalier". But that's what the current administration was looking for, right ?
NotTimothyGeithner | Jun 29, 2017 9:42:30 AM | 23
@20 "Home by Christmas" is the problem.

There are two views that make limited military force seem like a good idea: one is the perceived invincibility of the U.S. military within Versailles and the other is the perception of Russia as the land of Yakov Smirnov. Trump doesn't want a major war. I'll agree, and outside of McCains of the world, no one does. This doesn't mean Trump and his circle aren't under the impression they can skip the back nine and paunch a few cruise missiles to win a limited war.

Nikki Hailey wants a few scalps for her future Presidential run just like Hillary with Gaddafi or how Rummy lame Ted the absence of targets in Afghanistan he could run on CNN.

Noted lunatic, Fareed Zakaria pronounced Trump as officially the President when he launched cruise missiles against Syria. Thugs look for victims when they need to establish their power.

Peter AU | Jun 29, 2017 9:42:42 AM | 24
Not a word from either Trump or Tillerson on this bullshit. Looks like Trump has just thrown it out there for whatever reason and left the lackeys to deal with the fallout.
fastfreddy | Jun 29, 2017 10:18:10 AM | 27
Nikki Haley is one of many "leaders" that were created using Newt Gingrich's "Republican in an Can" kits. These kits were tweaked and perfected by Karl Rove. It is required of the candidate to be completely malleable and to contain no original thoughts. The only skill requirement is that the candidate must be capable of memorizing canned sound bites and patriotic slogans which are to be repeated and used as answers to any and all questions. The candidate must never, ever waver from these sound bites. When they do, they get in trouble. Nikki Haley is a standout, Marco Rubio is another prime example.
jfl | Jun 29, 2017 2:02:39 PM | 51

Ort | Jun 29, 2017 2:04:53 PM | 52
@ fastfreddy | 27

Well-stated and worth repeating:

Nikki Haley is one of many "leaders" that were created using Newt Gingrich's "Republican in an Can" kits. These kits were tweaked and perfected by Karl Rove.

It is required of the candidate to be completely malleable and to contain no original thoughts. The only skill requirement is that the candidate must be capable of memorizing canned sound bites and patriotic slogans which are to be repeated and used as answers to any and all questions. The candidate must never, ever waver from these sound bites. When they do, they get in trouble.
______________________________________

I also think it's worth adding that in this century-- especially after 9/11/2001-- the US, and even Western Europe has "created" leaders and official spokespersons using "Statesman in a Can" and "Diplomat in a Can" kits.

Yes, I realize that Haley is nominally a "diplomat", so you already covered that territory. But it struck me that the requirements you list apply more generally. As I recently commented elsewhere: beginning a few years ago, watching news videos of Putin helped me see through the Western propaganda profile characterizing Vladimir Putin as a ruthless, utterly self-serving reptilian dictator and ex-KGB thug. I was also impressed by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Both men comport themselves like authentic, sober professionals, albeit that they still labor under the misapprehension that the West has retained an appreciation of, and (potential) competence in, the indispensable art of diplomacy.

The collective Western political mind, possibly due to capitalism-induced dementia, has lost its capacity for understanding and practicing diplomacy. When one abandons an art, it's like abandoning an industry: over time, the basic knowledge and understanding of the craft is lost.

It's a bipartisan, or transnational, degeneracy. Whether it's the supposedly "eloquent", "intellectual" Obama and John Kerry, or Trump and Tillerson, (or Macron et al) the Western team looks, sounds, and acts like a troupe of life-sized animatronic puppets programmed to spew tendentious talking points du jour.
______________________________________

The "Statesman/Diplomat in a Can" kit fits right in with my "animatronic puppets" idea; instead of reasonably honest professional diplomats and statesmen, the West prefers talking-point spewing, hollow narcissists.

MadMax2 | Jun 30, 2017 6:28:18 AM | 65
For sure Nikki Haley is mildly retarded, placing her in the 'above average yank' percentile band.

[Jun 30, 2017] CNN is making Tucker Carlson look good!

Jun 30, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com
marknesop , June 29, 2017 at 11:54 am
I can't stand Tucker Carlson from his time as a loyal footsoldier in the ranks of the George Dubya Bush Apologist Army, but it's easy to feel in synch with him here just because CNN is so deservedly hated. Can't argue with your conclusions, either.
ucgsblog , June 29, 2017 at 2:12 pm
Then this will make you chuckle Mark – when I was discussing CNN at a meeting, one of the smarter analysts commented: "yet another reason to hate CNN is because they're making Tucker Carlson look good! Why doesn't anyone bring that up?"

The room responded with laughter. Remember the days when CNN used to claim that they're "the most trusted name in news" – well they're not doing that anymore:

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-09/cnn-now-least-trusted-news-network-among-viewers

"In the poll published Wednesday by Rasmussen Reports, 1,000 likely voters were asked to describe their media viewing habits. Seventy-five percent said they watch at least some form of cable news each week, with 42 percent saying they most frequently watch Fox News, 35 percent usually choosing CNN, and 19 percent favoring MSNBC. An even 50 percent of frequent Fox News viewers agreed with a followup question, "Do you trust the political news you are getting?" By comparison, 43 percent of frequent MSNBC viewers and just 33 percent of those who mostly watch CNN said they trust their political news."

http://www.dailywire.com/news/18088/death-spiral-along-its-credibility-cnn-ratings-john-nolte#exit-modal

"For instance, on Tuesday, over the course of the day, CNN was only able to attract a measly 670,000 viewers. For context, MSNBC nearly doubled this number; Fox News nearly tripled it. CNN has almost always lagged a bit behind MSNBC in total viewers, but not like this."

Why couldn't it be 620,000? The reason I'm asking, is because 6.2 million Americans watched Putin's interview with Megyn Kelly. I'm not yet sure about Stone's Putin Interviews – but that number also seems to be very positive and in the millions. Of course losing to Discovery Channel didn't help CNN:

"Furthermore, throughout this same quarter, CNN lost to MSNBC in total and primetime demo viewers. This is the first time since 2014 that CNN has lost that demo crown to its leftwing rival. In total viewers last quarter, among all cable news channels, Fox News placed first, MSNBC third, and CNN is all alone in tenth place, just barely ahead of Investigative Discovery, a second-tier offshoot of the Discovery Network."

I predicted this would happen back when they fucked up their coverage of the Ossetian War. Now I'm just watching the train-wreck, thinking "am I really eating the best tasting popcorn? Have I finally found it?"

marknesop , June 29, 2017 at 2:56 pm
I hope they are driven right out of existence – I can't wait to see Wolf Blitzer sitting on a bench outside Hope Cottage in downtown Halifax, bleary-eyed and waiting for the free soup line to open. All of a journalist's enemies should be among the corrupt mages of the state apparatus – when the common man earnestly prays for you to be brought low, you've lost your way, and are feeding on a projected image of yourself. I think it's safe to say that we have seen the most precipitous decline in ethics in journalism, this past decade, that has occurred since its humble beginnings.

[Jun 28, 2017] WaPo does not like Ukrainian far right

Notable quotes:
"... "The recent brutal stabbing of a left-wing anti-war activist named Stas Serhiyenko illustrates the threat posed by these extremists. Serhiyenko and his fellow activists believe the perpetrators belonged to the neo-Nazi group C14 (whose name comes from a 14-word phrase used by white supremacists). The attack took place on the anniversary of Hitler's birthday, and C14's leader published a statement that celebrated Serhiyenko's stabbing immediately afterward. ..."
"... The attack on Serhiyenko is just the tip of the iceberg. More recently C14 beat up a socialist politician while other ultranationalist thugs stormed the Lviv and Kiev City Councils. Far-right and neo-Nazi groups have also assaulted or disrupted art exhibitions, anti-fascist demonstrations, a "Ukrainians Choose Peace" event, LGBT events, a social center, media organizations, court proceedings and a Victory Day march celebrating the anniversary of the end of World War II. According to a study from activist organization Institute Respublica, the problem is not only the frequency of far-right violence, but the fact that perpetrators enjoy widespread impunity. It's not hard to understand why Kiev seems reluctant to confront these violent groups. For one thing, far-right paramilitary groups played an important role early in the war against Russian-supported separatists. Kiev also fears these violent groups could turn on the government itself - something they've done before and continue to threaten to do. ..."
"... To be clear, Russian propaganda about Ukraine being overrun by Nazis or fascists is false. Far-right parties such as Svoboda or Right Sector draw little support from Ukrainians." ..."
"... "Indeed, the brazen willingness of Vita Zaverukha – a renowned neo-Nazi out on bail and under house arrest after killing two police officers - to post pictures of herself after storming a popular Kiev restaurant with 50 other nationalists demonstrates the far right's confidence in their immunity from government prosecution. ..."
"... [ ] [T]he government must also break any connections between law enforcement agencies and far-right organizations. The clearest example of this problem lies in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which is headed by Arsen Avakov. Avakov has a long-standing relationship with the Azov Battalion, a paramilitary group that uses the SS symbol as its insignia and which, with several others, was integrated into the army or National Guard at the beginning of the war in the East. Critics have accused Avakov of using members of the group to threaten an opposition media outlet. As at least one commentator has pointed out, using the National Guard to combat ultranationalist violence is likely to prove difficult if far-right groups have become part of the Guard itself. Avakov's Deputy Minister Vadym Troyan was a member of the neo-Nazi Patriot of Ukraine (PU) paramilitary organization, while current Ministry of Interior official Ilya Kiva – a former member of the far-right Right Sector party whose Instagram feed is populated with images of former Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini – has called for gays "to be put to death." And Avakov himself used the PU to promote his business and political interests while serving as a governor in eastern Ukraine, and as interior minister formed and armed the extremist Azov battalion led by Andriy Biletsky, a man nicknamed the "White Chief" who called for a crusade against "Semite-led sub-humanity." [ ] ..."
"... In one notorious incident, media captured images of swastika-tattooed thugs - who police claimed were only job applicants wanting to have "fun" - giving the Nazi salute in a police building in Kiev. This cannot be allowed to go on, and it's just as important for Ukrainian democracy to cleanse extremists from law enforcement as it is to remove corrupt officials from former president Viktor Yanukovych's regime under Ukraine's "lustration" policy." ..."
Jun 21, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com

Lyttenburgh , June 16, 2017 at 12:10 pm

Into the breach – once more! Or – once again about honest, balanced and tolerant Western Media ™, SUDDENLY finding out that there are roving bands of neo-nazis in the Ukraine. Why this particular article is important? First of all – because it's WaPo – a fearless crusader and enabler of leakers in anything Trump+Russia related. To doubt WaPo for a certain category of the people is sacrilege. Second – because of WHO wrote this article, namely Joshua Cohen, former (?) USAID chief honcho in realization of the "economic reforms" on the territory of the former USSR – a thoroughly handshakable person, judging by his last name.

Thirdly – the amount of evidence provided in one article combined with proof links to serve as the future reference material. Links are to very-very kosher and Ukrainian sources – so you can't accuse them in good faith of being Kremlenite propaganda.

Ukraine's ultra-right militias are challenging the government to a showdown

Blah-blah-blah – evil Russia, blah-blah, and then:

"The recent brutal stabbing of a left-wing anti-war activist named Stas Serhiyenko illustrates the threat posed by these extremists. Serhiyenko and his fellow activists believe the perpetrators belonged to the neo-Nazi group C14 (whose name comes from a 14-word phrase used by white supremacists). The attack took place on the anniversary of Hitler's birthday, and C14's leader published a statement that celebrated Serhiyenko's stabbing immediately afterward.

The attack on Serhiyenko is just the tip of the iceberg. More recently C14 beat up a socialist politician while other ultranationalist thugs stormed the Lviv and Kiev City Councils. Far-right and neo-Nazi groups have also assaulted or disrupted art exhibitions, anti-fascist demonstrations, a "Ukrainians Choose Peace" event, LGBT events, a social center, media organizations, court proceedings and a Victory Day march celebrating the anniversary of the end of World War II.

According to a study from activist organization Institute Respublica, the problem is not only the frequency of far-right violence, but the fact that perpetrators enjoy widespread impunity. It's not hard to understand why Kiev seems reluctant to confront these violent groups. For one thing, far-right paramilitary groups played an important role early in the war against Russian-supported separatists. Kiev also fears these violent groups could turn on the government itself - something they've done before and continue to threaten to do.

To be clear, Russian propaganda about Ukraine being overrun by Nazis or fascists is false. Far-right parties such as Svoboda or Right Sector draw little support from Ukrainians."

Full stop here. First of all – "Russian propaganda" (and the Western propaganda understands by that all Russian press, except a few "brave ones" that suck foreign grants tit of theirs) claims no such a thing. Second – it is Poroshenko and his government who renames streets after Bandera and Shukhevitch. Third – in the second half of the article Mr. Cohen basically proves, that said roving bands all BUT overrun the Ukraine, while the alleged lack of support does not translate in the active resistance to them – which is what's enough for them to reign supreme:

"Indeed, the brazen willingness of Vita Zaverukha – a renowned neo-Nazi out on bail and under house arrest after killing two police officers - to post pictures of herself after storming a popular Kiev restaurant with 50 other nationalists demonstrates the far right's confidence in their immunity from government prosecution.

[ ]

[T]he government must also break any connections between law enforcement agencies and far-right organizations. The clearest example of this problem lies in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which is headed by Arsen Avakov. Avakov has a long-standing relationship with the Azov Battalion, a paramilitary group that uses the SS symbol as its insignia and which, with several others, was integrated into the army or National Guard at the beginning of the war in the East. Critics have accused Avakov of using members of the group to threaten an opposition media outlet. As at least one commentator has pointed out, using the National Guard to combat ultranationalist violence is likely to prove difficult if far-right groups have become part of the Guard itself.

Avakov's Deputy Minister Vadym Troyan was a member of the neo-Nazi Patriot of Ukraine (PU) paramilitary organization, while current Ministry of Interior official Ilya Kiva – a former member of the far-right Right Sector party whose Instagram feed is populated with images of former Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini – has called for gays "to be put to death." And Avakov himself used the PU to promote his business and political interests while serving as a governor in eastern Ukraine, and as interior minister formed and armed the extremist Azov battalion led by Andriy Biletsky, a man nicknamed the "White Chief" who called for a crusade against "Semite-led sub-humanity."

[ ]

In one notorious incident, media captured images of swastika-tattooed thugs - who police claimed were only job applicants wanting to have "fun" - giving the Nazi salute in a police building in Kiev. This cannot be allowed to go on, and it's just as important for Ukrainian democracy to cleanse extremists from law enforcement as it is to remove corrupt officials from former president Viktor Yanukovych's regime under Ukraine's "lustration" policy."

P.S. Comment section is as always colorful there.

yalensis , June 16, 2017 at 3:12 pm

"To be clear, Russian propaganda about Ukraine being overrun by Nazis or fascists is false. Far-right parties such as Svoboda or Right Sector draw little support from Ukrainians ."

True (about the level of support), but irrelevant, Mr. Cohen!
It doesn't matter if these fascists enjoy an approval rating of 5% or .005%
You yourself said that these perps enjoy "widespread impunity" --
They can do whatever they want, kill anybody they please, and never get punished --
That's the literal meaning of the word "impunity".

Eric , June 17, 2017 at 2:33 am
Yarosh is an MP, Parubiy would, if the same set of events occured as in February 2014, become President, as Turchynov did. Nazi's/far right are in the SBU, Police, parts of their academia, military

Its an intentionally idiotic statement by Cohen because Ukrainian political parties can come and go at the drop of the hat. All this just means that the 2 million Nazi voters in 2012 election have chosen these newly created parties because a new line of what is " mainstream" has been drawn in Ukraine.

That's why I found it more than a little odd what is happening in France now .a new party under Macron has been created and occupies that vast majority of seats .this is the type of thing you would see in a banana republic.

yalensis , June 17, 2017 at 4:36 am
Cohen is no idiot, I think he is just covering his ass and preparing his exit strategy.
In the hopes of keeping his press card after Ukraine goes totally South.
Cohen always knew these guys were Nazis, now he has to pretend to his reading public that he wasn't quite aware. He was duped!
Or maybe the turning point, which got his Jewish blood boiling was Biletsky calling his ethnic group a "Semite-led sub-humanity."

Cohen: "Oh, I never realized these people could be so hateful!" – LOL!

marknesop , June 17, 2017 at 8:15 am
They always use that to pooh-pooh the suggestion that Nazism is influential in Ukraine – but look! They only get tiny levels of support in elections! That matters little when people are appointed to political positions rather than voted into them. There are so many things – the dissolving of opposition political parties, the uberpatriotic signage everywhere exhorting citizens to report their neighbours if they suspect separatist sympathies, the hit list (Mirotvorets) of those who failed to shout the government line when prompted until told to stop – that simply scream "FASCISM!!!" But it is inconvenient for the west to see those things, because it could not acknowledge seeing them and continue to support the country and government which did them. The USA is an old hand at unseeing things which don't fit the narrative. Unfortunately, it has evolved into a nation which is good at unseeing obstacles as well; obstacles which are present and prevent it from achieving its goals. These are expected to disappear before the eraser called 'exceptionalism'.

The canard about levels of public support for Nazism in Ukraine is used to suggest that if Russia is spouting propaganda about this, then everything it says is propaganda. Reply

[Jun 26, 2017] Trump, Qatar and the Danger of Total Confusion by Gary Leupp

Notable quotes:
"... (By the way, Trump reportedly told Israeli leaders during his trip Israel that he was "just back from the Middle East." What did Netanyahu think about that, but: Oh god this guy's ignorant how do we use this ignorance? ) ..."
"... And on June 21 State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert declared that the more time passes, "the more doubt is raised about the actions taken by Saudi Arabia and the UAE At this point, we are left with one simple question: Were the actions really about their concerns regarding Qatar's alleged support for terrorism or were they about the long-simmering grievances between and among the GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council] countries?" ??? ..."
"... Some people speculate that Trump in his sly wisdom is sending out contrasting messages to obtain his mysterious ends to make America great again. This gives the man too much credit. His problem is that he blabbers whatever-he thinks for the moment-makes him look tough. He projects confidence, without knowing what the hell he's talking about. He's a dangerous buffoon. ..."
"... George W. Bush by his invasion of Iraq (to better his dad) produced a mess that his successor in some respects exacerbated. While Obama withdrew from Iraq in accordance with Bush's agreement, and limited the "mission" in Afghanistan, he (or Hillary) led in the destruction of Libya, and began the grotesque involvement in the Syrian conflict. Trump does not understand the causes and effects. He's just proud that his generals dropped a GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) bomb an ISIL camp in Afghanistan. ..."
"... Or Trump glories (echoed by Brian Williams) in that April 7 missile strike on the Syrian airfield, when supposedly 56 Tomahawk missiles destroyed a material storage depot, a training facility, a canteen, six MiG-23 aircraft in repair hangars and a radar station. "Congratulations," he tweeted, "to our great military men and women for representing the United States, and the world, so well in the Syria attack." Interviewed on TV he intimately associated the order to attack with the quality of this chocolate cake he was sharing with a very appreciative President Xi from China at the time. ..."
"... There have been more Syria attacks since, including one that shot down a Syrian warplane over Syria, and the one that shot down an Iranian-made drone. Trump was likely not informed in advance. Not that it would have made any difference, maybe. ..."
"... Of course the main issue remains U.S. imperialism, rooted in capitalism. The global dynamics of that can be rationally analyzed, and the president's role within the system assessed. Obama was fairly predicable. Hillary Clinton was predictable because she always articulated her hawkishness, like John McCain. Their relationships to capital and their intellectual positions (neoconservatism, "realism") were known. Trump is a new phenomenon, as someone combining Lyndon Johnson's crudity, Nixon's vindictiveness, Reagan's vapid populism, and Dubya's ignorance (but he was surrounded by Cheney's hand-picked neocons, virtually announcing plans for region-wide regime change). I'm not sure what he has in common with Bill Clinton other than promiscuity (but Clinton had no John Miller.) He's new in that he's at odds half the time with his own aides and puzzling world leaders ..."
"... British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher after meeting Ronald Reagan told her foreign secretary, Lord Carrington, as she tapped the side of her skull, "Peter, there's nothing there." ..."
Jun 23, 2017 | www.counterpunch.org

The isolation of Qatar appears to be a major step in the Saudi plan, directed by the newly pronounced crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman (the 31-year-old in charge of the Saudi war in Yemen), to provoke a general confrontation between the Sunni world (led by itself) and Shiite world (led by Iran). What has has Qatar done to offend the Saudis, the UAE, Bahrain, Egypt and Yemen? Its state-owned al-Jazeera network has been critical of their governments, especially during the "Arab Spring." But its real sin is its diplomatic and considerable trade relationship with Iran, with which it shares an oil field.

After the announcement by the five Arab nations on June 5 that they would break ties with Qatar, Donald Trump praised the move.

"During my recent trip to the Middle East," he tweeted on June 6. "I stated that there can no longer be funding of Radical Ideology. Leaders pointed to Qatar – look!"

And later that day: "So good to see the Saudi Arabia visit with the King and 50 countries already paying off. They said they would take a hard line on funding extremism, and all reference was pointing to Qatar. Perhaps this will be the beginning of the end to the horror of terrorism!"

In other words, his visit to Riyadh (with that sword dance and all) immediately paid off in everyone taking a harder line on terrorist funding from Qatar.

(By the way, Trump reportedly told Israeli leaders during his trip Israel that he was "just back from the Middle East." What did Netanyahu think about that, but: Oh god this guy's ignorant how do we use this ignorance? )

"The nation of Qatar unfortunately has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level," Trump told reporters at the White House June 9. "So we had a decision to make, do we take the easy road or do we finally take a hard but necessary action. We have to stop the funding of terrorism. I decided the time had come to call on Qatar to end its funding. They have to end that funding. And their terrorist ideology." He appears to allude to conversations during his May 20-21 trip to Riyadh and taking responsibility for the decision.

But then on June 14 Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Roger Cabiness told CNN: "Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis met today with Qatari Minister of State for Defense Affairs Dr. Khalid al-Attiyah to discuss concluding steps in finalizing the Foreign Military Sales purchase of US-manufactured F-15 fighter aircraft by the State of Qatar. The $12 billion sale will give Qatar a state of the art capability and increase security cooperation and interoperability between the United States and Qatar."

And on June 21 State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert declared that the more time passes, "the more doubt is raised about the actions taken by Saudi Arabia and the UAE At this point, we are left with one simple question: Were the actions really about their concerns regarding Qatar's alleged support for terrorism or were they about the long-simmering grievances between and among the GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council] countries?" ???

* * * *

Some people speculate that Trump in his sly wisdom is sending out contrasting messages to obtain his mysterious ends to make America great again. This gives the man too much credit. His problem is that he blabbers whatever-he thinks for the moment-makes him look tough. He projects confidence, without knowing what the hell he's talking about. He's a dangerous buffoon.

But he's not responsible for the fact that George W. Bush's war on Iraq in 2003 provoked a wave of massive catastrophes in the Middle East, and ignited a period of fierce contention among Iran, Sunni Arab countries in particular Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, while encouraging Kurdish nationalism from Iraq to Syria and Turkey. And that this conflict has acquired somewhat the character of a religious struggle of the Sunni world versus Iran-backed Shiites (the Alawite-led regime in Syria, Lebanon's Hizbollah, the Houthis in Yemen, Shiite human rights activists in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia). Surely the most ardent foes of Iran want to depict all these forces as pawns of the mullahs in Tehran, and (therefore) "terrorists" as such. And the Saudi king is doing a good job convincing the president of his view that Iran is the source of all evil in the region.

Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to Washington (1983-2005), once told M16 head Sir Richard Dearlove: "The time is not far off in the Middle East, Richard, when it will literally be 'God help the Shia.' More than a billion Sunni have simply had enough of them." This is the kind of specifically religious sectarianism Trump is embracing, no doubt having no idea what the difference is between Sunnis and Shiites. He just knows that "Radical Ideology" he oddly refers to is funded by Qatar at a very high level and Qatar also buys billions in arms from the U.S.

Or maybe he didn't know about the arms deal. Maybe he left that to his fine generals, the detail guys.

George W. Bush by his invasion of Iraq (to better his dad) produced a mess that his successor in some respects exacerbated. While Obama withdrew from Iraq in accordance with Bush's agreement, and limited the "mission" in Afghanistan, he (or Hillary) led in the destruction of Libya, and began the grotesque involvement in the Syrian conflict. Trump does not understand the causes and effects. He's just proud that his generals dropped a GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) bomb an ISIL camp in Afghanistan.

(Think of that. The U.S. drops the biggest non-nuclear bomb ever used in the history of the world, on militants who've just recently established a presence in the country who belong to a movement that started with al-Zarqawi in Afghanistan, relocated to Iraq, spread to Syria and elsewhere, and is now again in Afghanistan. Maybe 3000 jihadis. The war against the Taliban is not going well; they gain territory year to year. The Afghan army after 16 years of training remains riddled with high desertion rates, unable to make headway against the resurgent Taliban. U.S. trains and their charges view one another with mutual contempt. Green on blue explosions occur so often all U.S. troops are on their guard against their allies. In this hopeless situation-as if to merely express the outrage of frustration-that bomb was dropped on a remote area with undetermined results, condemned strongly by former president Hamid Karzai: "I vehemently and in strongest words condemn the dropping of the latest weapon " But Trump is proud of it.)

Or Trump glories (echoed by Brian Williams) in that April 7 missile strike on the Syrian airfield, when supposedly 56 Tomahawk missiles destroyed a material storage depot, a training facility, a canteen, six MiG-23 aircraft in repair hangars and a radar station. "Congratulations," he tweeted, "to our great military men and women for representing the United States, and the world, so well in the Syria attack." Interviewed on TV he intimately associated the order to attack with the quality of this chocolate cake he was sharing with a very appreciative President Xi from China at the time.

There have been more Syria attacks since, including one that shot down a Syrian warplane over Syria, and the one that shot down an Iranian-made drone. Trump was likely not informed in advance. Not that it would have made any difference, maybe.

But once upon a time, Trump talked about cooperation with Russia against ISIL, and seemed to strongly oppose regime change as policy. He is, in the sense of destructive power, the most powerful person on earth. That he is unreadable and unpredictable, predicting "we'll solve" this or that massively complex problem (North Korea), manifestly ignorant and not interested in history, inheriting the Bush/Cheney neocon-spawned mess and now taking advice from King Salman on matters like Qatar is frightening.

* * * *

Of course the main issue remains U.S. imperialism, rooted in capitalism. The global dynamics of that can be rationally analyzed, and the president's role within the system assessed. Obama was fairly predicable. Hillary Clinton was predictable because she always articulated her hawkishness, like John McCain. Their relationships to capital and their intellectual positions (neoconservatism, "realism") were known. Trump is a new phenomenon, as someone combining Lyndon Johnson's crudity, Nixon's vindictiveness, Reagan's vapid populism, and Dubya's ignorance (but he was surrounded by Cheney's hand-picked neocons, virtually announcing plans for region-wide regime change). I'm not sure what he has in common with Bill Clinton other than promiscuity (but Clinton had no John Miller.) He's new in that he's at odds half the time with his own aides and puzzling world leaders .

I can just imagine Xi and Putin exchanging their analyses of his mind, perhaps chuckling occasionally as we do in this country when we analyze his mind. It's necessary, after all.

British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher after meeting Ronald Reagan told her foreign secretary, Lord Carrington, as she tapped the side of her skull, "Peter, there's nothing there." (She has also been quoted as saying, "Poor dear, there's nothing between his ears.") Lady Thatcher of course gave a well-received eulogy at Reagan's funeral pretending to believe otherwise. The point being that world leaders can like other world leaders, as the Saudi king likes Trump, even if they have nothing between their ears, especially if they think they can exploit the mental vacuum to get them to do something stupid.

Such as, join with people who "have had enough of the Shia" and are showing (in that vicious war in Yemen especially) how they want to get rid of them. Join the debate on Facebook More articles by: Gary Leupp

Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and holds a secondary appointment in the Department of Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan ; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan ; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900 . He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion , (AK Press). He can be reached at: [email protected]

[Jun 26, 2017] Unilateral secondary sanctions imposed by the US would, above all, fall on Chinese companies

Jun 26, 2017 | marknesop.wordpress.com
Northern Star , June 22, 2017 at 9:32 am
"Tillerson called on China to make greater efforts to halt "illicit" revenue streams to North Korea that allegedly help fund Pyongyang's military programs. Just last week, he told a congressional committee the Trump administration was "at a stage" where "we are going to have to start taking secondary sanctions"-that is, penalise countries and corporations that engage in economic activities with North Korea.

Unilateral "secondary sanctions" imposed by the US would, above all, fall on Chinese companies. China is, by far, North Korea's largest trading partner. US officials and the media have repeatedly accused Beijing of failing to do enough to choke off trade and finance with the Pyongyang regime. Any penalties against Chinese individuals or entities would quickly sour relations between the US and China."

http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/06/22/usch-j22.html
http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2017/06/20/532915180/why-is-china-snatching-up-australian-farmland

Next to Japan, Australia is 'Murica's biggest lapdog in the Western Pacific Aussie **elites** are obviously hungry for mucho Renminbi

Obvious question: Do any of the moron USA foreign policy makers have a grasp of freshman logic???

Northern Star , June 22, 2017 at 9:35 am
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/here-are-australias-top-10-two-way-trading-partners-2014-8#china
marknesop , June 22, 2017 at 6:55 pm
I will be extremely surprised if Washington takes any steps which result in sanctions against China. For one thing, a staggering number of American brands and corporations have factories and manufacturing assets in China , and pissing off the Chinese risks hurting the bottom line. For another, China is one of the few countries with money to lend which can match the American appetite for borrowing.

It seems patently obvious to me that countries which find themselves the target of American sanctions should immediately react by kicking out American businesses in their country and embargoing American goods for import. The United States does not make very much which is so unique and rare that you could not find it anywhere else. American businesses and corporations will react with fury to trade actions taken against them because of posturing by the government. Do I have to think of everything?

[Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Many "never-Trumpers" of both parties see the deep state's national security bureaucracy as their best hope to destroy Trump and thus defend constitutional government, but those hopes are misguided. ..."
"... As Michael Glennon, author of National Security and Double Government, pointed out in a June 2017 Harper's essay, if "the president maintains his attack, splintered and demoralized factions within the bureaucracy could actually support - not oppose - many potential Trump initiatives, such as stepped-up drone strikes, cyberattacks, covert action, immigration bans, and mass surveillance." ..."
"... Corraborative evidence of Valentine's thesis is, perhaps surprisingly, provided by the CIA's own website where a number of redacted historical documents have been published. Presumably, they are documents first revealed under the Freedom of Information Act. A few however are copies of news articles once available to the public but now archived by the CIA which has blacked-out portions of the articles. ..."
"... This led to an investigation by New Times in a day when there were still "investigative reporters," and not the government sycophants of today. Based on firsthand accounts, their investigation concluded that Operation Phoenix was the "only systematized kidnapping, torture and assassination program ever sponsored by the United States government. . . . Its victims were noncombatants." At least 40,000 were murdered, with "only" about 8,000 supposed Viet Cong political cadres targeted for execution, with the rest civilians (including women and children) killed and "later conveniently labeled VCI. Hundreds of thousands were jailed without trial, often after sadistic abuse." The article notes that Phoenix was conceived, financed, and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency ..."
"... But the article noted that one of the most persistent criticisms of Phoenix was that it resulted "in the arrest and imprisonment of many innocent civilians." These were called "Class C Communist offenders," some of whom may actually have been forced to commit such "belligerent acts" as digging trenches or carrying rice. It was those alleged as the "hard core, full-time cadre" who were deemed to make up the "shadow government" designated as Class A and B Viet Cong. ..."
"... Ironically, by the Bush administration's broad definition of "unlawful combatants," CIA officers and their support structure also would fit the category. But the American public is generally forgiving of its own war criminals though most self-righteous and hypocritical in judging foreign war criminals. But perhaps given sufficient evidence, the American public could begin to see both the immorality of this behavior and its counterproductive consequences. ..."
"... Talleyrand is credited with saying, "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing." Reportedly, that was borrowed from a 1796 letter by a French naval officer, which stated, in the original language: Personne n'est corrigé; personne n'a su ni rien oublier ni rien appendre. In English: "Nobody has been corrected; no one has known to forget, nor yet to learn anything." That sums up the CIA leadership entirely. ..."
Jun 24, 2017 | original.antiwar.com

Douglas Valentine has once again added to the store of knowledge necessary for American citizens to understand how the U.S. government actually works today, in his most recent book entitled The CIA As Organized Crime . (Valentine previously wrote The Phoenix Program , which should be read with the current book.)

The US "deep state" – of which the CIA is an integral part – is an open secret now and the Phoenix Program (assassinations, death squads, torture, mass detentions, exploitation of information) has been its means of controlling populations. Consequently, knowing the deep state's methods is the only hope of building a democratic opposition to the deep state and to restore as much as possible the Constitutional system we had in previous centuries, as imperfect as it was.

Princeton University political theorist Sheldon Wolin described the US political system in place by 2003 as "inverted totalitarianism." He reaffirmed that in 2009 after seeing a year of the Obama administration. Correctly identifying the threat against constitutional governance is the first step to restore it, and as Wolin understood, substantive constitutional government ended long before Donald Trump campaigned. He's just taking unconstitutional governance to the next level in following the same path as his recent predecessors. However, even as some elements of the "deep state" seek to remove Trump, the President now has many "deep state" instruments in his own hands to be used at his unreviewable discretion.

Many "never-Trumpers" of both parties see the deep state's national security bureaucracy as their best hope to destroy Trump and thus defend constitutional government, but those hopes are misguided. After all, the deep state's bureaucratic leadership has worked arduously for decades to subvert constitutional order.

As Michael Glennon, author of National Security and Double Government, pointed out in a June 2017 Harper's essay, if "the president maintains his attack, splintered and demoralized factions within the bureaucracy could actually support - not oppose - many potential Trump initiatives, such as stepped-up drone strikes, cyberattacks, covert action, immigration bans, and mass surveillance."

Glennon noted that the propensity of "security managers" to back policies which ratchet up levels of security "will play into Trump's hands, so that if and when he finally does declare victory, a revamped security directorate could emerge more menacing than ever, with him its devoted new ally." Before that happens, it is incumbent for Americans to understand what Valentine explains in his book of CIA methods of "population control" as first fully developed in the Vietnam War's Phoenix Program.

Hating the US

There also must be the realization that our "national security" apparatchiks - principally but not solely the CIA - have served to exponentially increase the numbers of those people who hate the US.

Some of these people turn to terrorism as an expression of that hostility. Anyone who is at all familiar with the CIA and Al Qaeda knows that the CIA has been Al Qaeda's most important "combat multiplier" since 9/11, and the CIA can be said to have birthed ISIS as well with the mistreatment of incarcerated Iraqi men in US prisons in Iraq.

Indeed, by following the model of the Phoenix Program, the CIA must be seen in the Twenty-first Century as a combination of the ultimate "Murder, Inc.," when judged by the CIA's methods such as drone warfare and its victims; and the Keystone Kops, when the multiple failures of CIA policies are considered. This is not to make light of what the CIA does, but the CIA's misguided policies and practices have served to generate wrath, hatred and violence against Americans, which we see manifested in cities such as San Bernardino, Orlando, New York and Boston.

Pointing out the harm to Americans is not to dismiss the havoc that Americans under the influence of the CIA have perpetrated on foreign populations. But "morality" seems a lost virtue today in the US, which is under the influence of so much militaristic war propaganda that morality no longer enters into the equation in determining foreign policy.

In addition to the harm the CIA has caused to people around the world, the CIA works tirelessly at subverting its own government at home, as was most visible in the spying on and subversion of the torture investigation by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The subversion of democracy also includes the role the CIA plays in developing and disseminating war propaganda as "information warfare," upon the American people. This is what the Rand Corporation under the editorship of Zalmay Khalilzad has described as "conditioning the battlefield," which begins with the minds of the American population.

Douglas Valentine discusses and documents the role of the CIA in disseminating pro-war propaganda and disinformation as complementary to the violent tactics of the Phoenix Program in Vietnam. Valentine explains that "before Phoenix was adopted as the model for policing the American empire, many US military commanders in Vietnam resisted the Phoenix strategy of targeting civilians with Einsatzgruppen-style 'special forces' and Gestapo-style secret police."

Military Commanders considered that type of program a flagrant violation of the Law of War. "Their main job is to zap the in-betweeners – you know, the people who aren't all the way with the government and aren't all the way with the Viet Cong either. They figure if you zap enough in-betweeners, people will begin to get the idea," according to one quote from The Phoenix Program referring to the unit tasked with much of the Phoenix operations.

Nazi Influences

Comparing the Phoenix Program and its operatives to "Einsatzgruppen-style 'special forces' and Gestapo-style secret police" is not a distortion of the strategic understanding of each. Both programs were extreme forms of repression operating under martial law principles where the slightest form of dissent was deemed to represent the work of the "enemy." Hitler's Bandit Hunters: The SS and the Nazi Occupation of Europe by Philip W. Blood describes German "Security Warfare" as practiced in World War II, which can be seen as identical in form to the Phoenix Program as to how the enemy is defined as anyone who is "potentially" a threat, deemed either "partizans" or terrorists.

That the Germans included entire racial categories in that does not change the underlying logic, which was, anyone deemed an internal enemy in a territory in which their military operated had to be "neutralized" by any means necessary. The US military and the South Vietnamese military governments operated under the same principles but not based on race, rather the perception that certain areas and villages were loyal to the Viet Cong.

This repressive doctrine was also not unique to the Nazis in Europe and the US military in Vietnam. Similar though less sophisticated strategies were used against the American Indians and by the imperial powers of the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries, including by the US in its newly acquired territories of the Philippines and in the Caribbean. This "imperial policing," i.e., counterinsurgency, simply moved to more manipulative and, in ways, more violent levels.

That the US drew upon German counterinsurgency doctrine, as brutal as it was, is well documented. This is shown explicitly in a 2011 article published in the Journal of Military and Strategic Studies entitled German Counterinsurgency Revisited by Charles D. Melson. He wrote that in 1942, Nazi commander Heinrich Himmler named a deputy for "anti-bandit warfare," (Bevollmachtigter fur die Bandenkampfung im Osten), SS-General von dem Bach, whose responsibilities expanded in 1943 to head all SS and police anti-bandit units and operations. He was one of the architects of the Einsatzguppen "concept of anti-partisan warfare," a German predecessor to the "Phoenix Program."

'Anti-Partisan' Lessons

It wasn't a coincidence that this "anti-partisan" warfare concept should be adopted by US forces in Vietnam and retained to the present day. Melson pointed out that a "post-war German special forces officer described hunter or ranger units as 'men who knew every possible ruse and tactic of guerrilla warfare. They had gone through the hell of combat against the crafty partisans in the endless swamps and forests of Russia.'"

Consequently, "The German special forces and reconnaissance school was a sought after posting for North Atlantic Treaty Organization special operations personnel," who presumably included members of the newly created US Army Special Forces soldiers, which was in part headquartered at Bad Tolz in Germany, as well as CIA paramilitary officers.

Just as with the later Phoenix Program to the present-day US global counterinsurgency, Melson wrote that the "attitude of the [local] population and the amount of assistance it was willing to give guerilla units was of great concern to the Germans. Different treatment was supposed to be accorded to affected populations, bandit supporters, and bandits, while so-called population and resource control measures for each were noted (but were in practice, treated apparently one and the same). 'Action against enemy agitation' was the psychological or information operations of the Nazi period. The Nazis believed that, 'Because of the close relationship of guerilla warfare and politics, actions against enemy agitation are a task that is just as important as interdiction and combat actions. All means must be used to ward off enemy influence and waken and maintain a clear political will.'"

This is typical of any totalitarian system – a movement or a government – whether the process is characterized as counterinsurgency or internal security. The idea of any civilian collaboration with the "enemy" is the basis for what the US government charges as "conspiracy" in the Guantanamo Military Commissions.

Valentine explains the Phoenix program as having been developed by the CIA in 1967 to combine "existing counterinsurgency programs in a concerted effort to 'neutralize' the Vietcong infrastructure (VCI)." He explained further that "neutralize" meant "to kill, capture, or make to defect." "Infrastructure" meant civilians suspected of supporting North Vietnamese and Vietcong soldiers. Central to the Phoenix program was that its targets were civilians, making the operation a violation of the Geneva Conventions which guaranteed protection to civilians in time of war.

"The Vietnam's War's Silver Lining: A Bureaucratic Model for Population Control Emerges" is the title of Chapter 3. Valentine writes that the "CIA's Phoenix program changed how America fights its wars and how the public views this new type of political and psychological warfare, in which civilian casualties are an explicit objective." The intent of the Phoenix program evolved from "neutralizing" enemy leaders into "a program of systematic repression for the political control of the South Vietnamese people. It sought to accomplish this through a highly bureaucratized system of disposing of people who could not be ideologically assimilated." The CIA claimed a legal basis for the program in "emergency decrees" and orders for "administrative detention."

Lauding Petraeus

Valentine refers to a paper by David Kilcullen entitled Countering Global Insurgency. Kilcullen is one of the so-called "counterinsurgency experts" whom General David Petraeus gathered together in a cell to promote and refine "counterinsurgency," or COIN, for the modern era. Fred Kaplan, who is considered a "liberal author and journalist" at Slate, wrote a panegyric to these cultists entitled, The Insurgents: David Petraeus and the Plot to Change the American Way of War. The purpose of this cell was to change the practices of the US military into that of "imperial policing," or COIN, as they preferred to call it.

But Kilcullen argued in his paper that "The 'War on Terrorism'" is actually a campaign to counter a global insurgency. Therefore, Kilcullen argued, "we need a new paradigm, capable of addressing globalised insurgency." His "disaggregation strategy" called for "actions to target the insurgent infrastructure that would resemble the unfairly maligned (but highly effective) Vietnam-era Phoenix program."

He went on, "Contrary to popular mythology, this was largely a civilian aid and development program, supported by targeted military pacification operations and intelligence activity to disrupt the Viet Cong Infrastructure. A global Phoenix program (including the other key elements that formed part of the successful Vietnam CORDS system) would provide a useful start point to consider how Disaggregation would develop in practice."

It is readily apparent that, in fact, a Phoenix-type program is now US global policy and - just like in Vietnam - it is applying "death squad" strategies that eliminate not only active combatants but also civilians who simply find themselves in the same vicinity, thus creating antagonisms that expand the number of fighters.

Corraborative evidence of Valentine's thesis is, perhaps surprisingly, provided by the CIA's own website where a number of redacted historical documents have been published. Presumably, they are documents first revealed under the Freedom of Information Act. A few however are copies of news articles once available to the public but now archived by the CIA which has blacked-out portions of the articles.

The Bloody Reality

One "sanitized" article - approved for release in 2011 - is a partially redacted New Times article of Aug. 22, 1975, by Michael Drosnin. The article recounts a story of a US Army counterintelligence officer "who directed a small part of a secret war aimed not at the enemy's soldiers but at its civilian leaders." He describes how a CIA-directed Phoenix operative dumped a bag of "eleven bloody ears" as proof of six people killed.

The officer, who recalled this incident in 1971, said, "It made me sick. I couldn't go on with what I was doing in Vietnam. . . . It was an assassination campaign . . . my job was to identify and eliminate VCI, the Viet Cong 'infrastructure' – the communist's shadow government. I worked directly with two Vietnamese units, very tough guys who didn't wear uniforms . . . In the beginning they brought back about 10 percent alive. By the end they had stopped taking prisoners.

"How many VC they got I don't know. I saw a hell of a lot of dead bodies. We'd put a tag on saying VCI, but no one really knew – it was just some native in black pajamas with 16 bullet holes."

This led to an investigation by New Times in a day when there were still "investigative reporters," and not the government sycophants of today. Based on firsthand accounts, their investigation concluded that Operation Phoenix was the "only systematized kidnapping, torture and assassination program ever sponsored by the United States government. . . . Its victims were noncombatants." At least 40,000 were murdered, with "only" about 8,000 supposed Viet Cong political cadres targeted for execution, with the rest civilians (including women and children) killed and "later conveniently labeled VCI. Hundreds of thousands were jailed without trial, often after sadistic abuse." The article notes that Phoenix was conceived, financed, and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency, as Mr. Valentine writes.

A second article archived by the CIA was by the Christian Science Monitor, dated Jan. 5, 1971, describing how the Saigon government was "taking steps that could help eliminate one of the most glaring abuses of its controversial Phoenix program, which is aimed against the Viet Cong political and administrative apparatus." Note how the Monitor shifted blame away from the CIA and onto the South Vietnamese government.

But the article noted that one of the most persistent criticisms of Phoenix was that it resulted "in the arrest and imprisonment of many innocent civilians." These were called "Class C Communist offenders," some of whom may actually have been forced to commit such "belligerent acts" as digging trenches or carrying rice. It was those alleged as the "hard core, full-time cadre" who were deemed to make up the "shadow government" designated as Class A and B Viet Cong.

Yet "security committees" throughout South Vietnam, under the direction of the CIA, sentenced at least 10,000 "Class C civilians" to prison each year, far more than Class A and B combined. The article stated, "Thousands of these prisoners are never brought to court trial, and thousands of other have never been sentenced." The latter statement would mean they were just held in "indefinite detention," like the prisoners held at Guantanamo and other US detention centers with high levels of CIA involvement.

Not surprisingly to someone not affiliated with the CIA, the article found as well that "Individual case histories indicate that many who have gone to prison as active supporters of neither the government nor the Viet Cong come out as active backers of the Viet Cong and with an implacable hatred of the government." In other words, the CIA and the COIN enthusiasts are achieving the same results today with the prisons they set up in Iraq and Afghanistan.

CIA Crimes

Valentine broadly covers the illegalities of the CIA over the years, including its well-documented role in facilitating the drug trade over the years. But, in this reviewer's opinion, his most valuable contribution is his description of the CIA's participation going back at least to the Vietnam War in the treatment of what the US government today calls "unlawful combatants."

"Unlawful combatants" is a descriptive term made up by the Bush administration to remove people whom US officials alleged were "terrorists" from the legal protections of the Geneva Conventions and Human Rights Law and thus to justify their capture or killing in the so-called "Global War on Terror." Since the US government deems them "unlawful" – because they do not belong to an organized military structure and do not wear insignia – they are denied the "privilege" of belligerency that applies to traditional soldiers. But – unless they take a "direct part in hostilities" – they would still maintain their civilian status under the law of war and thus not lose the legal protection due to civilians even if they exhibit sympathy or support to one side in a conflict.

Ironically, by the Bush administration's broad definition of "unlawful combatants," CIA officers and their support structure also would fit the category. But the American public is generally forgiving of its own war criminals though most self-righteous and hypocritical in judging foreign war criminals. But perhaps given sufficient evidence, the American public could begin to see both the immorality of this behavior and its counterproductive consequences.

This is not to condemn all CIA officers, some of whom acted in good faith that they were actually defending the United States by acquiring information on a professed enemy in the tradition of Nathan Hale. But it is to harshly condemn those CIA officials and officers who betrayed the United States by subverting its Constitution, including waging secret wars against foreign countries without a declaration of war by Congress. And it decidedly condemns the CIA war criminals who acted as a law unto themselves in the torture and murder of foreign nationals, as Valentine's book describes.

Talleyrand is credited with saying, "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing." Reportedly, that was borrowed from a 1796 letter by a French naval officer, which stated, in the original language: Personne n'est corrigé; personne n'a su ni rien oublier ni rien appendre. In English: "Nobody has been corrected; no one has known to forget, nor yet to learn anything." That sums up the CIA leadership entirely.

Douglas Valentine's book is a thorough documentation of that fact and it is essential reading for all Americans if we are to have any hope for salvaging a remnant of representative government.

Todd E. Pierce retired as a Major in the US Army Judge Advocate General (JAG) Corps in November 2012. His most recent assignment was defense counsel in the Office of Chief Defense Counsel, Office of Military Commissions. This originally appeared at ConsortiumNews.com .

Read more by Todd E. Pierce Inciting Wars the American Way – August 14th, 2016 Chicago Police Adopt Israeli Tactics – December 13th, 2015 US War Theories Target Dissenters – September 13th, 2015 Ron Paul and Lost Lessons of War – September 1st, 2015 Has the US Constitution Been Lost to Military Rule?– January 4th, 2015

[Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... Many "never-Trumpers" of both parties see the deep state's national security bureaucracy as their best hope to destroy Trump and thus defend constitutional government, but those hopes are misguided. ..."
"... As Michael Glennon, author of National Security and Double Government, pointed out in a June 2017 Harper's essay, if "the president maintains his attack, splintered and demoralized factions within the bureaucracy could actually support - not oppose - many potential Trump initiatives, such as stepped-up drone strikes, cyberattacks, covert action, immigration bans, and mass surveillance." ..."
"... Corraborative evidence of Valentine's thesis is, perhaps surprisingly, provided by the CIA's own website where a number of redacted historical documents have been published. Presumably, they are documents first revealed under the Freedom of Information Act. A few however are copies of news articles once available to the public but now archived by the CIA which has blacked-out portions of the articles. ..."
"... This led to an investigation by New Times in a day when there were still "investigative reporters," and not the government sycophants of today. Based on firsthand accounts, their investigation concluded that Operation Phoenix was the "only systematized kidnapping, torture and assassination program ever sponsored by the United States government. . . . Its victims were noncombatants." At least 40,000 were murdered, with "only" about 8,000 supposed Viet Cong political cadres targeted for execution, with the rest civilians (including women and children) killed and "later conveniently labeled VCI. Hundreds of thousands were jailed without trial, often after sadistic abuse." The article notes that Phoenix was conceived, financed, and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency ..."
"... But the article noted that one of the most persistent criticisms of Phoenix was that it resulted "in the arrest and imprisonment of many innocent civilians." These were called "Class C Communist offenders," some of whom may actually have been forced to commit such "belligerent acts" as digging trenches or carrying rice. It was those alleged as the "hard core, full-time cadre" who were deemed to make up the "shadow government" designated as Class A and B Viet Cong. ..."
"... Ironically, by the Bush administration's broad definition of "unlawful combatants," CIA officers and their support structure also would fit the category. But the American public is generally forgiving of its own war criminals though most self-righteous and hypocritical in judging foreign war criminals. But perhaps given sufficient evidence, the American public could begin to see both the immorality of this behavior and its counterproductive consequences. ..."
"... Talleyrand is credited with saying, "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing." Reportedly, that was borrowed from a 1796 letter by a French naval officer, which stated, in the original language: Personne n'est corrigé; personne n'a su ni rien oublier ni rien appendre. In English: "Nobody has been corrected; no one has known to forget, nor yet to learn anything." That sums up the CIA leadership entirely. ..."
Jun 24, 2017 | original.antiwar.com

Douglas Valentine has once again added to the store of knowledge necessary for American citizens to understand how the U.S. government actually works today, in his most recent book entitled The CIA As Organized Crime . (Valentine previously wrote The Phoenix Program , which should be read with the current book.)

The US "deep state" – of which the CIA is an integral part – is an open secret now and the Phoenix Program (assassinations, death squads, torture, mass detentions, exploitation of information) has been its means of controlling populations. Consequently, knowing the deep state's methods is the only hope of building a democratic opposition to the deep state and to restore as much as possible the Constitutional system we had in previous centuries, as imperfect as it was.

Princeton University political theorist Sheldon Wolin described the US political system in place by 2003 as "inverted totalitarianism." He reaffirmed that in 2009 after seeing a year of the Obama administration. Correctly identifying the threat against constitutional governance is the first step to restore it, and as Wolin understood, substantive constitutional government ended long before Donald Trump campaigned. He's just taking unconstitutional governance to the next level in following the same path as his recent predecessors. However, even as some elements of the "deep state" seek to remove Trump, the President now has many "deep state" instruments in his own hands to be used at his unreviewable discretion.

Many "never-Trumpers" of both parties see the deep state's national security bureaucracy as their best hope to destroy Trump and thus defend constitutional government, but those hopes are misguided. After all, the deep state's bureaucratic leadership has worked arduously for decades to subvert constitutional order.

As Michael Glennon, author of National Security and Double Government, pointed out in a June 2017 Harper's essay, if "the president maintains his attack, splintered and demoralized factions within the bureaucracy could actually support - not oppose - many potential Trump initiatives, such as stepped-up drone strikes, cyberattacks, covert action, immigration bans, and mass surveillance."

Glennon noted that the propensity of "security managers" to back policies which ratchet up levels of security "will play into Trump's hands, so that if and when he finally does declare victory, a revamped security directorate could emerge more menacing than ever, with him its devoted new ally." Before that happens, it is incumbent for Americans to understand what Valentine explains in his book of CIA methods of "population control" as first fully developed in the Vietnam War's Phoenix Program.

Hating the US

There also must be the realization that our "national security" apparatchiks - principally but not solely the CIA - have served to exponentially increase the numbers of those people who hate the US.

Some of these people turn to terrorism as an expression of that hostility. Anyone who is at all familiar with the CIA and Al Qaeda knows that the CIA has been Al Qaeda's most important "combat multiplier" since 9/11, and the CIA can be said to have birthed ISIS as well with the mistreatment of incarcerated Iraqi men in US prisons in Iraq.

Indeed, by following the model of the Phoenix Program, the CIA must be seen in the Twenty-first Century as a combination of the ultimate "Murder, Inc.," when judged by the CIA's methods such as drone warfare and its victims; and the Keystone Kops, when the multiple failures of CIA policies are considered. This is not to make light of what the CIA does, but the CIA's misguided policies and practices have served to generate wrath, hatred and violence against Americans, which we see manifested in cities such as San Bernardino, Orlando, New York and Boston.

Pointing out the harm to Americans is not to dismiss the havoc that Americans under the influence of the CIA have perpetrated on foreign populations. But "morality" seems a lost virtue today in the US, which is under the influence of so much militaristic war propaganda that morality no longer enters into the equation in determining foreign policy.

In addition to the harm the CIA has caused to people around the world, the CIA works tirelessly at subverting its own government at home, as was most visible in the spying on and subversion of the torture investigation by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The subversion of democracy also includes the role the CIA plays in developing and disseminating war propaganda as "information warfare," upon the American people. This is what the Rand Corporation under the editorship of Zalmay Khalilzad has described as "conditioning the battlefield," which begins with the minds of the American population.

Douglas Valentine discusses and documents the role of the CIA in disseminating pro-war propaganda and disinformation as complementary to the violent tactics of the Phoenix Program in Vietnam. Valentine explains that "before Phoenix was adopted as the model for policing the American empire, many US military commanders in Vietnam resisted the Phoenix strategy of targeting civilians with Einsatzgruppen-style 'special forces' and Gestapo-style secret police."

Military Commanders considered that type of program a flagrant violation of the Law of War. "Their main job is to zap the in-betweeners – you know, the people who aren't all the way with the government and aren't all the way with the Viet Cong either. They figure if you zap enough in-betweeners, people will begin to get the idea," according to one quote from The Phoenix Program referring to the unit tasked with much of the Phoenix operations.

Nazi Influences

Comparing the Phoenix Program and its operatives to "Einsatzgruppen-style 'special forces' and Gestapo-style secret police" is not a distortion of the strategic understanding of each. Both programs were extreme forms of repression operating under martial law principles where the slightest form of dissent was deemed to represent the work of the "enemy." Hitler's Bandit Hunters: The SS and the Nazi Occupation of Europe by Philip W. Blood describes German "Security Warfare" as practiced in World War II, which can be seen as identical in form to the Phoenix Program as to how the enemy is defined as anyone who is "potentially" a threat, deemed either "partizans" or terrorists.

That the Germans included entire racial categories in that does not change the underlying logic, which was, anyone deemed an internal enemy in a territory in which their military operated had to be "neutralized" by any means necessary. The US military and the South Vietnamese military governments operated under the same principles but not based on race, rather the perception that certain areas and villages were loyal to the Viet Cong.

This repressive doctrine was also not unique to the Nazis in Europe and the US military in Vietnam. Similar though less sophisticated strategies were used against the American Indians and by the imperial powers of the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries, including by the US in its newly acquired territories of the Philippines and in the Caribbean. This "imperial policing," i.e., counterinsurgency, simply moved to more manipulative and, in ways, more violent levels.

That the US drew upon German counterinsurgency doctrine, as brutal as it was, is well documented. This is shown explicitly in a 2011 article published in the Journal of Military and Strategic Studies entitled German Counterinsurgency Revisited by Charles D. Melson. He wrote that in 1942, Nazi commander Heinrich Himmler named a deputy for "anti-bandit warfare," (Bevollmachtigter fur die Bandenkampfung im Osten), SS-General von dem Bach, whose responsibilities expanded in 1943 to head all SS and police anti-bandit units and operations. He was one of the architects of the Einsatzguppen "concept of anti-partisan warfare," a German predecessor to the "Phoenix Program."

'Anti-Partisan' Lessons

It wasn't a coincidence that this "anti-partisan" warfare concept should be adopted by US forces in Vietnam and retained to the present day. Melson pointed out that a "post-war German special forces officer described hunter or ranger units as 'men who knew every possible ruse and tactic of guerrilla warfare. They had gone through the hell of combat against the crafty partisans in the endless swamps and forests of Russia.'"

Consequently, "The German special forces and reconnaissance school was a sought after posting for North Atlantic Treaty Organization special operations personnel," who presumably included members of the newly created US Army Special Forces soldiers, which was in part headquartered at Bad Tolz in Germany, as well as CIA paramilitary officers.

Just as with the later Phoenix Program to the present-day US global counterinsurgency, Melson wrote that the "attitude of the [local] population and the amount of assistance it was willing to give guerilla units was of great concern to the Germans. Different treatment was supposed to be accorded to affected populations, bandit supporters, and bandits, while so-called population and resource control measures for each were noted (but were in practice, treated apparently one and the same). 'Action against enemy agitation' was the psychological or information operations of the Nazi period. The Nazis believed that, 'Because of the close relationship of guerilla warfare and politics, actions against enemy agitation are a task that is just as important as interdiction and combat actions. All means must be used to ward off enemy influence and waken and maintain a clear political will.'"

This is typical of any totalitarian system – a movement or a government – whether the process is characterized as counterinsurgency or internal security. The idea of any civilian collaboration with the "enemy" is the basis for what the US government charges as "conspiracy" in the Guantanamo Military Commissions.

Valentine explains the Phoenix program as having been developed by the CIA in 1967 to combine "existing counterinsurgency programs in a concerted effort to 'neutralize' the Vietcong infrastructure (VCI)." He explained further that "neutralize" meant "to kill, capture, or make to defect." "Infrastructure" meant civilians suspected of supporting North Vietnamese and Vietcong soldiers. Central to the Phoenix program was that its targets were civilians, making the operation a violation of the Geneva Conventions which guaranteed protection to civilians in time of war.

"The Vietnam's War's Silver Lining: A Bureaucratic Model for Population Control Emerges" is the title of Chapter 3. Valentine writes that the "CIA's Phoenix program changed how America fights its wars and how the public views this new type of political and psychological warfare, in which civilian casualties are an explicit objective." The intent of the Phoenix program evolved from "neutralizing" enemy leaders into "a program of systematic repression for the political control of the South Vietnamese people. It sought to accomplish this through a highly bureaucratized system of disposing of people who could not be ideologically assimilated." The CIA claimed a legal basis for the program in "emergency decrees" and orders for "administrative detention."

Lauding Petraeus

Valentine refers to a paper by David Kilcullen entitled Countering Global Insurgency. Kilcullen is one of the so-called "counterinsurgency experts" whom General David Petraeus gathered together in a cell to promote and refine "counterinsurgency," or COIN, for the modern era. Fred Kaplan, who is considered a "liberal author and journalist" at Slate, wrote a panegyric to these cultists entitled, The Insurgents: David Petraeus and the Plot to Change the American Way of War. The purpose of this cell was to change the practices of the US military into that of "imperial policing," or COIN, as they preferred to call it.

But Kilcullen argued in his paper that "The 'War on Terrorism'" is actually a campaign to counter a global insurgency. Therefore, Kilcullen argued, "we need a new paradigm, capable of addressing globalised insurgency." His "disaggregation strategy" called for "actions to target the insurgent infrastructure that would resemble the unfairly maligned (but highly effective) Vietnam-era Phoenix program."

He went on, "Contrary to popular mythology, this was largely a civilian aid and development program, supported by targeted military pacification operations and intelligence activity to disrupt the Viet Cong Infrastructure. A global Phoenix program (including the other key elements that formed part of the successful Vietnam CORDS system) would provide a useful start point to consider how Disaggregation would develop in practice."

It is readily apparent that, in fact, a Phoenix-type program is now US global policy and - just like in Vietnam - it is applying "death squad" strategies that eliminate not only active combatants but also civilians who simply find themselves in the same vicinity, thus creating antagonisms that expand the number of fighters.

Corraborative evidence of Valentine's thesis is, perhaps surprisingly, provided by the CIA's own website where a number of redacted historical documents have been published. Presumably, they are documents first revealed under the Freedom of Information Act. A few however are copies of news articles once available to the public but now archived by the CIA which has blacked-out portions of the articles.

The Bloody Reality

One "sanitized" article - approved for release in 2011 - is a partially redacted New Times article of Aug. 22, 1975, by Michael Drosnin. The article recounts a story of a US Army counterintelligence officer "who directed a small part of a secret war aimed not at the enemy's soldiers but at its civilian leaders." He describes how a CIA-directed Phoenix operative dumped a bag of "eleven bloody ears" as proof of six people killed.

The officer, who recalled this incident in 1971, said, "It made me sick. I couldn't go on with what I was doing in Vietnam. . . . It was an assassination campaign . . . my job was to identify and eliminate VCI, the Viet Cong 'infrastructure' – the communist's shadow government. I worked directly with two Vietnamese units, very tough guys who didn't wear uniforms . . . In the beginning they brought back about 10 percent alive. By the end they had stopped taking prisoners.

"How many VC they got I don't know. I saw a hell of a lot of dead bodies. We'd put a tag on saying VCI, but no one really knew – it was just some native in black pajamas with 16 bullet holes."

This led to an investigation by New Times in a day when there were still "investigative reporters," and not the government sycophants of today. Based on firsthand accounts, their investigation concluded that Operation Phoenix was the "only systematized kidnapping, torture and assassination program ever sponsored by the United States government. . . . Its victims were noncombatants." At least 40,000 were murdered, with "only" about 8,000 supposed Viet Cong political cadres targeted for execution, with the rest civilians (including women and children) killed and "later conveniently labeled VCI. Hundreds of thousands were jailed without trial, often after sadistic abuse." The article notes that Phoenix was conceived, financed, and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency, as Mr. Valentine writes.

A second article archived by the CIA was by the Christian Science Monitor, dated Jan. 5, 1971, describing how the Saigon government was "taking steps that could help eliminate one of the most glaring abuses of its controversial Phoenix program, which is aimed against the Viet Cong political and administrative apparatus." Note how the Monitor shifted blame away from the CIA and onto the South Vietnamese government.

But the article noted that one of the most persistent criticisms of Phoenix was that it resulted "in the arrest and imprisonment of many innocent civilians." These were called "Class C Communist offenders," some of whom may actually have been forced to commit such "belligerent acts" as digging trenches or carrying rice. It was those alleged as the "hard core, full-time cadre" who were deemed to make up the "shadow government" designated as Class A and B Viet Cong.

Yet "security committees" throughout South Vietnam, under the direction of the CIA, sentenced at least 10,000 "Class C civilians" to prison each year, far more than Class A and B combined. The article stated, "Thousands of these prisoners are never brought to court trial, and thousands of other have never been sentenced." The latter statement would mean they were just held in "indefinite detention," like the prisoners held at Guantanamo and other US detention centers with high levels of CIA involvement.

Not surprisingly to someone not affiliated with the CIA, the article found as well that "Individual case histories indicate that many who have gone to prison as active supporters of neither the government nor the Viet Cong come out as active backers of the Viet Cong and with an implacable hatred of the government." In other words, the CIA and the COIN enthusiasts are achieving the same results today with the prisons they set up in Iraq and Afghanistan.

CIA Crimes

Valentine broadly covers the illegalities of the CIA over the years, including its well-documented role in facilitating the drug trade over the years. But, in this reviewer's opinion, his most valuable contribution is his description of the CIA's participation going back at least to the Vietnam War in the treatment of what the US government today calls "unlawful combatants."

"Unlawful combatants" is a descriptive term made up by the Bush administration to remove people whom US officials alleged were "terrorists" from the legal protections of the Geneva Conventions and Human Rights Law and thus to justify their capture or killing in the so-called "Global War on Terror." Since the US government deems them "unlawful" – because they do not belong to an organized military structure and do not wear insignia – they are denied the "privilege" of belligerency that applies to traditional soldiers. But – unless they take a "direct part in hostilities" – they would still maintain their civilian status under the law of war and thus not lose the legal protection due to civilians even if they exhibit sympathy or support to one side in a conflict.

Ironically, by the Bush administration's broad definition of "unlawful combatants," CIA officers and their support structure also would fit the category. But the American public is generally forgiving of its own war criminals though most self-righteous and hypocritical in judging foreign war criminals. But perhaps given sufficient evidence, the American public could begin to see both the immorality of this behavior and its counterproductive consequences.

This is not to condemn all CIA officers, some of whom acted in good faith that they were actually defending the United States by acquiring information on a professed enemy in the tradition of Nathan Hale. But it is to harshly condemn those CIA officials and officers who betrayed the United States by subverting its Constitution, including waging secret wars against foreign countries without a declaration of war by Congress. And it decidedly condemns the CIA war criminals who acted as a law unto themselves in the torture and murder of foreign nationals, as Valentine's book describes.

Talleyrand is credited with saying, "They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing." Reportedly, that was borrowed from a 1796 letter by a French naval officer, which stated, in the original language: Personne n'est corrigé; personne n'a su ni rien oublier ni rien appendre. In English: "Nobody has been corrected; no one has known to forget, nor yet to learn anything." That sums up the CIA leadership entirely.

Douglas Valentine's book is a thorough documentation of that fact and it is essential reading for all Americans if we are to have any hope for salvaging a remnant of representative government.

Todd E. Pierce retired as a Major in the US Army Judge Advocate General (JAG) Corps in November 2012. His most recent assignment was defense counsel in the Office of Chief Defense Counsel, Office of Military Commissions. This originally appeared at ConsortiumNews.com .

Read more by Todd E. Pierce Inciting Wars the American Way – August 14th, 2016 Chicago Police Adopt Israeli Tactics – December 13th, 2015 US War Theories Target Dissenters – September 13th, 2015 Ron Paul and Lost Lessons of War – September 1st, 2015 Has the US Constitution Been Lost to Military Rule?– January 4th, 2015

[Jun 24, 2017] Ukraine had ceased to exist as an independent country in 2014, with arrival of Nuland (ziocon) and Brennan (the CIA)

Ukraine is now debt slave. Debt slave is not an independent country. No way. It is a neo-colony.
Notable quotes:
"... The scale of de-industrialization and of de-modernization Ukraine achieved in short 26 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union is nothing short of mind-boggling and unprecedented. ..."
Jun 24, 2017 | www.unz.com

annamaria June 23, 2017 at 1:48 am GMT

@Mr. Hack

who give a damn about what Ukrainians feel.
Why Ukrainians of course, it's their country after all. " it's their country after all."

Their country?

Ukraine had ceased to exist as an independent country in 2014, with arrival of Nuland (ziocon) and Brennan (the CIA). Hence the spectacular appointments of Misha Saakishvilli (wanted in his native Georgia), Natali Yaresko (an American felon), Pravyj sector (local neo-nazi), and finally, Groysman, a Jewish entrepreneur and current prime minister of Ukraine. Jews make 0.4% of Ukrainian population: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jewish-population-of-the-world

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-22/stockman-warns-great-big-coup-way

"While Putin was basking in the glory of the 2014 winter Olympics at Sochi, the entire apparatus of Imperial Washington - the CIA, the National Endowment for Democracy, the State Department and a long string of Washington funded NGOs - was on the ground in Kiev assisting the putsch that overthrew Ukraine's constitutionally elected President and Russian ally.

From there, the Ukrainian civil war and partition of Crimea inexorably followed, as did the escalating campaign against Russia and its leader.

So as it turned out, the War Party could not have planned a better outcome - especially after Russia moved to protect its legitimate interests in its own backyard resulting from the Washington-instigated civil war in Ukraine. That included protecting its 200-year old naval base at Sevastopol in Crimea."

Moreover, the Ukrainian territory is the result of Soviet annexations of Rumanian, Polish, and Hungarian territories; without the generous provisions by the USSR, Ukraine would be a puny patch of land: http://ukrmap.su/en-uh10/273.html

Rmthoughs Show Comment Next New Comment June 22, 2017 at 10:58 pm GMT

@Boris N
Get it, boys and girls? Everyone owes it to Ukraine to "put her on her feet". Russia owes her gas transit, buying everything Ukraine (less and less) produces. And, of course, Ukraine's main idea about Europe, as even her former President still thinks so, is to get to EU, get a truck load of free money (aka investments) and start living as European upper middle class. I am not exaggerating. Of course, the fact that Ukraine became what it became by 1990 was largely thanks to the Soviet economic system somehow got lost on such people as Kuchma, not to speak of very many average Ukrainians.

The scale of de-industrialization and of de-modernization Ukraine achieved in short 26 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union is nothing short of mind-boggling and unprecedented.

[Jun 17, 2017] The poverty for the most population for the ideological purity of Ukranian nationalism

Ukrainian nationalist help to impoverish he country...
www.unz.com

Northern Star , June 16, 2017 at 1:45 pm

Worth reviewing if you haven't seen it . It's dumbfounding how some Ukrainians today lionize the Nazi vermin who murdered their ancestors The woman. in the cover photo I wonder who she mourns .

https://sputniknews.com/society/201705061053337885-nazi-occupied-kherson-report-declassified/

yalensis , June 16, 2017 at 3:29 pm
Good article, and good to keep the numbers in perspective:

Everything will come out in the wash. Once Ukraine is reunited with Russia, it will be the 6 million who are honored; and the much smaller number (100K) will be cast aside with scorn as the vicious traitors that they were.

[Jun 14, 2017] Strange Oversight by Comey tells us a lot by Ray McGovern

Notable quotes:
"... Given the stakes involved in the Russia-gate investigation – now including a possible impeachment battle over removing the President of the United States – wouldn't it seem logical for the FBI to insist on its own forensics for this fundamental predicate of the case? Or could Comey's hesitancy to demand access to the DNC's computers be explained by a fear that FBI technicians not fully briefed on CIA/NSA/FBI Deep State programs might uncover a lot more than he wanted? ..."
"... "In the case of the DNC, and, I believe, the DCCC, but I'm sure the DNC, we did not have access to the devices themselves. We got relevant forensic information from a private party, a high-class entity, that had done the work. But we didn't get direct access." ..."
"... "Isn't content an important part of the forensics from a counterintelligence standpoint?" ..."
"... "It is, although what was briefed to me by my folks – the people who were my folks at the time is that they had gotten the information from the private party that they needed to understand the intrusion by the spring of 2016." ..."
"... Burr demurred on asking Comey to explain what amounts to gross misfeasance, if not worse. Perhaps, NBC could arrange for Megyn Kelly to interview Burr to ask if he has a clue as to what Putin might have been referring to when he noted, "There may be hackers, by the way, in the United States who very craftily and professionally passed the buck to Russia." ..."
"... Given the congressional intelligence "oversight" committees' obsequiousness and repeated "high esteem" for the "intelligence community," there seems an even chance that – no doubt because of an oversight – the CIA/FBI/NSA deep-stage troika failed to brief the Senate "oversight committee" chairman on WikiLeaks "Vault 7" disclosures – even when WikiLeaks publishes original CIA documents. ..."
Jun 13, 2017 | original.antiwar.com

Given the stakes involved in the Russia-gate investigation – now including a possible impeachment battle over removing the President of the United States – wouldn't it seem logical for the FBI to insist on its own forensics for this fundamental predicate of the case? Or could Comey's hesitancy to demand access to the DNC's computers be explained by a fear that FBI technicians not fully briefed on CIA/NSA/FBI Deep State programs might uncover a lot more than he wanted?

Comey was asked again about this curious oversight on June 8 by Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Richard Burr:

BURR: "And the FBI, in this case, unlike other cases that you might investigate – did you ever have access to the actual hardware that was hacked? Or did you have to rely on a third party to provide you the data that they had collected?"

COMEY: "In the case of the DNC, and, I believe, the DCCC, but I'm sure the DNC, we did not have access to the devices themselves. We got relevant forensic information from a private party, a high-class entity, that had done the work. But we didn't get direct access."

BURR: "But no content?"

COMEY: "Correct."

BURR: "Isn't content an important part of the forensics from a counterintelligence standpoint?"

COMEY: "It is, although what was briefed to me by my folks – the people who were my folks at the time is that they had gotten the information from the private party that they needed to understand the intrusion by the spring of 2016."

Burr demurred on asking Comey to explain what amounts to gross misfeasance, if not worse. Perhaps, NBC could arrange for Megyn Kelly to interview Burr to ask if he has a clue as to what Putin might have been referring to when he noted, "There may be hackers, by the way, in the United States who very craftily and professionally passed the buck to Russia."

Given the congressional intelligence "oversight" committees' obsequiousness and repeated "high esteem" for the "intelligence community," there seems an even chance that – no doubt because of an oversight – the CIA/FBI/NSA deep-stage troika failed to brief the Senate "oversight committee" chairman on WikiLeaks "Vault 7" disclosures – even when WikiLeaks publishes original CIA documents.

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. He was an Army Infantry/Intelligence officer and CIA analyst for a total of 30 years and now servers on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS). Reprinted with permission from Consortium News .

[Jun 11, 2017] The establishment refuses to see the limits of American power, and it also refuses to compel our military to focus on war against non-state opponents

Notable quotes:
"... Hillary is a wild-eyed interventionist. She gave us the Libyan fiasco, and had Obama been fool enough to listen to her again, we would now be at war on the ground in Syria. ..."
"... The establishment refuses to see the limits of American power, and it also refuses to compel our military to focus on war against non-state opponents, or Fourth Generation war. The Pentagon pretends its future is war against other states. ..."
"... The political and foreign-policy establishments pretend the Pentagon knows how to win. They waltz together happily, unaware theirs is a Totentanz." ..."
Jun 10, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com

libezkova, June 10, 2017 at 11:35 PM

William S. Lind on Hillary:

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/what-trump-can-do-for-defense/

"In the case of Hillary Clinton, not only does that mean more wasted money, it means more wars, wars we will lose.

Hillary is a wild-eyed interventionist. She gave us the Libyan fiasco, and had Obama been fool enough to listen to her again, we would now be at war on the ground in Syria.

The establishment refuses to see the limits of American power, and it also refuses to compel our military to focus on war against non-state opponents, or Fourth Generation war. The Pentagon pretends its future is war against other states.

The political and foreign-policy establishments pretend the Pentagon knows how to win. They waltz together happily, unaware theirs is a Totentanz."

[Jun 09, 2017] Tucker Carlson Lays Waste to Comeys Testimony and Democrat Attempt to Unseat the President

Notable quotes:
"... Everything about Comey is wrong. The fact that he felt the need to 'take notes' because the President asked for loyalty is fucking absurd. What sort of example did he make for fellow G men when he referred to his dealings with his commander in chief as being 'slightly cowardly'? The whole thing is rot, helping to fuel a bogus investigation spearheaded by a broken democratic party who have lost their fucking mind. ..."
"... He also touched upon the mercenary media's fake news about Trump, provided by bad sources, which was confirmed by Comey today. ..."
"... Don't forget it was McCain who took the 'pee' dossier that had been floating around DC which was so phoney even the media wouldn't touch - and told Comey to investigate. ..."
"... This is nothing less than a coordinated overthrow of the government by the deep state, media and uniparty ..."
"... So what do we need special counsel Mueller for in light of all this? Everyone knows the whole Russia collusion affair is politically motivated BS and deflection. ..."
"... Not to mention Comey handing out immunity deals like Christmas candy on Hillary's email investigation. Why would he do that? ..."
"... Comey took notes because he planned to blackmail Trump in the future just like J Edgar Hoover did when he ran the FBI. ..."
"... "Politicized" by the global central banks who own and operate virtually all world governments. I believe we need to keep the players very CLEAR in our minds. It's all of us; humanity, against the globalists who want us dead. Politicians, our institutions... all are aligned with the globalist psychopaths. It's that simple. ..."
"... Comey makes a memo, because that is the M.O. of the FBI. He fully expects gullible sheeple to believe any written statement by an FBI agent is truth, rather than a manipulating fake. ..."
"... Comey has admitted to a number of criminal acts ..."
"... Comey and his FBI partner should be legally charged by the Justice Department for releasing his FBI Memo to NY Times. His FBI partner should be fired and charged. They had no authority to release private government information and breach confidentiality with the president of the United States. The memo proved nothing and meant nothing but releasing it by a fired employee and FBI partner is a breach to FBI and the office of the president of the USA. ..."
"... Not one coward on that Senate committee had the balls to ask about the Seth Rich investigation........disappointing ..."
"... Comey also stated as 100% undisputed fact that Russia had "meddled" with the election. Again, no proof was cited, yet not a single Republican asked for such proof, nor has Trump managed to articulate a similar request. This is somewhat disturbing. ..."
"... The threat of being "Clintoned" is a powerful force. ..."
Jun 08, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com
Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

There will come a day when the city square will be packed with gibbets filled with swinging heads of traitorous bastard commies -- most readily found in leftshit cities. The degeneracy must end. Today's testimony by Comey was a farce, a transparent attempt by a spent and bitter bureaucrat trying to hurt a sitting President.

Everything about Comey is wrong. The fact that he felt the need to 'take notes' because the President asked for loyalty is fucking absurd. What sort of example did he make for fellow G men when he referred to his dealings with his commander in chief as being 'slightly cowardly'? The whole thing is rot, helping to fuel a bogus investigation spearheaded by a broken democratic party who have lost their fucking mind.

Tucker chimes in and reviews the day's events, pointing out the hypocrisy of Comey and his dealings with AG Lynch, who asked for Comey to word the investigation of Hillary Clinton's email scandal as a 'matter.' If that's not collusion and political pressure on the FBI, nothing is.

He also touched upon the mercenary media's fake news about Trump, provided by bad sources, which was confirmed by Comey today.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/tHtP2gQIoCE

rosiescenario , Jun 9, 2017 12:31 PM

After watching this political circus it is very clear that no one should be re-elected from either party, with the single exception of Paul.

Looks like what we really need is a new political party that actually serves the public tax payers, unfortunately it may take a major financial depression and its accompanying turmoil to bring that about.

Blazing in BC , Jun 9, 2017 12:25 PM

He seems to have blown his lead, I mean load, to no avail.

mary mary , Jun 9, 2017 12:14 PM

IMHO, the Comey hearing was John McCain's chance to redeem himself, and he blew it. I think his idea to go after Comey's interactions with the Obama regime was a great idea, but he came unprepared and unrehearsed. McCain had an opportunity to display leadership, but he failed to lead.

SummerSausage - mary mary , Jun 9, 2017 12:38 PM

Don't forget it was McCain who took the 'pee' dossier that had been floating around DC which was so phoney even the media wouldn't touch - and told Comey to investigate.

It's time 81 year old McCain - last in his Naval Academy class - shuffled off to an assisted living center in Arizona.

Tortuga , Jun 9, 2017 11:39 AM

These paris, comey, collusion, russki hoaxes are for 1 reason only; distraction to delay the "hanging".

http://skylarkutilities.com/video/watch/vid01SzjDOwbt8S8

SummerSausage , Jun 9, 2017 11:03 AM

Great post, as usual, Fly.

Comey created a memo because it's hard to leak to multiple sources at one time in person.

We're living history folks. This is nothing less than a coordinated overthrow of the government by the deep state, media and uniparty dominated by leftojihadis. The Gang of 8 is composed of 4 dimocrites and 4 rinos. The rinos had a duty to come forward and not only refute the lies in the media but to reveal it all as a hoax. Only Nunes told President Trump what was going on and he was forced to recuse himself from the intelligence committee investigation.

Even an atheist has to admit there's divine intervention at work here. Flawed though he admits to be, Trump is being guided and protected by a force more powerful than the swamp.

markar , Jun 9, 2017 10:22 AM

So what do we need special counsel Mueller for in light of all this? Everyone knows the whole Russia collusion affair is politically motivated BS and deflection.

Jim in MN - markar , Jun 9, 2017 10:34 AM

So he can quietly wander over and start pulling the illegal wiretap files that the Obama Stasi were compiling. Other than that, no point.

SummerSausage - Jim in MN , Jun 9, 2017 10:43 AM

But Mueller won't. He & Comey are besties of 25 year standing. All Mueller will do it find no direct links between the Russians and Trump or his administration but justify Comey's investigation by saying the Russians are bad, evil people who were trying to co-opt naive and inexperienced Trump colleagues.

If they wanted an honest and truthful investigation they would not have selected a retired swamp general.

ClowardPiven2016 - PitBullsRule , Jun 9, 2017 10:49 AM

It scares me that people actually believe this shit. I guess we are doomed considering how many morons like PitBullsRule are lapping up the koolaid with their heads in the sand

barysenter - PitBullsRule , Jun 9, 2017 10:18 AM

Reality doesn't conform to your expectations much? HA HA

Northern Flicker , Jun 9, 2017 9:44 AM

Not to mention Comey handing out immunity deals like Christmas candy on Hillary's email investigation. Why would he do that?

Comey's (limited hangout) strategy: Say a few things to look honest, so he could sell "the Russians did it (hack)" - despite showing no evidence. Otherwise, there would be no need for a Special Counsel and he knows Mueller will forment more troubles for Trump, perhaps for years. Trump needs to end this Russian hack nonsense ASAP.

Tachyon5321 , Jun 9, 2017 8:51 AM

Comey took notes because he planned to blackmail Trump in the future just like J Edgar Hoover did when he ran the FBI.

Kayman - Tachyon5321 , Jun 9, 2017 9:47 AM

Comey wouldn't state, "We are not investigating you, Mr. President." Yet....

Downtoolong , Jun 9, 2017 8:44 AM

I'd like Loretta Lynch to show me where in the FBI handbook it explains the proper procedure for conducting "matters".

They just make shit up to suit their needs. The Comey incident is another sad example of how every branch of government and every agency has become politicized by both sides, to the point they can no longer perform their intended function.

SummerSausage - Downtoolong , Jun 9, 2017 10:55 AM

The law does not allow subpeonas or grand juries based on "matters" - only valid "investigations".

Tell me how that is not Lynch & Comey colluding to interfere in the election and obstruct justice. I'm willing to listen with an open mind.

adanata - Downtoolong , Jun 9, 2017 9:51 AM

"Politicized" by the global central banks who own and operate virtually all world governments. I believe we need to keep the players very CLEAR in our minds. It's all of us; humanity, against the globalists who want us dead. Politicians, our institutions... all are aligned with the globalist psychopaths. It's that simple.

SoDamnMad - Downtoolong , Jun 9, 2017 9:26 AM

"how every branch of government and every agency has become politicized by both sides, to the point they can no longer perform their intended function" and should therefore be disbanded. Fixed it for you.

GotAFriendInBen , Jun 9, 2017 8:26 AM

Repeat lies often enough and they become the truth

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trumps-lawyer-cites-questionable-timeline-dis...

Reaper , Jun 9, 2017 8:24 AM

Comey makes a memo, because that is the M.O. of the FBI. He fully expects gullible sheeple to believe any written statement by an FBI agent is truth, rather than a manipulating fake. Trump's possible recording constrained Comey's M.O..

scoutshonor , Jun 9, 2017 7:43 AM

Nobody will do anything about any of this. Time to shitcan the lot of them. I hope not a single doofus up for re-election goes back to D.C. in '18.

It's hard to know which to slap first, those that break the law out in the open--or those that turn a blind eye to the flagrant lawlessness of the trangressors.

This is some weak-ass tea.

Thom Paine , Jun 9, 2017 7:35 AM

Comey has admitted to a number of criminal acts I think.

There are a few crimes there that I gather the DOJ has no option but to prosecute, how can it not? Since they are also prosecuting Winner for the exact same thing?

Jim in MN - Thom Paine , Jun 9, 2017 10:31 AM

He stole government property (the memos).

boattrash - Thom Paine , Jun 9, 2017 8:04 AM

All good points you listed, yet the fucker didn't see the need to take notes during the 4th of July weekend interview of Hillary? WTF?

Kayman - boattrash , Jun 9, 2017 9:45 AM

Why would Comey make notes of receiving payment from the Clinton Foundation?

SummerSausage - Kayman , Jun 9, 2017 11:07 AM

It's all here http://stateofthenation2012.com/?p=72788

Comey got rich covering up for the Clintons and swamp rats.

SithApprentice , Jun 9, 2017 7:23 AM

Comey thought he would be the next J Edgar Hoover and now he is unemployed and hopefully a pariah. Two-faced ass.

New_Meat - SithApprentice , Jun 9, 2017 8:40 AM

with a $10MM book advance

gregga777 , Jun 9, 2017 6:52 AM

Feral Bureau of Weasels Head Weasel James Comey said that he behaved 'slightly cowardly'. Well, that is the sort of behavior one expects from a Weasel.

[No insults intended to the small mammals grouped together in the weasel family.]

DarkestbeforeDawn , Jun 9, 2017 6:25 AM

Tucker distills gale wind force BS into an easily digestible summary. I'd watch him live every night, but I don't watch TV anymore

alphasammae , Jun 9, 2017 12:17 AM

Great review Tucker Carlson! Comey is a disgruntled loser like Killary. Comey never followed up on Seth Rich murder, a more serious matter than playing stupid politics.

Comey and his FBI partner should be legally charged by the Justice Department for releasing his FBI Memo to NY Times. His FBI partner should be fired and charged. They had no authority to release private government information and breach confidentiality with the president of the United States. The memo proved nothing and meant nothing but releasing it by a fired employee and FBI partner is a breach to FBI and the office of the president of the USA.

gregga777 - alphasammae , Jun 9, 2017 6:55 AM

Feral Bureau of Weasels Head Weasel James Comey was actively covering up for the murderers who murdered Seth Rich and the people who hired them. He should be shitting whole goats knowing that Attorney General Sessions seized everything in his office while he was in LACALIFUSA. Comey will probably be joining Obama shortly wherever it is that he is hanging out overseas.

Bytor325 - alphasammae , Jun 9, 2017 5:59 AM

Not one coward on that Senate committee had the balls to ask about the Seth Rich investigation........disappointing

francis_the_won... - Bytor325 , Jun 9, 2017 9:27 AM

Comey also stated as 100% undisputed fact that Russia had "meddled" with the election. Again, no proof was cited, yet not a single Republican asked for such proof, nor has Trump managed to articulate a similar request. This is somewhat disturbing.

Got The Wrong No - Bytor325 , Jun 9, 2017 6:17 AM

The threat of being "Clintoned" is a powerful force.

[Jun 09, 2017] Can Qatar Negotiate a Diplomatic Resolution with Its Neighbors

Notable quotes:
"... This would have been a perfect opportunity for the United States to step into the breach and offer a helping hand towards conflict resolution, which is exactly what Secretary of State Rex Tillerson offered on Monday during a press conference. Regrettably, President Donald Trump's tweets congratulating the Gulf Arabs for isolating their Qatari neighbor-while taking credit for it-has likely closed the door on any leading mediation role for Washington. ..."
"... Trump failed to recognize that Washington had an opening to show its Arab partners that the United States-under a Trump administration-values diplomacy just as much military force. ..."
Jun 09, 2017 | nationalinterest.org

The measures that the Saudis and company are taking today are much more significant. In addition to calling their diplomats home, the anti-Qatar reprisals include an order for Saudis, Bahraini and Emirati citizens to leave Qatar in fourteen days, and for Qatari citizens to go back to their own country over the same time period. Air, sea and land routes into the Qatari peninsula are blocked, which means that the food imports that Doha relies on to feed its population will need to rely on other seaports to unload their product. Qatar Airways, one of the region's major carriers, is banned from using Gulf Arab airspace, causing multiple delays and forcing the airline to fly more circuitous paths.

This would have been a perfect opportunity for the United States to step into the breach and offer a helping hand towards conflict resolution, which is exactly what Secretary of State Rex Tillerson offered on Monday during a press conference. Regrettably, President Donald Trump's tweets congratulating the Gulf Arabs for isolating their Qatari neighbor-while taking credit for it-has likely closed the door on any leading mediation role for Washington. It's tough to act as a mediating party between two sides when the mediator is seen as taking sides. With a single tweet, Trump managed to yet again undercut his own Secretary of State.

We could do the easy thing and bash Trump incessantly over yet one more unwise Twitter outburst. And it would be justified: Trump failed to recognize that Washington had an opening to show its Arab partners that the United States-under a Trump administration-values diplomacy just as much military force. It would also reassure European governments that have been skittish over the last four months.

[Jun 09, 2017] Dynamics of Ukrainian economics for the last three years

I am not sure the unemployment data are correct, but this official statistics.
Jun 09, 2017 | diana-mihailova.livejournal.com

Originally from: Динамика падения показателей украинской экономики за последние 3 года и налогообложение граждан diana_mihailova

Real GDP -14%
Nominal GDP ($) -200%
Inflation +101%
Index of industrial production -24.5%
1ndex of Agroproduction + 161%
1ndex of production + 124%
Gross external debt to GDP ratio +44%

Export of goods and services -180%
The volume of direct investment -400%
Capital investment (in $) -250%
Total private (in $) -56%
Wholesale volume (in $) -230%
Retail volumes (in $) -230%
Currency transferred from foreign countries -36%

Unemployment + 2%
Number of payers of taxes -10%
Goods transportation : -17.6%
Passenger transportation -27%

Gold and other noble metals reserves -25%
Currency reserves -360%
Devaluation of hryvna 320%

[Jun 08, 2017] The Qatar spat exposes Britains game of thrones in the Gulf by Paul Mason

Notable quotes:
"... Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the other Gulf monarchies, organised in the so called Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) , have a long history of backing the spread of Sunni Islamist ideology outside the region. Not just in Britain, but, for example, even in places such as rural Nigeria, where I've seen Gulf oil money used to incentivise Christians to convert, fuelling the religious conflict there. ..."
"... Saudi Arabia is meanwhile prosecuting a war on Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen, using more than £3bn worth of British kit sold to it since the bombing campaign began. In return, it has lavished gifts on Theresa May's ministers: Philip Hammond got a watch worth £1,950 when he visited in 2015 . In turn, Tory advisers are picking up lucrative consultancy work with the Saudi government. ..."
"... However, Salman has also escalated the Yemen war and escalated tensions with Iran – most notably by executing a prominent Shia cleric and 46 other opponents last year. ..."
Jun 05, 2017 | www.theguardian.com

This clash between Britain's allies in the so-called war on terror matters. If Corbyn is prime minister on Friday, there will be a break with the appeasement of jihadi-funding autocrats

Great. Just what we need. Our self-styled key ally in the so-called war on terror – Saudi Arabia – just closed the airspace, land and sea borders with our other ally, Qatar , accusing it of supporting Isis. What's that about?

Well, like almost everything in the region, it is about the strategic duplicity of the West, exacerbated by the childlike idiocy of the US president. Does it matter for Brits – other than those stuck at airports in the Gulf, or policy wonks obsessed with Middle Eastern conflicts?

It matters on every street in Britain.

Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the other Gulf monarchies, organised in the so called Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) , have a long history of backing the spread of Sunni Islamist ideology outside the region. Not just in Britain, but, for example, even in places such as rural Nigeria, where I've seen Gulf oil money used to incentivise Christians to convert, fuelling the religious conflict there.

But the Qataris have always punched above their weight in regional affairs, and displayed a more intelligent grasp on the strategic, demographic and cultural changes sweeping the Arab world.

It was the Qataris who set up Al Jazeera, as a counterweight to the reactionary state media across the middle east, and to challenge the US media's right to set the global narrative about the Islamic world.

Qatar supported the short-lived Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt and still supports and shelters the leaders of the Hamas government in Gaza . In Syria, Qatar spent up to $3bn (£2.3bn) in the first two years of the civil war bankrolling the rebels – allegedly including the al-Qaida-linked group al-Nusra Front.

The Saudis, too, bankrolled Islamist rebels , and both sides claim never to have bankrolled Isis. So what is really at stake?

The issue torturing the Saudi monarchy is Iran. Obama made peace with Iran in 2015, in the face of Saudi and Israeli opposition. Qatar is diplomatically closer to Iran. It has also supported (outside Qatar) the spread of political Islam – that is, of parties prepared to operate within nominally democratic institutions.

The Saudis' strategic aim, by contrast, is to end the peace deal with Iran and to stifle the emergence of political Islam full stop.

Last month, Donald Trump took himself to Riyadh to - participate in a sword dance and glad hand the Saudi royals. And that is where the trouble escalated.

Qatar's ruler had been reported by his own state media as warning against the escalating confrontation with Iran: "Iran represents a regional and Islamic power that cannot be ignored and it is unwise to face up against it," said a TV tickertape quoting the Emir.

When these comments caused outrage in Riyadh , the Qataris withdrew them, claiming they had been "hacked" .

But Trump's visit poured ethanol on to the simmering conflict. Few observers see today's move as anything other than the Saudis acting with state department backing. One Iranian official tweeted the spat was "the prelimary result of the sword dance".

Saudi Arabia is meanwhile prosecuting a war on Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen, using more than £3bn worth of British kit sold to it since the bombing campaign began. In return, it has lavished gifts on Theresa May's ministers: Philip Hammond got a watch worth £1,950 when he visited in 2015 . In turn, Tory advisers are picking up lucrative consultancy work with the Saudi government.

The problem remains Saudi culpability – past and present – for funding islamist terrorism. After September 11, the Saudi monarchy did begin to crack down on islamist terrorism domestically, criminalising terrorist finance. But, as a US cable released by Wikileaks shows , even as late as 2009, that "donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide".

Since the coronation of King Salman in January 2015, there has been a programme of economic modernisation and political reforms the monarchy has tried to sell as liberalisation.

However, Salman has also escalated the Yemen war and escalated tensions with Iran – most notably by executing a prominent Shia cleric and 46 other opponents last year.

In Britain, when the Lib Dems in the Coalition supported airstrikes against Isis, the price they extracted was for Cameron to launch an inquiry into foreign funding of terrorism. Eighteen months on, it remains suppressed . As with the infamous Serious Fraud Office investigation into corruption at BAE , it is being buried because it would expose the past misdemeanours of the the Saudis.

We do not know why Britain has suddenly become the target for a jihadi terror surge: five foiled attempts and three gruesomely successful ones in 70 days.

One possible explanation is that, with the increased tempo of fighting in Mosul and towards Raqqa, it is becoming clear to the thousands of jihadi fantasists sitting in bedrooms across Europe, that their "caliphate" will soon be over.

If so, the question arises: a) what will replace it on the ground and b) how to deal with the survivors as they fan out to do damage here?

In both cases, it is vital that the Gulf monarchies funding the Syrian resistance are on board with the solution. And, as of today, two of the key players are waging economic war and a bitter rhetorical fight with each other.

As for the wider world, it is Iran that emerges as the tactical victor in today's spat. Trump flew to Riyadh and the result was air transport chaos across the Gulf. Iran had an election and the moderates won.

But there is good news. If Jeremy Corbyn is prime minister on Friday, Britain's game of thrones in the Gulf will end. The foreign policy he outlined at Chatham House represents a complete break with the appeasement of terror-funding Saudi autocrats. The strategic defence review he has promised would unlikely keep funding the Royal Navy base in Bahrain.

Britain cannot solve the diplomatic crisis in the Gulf. But it can stop making it worse. Last December, Boris Johnson inadvertently had a go. He named the Yemen conflict as a proxy war; accusing both the Saudis and Iran of "puppeteering". He was quickly slapped down.

Only a Labour government will stop appeasing the Saudi monarchy and reset the relationship to match Britain's strategic interest – not the interest of Britain's arms dealers and PR consultants.

[Jun 08, 2017] The Qatar spat exposes Britains game of thrones in the Gulf by Paul Mason

Notable quotes:
"... Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the other Gulf monarchies, organised in the so called Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) , have a long history of backing the spread of Sunni Islamist ideology outside the region. Not just in Britain, but, for example, even in places such as rural Nigeria, where I've seen Gulf oil money used to incentivise Christians to convert, fuelling the religious conflict there. ..."
"... Saudi Arabia is meanwhile prosecuting a war on Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen, using more than £3bn worth of British kit sold to it since the bombing campaign began. In return, it has lavished gifts on Theresa May's ministers: Philip Hammond got a watch worth £1,950 when he visited in 2015 . In turn, Tory advisers are picking up lucrative consultancy work with the Saudi government. ..."
"... However, Salman has also escalated the Yemen war and escalated tensions with Iran – most notably by executing a prominent Shia cleric and 46 other opponents last year. ..."
Jun 05, 2017 | www.theguardian.com

This clash between Britain's allies in the so-called war on terror matters. If Corbyn is prime minister on Friday, there will be a break with the appeasement of jihadi-funding autocrats

Great. Just what we need. Our self-styled key ally in the so-called war on terror – Saudi Arabia – just closed the airspace, land and sea borders with our other ally, Qatar , accusing it of supporting Isis. What's that about?

Well, like almost everything in the region, it is about the strategic duplicity of the West, exacerbated by the childlike idiocy of the US president. Does it matter for Brits – other than those stuck at airports in the Gulf, or policy wonks obsessed with Middle Eastern conflicts?

It matters on every street in Britain.

Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the other Gulf monarchies, organised in the so called Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) , have a long history of backing the spread of Sunni Islamist ideology outside the region. Not just in Britain, but, for example, even in places such as rural Nigeria, where I've seen Gulf oil money used to incentivise Christians to convert, fuelling the religious conflict there.

But the Qataris have always punched above their weight in regional affairs, and displayed a more intelligent grasp on the strategic, demographic and cultural changes sweeping the Arab world.

It was the Qataris who set up Al Jazeera, as a counterweight to the reactionary state media across the middle east, and to challenge the US media's right to set the global narrative about the Islamic world.

Qatar supported the short-lived Muslim Brotherhood government in Egypt and still supports and shelters the leaders of the Hamas government in Gaza . In Syria, Qatar spent up to $3bn (£2.3bn) in the first two years of the civil war bankrolling the rebels – allegedly including the al-Qaida-linked group al-Nusra Front.

The Saudis, too, bankrolled Islamist rebels , and both sides claim never to have bankrolled Isis. So what is really at stake?

The issue torturing the Saudi monarchy is Iran. Obama made peace with Iran in 2015, in the face of Saudi and Israeli opposition. Qatar is diplomatically closer to Iran. It has also supported (outside Qatar) the spread of political Islam – that is, of parties prepared to operate within nominally democratic institutions.

The Saudis' strategic aim, by contrast, is to end the peace deal with Iran and to stifle the emergence of political Islam full stop.

Last month, Donald Trump took himself to Riyadh to - participate in a sword dance and glad hand the Saudi royals. And that is where the trouble escalated.

Qatar's ruler had been reported by his own state media as warning against the escalating confrontation with Iran: "Iran represents a regional and Islamic power that cannot be ignored and it is unwise to face up against it," said a TV tickertape quoting the Emir.

When these comments caused outrage in Riyadh , the Qataris withdrew them, claiming they had been "hacked" .

But Trump's visit poured ethanol on to the simmering conflict. Few observers see today's move as anything other than the Saudis acting with state department backing. One Iranian official tweeted the spat was "the prelimary result of the sword dance".

Saudi Arabia is meanwhile prosecuting a war on Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen, using more than £3bn worth of British kit sold to it since the bombing campaign began. In return, it has lavished gifts on Theresa May's ministers: Philip Hammond got a watch worth £1,950 when he visited in 2015 . In turn, Tory advisers are picking up lucrative consultancy work with the Saudi government.

The problem remains Saudi culpability – past and present – for funding islamist terrorism. After September 11, the Saudi monarchy did begin to crack down on islamist terrorism domestically, criminalising terrorist finance. But, as a US cable released by Wikileaks shows , even as late as 2009, that "donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide".

Since the coronation of King Salman in January 2015, there has been a programme of economic modernisation and political reforms the monarchy has tried to sell as liberalisation.

However, Salman has also escalated the Yemen war and escalated tensions with Iran – most notably by executing a prominent Shia cleric and 46 other opponents last year.

In Britain, when the Lib Dems in the Coalition supported airstrikes against Isis, the price they extracted was for Cameron to launch an inquiry into foreign funding of terrorism. Eighteen months on, it remains suppressed . As with the infamous Serious Fraud Office investigation into corruption at BAE , it is being buried because it would expose the past misdemeanours of the the Saudis.

We do not know why Britain has suddenly become the target for a jihadi terror surge: five foiled attempts and three gruesomely successful ones in 70 days.

One possible explanation is that, with the increased tempo of fighting in Mosul and towards Raqqa, it is becoming clear to the thousands of jihadi fantasists sitting in bedrooms across Europe, that their "caliphate" will soon be over.

If so, the question arises: a) what will replace it on the ground and b) how to deal with the survivors as they fan out to do damage here?

In both cases, it is vital that the Gulf monarchies funding the Syrian resistance are on board with the solution. And, as of today, two of the key players are waging economic war and a bitter rhetorical fight with each other.

As for the wider world, it is Iran that emerges as the tactical victor in today's spat. Trump flew to Riyadh and the result was air transport chaos across the Gulf. Iran had an election and the moderates won.

But there is good news. If Jeremy Corbyn is prime minister on Friday, Britain's game of thrones in the Gulf will end. The foreign policy he outlined at Chatham House represents a complete break with the appeasement of terror-funding Saudi autocrats. The strategic defence review he has promised would unlikely keep funding the Royal Navy base in Bahrain.

Britain cannot solve the diplomatic crisis in the Gulf. But it can stop making it worse. Last December, Boris Johnson inadvertently had a go. He named the Yemen conflict as a proxy war; accusing both the Saudis and Iran of "puppeteering". He was quickly slapped down.

Only a Labour government will stop appeasing the Saudi monarchy and reset the relationship to match Britain's strategic interest – not the interest of Britain's arms dealers and PR consultants.

[Jun 04, 2017] Shattering Ukraine by Robert Parry

Notable quotes:
"... Yet, while the neocons and their liberal allies had "won" again, what did that winning mean for the people of Ukraine? Their country, already teetering on the status of failed state, slid into deeper economic chaos and civil war. With neo-Nazis and other extremists appointed to key national security positions, the new regime began lashing out at ethnic Russians who were resisting Yanukovych's ouster. ..."
"... Ukraine's eastern provinces also sought secession, prompting military clashes that inflicted some of the worst bloodshed seen on the European continent in decades. Thousands died and millions fled. ..."
"... Of course, the standard line in the U.S. media was that it was all Putin's fault, even as the Kiev regime shelled eastern cities and unleashed brutal neo-Nazi militias to engage in street fighting, the first time storm troopers emblazoned with Nazi insignias had been deployed in Europe since World War II. Yet, buoyed by how easily the anti-Putin propaganda had prevailed, some neocons even began fantasizing about "regime change" in Moscow. ..."
"... Yet, if you were to step back for a minute and look at the history of the past 35 years from the Afghan covert op through the Iraq War and the U.S. interventions in Libya, Syria, Ukraine and elsewhere what you would see is the neocons and their liberal sidekicks behaving like the Sorcerer's Apprentice, stirring up troubles that soon spun out of control. ..."
"... We're supposed to continue the neocon "tough-guy-ism" - by repressing Muslims in the West, by ousting Assad in Syria, by crushing the ethnic Russian resistance in Ukraine, by destabilizing Russia, and by forsaking negotiations with Iran over its nuclear facilities in favor of more sanctions and maybe more bombing. All somehow in the name of "democracy" and "human rights" and "security." ..."
"... no one bothers to study the bitter history of a place like Ukraine, and where no one worries about spreading turmoil to nuclear-armed Russia. ..."
"... Yet, this neocon madness this "anti-realism" has been playing out in the real world on a grand scale, destroying real lives and endangering the real future of the planet. ..."
"... America's Stolen Narrative, ..."
"... America's Stolen Narrative ..."
Jan 17, 2015 | consortiumnews.com

Originally from: Neocons The 'Anti-Realists' By Robert Parry

Alarmed about this "realist" Obama-Putin collaboration, the "anti-realists" turned to demonizing the Russian president and driving a wedge between him and Obama. The place to splinter that relationship turned out to be Ukraine, where neocon Assistant Secretary of State Nuland was perfectly positioned to push for the ouster of elected pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych.

As Nuland noted in one speech, the U.S. government had invested $5 billion in the "European aspirations" of the western Ukrainians, including funding for political activists, journalists and various business groups. The time to collect on that investment came in February 2014 when violent demonstrations in Kiev, with well-organized neo-Nazi militias supplying the muscle, drove Yanukovych from power.[See Consortiumnews.com's " Neocons' Ukraine-Syria-Iran Gambit. "]

The Ukraine coup played out along another historic fault line, between European-oriented western Ukraine, where Adolf Hitler's SS had gained significant support during World War II, and eastern Ukraine with its ethnic Russian population and close business ties to Russia.

After the U.S. State Department rushed to embrace the coup regime as "legitimate" and as the U.S. media dished out anti-Yanukvych propaganda, such as citing a sauna in his home, Obama tagged along, falling into the neocon trap, again. U.S.-Russian relations spiraled into a hostility not seen since the Cold War. [See Consortiumnews.com's " Obama's True Foreign Policy Weakness ."]

Yet, while the neocons and their liberal allies had "won" again, what did that winning mean for the people of Ukraine? Their country, already teetering on the status of failed state, slid into deeper economic chaos and civil war. With neo-Nazis and other extremists appointed to key national security positions, the new regime began lashing out at ethnic Russians who were resisting Yanukovych's ouster.

Crimea voted overwhelmingly to secede from Ukraine and rejoin Russia, a move that Western government's denounced as an illegal "annexation" and the major U.S. media termed an "invasion," although the Russian troops involved were already stationed in Crimea under an agreement to maintain the Russian naval base at Sevastopol.

Ukraine's eastern provinces also sought secession, prompting military clashes that inflicted some of the worst bloodshed seen on the European continent in decades. Thousands died and millions fled.

Of course, the standard line in the U.S. media was that it was all Putin's fault, even as the Kiev regime shelled eastern cities and unleashed brutal neo-Nazi militias to engage in street fighting, the first time storm troopers emblazoned with Nazi insignias had been deployed in Europe since World War II. Yet, buoyed by how easily the anti-Putin propaganda had prevailed, some neocons even began fantasizing about "regime change" in Moscow.

Yet, if you were to step back for a minute and look at the history of the past 35 years from the Afghan covert op through the Iraq War and the U.S. interventions in Libya, Syria, Ukraine and elsewhere what you would see is the neocons and their liberal sidekicks behaving like the Sorcerer's Apprentice, stirring up troubles that soon spun out of control.

Just look at the chaos that has been unleashed by these reckless neocon and liberal interventionist policies from encouraging the rise of Islamic fundamentalism and facilitating the formation of al-Qaeda via the covert war in Afghanistan, from creating a hotbed for attracting and training jihadists during the Iraq War, from undermining regimes in Libya and Syria that for all their faults were trying to contain this spread of terrorism, and from provoking a new Cold War in Ukraine that risks bringing nuclear weapons into play in a showdown with Russia.

The latest outgrowth of all this trouble was the terror attack in Paris this month, with some European hotheads now calling for another neocon favorite idea, "a war of civilizations," pitting Christian societies against Islam in some modern version of the actual Crusades.

Yes, I know we're not supposed to talk about root causes of this chaos "at a time like this," and we are surely not supposed to blame the neocons and their liberal interventionist chums. Instead, we're supposed to escalate the conflicts and the chaos.

We're supposed to continue the neocon "tough-guy-ism" - by repressing Muslims in the West, by ousting Assad in Syria, by crushing the ethnic Russian resistance in Ukraine, by destabilizing Russia, and by forsaking negotiations with Iran over its nuclear facilities in favor of more sanctions and maybe more bombing. All somehow in the name of "democracy" and "human rights" and "security."

As we gaze out upon this mad house built by the neocons, we are witnessing on a grand scale the old adage about the inmates running the asylum, except that this asylum possesses the world's most sophisticated weapons including a massive nuclear arsenal.

What the neocons have constructed through their skilled propaganda isa grim wonderland where no one foresees the dangers of encouraging Islamist fundamentalism as a geopolitical ploy, where no one takes heed of the historic hatreds of Sunni and Shiite, where no one suspects that the U.S. military slaughtering thousands upon thousands of Muslims might provoke a backlash, where no one thinks about the consequences of overthrowing regimes in unstable regions, where no one bothers to study the bitter history of a place like Ukraine, and where no one worries about spreading turmoil to nuclear-armed Russia.

Yet, this neocon madness this "anti-realism" has been playing out in the real world on a grand scale, destroying real lives and endangering the real future of the planet.

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America's Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com ). You also can order Robert Parry's trilogy on the Bush Family and its connections to various right-wing operatives for only $34. The trilogy includes America's Stolen Narrative . For details on this offer, click here .

[May 31, 2017] Terror In Britain What Did The Prime Minister Know by John Pilger

Notable quotes:
"... Critical questions – such as why the security service MI5 maintained terrorist "assets" in Manchester and why the government did not warn the public of the threat in their midst – remain unanswered, deflected by the promise of an internal "review". ..."
"... The alleged suicide bomber, Salman Abedi (image on the right), was part of an extremist group, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, that thrived in Manchester and was cultivated and used by MI5 for more than 20 years. ..."
"... The Manchester atrocity lifts the rock of British foreign policy to reveal its Faustian alliance with extreme Islam, especially the sect known as Wahhabism or Salafism, whose principal custodian and banker is the oil kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Britain's biggest weapons customer. ..."
"... This imperial marriage reaches back to the Second World War and the early days of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The aim of British policy was to stop pan-Arabism: Arab states developing a modern secularism, asserting their independence from the imperial west and controlling their resources. The creation of a rapacious Israel was meant to expedite this. Pan-Arabism has since been crushed; the goal now is division and conquest. ..."
"... The overthrow of Gaddafi, who controlled Africa's largest oil reserves, had been long been planned in Washington and London. According to French intelligence, the LIFG made several assassination attempts on Gadaffi in the 1990s – bank-rolled by British intelligence. In March 2011, France, Britain and the US seized the opportunity of a "humanitarian intervention" and attacked Libya. They were joined by Nato under cover of a UN resolution to "protect civilians". ..."
"... In fact, Obama was a leading actor in the "shit show", urged on by his warmongering Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton , and a media accusing Gaddafi of planning "genocide" against his own people. ..."
"... Why was Abedi able to travel freely through Europe to Libya and back to Manchester only days before he committed his terrible crime? Was Theresa May told by MI5 that the FBI had tracked him as part of an Islamic cell planning to attack a "political target" in Britain? ..."
"... In the current election campaign, the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has made a guarded reference to a "war on terror that has failed". As he knows, it was never a war on terror but a war of conquest and subjugation. Palestine. Afghanistan. Iraq. Libya. Syria. Iran is said to be next. Before there is another Manchester, who will have the courage to say that? ..."
May 31, 2017 | www.informationclearinghouse.info

The unsayable in Britain's general election campaign is this. The causes of the Manchester atrocity, in which 22 mostly young people were murdered by a jihadist, are being suppressed to protect the secrets of British foreign policy.

Critical questions – such as why the security service MI5 maintained terrorist "assets" in Manchester and why the government did not warn the public of the threat in their midst – remain unanswered, deflected by the promise of an internal "review".

The alleged suicide bomber, Salman Abedi (image on the right), was part of an extremist group, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, that thrived in Manchester and was cultivated and used by MI5 for more than 20 years.

The LIFG is proscribed by Britain as a terrorist organisation which seeks a "hardline Islamic state" in Libya and "is part of the wider global Islamist extremist movement, as inspired by al-Qaida".

The "smoking gun" is that when Theresa May was Home Secretary, LIFG jihadists were allowed to travel unhindered across Europe and encouraged to engage in "battle": first to remove Mu'ammar Gadaffi in Libya, then to join al-Qaida affiliated groups in Syria.

Last year, the FBI reportedly placed Abedi on a "terrorist watch list" and warned MI5 that his group was looking for a "political target" in Britain. Why wasn't he apprehended and the network around him prevented from planning and executing the atrocity on 22 May?

These questions arise because of an FBI leak that demolished the "lone wolf" spin in the wake of the 22 May attack – thus, the panicky, uncharacteristic outrage directed at Washington from London and Donald Trump 's apology.

The Manchester atrocity lifts the rock of British foreign policy to reveal its Faustian alliance with extreme Islam, especially the sect known as Wahhabism or Salafism, whose principal custodian and banker is the oil kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Britain's biggest weapons customer.

This imperial marriage reaches back to the Second World War and the early days of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. The aim of British policy was to stop pan-Arabism: Arab states developing a modern secularism, asserting their independence from the imperial west and controlling their resources. The creation of a rapacious Israel was meant to expedite this. Pan-Arabism has since been crushed; the goal now is division and conquest.

In 2011, according to Middle East Eye , the LIFG in Manchester were known as the "Manchester boys". Implacably opposed to Mu'ammar Gadaffi, they were considered high risk and a number were under Home Office control orders – house arrest – when anti-Gadaffi demonstrations broke out in Libya, a country forged from myriad tribal enmities.

Suddenly the control orders were lifted.

"I was allowed to go, no questions asked," said one LIFG member.

MI5 returned their passports and counter-terrorism police at Heathrow airport were told to let them board their flights.

The overthrow of Gaddafi, who controlled Africa's largest oil reserves, had been long been planned in Washington and London. According to French intelligence, the LIFG made several assassination attempts on Gadaffi in the 1990s – bank-rolled by British intelligence. In March 2011, France, Britain and the US seized the opportunity of a "humanitarian intervention" and attacked Libya. They were joined by Nato under cover of a UN resolution to "protect civilians".

Last September, a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee inquiry concluded that then Prime Minister David Cameron had taken the country to war against Gaddafi on a series of "erroneous assumptions" and that the attack "had led to the rise of Islamic State in North Africa". The Commons committee quoted what it called Barack Obama's "pithy" description of Cameron's role in Libya as a "shit show".

In fact, Obama was a leading actor in the "shit show", urged on by his warmongering Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton , and a media accusing Gaddafi of planning "genocide" against his own people.

"We knew that if we waited one more day," said Obama, "Benghazi, a city the size of Charlotte, could suffer a massacre that would have reverberated across the region and stained the conscience of the world."

The massacre story was fabricated by Salafist militias facing defeat by Libyan government forces. They told Reuters there would be

"a real bloodbath, a massacre like we saw in Rwanda". The Commons committee reported, "The proposition that Mu'ammar Gaddafi would have ordered the massacre of civilians in Benghazi was not supported by the available evidence".

Britain, France and the United States effectively destroyed Libya as a modern state. According to its own records, Nato launched 9,700 "strike sorties", of which more than a third hit civilian targets. They included fragmentation bombs and missiles with uranium warheads. The cities of Misurata and Sirte were carpet-bombed. Unicef, the UN children's organisation, reported a high proportion of the children killed "were under the age of ten".

More than "giving rise" to Islamic State - ISIS had already taken root in the ruins of Iraq following the Blair and Bush invasion in 2003 - these ultimate medievalists now had all of north Africa as a base. The attack also triggered a stampede of refugees fleeing to Europe.

Cameron was celebrated in Tripoli as a "liberator", or imagined he was. The crowds cheering him included those secretly supplied and trained by Britain's SAS and inspired by Islamic State, such as the "Manchester boys".

To the Americans and British, Gadaffi's true crime was his iconoclastic independence and his plan to abandon the petrodollar, a pillar of American imperial power. He had audaciously planned to underwrite a common African currency backed by gold, establish an all-Africa bank and promote economic union among poor countries with prized resources. Whether or not this would have happened, the very notion was intolerable to the US as it prepared to "enter" Africa and bribe African governments with military "partnerships".

The fallen dictator fled for his life. A Royal Air Force plane spotted his convoy, and in the rubble of Sirte, he was sodomised with a knife by a fanatic described in the news as "a rebel".

Having plundered Libya's $30 billion arsenal, the "rebels" advanced south, terrorising towns and villages. Crossing into sub-Saharan Mali, they destroyed that country's fragile stability. The ever-eager French sent planes and troops to their former colony "to fight al-Qaida", or the menace they had helped create.

On 14 October, 2011, President Obama announced he was sending special forces troops to Uganda to join the civil war there. In the next few months, US combat troops were sent to South Sudan, Congo and the Central African Republic. With Libya secured, an American invasion of the African continent was under way, largely unreported.

In London, one of the world's biggest arms fairs was staged by the British government. The buzz in the stands was the "demonstration effect in Libya". The London Chamber of Commerce and Industry held a preview entitled "Middle East: A vast market for UK defence and security companies". The host was the Royal Bank of Scotland, a major investor in cluster bombs, which were used extensively against civilian targets in Libya. The blurb for the bank's arms party lauded the "unprecedented opportunities for UK defence and security companies."

Last month, Prime Minister Theresa May was in Saudi Arabia, selling more of the £3 billion worth of British arms which the Saudis have used against Yemen. Based in control rooms in Riyadh, British military advisers assist the Saudi bombing raids, which have killed more than 10,000 civilians. There are now clear signs of famine. A Yemeni child dies every 10 minutes from preventable disease, says Unicef.

The Manchester atrocity on 22 May was the product of such unrelenting state violence in faraway places, much of it British sponsored. The lives and names of the victims are almost never known to us.

This truth struggles to be heard, just as it struggled to be heard when the London Underground was bombed on July 7, 2005. Occasionally, a member of the public would break the silence, such as the east Londoner who walked in front of a CNN camera crew and reporter in mid-platitude.

"Iraq!" he said. "We invaded Iraq. What did we expect? Go on, say it."

At a large media gathering I attended, many of the important guests uttered "Iraq" and "Blair" as a kind of catharsis for that which they dared not say professionally and publicly.

Yet, before he invaded Iraq, Blair was warned by the Joint Intelligence Committee that

"the threat from al-Qaida will increase at the onset of any military action against Iraq The worldwide threat from other Islamist terrorist groups and individuals will increase significantly".

Just as Blair brought home to Britain the violence of his and George W Bush 's blood-soaked "shit show", so David Cameron, supported by Theresa May, compounded his crime in Libya and its horrific aftermath, including those killed and maimed in Manchester Arena on 22 May.

The spin is back, not surprisingly. Salman Abedi acted alone. He was a petty criminal, no more. The extensive network revealed last week by the American leak has vanished. But the questions have not.

Why was Abedi able to travel freely through Europe to Libya and back to Manchester only days before he committed his terrible crime? Was Theresa May told by MI5 that the FBI had tracked him as part of an Islamic cell planning to attack a "political target" in Britain?

In the current election campaign, the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has made a guarded reference to a "war on terror that has failed". As he knows, it was never a war on terror but a war of conquest and subjugation. Palestine. Afghanistan. Iraq. Libya. Syria. Iran is said to be next. Before there is another Manchester, who will have the courage to say that?

John Pilger is an Australian journalist and documentary film maker based in the United Kingdom since 1962. http://www.johnpilger.com/

The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Information Clearing House.

[May 29, 2017] Jared Kushner Reportedly Discussed Setting Up Secret Communication Channel With Moscow by Mary Papenfuss

Is really Russian ambassador so negligent that he posted such an information over open channel? I doubt it. that means that Hayden may be lying and this is just a part of Purple revolution campaign of discreditation of Trump administration. Otherwise he reveals that the NSA broke Russian diplomatic communication cipher, which is biog NO-NO.
Notable quotes:
"... Without specifically mentioning the report about Kushner, Trump tweeted Sunday in an apparent response to a number of recent stories about his administration that "leaks coming out of the White House are fabricated lies." ..."
"... Kushner's reported plan is evidence of an extreme cynicism about "organs of the state," said Hayden, and a belief that government institutions only serve the self-interests of the president currently in power. The apparent implication of such a Kremlin link was that the Trump team trusted Russian agents more than the outgoing Obama administration or the U.S. intelligence community. ..."
May 29, 2017 | www.huffingtonpost.com

Kushner's reported actions suggest "we are in a really dark place as a society," Michael Hayden said.

Former CIA Director General Michael Hayden said that the reported plan by chief White House adviser Jared Kushner's to arrange secret communications with the Russians during President Donald Trump's transition was "off the map" and like nothing he has seen in his lifetime.

Hayden wants to chalk up the stunning plan to "naivete" rather than evil intentions - but that's not reassuring, he said in an interview on CNN.

"Right now, I'm going with naivete, and that's not particularly comforting for me," he said. "What manner of ignorance, chaos, hubris, suspicion, contempt would you have to have to think that doing this with the Russian ambassador was a good or an appropriate idea?"

Hayden was commenting on reports, which first appeared in The Washington Post Friday, that Kushner discussed last December establishing a secret communication channel with the Kremlin - using Russian facilities - without any monitoring by the U.S.

Kushner discussed the idea in Trump Tower with Sergei Kislyak, Russia's ambassador to the U.S., who was surprised by the request, the Post reported, because of security risks such an arrangement would pose to both countries.

Kushner emerged last Thursday as a person of interest in the FBI's investigation of Russian interference in the U.S. presidential election.

Without specifically mentioning the report about Kushner, Trump tweeted Sunday in an apparent response to a number of recent stories about his administration that "leaks coming out of the White House are fabricated lies."

Kushner's reported plan is evidence of an extreme cynicism about "organs of the state," said Hayden, and a belief that government institutions only serve the self-interests of the president currently in power. The apparent implication of such a Kremlin link was that the Trump team trusted Russian agents more than the outgoing Obama administration or the U.S. intelligence community.

"What degree of suspicion of the existing government, what degree of contempt for the administration they were replacing would be required again to think this was an acceptable course of action?" he asked.

Hayden added: "It says an awful lot about us as a society that we could actually harbor those kinds of feelings that the organs of the state would be used by my predecessor to come after me or ... to disrupt my administration in a way that made it seem legitimate to me to use the secure communications facilities of a foreign power - a foreign power that some in government alleged you were cooperating with to affect the American election."

It's evidence, he added, that "we are in a really dark place as a society."

[May 29, 2017] Russia Expert Says No Evidence Russia Hacked the Election by Debra Heine

Notable quotes:
"... Why didn't the FBI do their own investigation? ..."
"... "They say that, but it's bogus," Cohen argued. "When Clapper, the director of national intelligence, signed that report in January, technically he represents all seventeen. I'll bet you a dime to a nickel you couldn't get a guest on, unprepared, who could name ten of them. This figure -- seventeen -- is bogus!" ..."
"... "The one agency that could conceivably have done a forensic examination on the Democratic computers is a national security agency ..."
Mar 31, 2017 | pjmedia.com
Professor Stephen Cohen: Not One Piece of Factual Evidence That Russia 'Hacked the Election' March 31, 2017 chat 176 comments Prof. Cohen: Not One Piece of Factual Evidence That Russia 'Hacked the Election'

Stephen F. Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies at New York University and Princeton, spoke Thursday evening with Fox News' Tucker Carlson about the latest shoes to drop in the investigations into the Trump campaign's possible ties to Russia.

The Wall Street Journal reported late Thursday that Michael Flynn, President Trump's former national security advisor, has told the FBI and congressional investigators that he is willing to be interviewed in exchange for a grant of immunity from prosecution -- not a particularly good sign for the Trump White House.

Cohen, one of the country's foremostexperts on Russia, has been arguing for months that the anti-Russia hysteria in Washington, D.C., is becoming a "grave national security threat."

Carlson began the discussion by bringing up what he sees as the core issue-- the allegations that the Russian government "hacked our election" by breaking into email accounts at the DNC and the Clinton campaign office.

"Everyone assumes this is true," he said. "We're all operating under the assumption that it's true. Do we know it's true?"

"No," Cohen answered flatly. "And if you listen to the hearings at the Senate today, repeatedly it was said -- particularly by Senator Warner, the Democratic co-chair of the proceedings -- that Russia had hijacked our democracy. What he means is that, the Russians, at Putin's direction, had gone into the Democratic National Committee's emails, which were embarrassing to Mrs. Clinton, given them to Wikileaks, Wikileaks then released them to damage Mrs. Clinton and put Trump in the White House."

He noted, "This is a very dramatic narrative and they're saying in Washington that this was an act of war.... So whether or not it's true is existential. Are we at war?"

After studying Russian leadership for 40 years, focusing on Putin in particular, Cohen said it was hard for him believe that the Russian president would have done such a thing.

"I could find not one piece of factual evidence," he said. "The only evidence ever presented was a study hired by the Clintons -- the DNC -- to do an examination of their computers.They [Crowdstrike] concluded the Russians did it. Their report has fallen apart." He added, " Why didn't the FBI do their own investigation? "

Tucker pointed out that even Republicans say that seventeen U.S. intelligence agencies (including Coast Guard Intelligence!) have concluded that Russian intelligence was behind this.

"They say that, but it's bogus," Cohen argued. "When Clapper, the director of national intelligence, signed that report in January, technically he represents all seventeen. I'll bet you a dime to a nickel you couldn't get a guest on, unprepared, who could name ten of them. This figure -- seventeen -- is bogus!"

The professor made one more critical point: "The one agency that could conceivably have done a forensic examination on the Democratic computers is a national security agency ," he said.

He continued: "When they admit that they have no evidence, they fall back on something else which I think is very important. They say Putin directed Russian propaganda at us and helped elect Trump. I don't know about you, Tucker, but I find that insulting -- because the premise they're putting out ... at this hearing is that the American people are zombies. ... It's the premise of democracy that we're democratic citizens," he said. "That we have a B.S. detector in us and we know how to use it."

[May 29, 2017] Loesch Americans Are Tired of Being Manipulated Lied to by Mainstream Media

Notable quotes:
"... On "Tucker Carlson Tonight," Dana Loesch said the agenda-driven media is focused on negatively portraying Trump, while they're largely giving Democrats a pass. ..."
"... Let's talk for a moment about the California Democrat convention ... where you had a number of Democrats on stage screaming 'expletive Trump' and 'expletive Republicans.'" She said Democrats and the mainstream media then want to turn around and accuse Trump and those on the right of fomenting violence. ..."
May 29, 2017 | insider.foxnews.com

Following Montana Republican congressional candidate Greg Gianforte's alleged assault of a reporter, some in the mainstream media are trying to blame the incident on President Trump. CNN host Don Lemon argued that Trump has culpability because he's said "very horrible things" about reporters and suggested that they are the enemy of the American people. MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell said that Trump has helped whip up "hostility" toward the press, while Joe Scarborough said a "straight line" can be drawn between Trump's anti-media rhetoric and the Gianforte incident.

On "Tucker Carlson Tonight," Dana Loesch said the agenda-driven media is focused on negatively portraying Trump, while they're largely giving Democrats a pass.

"Let's discuss Tom Perez and his cussing crusade that he's been giving at so many different fundraisers.

Let's talk for a moment about the California Democrat convention ... where you had a number of Democrats on stage screaming 'expletive Trump' and 'expletive Republicans.'" She said Democrats and the mainstream media then want to turn around and accuse Trump and those on the right of fomenting violence.

Watch more above.

[May 29, 2017] The Manchester Massacre Don't Let It Happen Here

May 29, 2017 | www.unz.com
Headliner of the week was the Muslim terrorist attack on a pop concert in Manchester, England. The bomber blew himself up and took 22 others with him. That's the count as I go to tape here; over a hundred were injured, some critically, so the death count may be higher as you hear this.

The bomber was a 22-year-old Muslim, name of Salman Abedi, born in Britain to parents from Libya. Those parents had been settled in England as refugees from Colonel Gaddafy's government; so that's where the bomber was born, in England, 1994.

In 2011, you'll recall, Barack Obama, prompted by the Three Horsegirls of the Apocalypse - Samantha Power of Obama's National Security Council, his U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice , and his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton -who in turn were prompted by Britain and France, with an assist from George Soro s- overthrew Colonel Gaddafy.

Salman Abedi's parents thereupon, in 2011, returned to Libya. Salman Abedi, then 17, stayed in the U.K.

So I'll just pause to note here that this is yet another case of absimilation . Here yet again is the relevant passage from We Are Doomed , the one book you need to explain the modern world. Chapter 10, edited quote:

The English word "assimilation" derives from the Latin prefix ad -, which indicates a moving towards something, and the same language's verb simulare, "to cause a person or thing to resemble another." You can make a precisely opposite word using the prefix ab -, which marks a moving away from something. Many immigrants of course assimilate to American society Many others, however, especially in the second and following generations, ab similate.

That's what Salman Abedi did: He absimilated, ending up hating the country that had taken in his parents.

It wasn't just him, either. His younger brother Hashim, 20 years old, and so presumably also born in England, seems to have been an accomplice to the bombing. He was arrested by authorities in Libya on Tuesday. There's also a slightly older brother, 23-year-old Ismail, arrested by British police in Manchester, also on Tuesday.

The father has been arrested, too, also in Libya. The authorities there say he belongs to an extremist sect of Islam.

There's also a sister, 18-year-old Jomana Abedi , also born in Manchester, where she is studying molecular biology with a view to advancing cancer research No, sorry, I got my news stories mixed up there. Ms. Abedi actually works at a mosque, though I haven't been able to discover what she does there.

... ... ...

John Derbyshire [ email him ] writes an incredible amount on all sorts of subjects for all kinds of outlets. (This no longer includes National Review, whose editors had some kind of tantrum and fired him. ) He is the author of We Are Doomed: Reclaiming Conservative Pessimism and several other books . He's had two books published by VDARE.com: FROM THE DISSIDENT RIGHT ( also available in Kindle ) and From the Dissident Right II: Essays 2013 . His writings are archived at JohnDerbyshire.com .

German_reader , May 27, 2017 at 4:36 am GMT

@Anon The terrorist bombing was terrible, but the concert was worse.

It was a celebration of open borders, degeneracy, interracism, slut culture for little girls, and jungle fever. It was all about globalist propaganda for kiddies.

https://twitter.com/polNewsForever/status/867105300784066561

British masses seem to welcome this cultural degeneracy and mass invasion by foreigners.
How ironic that an Islamic terrorist who gained entry into UK via globalism threw a monkey wrench at globalism?

If Muslims want to bomb every globalist celebration of open borders, degeneracy, Afro-colonization of white wombs, and slut culture for kids, who cares?

Globalism isn't about respect for world cultures and world histories. It is about spreading mono-culture of Afromania, Homomania, and Ziomania all over the world.

This is typical:

https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/rapper-and-actress-awkwafina-on-being-a-rare-asian-american-in-hollywood

If Muslims want to attack such degeneracy, they have my blessing.

Swing , May 27, 2017 at 5:15 am GMT

And the bombing of Libya has nothing to do with it. Stop killing Muslims, and they will stop killing u. U killmy brother, I kill yours, u kill my kids I kill yours, simple logic.

LauraMR , May 27, 2017 at 5:28 am GMT

Sure, lack of assimilation is the culprit but as a "truther" might say, this could well be an operation carried out by the deep state. Indeed, someone put this kid up to this, supplied explosives and logistics, so perhaps it was an Israeli plot, for certain some Anglo-Zionist one percenter must be behind all of this. Naturally, as it is often published here, white Europeans are superior to all other races so the kid was by virtue of ancestry a lesser, defective human being to begin with

Alden , May 27, 2017 at 6:21 am GMT

Manchester police announced where the Abedi family got the tens of thousands of pounds that enabled them to fly back and forth from England to several countries in the Middle East for years.
Welfare fraud and student loans funded the bombing. Apparently the English student loan system does not require class attendance and accumulation of credits to continue receiving loans.

BBC radio useful idiot programs claim the Abedi brothers might have been bullied by evil Whites. But they lived on the middle of the Libyan neighborhood so it's unlikely they were bullied by Whites.

jilles dykstra , May 27, 2017 at 6:48 am GMT

In 2004 the King of Jordan, the ruling Saud at the time in Saudi Arabia, and Mucharraf in Pakistan all told senator Hollings that the only way to end terrorism was to establish peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
Since 2004 the west did nothing for peace, on the contrary, efforts to destabilise the ME, and North Africa continued, an were intensified.
Deradicalisation is making Muslims believe that what they see happening is not happening.
It may succeed in a few cases, but it so me seems impossible in general.
So attacks in the west will continue, it is, as Mearsheimer and Walt write 'the strategy of the weak'.
On top of that, the west needs terrorism, if necessary does it herself, in order to make the western societies more totalitarian all the time 'for our safety'.
The destabilisation in ME and N Africa causes massive migration, the destabilisation of the European countries is welcome, in order to create an Europe, a USA clone.

Randal , May 27, 2017 at 8:13 am GMT

This latest Manchester bombing is the perfect illustration of the twofold nature of the problem of invade the world/invite the world. Furthermore it comes on top of another similarly perfect illustration of that twofold nature, in the Orlando shootings. In both cases a 2nd generation immigrant whose parents were only here because it suited the US/UK regimes to have them here as oppositionist tools for the destabilisation and overthrow of foreign governments, who in each case openly declare the ongoing butchery our governments are responsible for in the ME and North Africa as direct motivating factors for their own violence, was enabled to attack their host nations by immigration.

Derbyshire's piece does a good job of skewering the "invite the world" side of the issue, but ignores "invade the world".

In 2011, you'll recall, Barack Obama, prompted by the Three Horsegirls of the Apocalypse-Samantha Power of Obama's National Security Council, his U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, and his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton-who in turn were prompted by Britain and France, with an assist from George Soros-overthrew Colonel Gaddafy.

Salman Abedi's parents thereupon, in 2011, returned to Libya. Salman Abedi, then 17, stayed in the U.K.

That's barely the beginning of the story, with its murky elements of the UK regime's security forces using jihadist terrorism as a weapon for regime change in Libya and Syria, in which this family seem to have been up to their necks. Even the BBC reported on some of these murky aspects in the immediate aftermath of the bombing (though doubtless that line of inquiry will be quietly dropped, or suppressed).

Manchester attack: Who was Salman Abedi?

This was as clear a case of "blowback" as you'll get.

unit472 , May 27, 2017 at 9:49 am GMT

@Anon The terrorist bombing was terrible, but the concert was worse.

It was a celebration of open borders, degeneracy, interracism, slut culture for little girls, and jungle fever. It was all about globalist propaganda for kiddies.

https://twitter.com/polNewsForever/status/867105300784066561

British masses seem to welcome this cultural degeneracy and mass invasion by foreigners.
How ironic that an Islamic terrorist who gained entry into UK via globalism threw a monkey wrench at globalism?

If Muslims want to bomb every globalist celebration of open borders, degeneracy, Afro-colonization of white wombs, and slut culture for kids, who cares?

Globalism isn't about respect for world cultures and world histories. It is about spreading mono-culture of Afromania, Homomania, and Ziomania all over the world.

This is typical:

https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/rapper-and-actress-awkwafina-on-being-a-rare-asian-american-in-hollywood

If Muslims want to attack such degeneracy, they have my blessing.

Anonymous Nephew , May 27, 2017 at 10:01 am GMT

Guardian on form today, flushing the patrimony

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/26/salman-abedi-manchester-arena-attack-partying-suicide-bomber

"Others said he was a bit of a party animal, who drank vodka and smoked weed daily, was popular with girls and "always clubbing or at house parties", listening to rap and grime music. A young man, in other words, like so many others in Manchester: unconcerning, unremarkable . "

This is how the globalist media want us to live.

IIRC the 9/11 bombers liked clubbing, booze and strippers. Lots of jihadists were petty criminals or drug dealers before the gods of their far-off land repossessed their blood – and spilled ours

anonymous , May 27, 2017 at 11:53 am GMT

Salman's father Ramadan reportedly was a member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group back in the 90′s which had AQ links. Weren't those people in cahoots with British intelligence back then in schemes to overthrow Khaddafi? This explains his supposed resettlement in Britain; he was connected. Also, Daily Mail has described him as a "former airport security worker in the UK". Think about that one for a while. They were reported to the authorities years ago but apparently they were allowed to go on unencumbered. The son may have gone off and become a loose cannon but otherwise there's a lot of murkiness involved with these people.

Jonathan Mason , May 27, 2017 at 12:03 pm GMT

Like the author, I grew up in the UK in happier times and am now a US citizen.

It is a pity that free speech no longer exists in England, because prohibiting discussion of ideas skews all political debate. For example, it is pretty obvious that the successful Brexit vote was pretty much a plebiscite on unlimited immigration and loss of sovereignty, except that it would be illegal to say so in a UK publication, as this would be "hate speech."

However I do believe that the well-intended reason for the hate speech laws is to prevent a bad situation getting even worse, rather than to stop people from knowing what they can see with their own eyes.

I am reminded of a court case in the UK a few years ago in which a well-known soap opera star was on trial for the rape of a 6 year old girl several years earlier. Many UK readers were baffled by the story since secrecy laws meant that nearly all the salient details of the case could not be reported upon, nor were the media even allowed to say what they were not allowed to report on.

For example, it was not clear why the girl and the allegist rapist were living under the same roof. Had the public known that the girl in question was the man's own daughter, and that the rape allegations were part of a particularly nasty divorce dispute several years later, they might have been better able to form an opinion of his guilt or innocence.

As it happens, the accused was acquitted, possible because forensic medical evidence showed that the alleged victim was still a virgin at the time of the trial, but it was a close run thing, and the judge directed that jury that medical proof of the girl's virginity did not necessarily mean that she has not been raped. (Whatever!)

When so much of public life and politics cannot be reported upon, it is not surprising that people will arrive at false conclusions, or find ways of protesting that which cannot be discussed.

Like voting for Brexit.

DanCT , May 27, 2017 at 12:04 pm GMT

We should be thankful that all these bombers and shooters leave behind what those conspiracy nutcases might call magically indestructible identification so the authorities can go straight to the perp's family and friends. Apparently these imitators hope to outdo the ID that survived 911 among incinerated debris in perfect condition. And we should be doubly thankful that our loyal and patriotic msm have such incredible journalists that they simultaneously uncover the same evidence and reach exactly the same conclusions within minutes of each other.

Randal , May 27, 2017 at 1:04 pm GMT

@Alden Manchester police announced where the Abedi family got the tens of thousands of pounds that enabled them to fly back and forth from England to several countries in the Middle East for years.
Welfare fraud and student loans funded the bombing. Apparently the English student loan system does not require class attendance and accumulation of credits to continue receiving loans.

BBC radio useful idiot programs claim the Abedi brothers might have been bullied by evil Whites. But they lived on the middle of the Libyan neighborhood so it's unlikely they were bullied by Whites.

biz , May 27, 2017 at 2:02 pm GMT

@Swing And the bombing of Libya has nothing to do with it. Stop killing Muslims, and they will stop killing u. U killmy brother, I kill yours, u kill my kids I kill yours, simple logic.

biz , May 27, 2017 at 2:13 pm GMT

@jilles dykstra In 2004 the King of Jordan, the ruling Saud at the time in Saudi Arabia, and Mucharraf in Pakistan all told senator Hollings that the only way to end terrorism was to establish peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
Since 2004 the west did nothing for peace, on the contrary, efforts to destabilise the ME, and North Africa continued, an were intensified.
Deradicalisation is making Muslims believe that what they see happening is not happening.
It may succeed in a few cases, but it so me seems impossible in general.
So attacks in the west will continue, it is, as Mearsheimer and Walt write 'the strategy of the weak'.
On top of that, the west needs terrorism, if necessary does it herself, in order to make the western societies more totalitarian all the time 'for our safety'.
The destabilisation in ME and N Africa causes massive migration, the destabilisation of the European countries is welcome, in order to create an Europe, a USA clone.

Agent76 , May 27, 2017 at 2:36 pm GMT

Jun 27, 2016 What Does G4S Know About the Orlando Nightclub Massacre?

Much has been made in recent weeks of Omar Mateen's background. The perpetrator of the Orlando, Fla., massacre was alternately a "radical Islamist," a deeply closeted gay man, a wife abuser, a mental case, everybody's best friend in high school and a loser. The list goes on. But what the mainstream media-and the government, for that matter-have not talked about is the fact that Mateen was employed at the time of his crime by G4S, a London-based company that is one of the largest mercenary firms in the world, with intelligence contractors deployed in war zones and hot spots around the globe.

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/what_does_g4s_know_about_the_orlando_nightclub

annamaria , May 27, 2017 at 2:56 pm GMT

@Cyrano The west has two faces in regards to the middle east. One is kind, welcoming and accepting refugees and immigrants from the ME. The other face of the west is also supposedly kind – it goes to Muslim counties and helps them get rid of dictators – although nobody asked them to, but I guess kindness cannot be contained. Unfortunately, in the process of helping them reach the pinnacle of human achievement – democracy – the west wrecks country after country in the ME. My point is that both faces of the west are phony. You can't be kind and cruel at the same time. It just doesn't work that way. One overrides the other and can't be counterbalanced by phoniness.

Seneca44 , May 27, 2017 at 3:08 pm GMT

@unit472 No doubt the murderer Abedi chose his target well. Western pop culture threatens Islam a helluva of a lot more than democracy or capitalism. It is assimilative and transcends race and national borders. Its not possible to put this genie back in the bottle. That battle was lost with Elvis and the Beatles.

... ... ...

If I ran the CIA I would put my efforts into creating an Islamic Ariana Grande or forming some 'boy group' Saudi tweens would go crazy over. Let the devout Muslim mom and dad experience the 'generation gap'.

Anon , May 27, 2017 at 3:12 pm GMT

@Corvinus "If Muslims want to attack such degeneracy, they have my blessing."

Exactly what I thought. Justify the murder of people because you oppose the ways they express themselves culturally. Listen, why don't YOU man up and actually do something about the situation rather than be an armchair warrior?

German_reader , May 27, 2017 at 3:18 pm GMT

@Randal His comment went too far, perhaps as hyperbole, when he endorsed murder, for certain.

On the other hand, he was not really expressing sympathy for the islamists per se as much as expressing agreement with some of their positions, and that is certainly not unacceptable, treasonous or perverse, unless you think we should allow our opinions to be determined by what (a particular brand of) terrorists think.

That's a common trend in the modern US sphere, unfortunately (we must embrace sexual perversion and general degenerate decadence or we are the same as sunni muslim terrorists), to the ludicrous extent that we are now told that opinions and attitudes that the vast majority of our ancestors up until a couple of generations ago would have regarded as disgusting or contemptible at best and abominations at worst are "British values" or "European" or "western" values that we must defend to the death, and even murder foreigners in order to impose them in their countries.

annamaria , May 27, 2017 at 3:20 pm GMT

@LauraMR Sure, lack of assimilation is the culprit but as a "truther" might say, this could well be an operation carried out by the deep state. Indeed, someone put this kid up to this, supplied explosives and logistics, so perhaps it was an Israeli plot, for certain some Anglo-Zionist one percenter must be behind all of this. Naturally, as it is often published here, white Europeans are superior to all other races so the kid was by virtue of ancestry a lesser, defective human being to begin with...

JoaoAlfaiate , May 27, 2017 at 4:07 pm GMT

We're bombing them and they're bombing us. Why is that so difficult to understand?

US Sec of State Madeleine Albright said starving or otherwise murdering 500,000 Iraqi children was "worth it".

If Mr. Derbyshire can't recognize Manchester and other attacks as blow back, he's blind.

Biff , May 27, 2017 at 4:27 pm GMT

In this context of terrorism white people are just like Jews – always the innocent victim.

Andrei Martyanov , Website May 27, 2017 at 4:41 pm GMT

@Swing And the bombing of Libya has nothing to do with it. Stop killing Muslims, and they will stop killing u. U killmy brother, I kill yours, u kill my kids I kill yours, simple logic.

MBlanc46 , May 27, 2017 at 4:51 pm GMT

@Anon

The terrorist bombing was terrible, but the concert was worse.

It was a celebration of open borders, degeneracy, interracism, slut culture for little girls, and jungle fever. It was all about globalist propaganda for kiddies.

https://twitter.com/polNewsForever/status/867105300784066561

British masses seem to welcome this cultural degeneracy and mass invasion by foreigners.
How ironic that an Islamic terrorist who gained entry into UK via globalism threw a monkey wrench at globalism?

If Muslims want to bomb every globalist celebration of open borders, degeneracy, Afro-colonization of white wombs, and slut culture for kids, who cares?

Globalism isn't about respect for world cultures and world histories. It is about spreading mono-culture of Afromania, Homomania, and Ziomania all over the world.

This is typical:

https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/rapper-and-actress-awkwafina-on-being-a-rare-asian-american-in-hollywood

If Muslims want to attack such degeneracy, they have my blessing.

Anon , May 27, 2017 at 4:56 pm GMT

@Che Guava You may be right about Ariana Grande's shows.

I have no idea of her songs. They are likely crap, as you say.

Checking some photos of her and her fans, it is obvious that both her style and fans were a key in target selection.

You are a moron to compare that sleaze to the murderer.

In the few photos I viewed, she is clearly wearing tights, so not near-nude, as she would like to project.

Your comment is moronic, comparison is evil.

German_reader , May 27, 2017 at 4:57 pm GMT

@for-the-record


Islam is a threat,
Is Iran a threat to Europe? Is Indonesia (the largest "Islamic" country in terms of population)?

The real Islamic threat, such as it is, is that propagated by Saudi Arabia, a country which is embraced with open arms by Western governments (and their arms industries). And which for some time now has had a de facto alliance (or "united front" if you like) with Israel.

Art , May 27, 2017 at 5:11 pm GMT

The Jew entertainment culture lures 8-year-old girls into concerts – then an enemy of the Jews, kills them. It is called lose – lose!

What are 8-year-old girls doing at a concert where they yell and scream for hours watching some immature adult bump and grind her intimate body parts, singing sex empowerment songs.

Isn't there something very wrong about that scene?

Meanwhile – a 145-year-old venerable institution of Western entertainment – was being closed down forever – Barnum & Bailey Circus. 8-year-olds at the circus are in danger of eating too much cotton candy.

Peace – Art

p.s. Jew entertainment have taken our youth from sugar highs, to sex highs.

p.s. "Lose with the Jews."

p.s. Reject their culture lowering enticements.

jilles dykstra , May 27, 2017 at 5:12 pm GMT

@for-the-record

jilles dykstra , May 27, 2017 at 5:17 pm GMT

@JoaoAlfaiate We're bombing them and they're bombing us. Why is that so difficult to understand?

US Sec of State Madeleine Albright said starving or otherwise murdering 500,000 Iraqi children was "worth it".

If Mr. Derbyshire can't recognize Manchester and other attacks as blow back, he's blind.

jilles dykstra , May 27, 2017 at 5:20 pm GMT

@biz What about the ongoing Islamist terror campaigns in southern Thailand and the Philippines, directed largely at Buddhists and tribal villagers? How about the slow motion genocide of Melanesians in Irian Jaya at the hands of Indonesian Muslims? Al Shabab slaughtering black Kenyans in a mall? Are your 'zio-natos' responsible for those too?

Bragadocious , May 27, 2017 at 5:23 pm GMT

@Numinous


inhabitants of what formerly were British colonies and are now, since the Brits left, failed states sunk in poverty and disorder.
Those states were in worse poverty and similar levels of disorder when the British were there. The British were responsible for a lot of it.
jilles dykstra , May 27, 2017 at 5:26 pm GMT

@Diversity Heretic John has in past columns expressed what I interpret as an anti-invasion policy: wall the Middle East off. The wall keeps them out of the west and keeps the west out of the Middle East. I concur. The West is following the worse strategy possible: invade Middle Eastern countries and kill Muslims, then invite Muslims with a grudge (sometimes justifiable) to settle here.

jilles dykstra , May 27, 2017 at 5:34 pm GMT

@annamaria

Alden , May 27, 2017 at 6:16 pm GMT

@unit472

Rurik , Website May 27, 2017 at 6:34 pm GMT

@Anon Pop Culture has been weaponized.

madonna as interracist whore and 'pussy march' leader and her ilk have done more harm than a handful of terrorists.

Terrorists kill a few hundred per year.

Weaponized celebrities are globo agents who colonize the minds of 100s of millions of whites into accepting slut culture, interracism, 'diversity', jungle fever, ACOWW, pederasty, 'gay marriage', 'inclusion', cuckery, etc.

Indeed, the reason why Manchester let in all those foreigners and continues to self-hug itself with ugly anti-racist pseudo-virtue is because its people have been mentally colonized by PC and pop culture.

Colonization of minds is more dangerous than killing a few.
Romans defeated the Jews and oppressed the Christians, but Christians colonized Roman minds and Christians won. Romans fed few 100s of Christians to lions, but Christians colonized the minds of millions of Romans. Today's mass media spread not only ideas but idols on a global scale to billions of people.

Pop Culture and PC are weaponized globalist jihad. Pop Culture is no longer just for fun or a diversion. It is the MAIN culture for most white kids. Kids worship celebrities as angels of globalism.
Those young white girls at the concert were being mentally colonized and sensually manipulated into open borders for immigrant invaders and open vaginas for black Africans.

The concert was a propaganda act of war.

Culture matters. This is why the Progs and Glob tear down Confederate statues in the South. It is why they make movies like GET OUT, which are far more dangerous than terror bombings. Terror kills a few 100. Pop Culture or Prop Culture(as it is propaganda) colonize hundreds of millions of white hearts/minds and EFFECTIVELY MURDER the patriot soul-spirit within them.
Soul-Murder of whites makes whites welcome invasion and their own racial-territorial demise.

If you want to know why Manchester welcomed so much invasion and continue to do so after the bombing, it is because white minds have been colonized by PC and Pop Culture.
Indeed, these mentally-colonized whites hate terror bombings not because such attacks are consequences of invasion but because they may strengthen the nationalists who oppose immigrant-invasion.
Why do whites welcome immigrant-invasion? Because they've been mentally colonized by PC and Pop Culture that says being a white woman means to whore out to the world.

Suppose Nazis hadn't dropped bombs in UK in WWII but only propaganda material from the air and succeeded in winning over the hearts and minds of millions of Brits. That would have been more damaging.

It's like US took over so many nations with the 'soft power' of media, academia, and entertainment. Take over minds, you take over souls. The mind-colonized become your slaves.

Progs know the true meaning of culture as political instrument. This is why they denounce D.W. Griffith's THE BIRTH OF A NATION. They see it as more than just a movie. They see it as proud statement of white racial consciousness. This is why they wage culture war. Culture is a weapon. And as mass media has access to every home via the TV, the TV is the open gate thru which the globalisys get to attack and colonize your minds.
Why did Jews react so harshly to PASSION OF THE CHRIST? They saw it as Culture War in favor of Christian Pride and Jewish Guilt. Why won't Hollywood make a movie about Nakba or Knoxville Massacre? Because they can be propaganda against Jewish power.

How did the West come to accept 'gay marriage'? Colonization of white minds via Pop Culture and PC. PC and Pop Culture are globo-jihad.
They can also be violent. Look at BLM. Look at 'spreading democracy'. Look at destruction of Libya and coup in Ukraine. Look at destruction of Christian businesses for not baking 'gay wedding cake'. Globalism uses both soft jihad and hard jihad. Indeed, even the unleashing of ISIS and Alqaeda is the result of globalism's war on enemies of Israel. Zionist-globalists undermined Arab regimes and let ISIS run riot to mess things up. Thus, Islmic Jihadis are both agents of globalism and its enemy(as Muslims hate western degeneracy).
Anyway, the real shame is that whites acquiesced to defeat at hands of globalists without resitance and violence.
I think part of the reason why white rightists rag on Muslim terrorists is this: Muslims have guts enough to resist globalism(even as they've been enabled by it). In contrast, even white patriots make a lot of noise but are afraid to take real action.

There was a time when whites would have used violence against those who'd dare to stick homo flags in churches, push 'gay marriage' and destroy Christian bakers, and tear down Confederate statues.

But whites, even right wing ones, don't fight back but only complain NO MATTER HOW MUCH THEY ARE HUMILIATED, ABUSED, AND ATTACKED. Only the Alt Right did some pushing back at Berkeley.

So, when they see the courage of Muslim terrorists, they call them 'losers' and 'cowards'.
Really? The real cowards are whites who do nothing while General Lee statue is torn down. Real cowards are whites who do nothing while Trump reneges on all his promises. Real cowards are white men who raise their girls to whore out to Negroes. Real cowards are white men who let freaks turn big cities into homo celebration centers and invoke homomania as 'western value' that must be defended from Muslims. Real cowards are whites who praise Jewish globalists who are behind homomania, the attack on Confederate culture, open borders, and Afro-colonization of white wombs.

Compared to these loser white cowards, at least Muslim terrorists take action against globalist filth.

A Palestinian child with a rock in west Bank has more guts than all white men in the West who cuck out to Jewish globalists, homo freaks, and black thugs.

White fathers who let their girls attend that concert are far worse scum than the terrorist who blew it up.

Alden , May 27, 2017 at 6:59 pm GMT

@Rurik


A Palestinian child with a rock in west Bank has more guts than all white men in the West who cuck out to Jewish globalists, homo freaks, and black thugs.

White fathers who let their girls attend that concert are far worse scum

I often call them human urinals

white "men" so filled with racial self-loathing that they symbolically allow themselves to be pissed on to mollify their excruciating self-hatred

I condemn the terrorist with all my breath, but I have to admit, he isn't perhaps as morally execrable as the white men who sat by in Rotherham as their daughters were being passed around

nsa , May 27, 2017 at 7:08 pm GMT

A symbolic pinprick pipe bomb attack on a slut fest and the Brits are cringing and whining like school girls. At least the muzzies take their losses (100 to 300/day, mostly civilians) like men without all the moralizing and faggy hysteria. It's embarrassing

Alden , May 27, 2017 at 7:30 pm GMT

@Anon

[May 26, 2017] We know what inspired the Manchester attack – we just won't admit it - The Unz Review

May 26, 2017 | www.unz.com
In the wake of the massacre in Manchester, people rightly warn against blaming the entire Muslim community in Britain and the world. Certainly one of the aims of those who carry out such atrocities is to provoke the communal punishment of all Muslims, thereby alienating a portion of them who will then become open to recruitment by Isis and al-Qaeda clones.

This approach of not blaming Muslims in general but targeting "radicalisation" or simply "evil" may appear sensible and moderate, but in practice it makes the motivation of the killers in Manchester or the Bataclan theatre in Paris in 2015 appear vaguer and less identifiable than it really is. Such generalities have the unfortunate effect of preventing people pointing an accusing finger at the variant of Islam which certainly is responsible for preparing the soil for the beliefs and actions likely to have inspired the suicide bomber Salman Abedi.

The ultimate inspiration for such people is Wahhabism, the puritanical, fanatical and regressive type of Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia, whose ideology is close to that of al-Qaeda and Isis. This is an exclusive creed, intolerant of all who disagree with it such as secular liberals, members of other Muslim communities such as the Shia or women resisting their chattel-like status.

What has been termed Salafi jihadism, the core beliefs of Isis and al-Qaeda, developed out of Wahhabism, and has carried out its prejudices to what it sees as a logical and violent conclusion. Shia and Yazidis were not just heretics in the eyes of this movement, which was a sort of Islamic Khmer Rouge, but sub-humans who should be massacred or enslaved. Any woman who transgressed against repressive social mores should be savagely punished. Faith should be demonstrated by a public death of the believer, slaughtering the unbelievers, be they the 86 Shia children being evacuated by bus from their homes in Syria on 15 April or the butchery of young fans at a pop concert in Manchester on Monday night.

The real causes of "radicalisation" have long been known, but the government, the BBC and others seldom if ever refer to it because they do not want to offend the Saudis or be accused of anti-Islamic bias. It is much easier to say, piously but quite inaccurately, that Isis and al-Qaeda and their murderous foot soldiers "have nothing to do with Islam". This has been the track record of US and UK governments since 9/11. They will look in any direction except Saudi Arabia when seeking the causes of terrorism. President Trump has been justly denounced and derided in the US for last Sunday accusing Iran and, in effect, the Shia community of responsibility for the wave of terrorism that has engulfed the region when it ultimately emanates from one small but immensely influential Sunni sect. One of the great cultural changes in the world over the last 50 years is the way in which Wahhabism, once an isolated splinter group, has become an increasingly dominant influence over mainstream Sunni Islam, thanks to Saudi financial support.

A further sign of the Salafi-jihadi impact is the choice of targets: the attacks on the Bataclan theatre in Paris in 2015, a gay night club in Florida in 2016 and the Manchester Arena this week have one thing in common. They were all frequented by young people enjoying entertainment and a lifestyle which made them an Isis or al-Qaeda target. But these are also events where the mixing of men and women or the very presence of gay people is denounced by puritan Wahhabis and Salafi jihadis alike. They both live in a cultural environment in which the demonisation of such people and activities is the norm, though their response may differ.

The culpability of Western governments for terrorist attacks on their own citizens is glaring but is seldom even referred to. Leaders want to have a political and commercial alliance with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf oil states. They have never held them to account for supporting a repressive and sectarian ideology which is likely to have inspired Salman Abedi. Details of his motivation may be lacking, but the target of his attack and the method of his death is classic al-Qaeda and Isis in its mode of operating.

The reason these two demonic organisations were able to survive and expand despite the billions – perhaps trillions – of dollars spent on "the war on terror" after 9/11 is that those responsible for stopping them deliberately missed the target and have gone on doing so. After 9/11, President Bush portrayed Iraq not Saudi Arabia as the enemy; in a re-run of history President Trump is ludicrously accusing Iran of being the source of most terrorism in the Middle East. This is the real 9/11 conspiracy, beloved of crackpots worldwide, but there is nothing secret about the deliberate blindness of British and American governments to the source of the beliefs that has inspired the massacres of which Manchester is only the latest – and certainly not the last – horrible example. (Reprinted from The Independent by permission of author or representative)

Godfree Roberts , May 25, 2017 at 3:49 am GMT

Thanks! For a while I thought you might identify their motivation with our having bombed Muslim countries pretty much continuously since 1946.
Nice save!

The Anti-Gnostic , Website May 25, 2017 at 5:16 am GMT

@Godfree Roberts Thanks! For a while I thought you might identify their motivation with our having bombed Muslim countries pretty much continuously since 1946.
Nice save!

Robert Magill , May 25, 2017 at 9:27 am GMT

In most of the ME countries where the US and UK are persona non grata, China assists, remains a friend and does business. The West is not the future.

http://robertmagill.wordpress.com

LiveFreeOrDie , May 25, 2017 at 9:56 am GMT

Jihad, which is exactly what these people call what they do, is one of the "five pillars of Islam". It came directly from Muhammed and the Quran.

Why is it so hard to blame the source, instead of saying "this sect or that one is responsible"?

If it were not a core part of Islam to spread their faith violently, they would not do it.

Mudpie8 , May 25, 2017 at 10:45 am GMT

Why do those responsible deliberately miss the target and have gone on doing so? Because they all profit greatly from it. Who are they? The war industry and its various 'communities', the Jews. the media, you name it, they're all in it for fun and profit. None of them would have an income if it all just stopped, if they actually wanted, you know, peace whatever that is.

They can manufacture an invasion of Iraq based on non-existent WMDs as punishment for 911, when apparently the real culprits were supposed to be Saudis. They can pretend that the conflict in Syria is a 'civil war' rather than a proxy invasion by the US, Saudi Arabia and other Arab states. They can manufacture groups like Al-Qaeda and ISIS but pretend that these groups arose independently from their own funding, operations and just plain meddling in everybody else's business. They can pretend that Iran is the major sponsor of terrorism in the ME when clearly it isn't. They can bullshit really anything they want and everybody just buys it.

If they can do all this, then 911 ought not be too difficult either. The press and so-called intellectual class just buys into whatever the narrative is supposed to be. Karl Rove's statement that 'the empire can create it's own reality now' is fairly obviously a sly reference to 911. How does the empire get to this level of expertise? Clearly a military industrial complex funded to the tune of a trillion dollars per year that can research any problem and do whatever it wants could run such a project without much difficulty. It can also buy off the press and influence the intellectual classes in all sorts of ways that conform to some manual in some top secret facility that nobody has ever heard of and never will.

The release of the redacted 28 pages shows that Prince Bandar, good friend of the Bush family, funded two the supposed hijackers for a year while they prepared for the 'attack'. This indicates without any doubt that the hijackers were Saudi intelligence assets pretending to be hijackers. (Unless you are wacky enough to believe that Prince Bandar, good friend of the Bush family, secretly sought to stab his good friends in the back by committing a heavy atrocity upon them, or at least didn't tell them about it in advance). So its obvious that the Saudis were running the hijacker side of the 911 operation for their good friends in America because thats what good friends do. That's why the hijackers were Saudi, rather than say Iraqi or Iranian, and thats why America didn't invade the Saudis as punishment for the terrible deed.

Of course we also know that the CIA let these same two hijackers, or rather Saudi intelligence assets, into the United States without telling the FBI about it although it had several occasions to do so. How odd, yet these same two hijackers, or rather Saudi intelligence assets, were known terrorists and the CIA definitely knew all about them.

Please Mr Cockburn can you explain in your own words why believing 911 was an inside job is somehow crackpot?

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 11:14 am GMT

@The Anti-Gnostic So how come these attacks only happen in proudly tolerant, liberal countries at venues like teen concerts, coastal promenades, gay nightclubs, rock concert halls? I'd venture to say the victims were probably 90+% opposed to Middle Eastern wars or discrimination against Muslims.

Why don't they attack GOP campaign offices, churches, synagogues, defense contractors, Wall Street, oil companies?

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 11:24 am GMT

We Know What Inspired the Manchester Attack – We Just Won't Admit It

No, you won't, it seems.

You'll happily point to wahhabism as one of the contributory factors. I'd have thought you would be prepared to point to the history of aggressive US sphere military intervention in muslim countries, though you seem a little coy about that in this case, presumably so as not to distract from your case against wahhabism, which so conveniently ties in with your bête noir Trump's recent stupidity in Saudi Arabia.

But you won't ever admit that immigration is one of the prime factors.

So in this case we have a bombing carried out by a 2nd generation immigrant muslim Libyan whose father was admitted to the country for political reasons because he was an active member of the opposition to the Libyan government, which our government sought to encourage, in the context of Libya having recently been effectively destroyed and consigned to brutally murderous, bloody chaos by aggressive UK military action.

And yet for Cockburn and for most of the media and political establishments, it's seemingly vital to pretend that it's nothing to do with either "invade the world" or "invite the world".

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 11:42 am GMT

It now seems this was a bombing carried out by a 2nd generation immigrant muslim Libyan whose father was admitted to the country for political reasons because he was an active member of the opposition to the Libyan government, which our government sought to encourage, in the context of Libya having recently been effectively destroyed and consigned to brutally murderous, bloody chaos by aggressive UK military action.

Here's the BBC on the tangled web of foreign conflicts our government has enmeshed us in in Libya, by allowing immigration from a country and regime changing its government by aggressive military force:

Manchester attack: The Libya-jihad connection

Sound familiar? It should.

There is a stark similarity here with the recent Orlando nightclub shooting. In that case the attacker was likewise a second generation immigrant muslim from a country (in that case Afghanistan) the US government has destroyed by aggressive military action, whose parents were admitted to the country because his father was part of the opposition to a government the US regime wanted changed. Mateen made online posts calling for revenge on the US for what it had done to ME countries and even called the police in the midst of his shootings to declare it was an act of retaliation for US killings, and yet those with an interest in obfuscation have looked high and low for other motivations to obscure the obvious one.

Invade the world and invite the world. It really is as simple as that. Our governments interfere murderously in other countries whilst importing foreigners from those same countries and related ones, and then act all horrified when it turns out they have imported those wars along with the people.

Jim Christian , May 25, 2017 at 12:08 pm GMT

@The Anti-Gnostic So how come these attacks only happen in proudly tolerant, liberal countries at venues like teen concerts, coastal promenades, gay nightclubs, rock concert halls? I'd venture to say the victims were probably 90+% opposed to Middle Eastern wars or discrimination against Muslims.

Why don't they attack GOP campaign offices, churches, synagogues, defense contractors, Wall Street, oil companies?

Tiny Duck , May 25, 2017 at 12:28 pm GMT

What is your proposed solution?

Taking punitive action against all Muslims is the strategic goal of these people, widening the gulf between Muslims and non-believers and moving towards some kind of major clash of civilisations. They will not be dissuaded by the West making Islam illegal, shutting mosques and – somehow – exiling their own third-and-fourth generation citizens. As well as not being practical, it stands counter to our values, to whit punishing the actions of the overwhelming majority for the actions of the lunatic fringe few.

Britain endured 300,000 dead to defeat Nazi Germany, France over 700,000 dead. We are simply not going to be intimidated by such measures. If anything, they will strengthen our resolve.

These people are also not part of a centralised campaign being run by ISIS they are lone actors

What we need is more immigration so that Muslims feel more comfortable. As long as white hold any power in any society these attacks will continue

Svigor , May 25, 2017 at 3:19 pm GMT

Lefties like Cockburn know what made the Manchester attack possible, they just won't admit it.

IMMIGRATION.

MIGRATION.

OPEN BORDERS.

RACE REPLACEMENT OF EUROPEANS.

DEMOGRAPHIC INVASION.

Svigor , May 25, 2017 at 3:23 pm GMT

We can't control what goes on in darkies'/non-Europeans' heads. They may hate us and want to kill us, or they may not. They may decide to set off bombs, chop off heads, etc., or they may not.

But if we don't let them into our countries, it doesn't matter if they hate us, want to kill us, want to set off bombs, or want to chop off heads. They won't be able to do any of those things.

See how logic works, lefties? (Please say you do. The matter is very much in doubt.)

In that case the attacker was likewise a second generation immigrant muslim from a country (in that case Afghanistan) the US government has destroyed

Has anyone really made the case that Afghanistan was destroyed, by anyone? I've never seen it done convincingly.

The place has long been a complete dump; there's just never been anything to destroy. Not within living memory, anyway.

peterike , May 25, 2017 at 4:25 pm GMT

Beyond the question of Islam, the people from Muslim nations are for the most part lousy human specimens, Islam or not. Does Islam put them into garish track suits? Is Islam commanding them to grift on welfare and other public services? Is it Islam that has them sex grooming young white girls?

Or is this just the behavior one would expect from an invading army that faces no resistance? Indeed, not only are they not resisted, they are feted (but never vetted). They are given MORE RIGHTS by law than the native population. They are encouraged to remain tribal.

In other words, they see their host nations as weak, foolish, cowardly places simply asking to be exploited to the max. For one Mohammed maybe it's welfare fraud. For another it's hanging about in public spaces, threatening the native population. For another, it's bullying the white kids at school. For another, it's strapping on a bomb. These are all the same things, just at different places on a continuum.

And since they are nearly all low IQ with little future time orientation, they will never turn into the doctors and layers and computer programmers of Liberal fantasy.

Sure, it's pretty convenient that Islam is morally OK with any and all of this behavior. But the bottom line is that Europe is importing vast numbers of degenerate human specimens that will never amount to a thing and will be a problem in perpetuity. That is, until they take over and kill or enslave the remaining whites. Then hey, no more problem!

Sean , May 25, 2017 at 4:28 pm GMT

@Svigor We can't control what goes on in darkies'/non-Europeans' heads. They may hate us and want to kill us, or they may not. They may decide to set off bombs, chop off heads, etc., or they may not.

But if we don't let them into our countries, it doesn't matter if they hate us, want to kill us, want to set off bombs, or want to chop off heads. They won't be able to do any of those things.

See how logic works, lefties? (Please say you do. The matter is very much in doubt.)


In that case the attacker was likewise a second generation immigrant muslim from a country (in that case Afghanistan) the US government has destroyed
Has anyone really made the case that Afghanistan was destroyed, by anyone? I've never seen it done convincingly.

The place has long been a complete dump; there's just never been anything to destroy. Not within living memory, anyway.

jx37 , May 25, 2017 at 4:35 pm GMT

The real reason is the politically correct genocidal racism and racist colonialism that brought this bomber and his fellow invaders to the West in the first place. Those forces spend a hell of a a lot more money and effort in exterminating the West and its peoples than Wahhabism does promoting Sunni extremism. Stop cucking around the real issue, violent Muslim terrorism and crime in the West is a by-product of white-hating racism so intense and genocidal that its perpetrators will import, embrace, and support Muslims and Muslim terrorists.

Talha , May 25, 2017 at 4:59 pm GMT

@Tiny Duck What is your proposed solution?

Taking punitive action against all Muslims is the strategic goal of these people, widening the gulf between Muslims and non-believers and moving towards some kind of major clash of civilisations. They will not be dissuaded by the West making Islam illegal, shutting mosques and - somehow - exiling their own third-and-fourth generation citizens. As well as not being practical, it stands counter to our values, to whit punishing the actions of the overwhelming majority for the actions of the lunatic fringe few.

Britain endured 300,000 dead to defeat Nazi Germany, France over 700,000 dead. We are simply not going to be intimidated by such measures. If anything, they will strengthen our resolve.

These people are also not part of a centralised campaign being run by ISIS they are lone actors

What we need is more immigration so that Muslims feel more comfortable. As long as white hold any power in any society these attacks will continue

Sean , May 25, 2017 at 5:01 pm GMT

In the wake of the massacre in Manchester, people rightly warn against blaming the entire Muslim community in Britain and the world. Certainly one of the aims of those who carry out such atrocities is to provoke the communal punishment of all Muslims, thereby alienating a portion of them who will then become open to recruitment by Isis and al-Qaeda clones.

Thats a good one . The British are completely helpless against Muslims, the police are trained to punish whites not Muslims. Look at the Rotherham (actually every city in England) scandal. The only immigration that is vulnerable to public opinion is EU immigration.

President Trump is ludicrously accusing Iran of being the source of most terrorism in the Middle East.

Americans like Trumps defence advisor McMaster way have been rather put off Iran due to them supplying explosively formed penetrator weapons to their Shia proxy terrorist force in Iraq,which used them to kill hundreds of US troops., and leave many others without arms legs or testicles. McMaster was in Iraq at the time and he knows it was the Iranians .

Trump's original pick for McMaster's job, General Flynn, was there in Iraq too and later head of the DIA. By all accounts he was infuriated by Iranians supplying the Explosively formed penetrator weapons to Shia groups so their IEDs could blast though armour on US vehicles in Iraq. They, especially Flynn had access to all the examination of the wrecked vehicles and I suppose autopsies on US soldiers as well. Iran ludicrously took on the US, and now comes the reckoning.

Talha , May 25, 2017 at 5:05 pm GMT

@Randal Because those are the easy targets that create the most impact.

Of course they don't "mostly happen at venues like teen concerts, coastal promenades, gay nightclubs, rock concert halls", those are just the ones that make the big news splashes.

Nor do they "only happen in proudly tolerant, liberal countries": they mostly happen in the countries destabilised by US sphere military action. The vast, vast majority of all islamist terrorism happens in those countries (Iraq, Libya, Syria) and not "in proudly tolerant, liberal countries" at all.

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 6:26 pm GMT

@Svigor We can't control what goes on in darkies'/non-Europeans' heads. They may hate us and want to kill us, or they may not. They may decide to set off bombs, chop off heads, etc., or they may not.

But if we don't let them into our countries, it doesn't matter if they hate us, want to kill us, want to set off bombs, or want to chop off heads. They won't be able to do any of those things.

See how logic works, lefties? (Please say you do. The matter is very much in doubt.)


In that case the attacker was likewise a second generation immigrant muslim from a country (in that case Afghanistan) the US government has destroyed
Has anyone really made the case that Afghanistan was destroyed, by anyone? I've never seen it done convincingly.

The place has long been a complete dump; there's just never been anything to destroy. Not within living memory, anyway.

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMT

@Sean


In the wake of the massacre in Manchester, people rightly warn against blaming the entire Muslim community in Britain and the world. Certainly one of the aims of those who carry out such atrocities is to provoke the communal punishment of all Muslims, thereby alienating a portion of them who will then become open to recruitment by Isis and al-Qaeda clones.
Thats a good one . The British are completely helpless against Muslims, the police are trained to punish whites not Muslims. Look at the Rotherham (actually every city in England) scandal. The only immigration that is vulnerable to public opinion is EU immigration.

President Trump is ludicrously accusing Iran of being the source of most terrorism in the Middle East.
Americans like Trumps defence advisor McMaster way have been rather put off Iran due to them supplying explosively formed penetrator weapons to their Shia proxy terrorist force in Iraq,which used them to kill hundreds of US troops., and leave many others without arms legs or testicles. McMaster was in Iraq at the time and he knows it was the Iranians .

Trump's original pick for McMaster's job, General Flynn, was there in Iraq too and later head of the DIA. By all accounts he was infuriated by Iranians supplying the Explosively formed penetrator weapons to Shia groups so their IEDs could blast though armour on US vehicles in Iraq. They, especially Flynn had access to all the examination of the wrecked vehicles and I suppose autopsies on US soldiers as well. Iran ludicrously took on the US, and now comes the reckoning.

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 6:49 pm GMT

@Talha Hey Randal,

Very good posts. Also, as I pointed out in another thread, the security services have two different levels of prioritization when it comes to elites vs proles.

Note that this guy was reported to the police by his own family, acquaintances and security agencies knew he had traveled to Daesh-controlled territory in Libya:
"Two people who knew Salman Abedi are said to have called the police counter-terrorism hotline five years ago to raise concerns that he thought 'being a suicide bomber was OK'.
And a senior US intelligence official has claimed that members of his own family had warned police that he was 'dangerous' It is understood that Abedi was 'known' to the Security Services through his associations to those linked to terrorism in Manchester's Libyan community According to NBC, a senior US intelligence official said Abedi's family had warned police that he was 'dangerous'. He was identified after the attack by his bankcard and had used a 'big and sophisticated bomb' using materials not widely available in Britain."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4536624/Salman-Abedi-known-security-services-point.html

But when a guy was reported last month by the Muslim community, they picked up on it right away - well, guess what the target was:
"A suspected terrorist attack was foiled after armed police arrested a man who is alleged to have been found carrying knives near the Houses of Parliament.
The Guardian understands the operation was triggered following a tip-off to police by a member of Britain's Muslim community who was concerned about the man's behaviour."

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/apr/27/man-arrested-over-incident-in-whitehall-near-parliament

Is all of this coincidence? Simply incompetence?

Peace.

Reg Cæsar , May 25, 2017 at 7:50 pm GMT

@Jim Christian


Why don't they attack GOP campaign offices, churches, synagogues, defense contractors, Wall Street, oil companies?
Let us not leave out the good offices of the DNC, from where Hillary and Obama murdered millions collectively. The butcher's bill is still piling up in Syria, Iraq and especially, Libya. Bomb churches, they might get bombed back. And bomb a Synagogue? Not smart unless you want your entire crew invited to a seance with the Mossad. Wall Street and oil companies? Too secure, public venues are the easiest. But we get your point, Anti, you want Republicans, Jews and Christians and money to die, that will make you happy. Too bad for you, everyday gays and women are suffering the most anywhere you have the Muslims in all the Euro-flophouses.. Feminists, gays and Liberals in general are the first to the beheading line when the Caliphate is installed.
Bill Jones , May 25, 2017 at 7:52 pm GMT

@Sean


In the wake of the massacre in Manchester, people rightly warn against blaming the entire Muslim community in Britain and the world. Certainly one of the aims of those who carry out such atrocities is to provoke the communal punishment of all Muslims, thereby alienating a portion of them who will then become open to recruitment by Isis and al-Qaeda clones.
Thats a good one . The British are completely helpless against Muslims, the police are trained to punish whites not Muslims. Look at the Rotherham (actually every city in England) scandal. The only immigration that is vulnerable to public opinion is EU immigration.

President Trump is ludicrously accusing Iran of being the source of most terrorism in the Middle East.
Americans like Trumps defence advisor McMaster way have been rather put off Iran due to them supplying explosively formed penetrator weapons to their Shia proxy terrorist force in Iraq,which used them to kill hundreds of US troops., and leave many others without arms legs or testicles. McMaster was in Iraq at the time and he knows it was the Iranians .

Trump's original pick for McMaster's job, General Flynn, was there in Iraq too and later head of the DIA. By all accounts he was infuriated by Iranians supplying the Explosively formed penetrator weapons to Shia groups so their IEDs could blast though armour on US vehicles in Iraq. They, especially Flynn had access to all the examination of the wrecked vehicles and I suppose autopsies on US soldiers as well. Iran ludicrously took on the US, and now comes the reckoning.

Talha , May 25, 2017 at 8:12 pm GMT

@Randal


Is all of this coincidence? Simply incompetence?
Good question.

Though in this particular case I doubt they had much to go on with just a report that a teenager was spouting off about suicide bombing - that must be pretty commonplace.

Talha , May 25, 2017 at 8:16 pm GMT

@Randal


Americans like Trumps defence advisor McMaster way have been rather put off Iran due to them supplying explosively formed penetrator weapons to their Shia proxy terrorist force in Iraq,which used them to kill hundreds of US troops., and leave many others without arms legs or testicles. McMaster was in Iraq at the time and he knows it was the Iranians .
Then the likes of McMaster need to grow up a bit and recognise that going to war doesn't just mean that Americans get to kill other people without anyone fighting back.

Iran was being menaced and harmed by the US long before - decades before - the US chose to invade its neighbour whilst giving clear signals that if its occupation went well then Iran would be next. A grownup would understand that just as the US killed all the Iraqis it felt were necessary to the success of its policy, so Iran in turn helped kill all the Americans it felt were necessary to prevent that success and prevent the likely subsequent attack on Iran.

Hardball cuts both ways and big boys take their lumps and move on, when (as with the US and Iran) there is nothing the US can gain by coming back for another round and vast opportunities for yet another, worse, disaster.

And, of course, the Iranians weren't the ones supplying the sunni jihadists in Iraq, who killed more than their share of US troops, with money to buy weapons, for that McMaster would need to look closer to home - at the very same foreign interests currently trying to manufacture another confrontation of Iran.


Iran ludicrously took on the US, and now comes the reckoning.
Unlikely, since those who would gain from a confrontation between the US and Iran live in Riyadh and Tel Aviv, and in plush offices in Washington, not in the real America. Most likely the US regime will back away from a full confrontation when it comes down to it, as they have on every previous occasion since they were rightly turfed out of Iran with their tails between their legs in 1979.

And while those people do have the clout to manufacture consent for a war with Iran as they did with Iraq, they obviously (and rightly) fear the consequences for themselves when it all goes bad.

And if they don't back away from it then the consequences will be every bit as costly, and more, as the invasion and occupation of Iraq proved for the region and for the US and for American soldiers, and this time those responsible for it will likely face a lot more than general political embarrassment.

truthtellerAryan , May 25, 2017 at 8:40 pm GMT

The ultimate inspiration for such people is Wahhabism, the puritanical, fanatical and regressive type of Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia, whose ideology is close to that of al-Qaeda and Isis

Absolutely right. And we just swindled them for out of $110 billion to prop up our war industries so these "sand#@*&#$s" can go and do the dirty job for our masters in Tel-Aviv and their representatives in Washington.
Are we really "friends" with a regime that is only different from N. Korea because of its oil?
Even the Islam they're propagating is exactly what The Prophet Muhammad fought against, until they lost and had to convert. Its Islam, is a cult that follows strict Bedouin traditions, that are typical Semitic. Women and others who rank low in the tribe are considered less human. Orthodox Judaism, and their Bedouin half brothers have had this law of no rights to the above mentioned since time immemorial. Jewish women are forbidden to touch or read the Torah. This is a religious law. If they do it now its only because of progress.
So Arabs who have adopted Wahhabism (they have lots of money to spend) are trying to infuse their culture as part of Islam. Which it is not
Good luck to those who will receive the brunt of our mighty bombs thru the Wahhabis

Jonathan Mason , May 25, 2017 at 8:44 pm GMT

Young men, and occasionally women, from Muslim cultures are particularly prone to turn to a very nasty form of murder suicide when things go wrong in their lives, or they become depressed.

They tend to externalize their own unhappiness and blame others. Often the unhappiness is related to sexual frustration and their inability to form satisfying relationships.

Probably this killer found Ariana Grande sexually desirable, but unobtainable.

Within their cultures there are plenty of other equally embittered individuals willing to encourage and facilitate them and give them material support.

for-the-record , May 25, 2017 at 8:57 pm GMT

@Svigor We can't control what goes on in darkies'/non-Europeans' heads. They may hate us and want to kill us, or they may not. They may decide to set off bombs, chop off heads, etc., or they may not.

But if we don't let them into our countries, it doesn't matter if they hate us, want to kill us, want to set off bombs, or want to chop off heads. They won't be able to do any of those things.

See how logic works, lefties? (Please say you do. The matter is very much in doubt.)


In that case the attacker was likewise a second generation immigrant muslim from a country (in that case Afghanistan) the US government has destroyed
Has anyone really made the case that Afghanistan was destroyed, by anyone? I've never seen it done convincingly.

The place has long been a complete dump; there's just never been anything to destroy. Not within living memory, anyway.

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 9:01 pm GMT

@Talha Hey Randal,

But it's saying the guy's family called him out to the police. And that he was known to security services based on ties to terrorist sympathizers in the Libyan community in Manchester. Furthermore, the article mentions that they knew he went to Libya and what part of Libya - what the hell??!!

Furthermore, at this point - if you have teenager talking smack about suicide bombing - take it seriously.

Peace.

Randal , May 25, 2017 at 9:05 pm GMT

@Talha Hey Randal,

Plus, I thought our assassination of some of their nuclear scientists was our response.


big boys take their lumps and move on
Or we could try banging our head against the wall until it breaks...I'll let you figure out what "it" is in this circumstance.

Peace.

Talha , May 25, 2017 at 9:22 pm GMT

@Randal I'm not sure it's feasible to take seriously every report of a teenage immigrant (1st or 2nd gen) lad making big talk about suicide bombing or whatever. There are probably thousands of them, most of them just hormoned up boys making themselves feel big or expressing their inadequately controlled emotions.

In this case it was complicated by the fact that his family connections were to "our" terrorists in Libya and Syria. On the one hand that might suggest you should take it more seriously (he clearly had access to dodgy contacts and materials the average teenage wannabee doesn't have), but apart from whatever connections his family undoubtedly had in the UK security forces themselves, how would they be sure he was talking about blowing up people here and not blowing up people our government likes to see blown up in Libya or Syria?

The latter, of course, is an area we will never see honestly reported.

Talha , May 25, 2017 at 10:56 pm GMT

I think this lady has found the solution to stop these guys:
"'Much needs to be done to eradicate this evil. 'But there is one simple step which we can take now: we must bring back the death penalty.'"

http://metro.co.uk/2017/05/24/ex-ukip-mep-calls-for-death-penalty-for-suicide-bombers-6658334/

And I agree – death penalty for suicide bombers!!! Give them no quarter!

Peace.

Svigor , May 25, 2017 at 11:54 pm GMT

So long as the Afghan government is aligned with India, as it now is, Pakistan must support the Taliban. The Taliban offers its only option for an alliance with Afghanistan, which it must have for strategic depth vis-a-vis India. Remember, India is Pakistan's number one strategic threat. A pro-India Afghanistan threatens Pakistan with a two-front war, which is intolerable. So Pakistan is tied to the Taliban whether it wants to be or not (my guess is not).

Makes perfect sense.

This is literally stupid, and I have no doubt you know better. You imply that in this context actions have no consequences, but in the real world of course they do.

We can influence those things, but we have no control, and no guarantee. Keeping them out is fully under our control, and is guaranteed to work.

This is true only up to a point

It's far truer and more reliable than treating Muslims nicely.

Actions have consequences.

Yep; open borders leaves us vulnerable to foreign terrorism.

Svigor , May 25, 2017 at 11:57 pm GMT

Really, I say to the Libertardians/Leftists/Muslim sympathizers, and to the Zionists/Cucked Right/'Murricans, a pox on both your houses. Both of you lie through your teeth on a constant basis. Both groups are fanatically pro-open-borders, for the most part.

Svigor , May 26, 2017 at 12:00 am GMT

This is such an ignorant statement that it almost defies belief. It is the type of statement that, were I from a Muslim nation, would almost make me think that the terrorists were not completely unjustified.

It's beyond your ken that when people talk of the destruction of Afghanistan, some other people point out that there wasn't far to fall?

Keep it to talk of dead Afghans, that works a lot better.

Svigor , May 26, 2017 at 12:01 am GMT

I mean, we're talking about people who fuck sheep when they aren't fucking little boys or beating their wives.

rw95 , May 26, 2017 at 12:29 am GMT

@Sean


https://www.traditionalright.com/the-view-from-olympus-strategic-idiocy-and-an-alternative/

So long as the Afghan government is aligned with India, as it now is, Pakistan must support the Taliban. The Taliban offers its only option for an alliance with Afghanistan, which it must have for strategic depth vis-a-vis India. Remember, India is Pakistan's number one strategic threat. A pro-India Afghanistan threatens Pakistan with a two-front war, which is intolerable. So Pakistan is tied to the Taliban whether it wants to be or not (my guess is not).

Afghanistan is a pawn in the Pakistan-India conflict, just as Syria is caught up in a Arab-Persian quarrel that started at the dawn of recorded history. All this reduction to the variant of Islam promoted by the Saudis Cockburn does leaves you none the wiser.
aceofspades , May 26, 2017 at 1:36 am GMT

The irony is that the places that terrorists targeted were the very places that would give the most support to Muslims and refugees. And they still would, too. The very same neighborhood in Paris that suffered from the 2015 attacks rejected Le Pen at an even higher margin than the last election. I suppose these people have a death wish.

aceofspades , May 26, 2017 at 1:37 am GMT

@Svigor Really, I say to the Libertardians/Leftists/Muslim sympathizers, and to the Zionists/Cucked Right/'Murricans, a pox on both your houses. Both of you lie through your teeth on a constant basis. Both groups are fanatically pro-open-borders, for the most part.

The Kid , May 26, 2017 at 2:04 am GMT

Sorry, but the Wahhabis were happily slaughtering fellow Sunni, Jews, Shia, and anyone else they decided to declare a "pagan" (kaffirun) in order to legitimize raping, robbing, enslaving, and murdering them LONG before the West even considered bothering to colonize the Arabs.

The Wahhabi originated in the one part of Arabia that the Prophet (SAAW) refused to bless – the Najd. He stated that that was the place where fitnah (disorder, chaos) came from.

The preaching of Abdul-Wahhab was very popular among the bedu clan ruled by the Saud family. This practice of takfir, insisting other Muslims were heretics, polytheists, pagans (kaffirun) made robbing pilgrimage and other caravans a *virtue* instead of brigandage. The British put the Sauds in charge of the Arabian peninsula, now known as Saudi Arabia.

The Wahhabis promptly slaughtered those they considered pagan – Maliki, Hanafi, Shafi, Shia – it didn't matter. Unless you believed in their literalist primitive understanding of Islam, you were obviously a pagan. The Wahhabi focus almost entirely on outward conformity from what I have seen. While other Muslims are discussing the attributes of God, the Wahhabis are ordering Hanafi women to "follow the stronger evidence" and cover their *feet.* Seriously. For real.

Go to any Saudi supported masjid in the US, and notice how many have filthy, horrible areas for women to pray, often only accessible by passing through the area outside where the dumpsters are, and note that the women's restroom many be filthier than a porta-potti in Tijuana. This is no accident. Wahhabis think women should be neither seen nor heard. They know more than the Caliph Umar who accepted a correction on Islamic law from a woman – in public – and acknowledged to all present that she was correct, and he was wrong. No danger of that happening in Wahhabi land – a woman's voice is considered part of her awrah or nakedness.

If a religious education program for women even *exists* , it will tend to focus on the importance of wearing a head scarf, and covering one's feet. Sometimes it will stress how a woman's prayer is "better" for her at home – so why are all of you ladies here for Juuma every Friday?

The importance of prayer seems to be limited to having the exact "correct" position of the hands, feet, etc. – and saying the "correct" exact words. Imagine my surprise when I was earnestly informed that I should never, ever pray in sadl – with my arms down – because Imam Malik only did that "because he had been tortured." When I asked a Mauritania Shaykh, a noted religious scholar about this statement, he was rather blunt. It seems that "whoever says that is a liar." And that they really need to fear God.

So, while silly westerners are running around and claiming that Daesh and crew are really upset about colonialism or whatever, the extremists keep telling us all what they really want – and the left of the west is so bigoted and patronizing that it literally insists that the extremists are so backward and stupid that they don't really mean what they say because anyone with half a brain would be irate over *material* issues, not religious matters.

You can find the Daesh English language publication on line. Read it before you continue blathering endless irrelevancies about "colonialism."

exiled off mainstreet , May 26, 2017 at 3:05 am GMT

While I fully concur the views stated here by Mr. Cockburn on this matter, "western" regimes have a more direct link to the Manchester terrorist act: the fact that the destruction of Libya by Obama and the French, spearheaded in the US by then foreign secretary Hillary Clinton against the advice of Gates, the war minister at the time, and contrary to Obama's instincts was a direct link in the chain leading to this Libyan's terrorist act. There are also rumours published elsewhere that this terrorist underwent training to act as one of the "tame" rebels working to overthrow the Assad government. The support for the Cameron government for the Libya action puts the blood of this event on the hands of the successor tory May government, in its use of this blowback event to gain electoral mileage in its effort to stay in power in Britain.

As indicated, I concur with inferences of the comment by Randal, #8 above that western actions, including the destruction of Libya, played the key role in this attack.

Talha , May 26, 2017 at 4:37 am GMT

@The Kid Sorry, but the Wahhabis were happily slaughtering fellow Sunni, Jews, Shia, and anyone else they decided to declare a "pagan" (kaffirun) in order to legitimize raping, robbing, enslaving, and murdering them LONG before the West even considered bothering to colonize the Arabs.

The Wahhabi originated in the one part of Arabia that the Prophet (SAAW) refused to bless - the Najd. He stated that that was the place where fitnah (disorder, chaos) came from.

The preaching of Abdul-Wahhab was very popular among the bedu clan ruled by the Saud family. This practice of takfir, insisting other Muslims were heretics, polytheists, pagans (kaffirun) made robbing pilgrimage and other caravans a *virtue* instead of brigandage. The British put the Sauds in charge of the Arabian peninsula, now known as Saudi Arabia.

The Wahhabis promptly slaughtered those they considered pagan - Maliki, Hanafi, Shafi, Shia - it didn't matter. Unless you believed in their literalist primitive understanding of Islam, you were obviously a pagan. The Wahhabi focus almost entirely on outward conformity from what I have seen. While other Muslims are discussing the attributes of God, the Wahhabis are ordering Hanafi women to "follow the stronger evidence" and cover their *feet.* Seriously. For real.

Go to any Saudi supported masjid in the US, and notice how many have filthy, horrible areas for women to pray, often only accessible by passing through the area outside where the dumpsters are, and note that the women's restroom many be filthier than a porta-potti in Tijuana. This is no accident. Wahhabis think women should be neither seen nor heard. They know more than the Caliph Umar who accepted a correction on Islamic law from a woman - in public - and acknowledged to all present that she was correct, and he was wrong. No danger of that happening in Wahhabi land - a woman's voice is considered part of her awrah or nakedness.

If a religious education program for women even *exists*, it will tend to focus on the importance of wearing a head scarf, and covering one's feet. Sometimes it will stress how a woman's prayer is "better" for her at home - so why are all of you ladies here for Juuma every Friday?

The importance of prayer seems to be limited to having the exact "correct" position of the hands, feet, etc. - and saying the "correct" exact words. Imagine my surprise when I was earnestly informed that I should never, ever pray in sadl - with my arms down - because Imam Malik only did that "because he had been tortured." When I asked a Mauritania Shaykh, a noted religious scholar about this statement, he was rather blunt. It seems that "whoever says that is a liar." And that they really need to fear God.

So, while silly westerners are running around and claiming that Daesh and crew are really upset about colonialism or whatever, the extremists keep telling us all what they really want - and the left of the west is so bigoted and patronizing that it literally insists that the extremists are so backward and stupid that they don't really mean what they say because anyone with half a brain would be irate over *material* issues, not religious matters.

You can find the Daesh English language publication on line. Read it before you continue blathering endless irrelevancies about "colonialism."

LSWCHP , May 26, 2017 at 8:30 am GMT

@Godfree Roberts Thanks! For a while I thought you might identify their motivation with our having bombed Muslim countries pretty much continuously since 1946.
Nice save!

Craken , May 26, 2017 at 9:05 am GMT

@aceofspades The irony is that the places that terrorists targeted were the very places that would give the most support to Muslims and refugees. And they still would, too. The very same neighborhood in Paris that suffered from the 2015 attacks rejected Le Pen at an even higher margin than the last election. I suppose these people have a death wish.

5371 , May 26, 2017 at 9:07 am GMT

@Sean


In the wake of the massacre in Manchester, people rightly warn against blaming the entire Muslim community in Britain and the world. Certainly one of the aims of those who carry out such atrocities is to provoke the communal punishment of all Muslims, thereby alienating a portion of them who will then become open to recruitment by Isis and al-Qaeda clones.
Thats a good one . The British are completely helpless against Muslims, the police are trained to punish whites not Muslims. Look at the Rotherham (actually every city in England) scandal. The only immigration that is vulnerable to public opinion is EU immigration.

President Trump is ludicrously accusing Iran of being the source of most terrorism in the Middle East.
Americans like Trumps defence advisor McMaster way have been rather put off Iran due to them supplying explosively formed penetrator weapons to their Shia proxy terrorist force in Iraq,which used them to kill hundreds of US troops., and leave many others without arms legs or testicles. McMaster was in Iraq at the time and he knows it was the Iranians .

Trump's original pick for McMaster's job, General Flynn, was there in Iraq too and later head of the DIA. By all accounts he was infuriated by Iranians supplying the Explosively formed penetrator weapons to Shia groups so their IEDs could blast though armour on US vehicles in Iraq. They, especially Flynn had access to all the examination of the wrecked vehicles and I suppose autopsies on US soldiers as well. Iran ludicrously took on the US, and now comes the reckoning.

Randal , May 26, 2017 at 10:02 am GMT

@5371 On earth, it was Sunni insurgents who inflicted well over 90% of casualties on US troops. You are stupid and crazy.

Joe Wong , May 26, 2017 at 11:57 am GMT

@Mudpie8

Why do those responsible deliberately miss the target and have gone on doing so? Because they all profit greatly from it. Who are they? The war industry and its various 'communities', the Jews. the media, you name it, they're all in it for fun and profit. None of them would have an income if it all just stopped, if they actually wanted, you know, peace whatever that is.

They can manufacture an invasion of Iraq based on non-existent WMDs as punishment for 911, when apparently the real culprits were supposed to be Saudis...

[May 23, 2017] CIA, the cornerstone of the deep state has agenda that is different from the US national interest and reflect agenda of the special interest groups such as Wall Street bankers and MIC

Highly recommended!
CIA is actually a state within the state as Church commission revealed and it has an immanent tendency to seek control over "surface state" and media. In other words large intelligence apparatus might well be incompatible with the democratic governance.
Notable quotes:
"... The CIA has a track record of acting out of self interest since its inception and should not be believed. That being said, the public is almost completely unaware of the agency's misdeeds. ..."
May 23, 2017 | nakedcapitalism.com

"In the long run, the CIA can't deceive the Chinese government without also deceiving, in some way, the American public. This leaves us with an obvious problem: Should we believe anything the CIA says?" [RealClearWorld]. "It's a tough question for a democracy to answer. Trust is built on the tacit agreement that the "bad things" an agency does are good for the country.

If the public believes that that is no longer the case – if it believes the agency is acting out of self-interest and not national interest – then the agreement is broken. The intelligence agency is seen as an impediment of the right to national self-determination, a means for the ends of the few."

Huey Long <

RE: Hall of Mirrors/Believing the CIA

The CIA has a track record of acting out of self interest since its inception and should not be believed. That being said, the public is almost completely unaware of the agency's misdeeds.

I think the reason folks like Manning, Snowden and Assange are so reviled by the agency is because they are a threat to the CIA's reputation more than anything else.

[May 23, 2017] CIA, the cornerstone of the deep state has agenda that is different from the US national interest and reflect agenda of the special interest groups such as Wall Street bankers and MIC

Highly recommended!
CIA is actually a state within the state as Church commission revealed and it has an immanent tendency to seek control over "surface state" and media. In other words large intelligence apparatus might well be incompatible with the democratic governance.
Notable quotes:
"... The CIA has a track record of acting out of self interest since its inception and should not be believed. That being said, the public is almost completely unaware of the agency's misdeeds. ..."
May 23, 2017 | nakedcapitalism.com

"In the long run, the CIA can't deceive the Chinese government without also deceiving, in some way, the American public. This leaves us with an obvious problem: Should we believe anything the CIA says?" [RealClearWorld]. "It's a tough question for a democracy to answer. Trust is built on the tacit agreement that the "bad things" an agency does are good for the country.

If the public believes that that is no longer the case – if it believes the agency is acting out of self-interest and not national interest – then the agreement is broken. The intelligence agency is seen as an impediment of the right to national self-determination, a means for the ends of the few."

Huey Long <

RE: Hall of Mirrors/Believing the CIA

The CIA has a track record of acting out of self interest since its inception and should not be believed. That being said, the public is almost completely unaware of the agency's misdeeds.

I think the reason folks like Manning, Snowden and Assange are so reviled by the agency is because they are a threat to the CIA's reputation more than anything else.

[May 05, 2017] In defence of the size of Obama bribe

Notable quotes:
"... Apparently, corruption is now the love that dare not speak its name. ..."
Apr 28, 2017 | www.nakedcapitalism.com
WheresOurTeddy , , April 26, 2017 at 3:18 pm

In defense of Obama making $400K while Clinton only made $225K

he was actually able to *GET ELECTED*.. She took all her bribes up front then lost to Trump with a 2-1 money advantage and the press completely in her pocket. Truly pathetic. He should get WAY more than 2x what she does. HE ACTUALLY DELIVERED SOMETHING TO HIS BENEFACTORS. If she had any shame - which she obviously doesn't - she'd disappear forever. And we'd all be the better for it.

Hillary, Bill, and Chelsea are three of the most embarrassing Americans to have ever lived. If you think I'm being too harsh, ask yourself why the (D) party they built for 30 years prefers fascism to democratic socialism.

Jeff W , April 26, 2017 at 4:48 pm

WaPo:

Whether fair or not, it's not difficult to look at Wall Street paying $400,000 to Obama as a reward for [not prosecuting anyone on Wall Street for the crash].

Well, something that seems fairer , if not inarguable, is that if President Obama had prosecuted people on Wall Street, demanded Pecora investigation-style hearings, or, y'know, acted generally in the public interest, Wall Street would not be shelling out $400,000 to hear his views on anything.

To view Obama during his presidency as not being constrained under those circumstances seems, to me, to be a kind of willful obliviousness.

Marina Bart , April 26, 2017 at 8:19 pm

Great framing.

Apparently, corruption is now the love that dare not speak its name.

[May 05, 2017] How to Bring Down the Elephant in the Room by the Saker

I think the problem with this article is that the author can't distinguish were Neoliberalism starts and ends and were Anglo Zionism (which we will understand simply as Neocon ideology starts and ends. both are variants of Trotskyism -- "Trotskyism for the rich" to be exact. Also it is economic interest that trump all others, so that alliance of the USA and Israel is pragmatic and is about USA access to ME oil
They definitely highly intersect, but they are still distinct political ideas ("The USA global empire uber alles in case of neocons; translational elites uber alles in case of neoliberals) and somewhat distinct ideologies. I am not convinced that Cheney cabals (which included Paul Wolfiwitz and several other neocons) was only or mostly pro-Israel political faction. And if tail really wags the dog -- the idea that Israel determine foreign policy of the USA -- is true of not. It can be be that empire has its own dynamics and Israel is just a convenient and valuable ally for now, much like Saudies
Notable quotes:
"... To sum it all up, I need to warn both racists and rabid anti-anti-Zionists that I will disappoint them both: the object of my discussion and criticism below will be limited to categories which a person chooses to belong to or endorse (religion, political ideas, etc.) and not categories which one is born with (race, ethnicity). ..."
"... Second, so what are Jews if not a race? In my opinion, they are a tribe (which Oxford Dictionaires defines as: a social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties, with a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader ..."
"... as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise ..."
"... My own preference still goes for "Zionist" because it combines the ideological racism of secular Jews with the religious racism of Judaics (if you don't like my choice, just replace "Zionist" with any of the categories I listed above). Zionism used to be secular, but it has turned religious during the late 20th century now and so for our purposes this term can encompass both secular and religious Jewish supremacists. Add to this some more or less conservative opinions and minsets and you have "Ziocons" as an alternative expression. ..."
"... doubleplusgoodthinking ..."
"... The reason why I decided to tackle this issue today is that the forces who broke Trump in less than a month are also the very same forces who have forced him into a political 180: the Neocons and the US deep state. However, I think that these two concepts can be fused into on I would call the "Ziocons": basically Zionists plus some rabid Anglo imperialists à la ..."
"... There is some pretty good evidence that the person in charge of this quiet coup is Jared Kushner, a rabid Zionist . Maybe . Maybe not. This does not really matter, what matters now is to understand what this all means for the rest of us in the "basket of deplorables", the "99%ers" – basically the rest of the planet. ..."
"... Syria . I think that we can all agree that having the black flag of Daesh fly over Damascus would be a disaster for Israel. Right? Wrong! You are thinking like a mentally sane person. This is not how the Israelis think at all. For them, Daesh is much preferable to Assad not only because Assad is the cornerstone of a unitary Syria, but because Daesh in power gives the Israelis the perfect pretext to establish a "security zone" to "protect" northern Israel. ..."
"... Daesh is basically a tool to carve up an even bigger Zionist entity. ..."
"... The bottom line is this: modern Neocons are little more than former Trotskyists who have found a new host to use. Their hatred for everything Russian is still so visceral that they rather support bona fide ..."
"... Bottom line – Ziocons feel an overwhelming and always present hatred for Russia and Russians and that factor is one of the key components of their motivations. Unless you take that hatred into account you will never be able to make sense of the Ziocons and their demented policies. ..."
"... Yes, Trump is a poorly educated ignoramus who is much better suited to the shows in Las Vegas than to be President of a nuclear superpower, but I don't see any signs of him being hateful of anybody. ..."
"... The poor man apparently had absolutely no idea of the power and maniacal drive of the Neocons who met him once he entered the White House. ..."
"... we now have the Ziocons in total control of BOTH parties in Congress (or, more accurately, both wings of the Ziocon party in Congress ..."
"... I get the feeling that there are only two types of officers left in the top ranks of the US military: retired ones and " ass-kissing little chickenshit s " à la ..."
"... ZOG. Or "Zionist Occupation Government". That used to be the favorite expression of various Jew-haters out there and it's use was considered the surefire sign of a rabid anti-Semite. And yet, that is precisely what we are now all living with: a Zionist occupation government which has clearly forced Trump to make a 180 on all his campaign promises and which now risks turning the USA into a radioactive desert resulting from a completely artificial and needless confrontation with Russia. ..."
"... Facts are facts, you cannot deny them or refuse to correctly qualify them that because of the possible "overtones" of the term chosen or because of some invented need to be especially "sensitive" when dealing with some special group. Remember – Jews are not owed any special favor and there is no need to constantly engage in various forms of complex linguistic or mental yoga contortions when discussing them and their role in the modern world. Still, I am using ZOG here just to show that it can be done, but this is not my favorite expression. ..."
"... at the same time ..."
"... ZOG is not an American problem. It is a planetary problem, if only because right now ZOG controls the US nuclear arsenal. ..."
"... I don't believe that Trump is dumb enough to actually strike at North Korea. I think that his dumbass plan is probably to shoot down a DPRK missile to show that he has made "America great again" or something equally asinine. ..."
"... To be totally honest, I don't think that the "very powerful armada" will do anything other than waste the US taxpayer's money. I am getting a strong sense that Trump is all about appearance over substance, what the Russians call "показуха" – a kind of fake show of force, full with special effects and "cool" photo ops, but lacking any real substance. Still, being on the receiving end of Trump's показуха (po-kah-zoo-kha) must be unnerving, especially if you already have natural paranoid tendencies. I am not at all sure the Kim Jong-un will find the presence of the US carrier strike group as pathetic and useless as I do. ..."
"... They are the ONLY ONES who really want to maintain the AngloZionst Empire at any cost. Trump made it clear over and over again that his priority was the USA and the American people, not the Empire. ..."
"... I can imagine the gasp of horror and disgust some of you will have at seeing me use the ZOG expression. I assure you, it is quite deliberate on my part. I want to 1) wake you up and 2) show you that you cannot allow the discomfort created by conditioning to guide your analyses ..."
"... Things are coming to a head. Trump presented himself as a real alternative to the ultimate warmongering shabbos-shiksa Hillary. It is now pretty darn obvious that what we got ourselves is just another puppet, but that the puppet-masters have not changed. ..."
"... From Ann Coulter to Pat Buchanan , many paleo-Conservatives clearly "got it". As did the real progressives . What we are left with is what I call the "extreme center", basically zombies who get their news from the Ziomedia and who have so many mental blocks that it takes weeks of focused efforts to basically bring them back to reality. ..."
"... The modern western [neoliberal] society has been built on a categorical rejection of [Christian] ethics and morality. Slogans like "God is dead" or "Beyond good and evil" resulted in the most abject and viciously evil century in human history: the 20th century. Furthermore, most people by now can tell that Hollywood, and its bigger brother, the US porn industry, have played a central role in basically removing categories such as "good" or "truth" or "honor" from the mind of those infected by the US mass media, especially the Idiot-box (aka "telescreen" in Orwell's 1984). Instead unbridled greed and consumption became the highest and most sacred expression of "our way of life" as Americans like to say ..."
"... Hollywood movies proclaimed that " greed is good ". In fact, at the very core of the capitalist [neoliberal] ideology is the belief that the sum total of everybody's greed yields the happiest and most successful society possible. Crazy and sick stuff, but I don't have the place to discuss this here. ..."
"... Sidebar: by the way, and contrary to popular belief, Russia is not an especially religious country at all. While only a minority of Russians is truly religious, a majority of Russians seem to support religious values as civilizational ones. ..."
"... for the time being we have this apparently paradoxical situation of a generally secular society standing for traditional and religious values ..."
"... You might wonder how pacifism, international law, human and civil rights, democracy, pluralism, anti-racism, ethics and morality can help avert a nuclear war in Korea. In truth – they cannot directly do this. But in the long term, I firmly believe that these values can corrode the AngloZionist Empire from within. ..."
"... Public protests does not work in a regime where the Ziomedia gets to decide which demonstration gets coverage and which one does not. ..."
"... ZIG is a more accurate acronym as in INFESTED. Think parasites like bed bugs, ticks, lice, mites, termites, scabies, fleas, ringworm, etc. ..."
"... Excellent, thought provoking and depressingly accurate. Even the cavil about the Golan Heights is based, if I'm not mistaken, on the fact Israel declared it annexed in 1981. ..."
"... I'll have to disagree. It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around. US realized the propaganda potential of the Jews and Israel at the end of WW2 and they never let go of it. ..."
"... That propaganda potential is still there, although it has been milked for more than 70 years now. Before WW2, there was not any kind of "special relationship" between the Jews and USA. US even turned a ship full of Jewish refugees before the onset of the war out of fear that they might offend the Nazis and suffer the consequences for it. That's what a great power they used to be back then – afraid what the Nazis might do to them. ..."
"... Their calculation was like this: Who were the greatest villains of WW2? – The Germans. Who were the ultimate victims of WW2? – The Jews. If the Germans were the bad guys, and the Jews were the good guys and the innocent victims – anybody portraying themselves as protectors of the victims can enjoy the image of being the good guys themselves. ..."
"... US are not the ones being controlled, they are the ones using Israel and the Jews for all they are worth as excellent propaganda material. Sure Israel and the Jews benefit from this, otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to this cozy symbiotic relationship. But the Jews didn't initiate this, it was always US idea. ..."
"... If Trump's foreign policies are being dictated by someone else I want him to give us names, addresses and photographs of the real decision makers. Until that happens I hold him responsible. I have begun to regard Trump as Dubya with Jared as his Cheney. ..."
"... Zionists are very powerful, but they are part of Globalism, a cabal of all elites of world: Chinese, EU, American, Jewish, Latin America, Hindus, Saudis, etc. It is the GLOB that rules. ..."
"... In general, the US leadership has not proven itself bright, cunning or principled enough to resist the Zio agenda. For exhibit "A" just read up on Truman. Then consider LBJ's response to the attack on the USS Liberty. ..."
"... One could also examine who the influential members of the admins of Wilson and FDR as well. ..."
"... But ZOG goes beyond mere government. The Zions now permeate countless NGO's, media institutions including news and entertainment, high finance, folkways involving culture-wide taboos, and or course, higher and lower education. Even Christian doctrine has been altered to accommodate this highly-aggressive movement. The Zionist agenda is a burgeoning phenomena. And its zombie acolytes are similarly ubiquitous. The Zions have captured our government–and more. ..."
"... So, we see a bunch of loyal dual American-Israeli citizens sitting at the top of the Israeli government, it's businesses, and its media? Oh – right – all those dual citizens are sitting atop US government, businesses and media. And we see Israel fighting wars for US' benefit? Oh – right – it's US doing the dirty work for Jewish expansionism. ..."
"... You do not get it Saker. It does not work that way. In absolute numbers losses are very low. It is all up to media to create a perception. America can afford to have many 1000′s more dead w/o any dent in its well being. Just control the media. Vilify the enemies. ..."
"... With the exception of Vietnam War America as and Empire hasn't lost a single war. Vietnam War was misguided from the point of view of the Empire which at the end of 1960′s and beginning of 1970′s was to be redirected to Middle East. ..."
"... There will be everlasting chaos of sectarian fighting as as long as TPTB will be supplying weapons to one of the sides. Always the weaker one at given moment. The same goes for Libya and soon for Syria. No more stable, semi-secular states with strong central power in the Middle East. ..."
"... Do not judge war success in terms of what is good or bad for Americans. It's all about the Empire, not about Americans. ..."
"... My bet is that it is not Trump himself but Ivanka. The elites found a soft spot and are using this weakness to control him. Who would have the means to do this? None other than his son in law Jared. ..."
"... Roland Bernard High Finance Shocking Revelations (Dutch with Subtitles) This video, more than any I have seen, exposes the dark heart of the matter. It's a must-watch from beginning to end. Highly credible, in my opinion. ..."
"... The Zionist attempt to control language. The Israel Project's 2009 GLOBAL LANGUAGE DICTIONARY ..."
"... But the Elephant driver is the British Empire System!!! ..."
"... It is the British behind the coup against Trump. The British want to prevent the end of "Geopolitics" as we know it which is what would happen should America Russia and China come together per the New Silk Road and One Belt initiatives. This is why the British are setting off ..."
"... Look at a swarm of the US Congresspeople blubbering praises for Israel during AIPAC' annual meetings. The US Congress is indeed the Zionist Occupied Territory, a picture of a host captured by a parasitoid. ..."
"... How many referenda the Syrians have held to bring the Golan Heights to the embrace of Israel? We cannot wait to hear your story of Syrian people voting to join Israel. ..."
"... Surely in the dreams of the US ziocons and in the criminal Oded Yinon's plan for Eretz Israel, which preaches for creating a civil disorder in the neighboring states so that Israel could snatch as much territory as possible from the neighbors. The ongoing Libyan and Syrian tragedies belong to that plan. ..."
"... Several notable Jewish American mobsters provided financial support for Israel through donations to Jewish organizations since the country's creation in 1948. Jewish-American gangsters used Israel's Law of Return to flee criminal charges or face deportation " ..."
"... when I read that I thought you might have meant Charlie Reese. he used to write for the Orlando Sentinel in Florida, until ((they)) ran him out ..."
"... Doesn't matter. It was a political defeat, and war is an extension of politics. ..."
Apr 16, 2017 | www.unz.com
219 Comments

First, a painful, but needed, clarification: Basement crazies . Neocons . Zionists . Israel Lobbyists . Judaics . Jews . Somewhere along this list we bump into the proverbial "elephant in the room". For some this bumping will happen earlier in the list, for others a little later down the list, but the list will be more or less the same for everybody. Proper etiquette, as least in the West, would want to make us run away from that topic. I won't. Why? Well, for one thing I am constantly accused of not discussing this elephant. Furthermore, I am afraid that the role this elephant is playing is particularly toxic right now. So let me try to deal with this beast, but first I have to begin with some caveats.

First, terminology. For those who have not seen it, please read my article " Why I use the term AngloZionist and why it is important ". Second, please read my friend Gilad Atzmon's article " Jews, Judaism & Jewishness " (or, even better, please read his seminal book The Wondering Who ). Please note that Gilad specifically excludes Judaics (religious Jews,) from his discussion. He writes "I do not deal with Jews as a race or an ethnicity . I also generally avoid dealing with Judaism (the religion)". I very much include them in my discussion. However, I also fully agree with Gilad when he writes that " Jews Are Not a Race But Jewish Identity is Racist " (those having any doubts about Jews not being a race or ethnicity should read Shlomo Sand's excellent book " The Invention of the Jewish People "). Lastly, please carefully review my definition of racism as spelled out in my " moderation policies ":

Racism is, in my opinion, not so much the belief that various human groups are different from each other, say like dog breeds can be different, but the belief that the differences between human groups are larger than within the group. Second, racism is also a belief that the biological characteristics of your group somehow pre-determine your actions/choices/values in life. Third, racism often, but not always, assumes a hierarchy amongst human groups (Germanic Aryans over Slavs or Jews, Jews over Gentiles, etc.). I believe that God created all humans with the same purpose and that we are all "brothers in Adam", that we all equally share the image (eternal and inherent potential for perfection) of God (as opposed to our likeness to Him, which is our temporary and changing individual condition).

To sum it all up, I need to warn both racists and rabid anti-anti-Zionists that I will disappoint them both: the object of my discussion and criticism below will be limited to categories which a person chooses to belong to or endorse (religion, political ideas, etc.) and not categories which one is born with (race, ethnicity).

Second, so what are Jews if not a race? In my opinion, they are a tribe (which Oxford Dictionaires defines as: a social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties, with a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader ). A tribe is a group one can chose to join (Elizabeth Taylor) or leave (Gilad Atzmon).

Third, it is precisely and because Jews are a tribe that we, non-Jews, owe them exactly nothing: no special status, neither bad nor good, no special privilege of any kind, no special respect or "sensitivity" – nothing at all. We ought to treat Jews exactly as we treat any other of our fellow human beings: as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise (Luke 6:31). So if being Jewish is a choice and if any choice is a legitimate object of discussion and criticism, then (choosing to) being Jewish is a legitimate object of discussion and criticism. Conversely, those who would deny us the right to criticize Jews are, of course, the real racists since they do believe that Jews somehow deserve a special status. In fact, that notion is at the core of the entire Jewish identity and ideology.

Now let's come back to our opening list: Basement crazies. Neocons. Zionists. Israel Lobbyists. Judaics. Jews. I submit that these are all legitimate categories as long as it is clear that "Jews by birth only", what Alain Soral in France calls "the everyday Jews", are not included in this list. Thus, for our purposes and in this context, these terms are all interchangeable. My own preference still goes for "Zionist" because it combines the ideological racism of secular Jews with the religious racism of Judaics (if you don't like my choice, just replace "Zionist" with any of the categories I listed above). Zionism used to be secular, but it has turned religious during the late 20th century now and so for our purposes this term can encompass both secular and religious Jewish supremacists. Add to this some more or less conservative opinions and minsets and you have "Ziocons" as an alternative expression.

[Sidebar: it tells you something about the power of the Zionist propaganda machine, I call it the Ziomedia, that I would have to preface this article with a 700+ explanatory words note to try to overcome conditioned mental reflexes in the reader (that I might be an evil anti-Semite). By the way, I am under no illusions either: some Jews or doubleplusgoodthinking shabbos-goyim will still accuse me of racism. This just comes with the territory. But the good news is when I will challenge them to prove their accusation they will walk away empty-handed].

The reason why I decided to tackle this issue today is that the forces who broke Trump in less than a month are also the very same forces who have forced him into a political 180: the Neocons and the US deep state. However, I think that these two concepts can be fused into on I would call the "Ziocons": basically Zionists plus some rabid Anglo imperialists à la Cheney or McCain. These are the folks who control the US corporate media, Hollywood, Congress, most of academia, etc . These are the folks who organized a ferocious assault on the "nationalist" or "patriotic" wing of Trump supporters and ousted Flynn and Bannon and these are the folks who basically staged a color revolution against Trump . There is some pretty good evidence that the person in charge of this quiet coup is Jared Kushner, a rabid Zionist . Maybe . Maybe not. This does not really matter, what matters now is to understand what this all means for the rest of us in the "basket of deplorables", the "99%ers" – basically the rest of the planet.

Making sense of the crazies

Making sense of the motives and goals (one cannot speak of "logic" in this case) of self-deluded racists can be a difficult exercise. But when the "basement crazies" (reminder: the term from from here ) are basically in control of the policies of the US Empire, this exercise becomes crucial, vital for the survival of the mentally sane. I will now try to outline the reasons behind the "new" Trump policies using two examples: Syria and Russia.

Syria . I think that we can all agree that having the black flag of Daesh fly over Damascus would be a disaster for Israel. Right? Wrong! You are thinking like a mentally sane person. This is not how the Israelis think at all. For them, Daesh is much preferable to Assad not only because Assad is the cornerstone of a unitary Syria, but because Daesh in power gives the Israelis the perfect pretext to establish a "security zone" to "protect" northern Israel. And that, in plain English, means fully occupying and annexing the Golan (an old Israeli dream). Even better, the Israelis know Daesh really well (they helped create it with the USA and Saudi Arabia) and they know that Daesh is a mortal threat to Hezbollah. By putting Daesh into power in Syria, the Israelis hope for a long, bloody and never ending war in Lebanon and Syria. While their northern neighbors would be plugged into maelstrom of atrocities and horrors, the Israelis would get to watch it all from across their border while sending a few aircraft from time to time to bomb Hezbollah positions or even innocent civilians under whatever pretext. Remember how the Israelis watched in total delight how their forces bombed the population of Gaza in 2014? With Daesh in power in Damascus, they would get an even better show to take their kids to. Finally, and last but most definitely not least, the Syrian Christians would be basically completely wiped out. For those who know the hatred Judaics and Jews have always felt for Christianity (even today ) it will be clear why the Israelis would want Daesh in power in Syria: Daesh is basically a tool to carve up an even bigger Zionist entity.

Russia . Ziocons absolutely loathe Russia and everything Russian. Particularly the ex-Trotskyists turned Neocons. I have explained the origins of this hatred elsewhere and I won't repeat it all here. You just need to study the genocidal policies against anything Russian of the first Bolshevik government (which was 80%-85% Jews; don't believe me? Then listen to Putin himself ). I have already discussed " The ancient spiritual roots of russophobia " in a past article and I have also explain what rabbinical Phariseism (what is mistakenly called "Judaism" nowadays) is little more than an "anti-Christianity "(please read those articles if this complex and fascinating history is of interest to you). The bottom line is this: modern Neocons are little more than former Trotskyists who have found a new host to use. Their hatred for everything Russian is still so visceral that they rather support bona fide Nazis (isn't this ironic?) in the Ukraine than Russia, which is even more paradoxical if you recall that before the 1917 Bolshevik coup anti-Jewish feelings were much stronger in what is today the Ukraine than in what is the Russian Federation today.

In fact, relations between Russians and Jews have, I would argue, been significantly improving since the Nazi coup in Kiev, much to the chagrin of the relatively few Russians left who truly hate Jews. While you will hear a lot of criticism of organized political Jewry in Russia, especially compared to the West, there is very little true anti-Jewish racism in Russia today, and even less publicly expressed in the media (in fact, 'hate speech' is illegal in Russia). One thing to keep in mind is that there are many substantial differences between Russian Jews and US Jews, especially amongst those Russian Jews who deliberately chose not to emigrate to Israel, or some other western country (those interested in this topic can find a more detailed discussion here ). Jews in Russia today deliberately chose to stay and that, right there, show a very different attitude than the attitude of those (Jews and non-Jews) who took the first opportunity to get out of Russia as soon as possible. Bottom line – Ziocons feel an overwhelming and always present hatred for Russia and Russians and that factor is one of the key components of their motivations. Unless you take that hatred into account you will never be able to make sense of the Ziocons and their demented policies.

Making sense of Trump

I think that Trump can be criticized for a lot of things, but there is exactly zero evidence of him ever harboring anti-Russian feelings. There is plenty of evidence that he has always been pro-Israeli, but no more than any politician or businessman in the USA. I doubt that Trump even knows where the Golan Heights even are. He probably also does not know that Hezbollah and Daesh are mortal enemies. Yes, Trump is a poorly educated ignoramus who is much better suited to the shows in Las Vegas than to be President of a nuclear superpower, but I don't see any signs of him being hateful of anybody. More generally, the guy is really not ideological. The best evidence is his goofy idea of building a wall to solve the problem of illegal immigration: he (correctly) identified a problem, but then he came up with a Kindergarten level (pseudo) solution.

The same goes for his views on Russia. He probably figured out something along these lines: "Putin is a strong guy, Russia is a strong country, they hate Daesh and want to destroy it – let's join forces". The poor man apparently had absolutely no idea of the power and maniacal drive of the Neocons who met him once he entered the White House. Even worse is the fact that he apparently does not realize that they are now using him to try out some pretty demented policies for which they will later try to impeach him as the sole culprit should things go wrong (and they most definitely will). Frankly, I get the feeling that Trump was basically sincere in his desire to "drain the swamp" but that he is simply not too clever (just the way he betrayed Flynn and Bannon to try to appease the Ziocons is so self-defeating and, frankly, stupid). But even if I am wrong and Trump was "their" plant all along (I still don't believe that at all), the end result is the same: we now have the Ziocons in total control of BOTH parties in Congress (or, more accurately, both wings of the Ziocon party in Congress ), in total control of the White House, the mass media and Hollywood. I am not so sure that they truly are in control of the Pentagon, but when I see the kind of pliable and spineless figures military Trump has recently appointed, I get the feeling that there are only two types of officers left in the top ranks of the US military: retired ones and " ass-kissing little chickenshit s " à la Petraeus. Not good. Not good at all. As for the ridiculously bloated (and therefore mostly incompetent) "three letter agencies soup", it appears that it has been turned from an intelligence community to a highly politicized propaganda community whose main purpose is to justify whatever counter-factual insanity their political bosses can dream up. Again. Not good. Not good at all.

Living with ZOG

ZOG. Or "Zionist Occupation Government". That used to be the favorite expression of various Jew-haters out there and it's use was considered the surefire sign of a rabid anti-Semite. And yet, that is precisely what we are now all living with: a Zionist occupation government which has clearly forced Trump to make a 180 on all his campaign promises and which now risks turning the USA into a radioactive desert resulting from a completely artificial and needless confrontation with Russia. To those horrified that I would dare use an expression like ZOG I will reply this: believe me, I am even more upset about having to admit that ZOG is real than you are: I really don't care for racists of any kind, and most of these ZOG folks looks like real racists to me. But, alas, they are also right! Facts are facts, you cannot deny them or refuse to correctly qualify them that because of the possible "overtones" of the term chosen or because of some invented need to be especially "sensitive" when dealing with some special group. Remember – Jews are not owed any special favor and there is no need to constantly engage in various forms of complex linguistic or mental yoga contortions when discussing them and their role in the modern world. Still, I am using ZOG here just to show that it can be done, but this is not my favorite expression. I just feel that committing the crimethink here will encourage others to come out of their shell and speak freely. At the very least, asking the question of whether we do or do not have a Zionist Occupation Government is an extremely important exercise all by itself. Hence, today I ZOG-away

Some might argue with the "occupation" part of the label. Okay – what would you call a regime which is clearly acting in direct opposition to the will of an overwhelming majority of the people and which acts in the interests of a foreign power (with which the USA does not even have a formal treaty)? Because, please make no mistake here, this is not a Trump-specific phenomenon. I think that it all began with Reagan and that the Ziocons fully seized power with Bill Clinton. Others think that it all began with Kennedy. Whatever may be the case, what is clear is that election after election Americans consistently vote for less war and each time around they get more wars . It is true that most Americans are mentally unable to conceptually analyze the bizarre phenomena of a country with no enemies and formidable natural barriers needs to spend more on wars of aggression then the rest of the planet spends of defense. Nor are they equipped to wonder why the US needs 16/17 intelligences agencies when the vast majority of countries out there do fine with 2-5. Lastly, most Americans do believe that they have some kind of duty to police the planet. True. But at the same time , they are also sick and tired of wars, if only because so many of their relatives, friends and neighbors return from these wars either dead or crippled. That, and the fact that Americans absolutely hate losing. Losing is all the USA has been doing since God knows how long: losing wars against all but the weakest and most defenseless countries out there. Most Americans also would prefer that the money spent aboard on "defending democracy" (i.e. imperialism) be spent at home to help the millions of Americans in need in the USA. As the southern rock band Lynyrd Snynyrd (which hails from Jacksonville, Florida) once put it in their songs " Things goin' on ":

Too many lives they've spent across the ocean
Too much money been spent upon the moon
Well, until they make it right
I hope they never sleep at night
They better make some changes
And do it soon

Soon? That song was written in 1978! And since then, nothing has changed. If anything, things got worse, much worse.

Houston, we got a problem

ZOG is not an American problem. It is a planetary problem, if only because right now ZOG controls the US nuclear arsenal. And Trump, who clearly and unequivocally campaigned on a peace platform, is now sending a " very powerful armada " to the coast of the DPRK. Powerful as this armada might be, it can do absolutely nothing to prevent the DPRK artillery from smashing Seoul into smithereens. You think that I am exaggerating? Business Insider estimated in 2010 that it would take the DPRK 2 hours to completely obliterate Seoul . Why? Because the DPRK has enough artillery pieces to fire 500,000 rounds of artillery on Seoul in the first hour of a conflict , that's why. Here we are talking about old fashioned, conventional, artillery pieces. Wikipedia says that the DPRK has 8,600 artillery pieces and 4,800 multiple rocket launcher systems. Two days a go a Russian expert said that the real figure was just under 20'000 artillery pieces. Whatever thee exact figure, suffice to say that it is "a lot".

The DPRK also has some more modern but equally dangerous capabilities . Of special importance here are the roughly 200'000 North Korean special forces. Oh sure, these 200'000 are not US Green Beret or Russian Spetsnaz, but they are adequate for their task: to operate deep behind enemy lies and create chaos and destroy key objectives. You tell me – what can the USS Carl Vinson carrier strike group deploy against these well hidden and dispersed 10'000+ artillery pieces and 200'000 special forces? Exactly, nothing at all.

And did I mention that the DPRK has nukes?

No, I did not. First, I am not at all sure that the kind of nukes the DPRK has can be fitted for delivery on a missile. Having a few nukes and having missiles is one thing, having missiles capable of adequately delivering these nukes is quite another. I suppose that DPRK special forces could simply drive a nuke down near Seoul on a simple army truck and blow it up. Or bring it in a container ship somewhere in the general vicinity of a US or Korean base and blow it up there. One neat trick would be to load a nuke on a civilian ship, say a fishing vessel, and bring it somewhere near the USS Carl Vinson and then blow it up. Even if the USN ships survive this unscathed, the panic aboard these ships would be total. To be honest, this mostly Tom Clancy stuff, in real warfare I don't think that the North Korean nukes would be very useful against a US attack. But you never know, necessity is the mother of invention , as the British like to say.

I don't believe that Trump is dumb enough to actually strike at North Korea. I think that his dumbass plan is probably to shoot down a DPRK missile to show that he has made "America great again" or something equally asinine. The problem here is that I am not sure at all how Kim Jong-un and his Party minions might react to that kind of loss of face. What if they decided that they needed to fire some more missiles, some in the general direction of US forces in the region (there are fixed US targets all over the place). Then what? How will Trump prove that he is the biggest dog on the block? Could he decide to "punish" the offending missile launch site like he did with the al-Sharyat airbase in Syria? And if Trump does that – what will Kim Jong-un's reaction be?

To be totally honest, I don't think that the "very powerful armada" will do anything other than waste the US taxpayer's money. I am getting a strong sense that Trump is all about appearance over substance, what the Russians call "показуха" – a kind of fake show of force, full with special effects and "cool" photo ops, but lacking any real substance. Still, being on the receiving end of Trump's показуха (po-kah-zoo-kha) must be unnerving, especially if you already have natural paranoid tendencies. I am not at all sure the Kim Jong-un will find the presence of the US carrier strike group as pathetic and useless as I do.

Both Russia and Syria have shown an amazing about of restraint when provoked by Turkey or the US. This is mostly due to the fact that Russian and Syrian leaders are well-educated people who are less concerned with loss of face than with achieving their end result. In direct contrast, both Kim Jong-un and Trump are weak, insecure, leaders with an urgent need to prove to their people (and to themselves!) that they are tough guys. Exactly the most dangerous kind of mindset you want in any nuclear-capable power, be it huge like the USA or tiny like the DPRK.

So what does that have to do with the ZOG and the Ziocons? Everything.

They are the ONLY ONES who really want to maintain the AngloZionst Empire at any cost. Trump made it clear over and over again that his priority was the USA and the American people, not the Empire. And yet now is is playing a crazy game of "nuclear chicken" with the DPRK. Does that sound like the "real Trump" to you? Maybe – but not to me. All this crazy stuff around the DPRK and the (few) nukes it apparently has, is all just a pretext to "play empire", to show that, as Obama liked to say, the USA is the " indispensable nation ". God forbid the local countries would deal with that problem alone, without USN carrier strike groups involved in the "solving" of this problem!

[Sidebar: by the way, this is also the exact same situation in Syria: the Russians have single-handedly organized a viable peace-process on the ground and then followed it up with a multi-party conference in Astana, Kazakhstan. Looks great except for one problem: the indispensable nation was not even invited. Even worse, the prospects of peace breaking out became terribly real. The said indispensable nation therefore "invited itself" by illegally (and ineffectually) bombing a Syrian air base and, having now proven its capacity to wreck any peace process, the USA is now right back in center-stage of the negotiations about the future of Syria. In a perverse way, this almost makes sense.]

So yes, we have a problem and that problem is that ZOG is in total control of the Empire and will never accept to let it go, even if that means destroying the USA in the process.

I can imagine the gasp of horror and disgust some of you will have at seeing me use the ZOG expression. I assure you, it is quite deliberate on my part. I want to 1) wake you up and 2) show you that you cannot allow the discomfort created by conditioning to guide your analyses . As with all the other forms of crimethink , I recommend that you engage in a lot of it, preferably in public, and you will get used to it. First it will be hard, but with time it will get easier (it is also great fun). Furthermore, somebody needs to be the first one to scream " the emperor has no clothes ". Then, once one person does it, the others realize that it is safe and more follow. The key thing here is not to allow ideological "sacred cows" to roam around your intellectual mindspace and limit you in your thinking. Dogmas should be limited to Divine revelations, not human ideological constructs.

Where do we go from here?

Things are coming to a head. Trump presented himself as a real alternative to the ultimate warmongering shabbos-shiksa Hillary. It is now pretty darn obvious that what we got ourselves is just another puppet, but that the puppet-masters have not changed. The good news is that those who were sincere in their opposition to war are now openly speaking about Trump great betrayal. From Ann Coulter to Pat Buchanan , many paleo-Conservatives clearly "got it". As did the real progressives . What we are left with is what I call the "extreme center", basically zombies who get their news from the Ziomedia and who have so many mental blocks that it takes weeks of focused efforts to basically bring them back to reality.

The key issue here is how do we bring together those who are still capable of thought? I think that a minimalist agenda we can all agree upon could be composed of the following points:

Peace/pacifism International law Human and civil rights Democracy Pluralism Anti-racism Ethics and morality

Sounds harmless? It ain't, I assure you. ZOG can only survive by violence, terror and war. Furthermore, the AngloZionist Empire cannot abide by any principles of international law. As for human and civil right, once quick look at the Patriot Act (which was already ready by the time the 9/11 false flag operation was executed) will tell you how ZOG feels about these issues. More proof? How about the entire "fake news" canard? How about the new levels of censorship in YouTube, Facebook or Google? Don't you see that this is simply a frontal attack on free speech and the First Amendment?! What about Black Lives Matter – is that not a perfect pretext to justify more police powers and a further militarization of police forces? To think that the Zionists care about human or civil rights is a joke! Just read what the Uber-Zionist and [putative] human right lawyer, the great Alan Dershowitz writes about torture, Israel or free speech (for Norman Finkelstein). Heck, just read what ultra-liberal super-mega human righter (well, after he returned to civilian life) and ex-President Jimmy Carter writes about Israel -- Or look at the policies of the Bolshevik regime in Russia. It it pretty clear that these guys not only don't give a damn about human or civil right, but that they are deeply offended and outraged when they are told that they cannot violate these rights.

What about democracy? How can that be a intellectual weapon? Simple – you show that every time the people (in the USA or Europe) voted for X they got Y. Or they were told to re-vote and re-vote and re-vote again and again until, finally, the Y won. That is a clear lack of democracy. So if you say that you want to restore democracy, you are basically advocating regime-change, but nicely wrapped into a "good" ideological wrapper. Western democracies are profoundly anti-democratic. Show it!

Pluralism? Same deal. All this takes is to prove that the western society has become a "mono-ideological" society were real dissent is simply not tolerated and were real pluralism is completely ascent from the public discourse. Demand that the enemies of the system be given equal time on air and always make sure that you give the supporters of the system equal time on media outlets you (we) control. Then ask them to compare. This is exactly what Russia is doing nowadays (see here if you are interested). Western democracies are profoundly anti-pluralistic. Again, show it!

Anti-racism. Should be obvious to the reader by now. Denounce, reject and attack any idea which gives any group any special status. Force your opponents to fess up to the fact that what they really want when they claim to struggle for "equality" is a special status for their single-issue minority. Reject any and all special interest groups and, especially, reject the notion that democracy is about defending the minority against the majority. In reality, minorities are always much more driven and motivated by a single issue which is why a coalition of minorities inevitably comes to power. What the world needs is the exact opposite: a democracy which would protect the majority against the minorities. Oh, sure, they will fight you on this one, but since you are right this is an intellectual argument you ought to be capable of winning pretty easily (just remember, don't let accusations of crimethink freeze you in terror).

Last, my favorite one: ethics and morality.

The modern western [neoliberal] society has been built on a categorical rejection of [Christian] ethics and morality. Slogans like "God is dead" or "Beyond good and evil" resulted in the most abject and viciously evil century in human history: the 20th century. Furthermore, most people by now can tell that Hollywood, and its bigger brother, the US porn industry, have played a central role in basically removing categories such as "good" or "truth" or "honor" from the mind of those infected by the US mass media, especially the Idiot-box (aka "telescreen" in Orwell's 1984). Instead unbridled greed and consumption became the highest and most sacred expression of "our way of life" as Americans like to say .

Hollywood movies proclaimed that " greed is good ". In fact, at the very core of the capitalist [neoliberal] ideology is the belief that the sum total of everybody's greed yields the happiest and most successful society possible. Crazy and sick stuff, but I don't have the place to discuss this here. All I will say that that rehabilitating notions such as right and wrong, good and evil, truth and falsehood, healthy and natural versus unnatural and pathological is a great legal way (at least so far) to fight the Empire. Ditto for sexual morality and family. There is a reason why all Hollywood movies inevitably present only divorced or sexually promiscuous heroes: they are trying to destroy the natural family unit because they *correctly* identify the traditional family unit as a threat to the AngloZionist order. Likewise, there is also a reason why all the western elites are constantly plagued by accusations of pedophilia and other sexual scandals. One Russian commentator, Vitalii Tretiakov, recently hilariously paraphrased the old communist slogan and declared "naturals of all countries – come to Russia" [in modern Russian "naturals" is the antonym of "homosexual"). He was joking, of course, but he was also making a serious point: Russia has become the only country which dares to openly uphold the core values of Christianity and Islam (that, of course, only adds to the Ziocon's hatred of Russia).

[ Sidebar: by the way, and contrary to popular belief, Russia is not an especially religious country at all. While only a minority of Russians is truly religious, a majority of Russians seem to support religious values as civilizational ones. I don't think that this is sustainable for too long, Russia will either become more religious or more secularized, but for the time being we have this apparently paradoxical situation of a generally secular society standing for traditional and religious values ]

You might wonder how pacifism, international law, human and civil rights, democracy, pluralism, anti-racism, ethics and morality can help avert a nuclear war in Korea. In truth – they cannot directly do this. But in the long term, I firmly believe that these values can corrode the AngloZionist Empire from within. And look at the alternatives:

Organizing political parties does not work in a system where money determine the outcome. "Direct action" does not work in a system which treats libertarians and ecologists as potential terrorists. Public protests does not work in a regime where the Ziomedia gets to decide which demonstration gets coverage and which one does not. Civil disobedience does not work in a regime which has no problem having the highest per capita incarceration rate on the planet. Running for office does not work in a regime which selects for spinelessness, immorality and, above all, subservience. Even running away abroad does not work when dealing with an Empire which has 700-1000 (depends on how you count) military bases worldwide and which will bomb the crap out of any government which strives at even a modicum of true sovereignty.

The only other option is "internal exile", when you build yourself you own inner world of spiritual and intellectual freedom and you basically "live there" with no external signs of you having "fled" the Empire's ugly reality. But if nuclear-tipped ICBMs start flying no amount of "internal exile" will protect you, not even if you combine that internal exile with with a life far away in the boonies.

Orthodox Christian eschatology teaches that the End Times are inevitable. However, the Fathers also teach that we can push the End Times back by our collective actions, be it in the form of prayers or in the form of an open resistance to Evil in our world. I have three children, 1 girl and 2 boys, and I feel like I owe it to them to fight to make the world they will have to live even marginally better.

... ... ..

nsa, April 17, 2017 at 1:26 am GMT

ZIG is a more accurate acronym as in INFESTED. Think parasites like bed bugs, ticks, lice, mites, termites, scabies, fleas, ringworm, etc.

exiled off mainstreet, April 17, 2017 at 2:10 am GMT • 100 Words

Excellent, thought provoking and depressingly accurate. Even the cavil about the Golan Heights is based, if I'm not mistaken, on the fact Israel declared it annexed in 1981. I'm not sure it is internationally recognized, though the US, as an Israeli acolyte as indicated by the article in spades, may have done so at some point.

Cyrano , April 17, 2017 at 2:44 am GMT

Most of the time I like the way Saker thinks, but on this one I'll have to disagree. It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around. US realized the propaganda potential of the Jews and Israel at the end of WW2 and they never let go of it.

That propaganda potential is still there, although it has been milked for more than 70 years now. Before WW2, there was not any kind of "special relationship" between the Jews and USA. US even turned a ship full of Jewish refugees before the onset of the war out of fear that they might offend the Nazis and suffer the consequences for it. That's what a great power they used to be back then – afraid what the Nazis might do to them.

Then in the closing stages of WW2, when the Russians told them what they found in the concentration camps that they liberated – at first the Americans dismissed their reports as "communist propaganda." They refused to believe that highly "civilized" European country such as Germany can commit such barbarities. Only after they were faced with overwhelming evidence about the concentration camps, the US decided to change their tune.

Their calculation was like this: Who were the greatest villains of WW2? – The Germans. Who were the ultimate victims of WW2? – The Jews. If the Germans were the bad guys, and the Jews were the good guys and the innocent victims – anybody portraying themselves as protectors of the victims can enjoy the image of being the good guys themselves. That formula is still being used today, but it's mostly in Europe and US that it's still considered valid, for the rest of the world just too much time has passed and some of Israel's behavior in the ME has cast a shadow on their image as eternal victims.

People on this site want to view the Jews as George Milton and US as Lenny Small – from Steinbeck novel "Of mice and men". But the reality is much different. US are not Lenny Small, a giant with great physical strength but not too much brain power. US are not the ones being controlled, they are the ones using Israel and the Jews for all they are worth as excellent propaganda material. Sure Israel and the Jews benefit from this, otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to this cozy symbiotic relationship. But the Jews didn't initiate this, it was always US idea.

WorkingClass, April 17, 2017 at 4:20 am GMT /p>

If Trump's foreign policies are being dictated by someone else I want him to give us names, addresses and photographs of the real decision makers. Until that happens I hold him responsible. I have begun to regard Trump as Dubya with Jared as his Cheney.

Well done Saker. Please keep up the good work.

Anon, April 17, 2017 at 5:31 am GMT

Zionists are very powerful, but they are part of Globalism, a cabal of all elites of world: Chinese, EU, American, Jewish, Latin America, Hindus, Saudis, etc. It is the GLOB that rules.

jacques sheete , April 17, 2017 at 12:37 pm GMT
@Cyrano

But the Jews didn't initiate this, it was always US idea.

Nice try, but what have you to say about the originators of the Zionist project?

P.S.: In general, the US leadership has not proven itself bright, cunning or principled enough to resist the Zio agenda. For exhibit "A" just read up on Truman. Then consider LBJ's response to the attack on the USS Liberty.

One could also examine who the influential members of the admins of Wilson and FDR as well.

Mark Green, April 17, 2017 at 4:50 pm GMT

This is a very thoughtful article. The Saker covers a lot of ground. Basically, he has provided his readers with not only a highly perceptive overview, but a blueprint from which they can begin resisting ZOG (or ZIG) tyranny. And let's make no mistake about it: ZOG exists and its impact is immense.

But ZOG goes beyond mere government. The Zions now permeate countless NGO's, media institutions including news and entertainment, high finance, folkways involving culture-wide taboos, and or course, higher and lower education. Even Christian doctrine has been altered to accommodate this highly-aggressive movement. The Zionist agenda is a burgeoning phenomena. And its zombie acolytes are similarly ubiquitous. The Zions have captured our government–and more.

The Saker also correctly notes that the distorting influence of Zionism has become too apparent to deny–even though it is, at the same time, nearly invisible; as it operates in plain sight under various pseudonyms, disguises and false pretenses.

Indeed, its influence remains mostly unrecognized and it is therefore unresisted. For now.

Indeed, even Trump–after only months in office–has fallen under its clever spell. We must therefore strive to examine, discuss, critique and resist this extra-national force of malevolence. Step one: Identify the source.

The intellectual and culture-wide power of ZOG emanates in great part via our mainstream media. The mind-numbing and destructive impact of ZOG in Western media must be understood and unmasked.

Fran Macadam, April 18, 2017 at 2:13 am GMT

When you're right you're right. Logic like this is what leads the paranoiacs to think Russkis are taking over! When you make good sense, it can't help but "control" minds.

One of the saddest developments, to a former implacable Cold Warrior and anticommunist, is that when by a miracle (yes, I count it that) the Russians ended communism by their own choice, without shots being fired, our side did not respond honorably (at least the ones at the commanding heights of our society.)

Like your description of what Trump thought, "Hey Russia's fighting ISIS, let's have them take care of it and save us the trouble" I'm a simple guy too who'd rather see the destructive waste of war money instead be spent on infrastructure for our folks.

I think of "House of the Dead" where the picture of the prisoners waiting for release through the coming of Christ, is a picture of us poor prisoners, but still of faith, waiting in this world too. Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus.

CalDre, April 18, 2017 at 2:56 am GMT

@Cyrano

Wow, where to start when someone claims white is black .

It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around.

So, we see a bunch of loyal dual American-Israeli citizens sitting at the top of the Israeli government, it's businesses, and its media? Oh – right – all those dual citizens are sitting atop US government, businesses and media. And we see Israel fighting wars for US' benefit? Oh – right – it's US doing the dirty work for Jewish expansionism.

US even turned a ship full of Jewish refugees before the onset of the war out of fear that they might offend the Nazis and suffer the consequences for it.

That's not the case. The Jews were turned away because the Jewish Establishment/Zionists ordered the US to turn them back. Why? Because they wanted them to go to Israel to rob the Palestinians of their land instead. So it was not the Nazis the US was afraid of (then or now), but the Jewish oligarchs.

Then in the closing stages of WW2, when the Russians told them what they found in the concentration camps that they liberated – at first the Americans dismissed their reports as "communist propaganda." They refused to believe that highly "civilized" European country such as Germany can commit such barbarities. Only after they were faced with overwhelming evidence about the concentration camps, the US decided to change their tune.

There is not to this day any "overwhelming" or even "underwhelming" evidence of the Holohoax. Soviets made a bunch of propaganda out of the (labor) camps in large part to get back at Germany for the terrible losses the Soviets suffered, as well as the huge embarrassment when the Nazis revealed the Soviet crimes in Katlyn Forest. However when in the early 1990s Gorbachev released the notorious Auschwitz "death books", it turns out hardly any Jews were killed, and none by gassings, rather the vast majority of the dead succumbed to typhus (typhus being carried by lice, and Zyklon-B, the chemical Germany is (falsely) accused of using to murder Jews by the millions, was actually used to kill lice and thereby save Jews in the camps).

utu, April 18, 2017 at 5:37 am GMT

But even if I am wrong and Trump was "their" plant all along

It's possible that Trump did not even know that he was their plant but at some point after psychological profiling of him and assessing all leverages available to them to pry and prod him it was decided he will be just fine for the job. That's why he was allowed to win the election. The anti-Trump color revolution conducted by the so-called liberal left was a crucial part from the arsenal of the leverages. In the end it worked out beautifully for them. Gen. Flynn was not too bright to realize what hit him but Bannon is perhaps the only guy, in the good guys camp, who knows what is really going on. I am just wondering why he is still there. Perhaps they are forcing him to stay for the sake of the deluded iron electorate of Trump to prolong their delusion.

utu , April 18, 2017 at 5:54 am GMT

they are also sick and tired of wars, if only because so many of their relatives, friends and neighbors return from these wars either dead or crippled. That, and the fact that Americans absolutely hate losing. Losing is all the USA has been doing since God knows how long: losing wars against all but the weakest and most defenseless countries out there

You do not get it Saker. It does not work that way. In absolute numbers losses are very low. It is all up to media to create a perception. America can afford to have many 1000′s more dead w/o any dent in its well being. Just control the media. Vilify the enemies.

With the exception of Vietnam War America as and Empire hasn't lost a single war. Vietnam War was misguided from the point of view of the Empire which at the end of 1960′s and beginning of 1970′s was to be redirected to Middle East.

This was a new task for the Empire. So everything goes according to the plan, e.g. Iraq war goals were 100% accomplished. There is no more state of Iraq. Iraq will no pose a thread to anybody and Israel in particular. There will be everlasting chaos of sectarian fighting as as long as TPTB will be supplying weapons to one of the sides. Always the weaker one at given moment. The same goes for Libya and soon for Syria. No more stable, semi-secular states with strong central power in the Middle East.

Do not judge war success in terms of what is good or bad for Americans. It's all about the Empire, not about Americans.

Kiza , April 18, 2017 at 6:54 am GMT
The best Saker's essay so far, the most inspired and the most identifiable. Just two quick notes from me.

First, the ZOG/ZIG is so ubiquitous and powerful that the past election with Trump against Hillary was really a duel between pro-Trump young Zionists and the pro-Hillary old Zionists, in other words it was a generational change among the Masters (it was also a change in who will profit from political power). Since Trump turned to the Dark Side, I have realised that Jared was always there, even during the election, as an éminence grise and he pulled Trump's strings a forced a switch from election rhetoric to post-election reality. I have no doubt that Jared is the man behind the man, except that he also must have a fairly powerful Zionist base behind him.

Second, Saker just like Mr Giraldi has become a magnet for all and sundry Hasbara trolls, obviously because both are the most prominent exposers of the ZOG/ZIG. It is important to remember that all Western Governments are ZOG/ZIG, without exception. Only BRICS countries appear free at the moment, despite 1000 military basis of the global ZOG/ZIG.

Truth , April 18, 2017 at 12:09 pm GMT
@Anonymous

Trump is being blackmailed.

My bet is that it is not Trump himself but Ivanka. The elites found a soft spot and are using this weakness to control him. Who would have the means to do this? None other than his son in law Jared.

He could have coerced her into doing something stupid on camera like group sex or being blacked and little Jared would not think twice to use this to control a weak man like Trump.

Translation from "alt-rightish" into English:

"Ive been a dupe and a stupid sucker for the last 2 1/2 years, and I need to believe that somehow the Jooz corrupted and bent this fine American hero to their own will in two months, instead of acknowledging the obvious truth that he was a weak, pathetic asset, and a literal as well as figurative, cocksucker, all along."

You're welcome

Tha Philosopher , April 18, 2017 at 12:46 pm GMT
I don't know if you wrote this as a response to my comment some time back arguing you were ignoring the elephant in the room, but this article reflects my thoughts more or less on Zion.

I would add the historical record of Zion from Pharoah, the catacombs under Rome, to Spain, to Edwardian England, Tsarist Russia and so on is a record much like a locust. You have to wonder where all the 'persecution' comes from. Where the causuality?

Its seeks economic surplus.

And yes, they are missing the part of the brain associated with white high empathy and 'fair play' as Jayman has mentioned. They studied that weakness in Tavistock to find these pavlonian words like 'rac-ism' and when designing the themes in their movies and the fiction work they publish.

The way to defeat Zion is to say the Necromancers name. Say it. If you say whats going on, the power of the Illusion and the fraud subsists entirely. No violence is needed. Repeat no violence is needed. Just say it. Bring it up in a discussion about politics politely and with evidence. The higher IQ people you meet will cotton on when you anchor the pattern recognition.

They are the real 1%, they cannot govern with enlightened chattel. This is why philosophy, psychology, economics, history, anthropology, biology, and so on have been debased into slogans in the academy.

In time, they will come after your daughters and mothers and sisters and turn them into whores. They will send your sons to war. They will fleece your pension funds.

The truth, is that the most persecuted race of man in history – with a notable minority of followers of truth like the editor of this webzine -Mr Unz, Mr Sanders, Mr Marx and so on – is that there is a number who are essentially a very high IQ version of the mafia.

Tha Philosopher , April 18, 2017 at 12:51 pm GMT
• 100 Words My own reading leads me to identify the following as the Elders of Zion:

Steve Schwarzmann
Paul Singer
Robert Rubin
David Rubenstein
Summer Rothstein
Evelyn Rothschild
Stephen Friedman
Elliot Abrams

There are some more. Put them on a map and draw the links between them and their agents. Khordovsky gave his money to Rothschild to mind after the 1990s pillaging of Russia when Putin imprisoned him.

Ohhh they hate Putin because he stopped them in the 90s more than anything. Khordovsky was trying to buy a media outlet.

Also the Protocols may be based on a satire but as Lord Syndenham mentioned in the Times 100 years ago, it was a spooky blueprint for the Bolshevik revolution .and the EU.

Tha Philosopher , April 18, 2017 at 12:58 pm GMT
You can tell the puppets by their policies

Lena Dunham social policy for jewish social freedom
Milton Autism on economics to stop redistribution to the goyim
Kristol on foreign policy for Israel's world domination.

e.g Tony Blair, Macron, Cameroon, Merkel, Juncker, Bush, Clinton etc etc.

There is no difference. They are all the same party.

Zion.

Uncle Davy , April 19, 2017 at 6:25 am GMT
@Cyrano Most of the time I like the way Saker thinks, but on this one I'll have to disagree. It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around. US realized the propaganda potential of the Jews and Israel at the end of WW2 and they never let go of it.

That propaganda potential is still there, although it has been milked for more than 70 years now. Before WW2, there was not any kind of "special relationship" between the Jews and USA. US even turned a ship full of Jewish refugees before the onset of the war out of fear that they might offend the Nazis and suffer the consequences for it. That's what a great power they used to be back then – afraid what the Nazis might do to them.

Then in the closing stages of WW2, when the Russians told them what they found in the concentration camps that they liberated – at first the Americans dismissed their reports as "communist propaganda." They refused to believe that highly "civilized" European country such as Germany can commit such barbarities. Only after they were faced with overwhelming evidence about the concentration camps, the US decided to change their tune.

Their calculation was like this: Who were the greatest villains of WW2? – The Germans. Who were the ultimate victims of WW2? – The Jews. If the Germans were the bad guys, and the Jews were the good guys and the innocent victims – anybody portraying themselves as protectors of the victims can enjoy the image of being the good guys themselves. That formula is still being used today, but it's mostly in Europe and US that it's still considered valid, for the rest of the world just too much time has passed and some of Israel's behavior in the ME has cast a shadow on their image as eternal victims.

People on this site want to view the Jews as George Milton and US as Lenny Small – from Steinbeck novel "Of mice and men". But the reality is much different. US are not Lenny Small, a giant with great physical strength but not too much brain power. US are not the ones being controlled, they are the ones using Israel and the Jews for all they are worth as excellent propaganda material. Sure Israel and the Jews benefit from this, otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to this cozy symbiotic relationship. But the Jews didn't initiate this, it was always US idea. With no disrespect Cyrano, you may need to read the 1996 report 'A Clean Break'
- and you'll quickly discover its the zionist entity that is the tail that wags the American dog. The zionist entity is not limited to the geographical borders of the state of Israel, either.

https://web.archive.org/web/20140125123844/http://www.iasps.org/strat1.htm

Fran Macadam , • Website April 19, 2017 at 9:08 am GMT
Before blaming "The Jews" for the ills of the world it would behoove everyone to take a good long hard look in the mirror. If you think you get an affirmative answer to "Who is the most beautiful of all?" you are living in a fairy tale.
Deeply Concerned , April 19, 2017 at 1:09 pm GMT
• 100 Words May I add that calling for a worldwide demonstration on a preannouced day (similar to the one against W's Iraq war) is critically needed. The slogan of this demonstration should be "ANY US CITIZEN WHO PUTS THE INTEREST OF ISRAEL ABOVE THE NATIONAL INTEREST OF THE US IS – A TRAITOR . ANYONE WHO SUPPORT, PROMOTE, DEFEND A TRAITOR IS A TRAITOR". Traitor is the key word in my opinion and it should be the rallying word.
Vires , April 19, 2017 at 5:50 pm GMT
• 300 Words @Cyrano Most of the time I like the way Saker thinks, but on this one I'll have to disagree. It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around. US realized the propaganda potential of the Jews and Israel at the end of WW2 and they never let go of it.

That propaganda potential is still there, although it has been milked for more than 70 years now. Before WW2, there was not any kind of "special relationship" between the Jews and USA. US even turned a ship full of Jewish refugees before the onset of the war out of fear that they might offend the Nazis and suffer the consequences for it. That's what a great power they used to be back then – afraid what the Nazis might do to them.

Then in the closing stages of WW2, when the Russians told them what they found in the concentration camps that they liberated – at first the Americans dismissed their reports as "communist propaganda." They refused to believe that highly "civilized" European country such as Germany can commit such barbarities. Only after they were faced with overwhelming evidence about the concentration camps, the US decided to change their tune.

Their calculation was like this: Who were the greatest villains of WW2? – The Germans. Who were the ultimate victims of WW2? – The Jews. If the Germans were the bad guys, and the Jews were the good guys and the innocent victims – anybody portraying themselves as protectors of the victims can enjoy the image of being the good guys themselves. That formula is still being used today, but it's mostly in Europe and US that it's still considered valid, for the rest of the world just too much time has passed and some of Israel's behavior in the ME has cast a shadow on their image as eternal victims.

People on this site want to view the Jews as George Milton and US as Lenny Small – from Steinbeck novel "Of mice and men". But the reality is much different. US are not Lenny Small, a giant with great physical strength but not too much brain power. US are not the ones being controlled, they are the ones using Israel and the Jews for all they are worth as excellent propaganda material. Sure Israel and the Jews benefit from this, otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to this cozy symbiotic relationship. But the Jews didn't initiate this, it was always US idea. Why are you trying to conflate Jews and Zionists? Are you unable to see the difference between the two concepts?

It's pretty clear the issue is the stranglehold the Zionist Lobby AKA Israel lobby has on the legislative, judiciary and executive branches of the US Federal Government and the Federal Reserve, and its influence on the propaganda machine and academia.

Therefore the issue is not about "Jews" using the USG, but rather the Zionist Lobby, AKA Israel Lobby in the US or Jewish Lobby in Israel, having and using the stranglehold on the USG, academia and propaganda machine (mass media and Hollywood) to further their goals.

It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around

When you refer to "Jews", do you mean the Zionist lobby AKA Israel lobby , or the average "Jew sixpack" living in the US i.e. the rest?

If what you mean is the so called Israel lobby when you refer to "Jews", two professors, one of Political Sciences and one of International Affairs, both from top US Universities, disagree with your remarkable theory, and have written extensively and with plenty of references supporting their claims:

John Mearsheimer
R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Sciences
Chicago University

Stephen Walt
Belfer Professor of International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of Government
Harvard University

Three links, first two for an article, second with all references. Third for the even more detailed book, refuting your claims.

https://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n06/john-mearsheimer/the-israel-lobby

http://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjoisrX36zTAhVIJlAKHbf5Bm4QFghAMAM&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmearsheimer.uchicago.edu%2Fpdfs%2FIsraelLobby.pdf&usg=AFQjCNFlVQO8EGLPxZsbik8QZaH4vQ15Cw

https://www.amazon.com/Israel-Lobby-U-S-Foreign-Policy/dp/0374531501

Are you familiar with their work? Are you rejecting their claims?

If yes, on what are you basing your rebuttal and what is your background?

Or are you trying to frame the blogger and everyone concerned with the subject as old Jew-haters and anti-semites?

Now, if after reading the Saker's post, the only thing you understood was:

The Saker: "The Jews" are to blame for the ills of the world folks

Then I would recommend you should seriously improve your English, at least reading comprehension skills – perhaps some online courses – before commenting and making a fool of yourself again publicly.

Cyrano , April 19, 2017 at 7:39 pm GMT
• 200 Words @Vires Why are you trying to conflate Jews and Zionists? Are you unable to see the difference between the two concepts?

It's pretty clear the issue is the stranglehold the Zionist Lobby AKA Israel lobby has on the legislative, judiciary and executive branches of the US Federal Government and the Federal Reserve, and its influence on the propaganda machine and academia.

Therefore the issue is not about "Jews" using the USG, but rather the Zionist Lobby, AKA Israel Lobby in the US or Jewish Lobby in Israel, having and using the stranglehold on the USG, academia and propaganda machine (mass media and Hollywood) to further their goals.


It's not the Jews that are using US for their own needs – it's the other way around
When you refer to "Jews", do you mean the Zionist lobby AKA Israel lobby , or the average "Jew sixpack" living in the US i.e. the rest?

If what you mean is the so called Israel lobby when you refer to "Jews", two professors, one of Political Sciences and one of International Affairs, both from top US Universities, disagree with your remarkable theory, and have written extensively and with plenty of references supporting their claims:

John Mearsheimer
R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Sciences
Chicago University

Stephen Walt
Belfer Professor of International Affairs, John F. Kennedy School of Government
Harvard University

Three links, first two for an article, second with all references. Third for the even more detailed book, refuting your claims.

https://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n06/john-mearsheimer/the-israel-lobby

http://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwjoisrX36zTAhVIJlAKHbf5Bm4QFghAMAM&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmearsheimer.uchicago.edu%2Fpdfs%2FIsraelLobby.pdf&usg=AFQjCNFlVQO8EGLPxZsbik8QZaH4vQ15Cw

https://www.amazon.com/Israel-Lobby-U-S-Foreign-Policy/dp/0374531501

What is your background, and on what are you basing your claims?

Have you published an official rebuttal?

Or is your theory just a "hunch"? I am just a writer, I don't have any agenda and I call the things as I see them. I don't buy the theory of the all-powerful Zionist lobby steering the American foreign policy either. Why? Because it makes no sense. Sure there is such a lobby, but US allows it to exist because it suits their interests. They (US establishment) are the ones responsible, not the Israel lobby.

If all anyone had to do in order to influence US government – was to form a lobby – then during the cold war there would have been a communist lobby in Washington, financed by the USSR. They would have poured billions of dollars, and not only the cold war could have ended quickly, but maybe today America would have been communist. Do you see where I am going with this? US government allows lobbies to exist only after they comply with their interests. They are the initiators of policies, not lobbies. Have a nice day.

Cyrano, April 20, 2017 at 3:56 am GMT

• 100 Word\

@Vires

You know man, you are a perfect proof why there is so much propaganda in US. Because you make it easy on them. Them being the government. Yeah, poor US government at the mercy of evil Zionist lobby. If it wasn't for it, it would be the most benevolent government in the world, bringing peace and prosperity wherever they go. One day you'll wake up and you'll look into the abyss and you'll realize that the abyss is your complete ignorance. But don't listen to me, keep on voting every 4 years, that's going to change everything. And keep bitching about the Jewish lobby, you are so much smarter than the average American, you have it all figured out.

wayfarer , April 20, 2017 at 4:44 am GMT
Inevitably, somebody always volunteers to carry water, down the dark self-serving spiritual path.

"Israel Benefits as World Loses"
source: https://www.sott.net/article/268125-Israel-benefits-as-world-loses

"True Cost of Israel"
source: http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-true-cost-of-israel/

"History of the House of Rothschild"
source: http://rense.com/general88/hist.htm

Greasy William , April 20, 2017 at 6:18 am GMT

Russia. Ziocons absolutely loathe Russia and everything Russian.

Don't flatter yourself. Most Jews don't give a shit about Russia. Jews *DO* hate Iranians, Palestinians, Syrians, Lebanese and Arab Christians but we really don't care about Russia. We like to mock Russian nationalists like yourself and Western Russophiles but we don't hate you. Okay, maybe we do hate Western Russophiles, I know I sure do, but we don't hate Russia or Russians.

And the reason we don't hate you is because you just aren't important enough to be worth hating.

I agree with your reasons for why Israel wants an ISIS victory (although it is ridiculous to suggest that Israel's current cucked out leadership wants to expand Israel's borders). It is probably the only thing you have gotten right in years. Good job! You are improving!

ThereisaGod , April 20, 2017 at 6:40 am GMT
Roland Bernard High Finance Shocking Revelations (Dutch with Subtitles) This video, more than any I have seen, exposes the dark heart of the matter. It's a must-watch from beginning to end. Highly credible, in my opinion.
Wally , April 20, 2017 at 7:58 am GMT
@Greasy William
Russia. Ziocons absolutely loathe Russia and everything Russian.
Don't flatter yourself. Most Jews don't give a shit about Russia. Jews *DO* hate Iranians, Palestinians, Syrians, Lebanese and Arab Christians but we really don't care about Russia. We like to mock Russian nationalists like yourself and Western Russophiles but we don't hate you. Okay, maybe we do hate Western Russophiles, I know I sure do, but we don't hate Russia or Russians.

And the reason we don't hate you is because you just aren't important enough to be worth hating.

I agree with your reasons for why Israel wants an ISIS victory (although it is ridiculous to suggest that Israel's current cucked out leadership wants to expand Israel's borders). It is probably the only thing you have gotten right in years. Good job! You are improving! The True Cost of Israel
Forced U.S. taxpayers money goes far beyond the official numbers.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-true-cost-of-israel/

Jewish groups get up to 97% of grants from the Homeland Security"

http://mondoweiss.net/2012/07/islamophobia-shmislamophobia-97-of-homeland-security-security-grants-go-to-jewish-orgs

and:
Zionist Wikipedia Editing Course

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/139189

and:
The Zionist attempt to control language. The Israel Project's 2009 GLOBAL LANGUAGE DICTIONARY

https://www.transcend.org/tms/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/sf-israel-projects-2009-global-language-dictionary.pdf

and:
The commander behind the pro-Israel student troops on U.S. college campuses

http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page//.premium-1.709014

and:
Israel tech site paying "interns" to covertly plant stories in social media

http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/israel-tech-site-paying-interns-covertly-plant-stories-social-media

and:
Israeli students to get $2,000 to spread state propaganda on Facebook

http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israeli-students-get-2000-spread-state-propaganda-facebook

Anonymous, April 20, 2017 at 8:58 am GMT

@Kiza

"Only BRICS countries appear free at the moment "

Apparently you haven't heard of the long amorous relationship between the Zionists and the I in BRICS.

Agent76 , April 20, 2017 at 1:08 pm GMT
Apr 13, 2017 Empire Files: Silencing Palestine – Prison & Repression

Israel's occupation of the West Bank is an internationally-recognized human rights crime-but those being impacted are harshly punished for not only acts of resistance, but even mere advocacy for their rights.

wow , April 20, 2017 at 2:41 pm GMT
When Trump basically fellated AIPAC during his campaign it worried me. But I thought maybe just maybe, Trump was playing the Jews ..this article in all it's glory suggests I am very wrong.

That any potential president has to genuflect to Israel and Jews is the saddest thing in American History. You can almost wish it would all implode. A hard reset minus Jewish whining and control would be a true utopia.

Stonehands , April 20, 2017 at 3:19 pm GMT
@Cyrano You know man, you are a perfect proof why there is so much propaganda in US. Because you make it easy on them. Them being the government. Yeah, poor US government at the mercy of evil Zionist lobby. If it wasn't for it, it would be the most benevolent government in the world, bringing peace and prosperity wherever they go. One day you'll wake up and you'll look into the abyss and you'll realize that the abyss is your complete ignorance. But don't listen to me, keep on voting every 4 years, that's going to change everything. And keep bitching about the Jewish lobby, you are so much smarter than the average American, you have it all figured out. Jew finance capitalists [ the master money manipulators] and their cohort in MEDIA are most certainly jewish.. Who the hell do you think promotes all this homo rights crap? It's not so much the jew Svengali -but you- the rube in the mirror, who will have to be dealt with first when the lights go out..
Bruce Marshall , April 20, 2017 at 4:16 pm GMT
But the Elephant driver is the British Empire System!!!

It is the British behind the coup against Trump. The British want to prevent the end of "Geopolitics" as we know it which is what would happen should America Russia and China come together per the New Silk Road and One Belt initiatives. This is why the British are setting off
World War III.

http://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/2017/2017_10-19/2017-15/pdf/02-03_4415.pdf

annamaria , April 20, 2017 at 4:18 pm GMT

@Cyrano

" you are a perfect proof why there is so much propaganda in US. "

Don't you imply that "so much propaganda in US" is anti-Zionist? If yes, then you have no idea about MSM in the US. Just to give you a hint, try to google this name: Helen Thomas, specifically a story of her private conversation with a Jewish man (who happened to be a born informer). Look at a swarm of the US Congresspeople blubbering praises for Israel during AIPAC' annual meetings. The US Congress is indeed the Zionist Occupied Territory, a picture of a host captured by a parasitoid.

annamaria , April 20, 2017 at 4:29 pm GMT
@Quartermaster And so was Russia's annexation of Crimea. You don't think Saker would want to call attention to such things do you?

How many referenda the Syrians have held to bring the Golan Heights to the embrace of Israel? We cannot wait to hear your story of Syrian people voting to join Israel. Tell us, when did the Golan Heights belong to Israel?

Surely in the dreams of the US ziocons and in the criminal Oded Yinon's plan for Eretz Israel, which preaches for creating a civil disorder in the neighboring states so that Israel could snatch as much territory as possible from the neighbors. The ongoing Libyan and Syrian tragedies belong to that plan.

The ziocons' cooperation with Ukrainian neo-Nazis is another story. "Never again," indeed.

annamaria , April 20, 2017 at 4:40 pm GMT
@biz

In the Middle Ages, antisemitism defined Jews as a religious group and focused on their religious separateness.

In the more secular era of Dreyfus and the Nazis and Nasser, antisemitism defined Jews as an ethnic group and focused on their ethnic separateness.

Now that we are in an era which celebrates group identity and views it as a virtue, antisemitism focuses on denying Jews their ethnic or religious identity.

Fascinating.

annamaria , April 20, 2017 at 4:40 pm GMT
@biz

" antisemitism focuses on denying Jews their ethnic or religious identity.states "

The article is about ziocons and it emphasizes, specifically, that conflating Jews and Zionists is dishonest. You need to read the article before making your generalizations.

It was the Israelis that enjoyed the bombing of civilians in Israel-occupied Gaza by the "most moral" idiots of IDF. Palestinian children died in hundreds. White phosphorus was used by Israelis. https://friendsofpalestine.wordpress.com/resources-and-readings/image-galleries/photos-of-israeli-white-phosphorus-attacks-on-un-schools-in-gaza/ So much for "never again."

Considering the number of synagogues in the US and the prominence of ziocons among policy-makers in the US, please tell us, who exactly "denies Jews their ethnic or religious identity." Have you heard about Wolfowitz, Feith, and Kagans? How about Nuland-Kagan fraternizing with neo-Nazis? Still OK? https://consortiumnews.com/2015/07/13/the-mess-that-nuland-made/

annamaria , April 20, 2017 at 4:41 pm GMT
@Quartermaster And so was Russia's annexation of Crimea. You don't think Saker would want to call attention to such things do you? Oded Yinon' plan for creating Eretz Israel: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/pdf/The%20Zionist%20Plan%20for%20the%20Middle%20East.pdf
Jus' Sayin'... , April 20, 2017 at 4:42 pm GMT
@nsa

ZIG is a more accurate acronym......as in INFESTED. Think parasites like bed bugs, ticks, lice, mites, termites, scabies, fleas, ringworm, etc.

Zionist Infested Government! Brilliant! I'm going to start using this term.

Anyone who's spent any time inside the beltway quickly realizes that AngloZionists – the Saker's term is really useful if one wants to accurately and concisely summarize these people, their ideology, and their ultimate loyalties – infest from top to bottom the three branches of the federal government, all the supporting bureaucracies, and all the parasitic lobbying groups, consultants, foundations, think tanks, etc., that wield less official powers. Their proportional presence in Washington is many orders of magnitude greater than their proportion in the general population and their power is magnified by their informally shared ideologies and goals.

Not many of these people are actually aware of the harm they are causing. Most are fundamentally decent people. Some I count as close friends. Yet the combined power these people wield and the varying levels of allegiance they bear to foreign powers whose interests are inimical to those of the USA and its citizens make them, considered en masse, an existential threat to this country, to world peace, and to international law and order.

jilles dykstra , April 20, 2017 at 5:29 pm GMT
Few US citizens nowadays seem to know any foreign language, pity, for the following book explains Russian anti semitism:
Alexander Solschenizyn, ´Die russisch- jüdische Geschichte 1795- 1916, >> Zweihundert Jahre zusammen <<´, Moskau 2001, München 2002
Who is interested in the why of German anti semitism after 1870 has more luck:
Ismar Schorsch, 'Jewish Reactions to German Anti-Semitism, 1870 – 1914', New York 1972
Fritz Stern, 'Gold and Iron, Bismarck, Bleichröder, and the Building of the German Empire', New York, 1977.
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA
Also interesting is:
Horace Meyer Kallen, 'Zionism and World Politics; A Study in History and Social Psychology', New York, 1921
Pre WWII 'neocons':
Bruce Allen Murphy, 'The Brandeis/Frankfurter Connection, The Secret Political Activities of Two Supreme Court Justices', New York, 1983

jacques sheete ,

April 20, 2017 at 6:23 pm GMT

@Wally

Jewish groups get up to 97% of grants from the Homeland Security"

The so called non-profit scene also appears to me little more than a cesspool of corruption and I wonder who or what dominates those rackets.

Art , April 20, 2017 at 9:06 pm GMT
ZOG. Or "Zionist Occupation Government".

ZOG is an excellent term that describes the situation in America perfectly. The fact of ZOG is undeniable to everyone politically involved in the US government.

The question is will people use the term "ZOG" to attack Jews? It has one great advantage – the word "Jew" is not used.

The thing that Jews themselves fear the most, is the word "Jew" used by Gentiles. The American population is conditioned not to use the word. Subliminal fear is attached to using the word "Jew."

The goal of the American population must be to eliminate ZOG – but not Jews.

The question is – can this be done without using the word "Jew" and all that goes with it?

The answer is most likely – NOT!

Peace - Art

p.s. Great article.

Dr. X , April 20, 2017 at 9:10 pm GMT
@blaggard I applaud your honesty and logic. What a fight...

Although it is made to appear so, the battle between the 'conservatives' and 'liberals' is not a battle of ideas or even of political organizations. It's is a battle of force, terror and power. The Jews and their accomplices and dupes are not running our country and its people because of the excellence of their ideas or the merit of their work or because they have the genuine backing of the majority. The Zionists are in power in spite of the lack of these things, and only because they have driven their way into power by daring minority tactics. They can stay in power only because people are afraid to oppose them, afraid they will be socially ostracized, afraid they will be smeared in the press, afraid they will lose their jobs, afraid they will not be able to run their businesses, afraid they will lose their political offices. It is fear and fear alone which keeps these filthy left-wing sneaks in power.

George Lincoln Rockwell wrote that - in 1961 (!)

Beefcake the Mighty , April 20, 2017 at 9:17 pm GMT
@naro No one is more critical of Jews and Israel than other Jews. Jews are and have been a NATION in exile. Their genetic identity has been proven several times using Mitochondrial DNA in prestigious medical journals such as Nature and Science...so it is not in doubt. There is continuous historical record of Jews for at least 2000 years. Christian guilt is well deserved for their historical hounding, persecutions, exiled and pogroms against innocent Jews under their jurisdictions.

The writer of this article is a hate monger. There are Jews of all political spectrum. They are not homogeneous in their political position.
Jews succeed because they study hard, work hard, and take risks in business and politics. They think outside the box, and are inventive and scientifically curious. Instead of envying their success try to learn and emulate it losers.

They also engage in pretty intense ethnic networking and favoritism, things they typically castigate others for doing.

Re. diversity of Jewish political opinion, I don't see it. Most Jews are partisan Democrats in the US and there is very broad agreement on major issues, like immigration and Israeli-centric foreign policy, details notwithstanding. And very few Jews will acknowledge that historically, collective Jewish behavior has played a role in the negative opinions so many peoples hold against them, indeed they strenuously deny it. (Smoke but no fire? Unlikely.)

Talha , April 20, 2017 at 9:51 pm GMT

Last, my favorite one: ethics and morality. The modern western society has been built on a categorical rejection of ethics and morality.

Bravo – that paragraph was golden in my book. If this is gone – kiss your society good bye – you're just living on borrowed time – all the gold and all the nuclear spears in the world will not save you.

"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root." – Henry David Thoreau

Talha , April 20, 2017 at 9:52 pm GMT
@Seraphim Tramp is a Joo himself!

"Looks Like Donald Trump May Well Be Jewish. That Would Explain A Great Deal", By Miles Mathis via Jim Kirwan, 4-9-17

- See more at: http://www.rense.com/general96/trumpjewish.htm#sthash.4xaQKh2i.dpuf

Ivanka's mommy is of the tribe too: "Ivana is also Jewish. Geni.com lists her father's name as both Knavs and Zelnícek. I'll give you a hint: drop the second "e". You get Zelnick. It is Yiddish for haberdasher. Clothier. It's Jewish, too. See Robert Zelnick, Strauss Zelnick, Bob Zelnick, etc. Robert was a fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford. Strauss was President of 20th Century Fox. Bob was ABC News producer. Also Friedrich Zelnik, silent film producer. Also David O. Selznick, whose name was originally Zeleznick, or, alternately, Zelnick. He and his father were major Hollywood produ - See more at: http://www.rense.com/general96/trumpjewish.htm#sthash.4xaQKh2i.dpuf

It's all in the family (La famiglia, Kosher Nostra). The ones who voted for him are the suckers. Kosher Nostra!!!

Oh man – that was awesome!!!

Peace.

wayfarer , April 20, 2017 at 10:12 pm GMT
The problem with fiat money is that if one has enough of it, one can buy just about anything under the sun that they please, including even large parts of a country's political system and government.

Take for example, Jared (a.k.a. billionaire arch-Zionist trust-fund baby) Kushner

source: https://www.sott.net/article/348461-The-controversy-of-Jared-Kushner-A-suspected-gangster-within-the-Trump-White-House

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtf6TgQgWr4

Seraphim , April 20, 2017 at 11:52 pm GMT
• 200 Words @Talha Kosher Nostra!!!

Oh man - that was awesome!!!

Peace. It is not my invention. All From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"Jewish-American organized crime":

'Jewish-American organized crime emerged within the American Jewish community during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It has been referred to variously in media and popular culture as the Jewish Mob, Jewish Mafia, Kosher Mafia, Kosher Nostra, or Undzer Shtik (Yiddish: אונדזער שטיק‎). The last two of these terms refer to the Italian Cosa Nostra (Italian pronunciation: [kɔza nɔstra]); the former is a play on the word kosher, referring to Jewish dietary laws, while the latter is a direct translation of the phrase (Italian for "our thing") into Yiddish, which was at the time the predominant language of the Jewish diaspora in the United States

In more recent years, Jewish-American organized crime has reappeared in the forms of both Israeli and Jewish-Russian mafia criminal groups, and Orthodox kidnapping gangs .

Several notable Jewish American mobsters provided financial support for Israel through donations to Jewish organizations since the country's creation in 1948. Jewish-American gangsters used Israel's Law of Return to flee criminal charges or face deportation "

Anonymous , April 21, 2017 at 3:31 am GMT

@wayfarer

Even the staff at his own Jewish day school were surprised he was accepted at Harvard.

He was described as a lacklustre student his father bought his entry, and they were disappointed that more qualified students from his school didn't make the cut.

Miro23 , April 21, 2017 at 5:26 am GMT

Second, so what are Jews if not a race? In my opinion, they are a tribe (which Oxford Dictionaires defines as: a social division in a traditional society consisting of families or communities linked by social, economic, religious, or blood ties, with a common culture and dialect, typically having a recognized leader). A tribe is a group one can chose to join (Elizabeth Taylor) or leave (Gilad Atzmon).

It's true that US Jews are mixed race (about 55% European and 45% Semitic) although they choose to Obama-ize the fact (the European part disappears).

Also, after a lifetime of contact, I would say that the best guys leave the Tribe (often the most Semitic and through disgust ) and the worst girls join (Gentiles attracted by money and power).

annamaria , April 21, 2017 at 9:40 am GMT
@Ilyana_Rozumova @

Saker!!!!

FGS. Please give it up! Trying to solve Jewish question eventually leads to insanity. Saker (et al on this site) are not interested in "solving Jewish question." – We are interested in the survival of humanity, specifically in stopping a WWIII that could happen thanks to ziocons' policies.
" fomenting sectarian strife in order to forestal the development of a unified Arab nation which could threaten it and creating the circumstances in which land could be acquired was at the root of Israel's relationship with its northern neighbor." http://www.globalresearch.ca/israel-and-islamist-militias-a-strange-and-recurring-alliance/5586075
" the "liberal" American press, written almost totally by Jewish admirers of Israel who, even if they are critical of some aspects of the Israeli state, practice loyally what Stalin used to call "the constructive criticism." (In fact those among them who claim also to be "Anti- Stalinist" are in reality more Stalinist than Stalin, with Israel being their god which has not yet failed). In the framework of such critical worship it must be assumed that Israel has always "good intentions" and only "makes mistakes," and therefore such a plan would not be a matter for discussion–exactly as the Biblical genocides committed by Jews are not mentioned." http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/pdf/The%20Zionist%20Plan%20for%20the%20Middle%20East.pdf

jilles dykstra , April 21, 2017 at 9:53 am GMT
@JerseyJeffersonian Thanks Jilles,

My German is not of the best, but I have been interested in 200 Years Together for a while, so maybe I can give it a try. I will try to check out these other titles you have provided, too. Sol Bloom, 'The Autobiography of Sol Bloom', New York 1948

also is interesting, though just for one sentence, something like 'the great accomplishment of Roosevelt was that he slowy prepared the USA people for war'.
This is in one sentence the book

Charles A. Beard, 'American Foreign Policy in the Making, 1932 – 1940, A study in responsibilities', New Haven, 1946

Alas few people seem to read books any more, especially old books. The interesting thing about a book, great contrast with a web article, is, once printed, it cannot be changed any more.

Sol Bloom was a jewish friend of Roosevelt. You might also want to read
Henry Morgenthau, 'Ambassador Morgenthau's Story', New Yirk, 1918
Heath W. Lowry, 'The story behind Ambassador Morgenthau's Story', Istanbul 1990
and
Charles Callan Tansill, 'Amerika geht in den Krieg', Stuttgart 1939 (America goes to War, 1938)
How the USA, and especially Morgenthau, wanted to fight Germany, in WWI.
Both Bloom and Morgenthau were of German descent, I suppose they hated Germany because of its antisemitism.

jilles dykstra , April 21, 2017 at 10:03 am GMT
@Ilyana_Rozumova @ Saker!!!!
FGS. Please give it up! Trying to solve Jewish question eventually leads to insanity. Are maybe present events solving the jewish question ?
There seems to be little doubt that Trump is in conflict with Deep State, neocons in the lead, mainly jews.
See also:
John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, 'The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy', New York 2007
It is possible that Marine le Pen of FN wins the French elections.
FN is accused of being antisemitic:
Pierre-André Taguieff, Michèle Tribalat, 'Face au Front national, Arguments pour une contre-offensive', Paris, 1998 is an anti FN book written by two jews.
Hungary is closing Soros's university.
Putin already closed his institutions in Russia.

Joe Levantine , April 21, 2017 at 3:24 pm GMT

@Cyrano

Americans using Jews or vice versa? Just check the roles that Bernard Baruck and Rabbi Steven Wise have played from the administration of crooked Woodrow Wilson to the more crooked Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Two names among thousands of Jews who have shaped U.S. policies while hiding behind the facade of their puppet presidents should give anyone food for thought.
If Cyrano can bring back into circulation the forbidden book of ' The Controversy of Zion' by the late Douglas Reed who turned from bestseller author to a nonexistent nothing the moment he published his 400+ book, I am positive that the commentator would apologise for this comment.

annamaria , April 21, 2017 at 4:53 pm GMT
@naro Mr. Petras you are a vile old man. Nazis were quite capable at merciless killing of defenseless Jewish (and others) men, women and children by the millions, as they were unprepared for the utter vile brutality that Nazism represented. Now the Jews are well defended and strong, and will defend themselves to the utmost. So come to to the fight old boy, we can take on Nazis . We know them better now. "Now the Jews are well defended and strong we can take on Nazis."

Actually, an Israeli citizen Mr. Kolomojsky financed the neo-Nazi Azov battalion that auto-da-fe(d) a good number of civilians in Odessa: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJexglSOF6s (see also Azov battalion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion )

A member of the powerful Kagans' clan of warmongers, Mrs. Nuland-Kagan has been an eager collaborator with Ukrainian neo-Nazis (do you know about Baby Yar and such? – Mrs. Nuland-Kagan is obviously OK with the history of Ukrainian Jews during WWII). Neither ADL nor AIPAC made any noises about bringing Ukrainian neo-Nazis to power in Kiev in 2014. Why?

And what about Israel' collaboration with ISIS against sovereign Syria? "The documents show that Israel has been doing more than simply treating wounded Syrian civilians in hospitals. This and a few past reports have described transfer of unspecified supplies from Israel to the Syrian rebels, and sightings of IDF soldiers meeting with the Syrian opposition east of the green zone, as well as incidents when Israeli soldiers opened up the fence to allow Syrians through who did not appear to be injured. http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-UN-report-reveals-collaboration-between-Israel-and-Syrian-rebels-383926

A Canadian darling of the US State Dept, Chrystia Freeland, happened to be a progeny of a Nazi collaborator from Ukraine (Mr. Chomiak), though Mrs. Freeland proclaimed loudly that her grandpa was "persecuted by the Soviets:" https://consortiumnews.com/2017/02/27/a-nazi-skeleton-in-the-family-closet/
" it appears Freeland's grandfather – rather than being a helpless victim – was given a prestigious job to spread Nazi propaganda, praising Hitler from a publishing house stolen from Jews and given to Ukrainians who shared the values of Nazism. Chomiak's editorials also described a Poland "infected by Jews." Mrs. Freeland is still in office, spreading Russophobia that is so dear to ziocon hearts.

In case you did not notice, Zionists (ziocons) are modern-day Nazis.

" the "liberal" American press, written almost totally by Jewish admirers of Israel who, even if they are critical of some aspects of the Israeli state, practice loyally what Stalin used to call "the constructive criticism." In the framework of such critical worship it must be assumed that Israel has always "good intentions" and only "makes mistakes," and therefore such a plan would not be a matter for discussion–exactly as the Biblical genocides committed by Jews are not mentioned." http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/pdf/The%20Zionist%20Plan%20for%20th

Rurik , April 21, 2017 at 5:22 pm GMT

Good ol' Charlie he knew.
He learned to beware the POWER of the Cabal

when I read that I thought you might have meant Charlie Reese. he used to write for the Orlando Sentinel in Florida, until ((they)) ran him out

here's a light hearted one that shows his depth and humor

http://thebirdman.org/Index/Others/Others-Doc-Birds&OtherAnimals/+Doc-Birds&OtherAnimals-OtherAnimals/CharleyReeseOnSquirrels.htm

more:

We are guilty by proxy of murder, land theft, destruction of property and all the other human misery that Israel has caused in the region.

So, if you're one of those rah-rah Israel First supporters, don't complain when the terrorists come looking for you. You've allowed your politicians to enlist you in somebody else's war, and in war there are always casualties on both sides.

America has become a nation of pathological irresponsibility. Nobody wants to take responsibility for his or her own actions, which is the basic cause of the litigation flood. Least of all do American politicians wish to do so. They would rather heap on the manure that the terrorism directed at us has nothing whatsoever to do with the policies they have followed for the past 30 years or more. In truth, it has everything to do with those policies.

So, if you or your loved ones get bloodied by terrorists, then blame your Christian Zionists, your Israel First crowd and your corrupt politicians who have their tongues in the ears and their hands in the pockets of the Israeli lobby.

http://www.antiwar.com/frank/?articleid=2197

there's a whole slew of treasures and beautiful prose and simple, human humility and decency in these archives.

http://www.antiwar.com/reese/archives.php

I heartily encourage the reader to peruse them with pleasure.

more:

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/opinion/os-ed-charley-reese-545-people-1984-073111-story.html

Alden , April 21, 2017 at 5:53 pm GMT
@turtle Sooner or later, the U.S. will go down to defeat, at which point "da Joos" will have to find a new host.
I expect they will have a bit of a tough row to hoe in this, the New Chinese Century.
No matter how hard you try, I doubt you can pass off this woman:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connie_Chung
or any of her countrywomen, as "Semitic,"
thus disproving that "Jewish" = "Semitic" or vice versa.
Shlomo Wong? I think not. I read Jewish community publications all the time I have concluded they are planning their next jump to China after they destroy America
There are endless articles about how much Jews and Chinese have in common (lie, cheat and steal). They discovered that in medieval and early modern times there was a community of Persian Jews in China and blather on about that.
And there is approval of marriage of Jewish men to Chinese women.

But the Chinese are not love thy neighbor Christians. Nor do they have millions of wanna be Jews Old Testament obsessed Protestants. Chinese officials are well known for accepting bribes and then doing exactly what they want.

On the other hand, Israel and American DOD employees sell lots of stolen American military secrets to China.

Jewish attempted takeover of China will be a battle of the Titans.

Anon , April 21, 2017 at 6:05 pm GMT
• 100 Words @Wally Indeed, "non-profit", but Jews Only and huge salaries

Recall the corrupt & hate mongering ADL, or SPLC.

Look at the 'holocau$t' scam.

Build yet another laughable 'holocaust' Theme Park, Potemkin Village, put up a picture of MLK, falsely claim that it's all about 'tolerance', 'diversity and civil rights while down playing it's obvious Jewish supremacism, and voila! Massive taxpayers subsidies.


"One should not ask, how this mass murder was made possible. It was technically possible, because it happened. This has to be the obligatory starting-point for any historical research regarding this topic. We would just like to remind you: There is no debate regarding the existence of the gas chambers, and there can never be one."
- endorsed by 34 "reputable historians" and published in the French daily Le Monde on February 21, 1979
====================================
"These Holocaust deniers are very slick people. They justify everything they say with facts and figures."

- Steven Some, Chairman of the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education, Newark Star-Ledger, 23 Oct. 1996, p 15.

Here's the top non-profits. None are identifiably Jewish:

1 Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation United States Seattle, Washington $42.3 billion 1994 [1]
2 Stichting INGKA Foundation Netherlands Leiden $34.6 billion €33.0 billion (EUR) 1982 [2]
3 Wellcome Trust United Kingdom London $26.0 billion £20.9 billion (GBP) 1936 [3]
4 Howard Hughes Medical Institute United States Chevy Chase, Maryland $18.2 billion 1953 [4]
5 Ford Foundation United States New York City, New York $11.2 billion 1936 [5]
6 Kamehameha Schools United States Honolulu, Hawaii $11.1 billion 1887 [6]
7 J. Paul Getty Trust United States Los Angeles, California $10.5 billion 1982 [5]
8 Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation United Arab Emirates Dubai $10.0 billion 37 billion د.إ (AED) 2007 [7]
9 Azim Premji Foundation India Bangalore $9.8 billion 2001 [8]
10 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation United States Princeton, New Jersey $9.53 billion 1972 [5]

Art , April 21, 2017 at 6:56 pm GMT
@Alden I just read the latest ADL diktat. As of today any mention of Jared Kushner is deemed anti Semitic. Consequences will be severe. I just read the latest ADL diktat. As of today any mention of Jared Kushner is deemed anti Semitic. Consequences will be severe.

They have good reason to hide him – he and his family have some shady business dealings – his father is a x-convict. How did he come into billions of dollars?

They say that Jared inherited his money – how did that happen when his father is still living – did they get special tax treatment?

Hmm?

Peace - Art

p.s. Jared Kushner is 100% Zionist – how can this work out good for America?

Sam J. , April 21, 2017 at 7:29 pm GMT
" Please note that Gilad specifically excludes Judaics (religious Jews,) "

Well he's wrong to exclude them unless you're just excluding Zionist. It doesn't matter whether they are religious or secular. They're all made of the same stuff. Surely you've heard of all the organ smuggling, drug dealing and other goings on in the religious community and they're supposed to be the good guys?

There's one idea that describes the Jews perfectly. It describes their parasitism, their, lying, their chameleon like behavior, their sense of superiority and belief that they are different from everyone else. There's a simple explanation for why the Jews are hated so much that also explains their behavior and success. The Jews are a tribe of psychopaths. No all, maybe not even the majority, but a large number. All of the Jews ancient writings are nothing more than a manual for psychopaths to live by. The Talmud is nothing but one psychopathic thought after another. The Talmud "great enlightenment" basically says that everyone not Jewish is there to serve Jews. All their property is really the Jews. No one is really human unless they're Jews and their lives don't matter. A psychopathic religion for a psychopathic people.

They've been thrown out of every single country that they've been to in any numbers. Psychopaths having no empathy themselves can only go by the feedback they get from the people they are exploiting. So they push and push to see what they can get away with. The normal people build up resentment towards them. Thinking "surely they will reform or repent" like a normal person who does wrong. Of course the Jews do not. They don't have the mental process for reform. Then in a huge mass outpouring of hate for the Jews, fed up with the refusal to reform their behavior, they attack and/or deport them. In this stage of the cycle the Big/Rich Jews escape and the little Jews are attacked.

Start over.

Even if it's wrong if you assume the Jews are a tribe of psychopaths you will never be surprised and Jew's behavior will make sense.

In order to predict Jews behavior read the great book on Psychopaths by Hervey Cleckley, "The Mask of Sanity". Here's a chapter you should read. It's about the psychopath Stanley. Who does all kinds of manic bullshit and spends all his time feeding people the most outrageous lies. Look at the astounding array of things he's able to get away with. Maybe it will remind you of a certain tribe. New meme. "They're pulling a Stanley". The whole book is on the web and worth reading.

http://www.energyenhancement.org/Psychopath/psychopath-Hervey-Cleckley-the-mask-of-sanity-SECTION-TWO-THE-MATERIAL-Part-1-The-disorder-in-full-clinical-manifestations-19-Stanley.html

I use the simplest of logic to determine this. Form follows function, Occam's Razor. Their behavior is exactly like psychopaths. Their religious beliefs are exactly like the internal dialog of psychopaths. I don't know but if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and swims like a duck. It's a duck and the Jews are a tribe of psychopaths. The MOST IMPORTANT PART is that the behavior of the Jews as a group over time can not be reliably separated from the behavior of psychopaths. Even if I'm wrong their behavior is the same so they should be treated as psychopaths. A very dangerous, powerful group with no empathy towards anyone but other Jews.

I don't know why Zionist get such a bad rap I want them all to go to Israel so I'm a Zionist too.

Alden , April 21, 2017 at 8:18 pm GMT
@wayfarer The problem with fiat money is that if one has enough of it, one can buy just about anything under the sun that they please, including even large parts of a country's political system and government.

Take for example, Jared (a.k.a. billionaire arch-Zionist trust-fund baby) Kushner

source: https://www.sott.net/article/348461-The-controversy-of-Jared-Kushner-A-suspected-gangster-within-the-Trump-White-House

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtf6TgQgWr4

Thanks, very interesting. Funny thing, most of the Jews I know are such fervent liberals they think Kushner is a traitor to the cause of liberalism.
Seraphim , April 22, 2017 at 2:09 am GMT
@Art You are a nazi. Your generalization are the vile ranting of a hate filled animal.

Oh my - straight to the "N" word - what happened to "anti-Semite" - has it lost its sting? Ah' to bad.

What are you going to call us next?

Peace --- Art

p.s. By the way Nazism and Zionism are brothers - both are fascists.

p.s. What about you Jew animals in Israel - you have the most immoral army in the world.

p.s. You Jews and your hateful bluster - you are fooling no one.

p.s. ZOG is going to lose. It is an irrefragable law:

"Godwin's law (or Godwin's rule of Hitler analogies) is an Internet adage which asserts that "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Hitler approaches -‌that is, if an online discussion (regardless of topic or scope) goes on long enough, sooner or later someone will compare someone or something to Hitler.

Promulgated by American attorney and author Mike Godwin in 1990, Godwin's law originally referred specifically to Usenet newsgroup discussions. It is now applied to any threaded online discussion, such as Internet forums, chat rooms, and comment threads, as well as to speeches, articles, and other rhetoric where 'reductio ad Hitlerum'* occurs.

*Reductio ad Hitlerum (pseudo-Latin for "reduction to Hitler"; sometimes argumentum ad Hitlerum, "argument to Hitler", ad Nazium, "to Nazism"), or playing the Nazi card, is an attempt to invalidate someone else's position on the basis that the same view was held by Adolf Hitler or the Nazi Party, for example: "Hitler was a vegetarian, X is a vegetarian, therefore X is a Nazi". A variation of this fallacy, reductio ad Stalinum, also known as "red-baiting", has also been used in political discourse.

Coined by Leo Strauss in 1951, reductio ad Hitlerum borrows its name from the term used in logic, reductio ad absurdum (reduction to the absurd). According to Strauss, reductio ad Hitlerum is a form of ad hominem, ad misericordiam, or a fallacy of irrelevance. The suggested rationale is one of guilt by association. It is a tactic often used to derail arguments, because such comparisons tend to distract and anger the opponent, as Hitler and Nazism have been condemned in the modern world.

Sam J. , April 22, 2017 at 7:34 am GMT
@Sam J. "... Please note that Gilad specifically excludes Judaics (religious Jews,)..."

Well he's wrong to exclude them unless you're just excluding Zionist. It doesn't matter whether they are religious or secular. They're all made of the same stuff. Surely you've heard of all the organ smuggling, drug dealing and other goings on in the religious community and they're supposed to be the good guys?

There's one idea that describes the Jews perfectly. It describes their parasitism, their, lying, their chameleon like behavior, their sense of superiority and belief that they are different from everyone else. There's a simple explanation for why the Jews are hated so much that also explains their behavior and success. The Jews are a tribe of psychopaths. No all, maybe not even the majority, but a large number. All of the Jews ancient writings are nothing more than a manual for psychopaths to live by. The Talmud is nothing but one psychopathic thought after another. The Talmud "great enlightenment" basically says that everyone not Jewish is there to serve Jews. All their property is really the Jews. No one is really human unless they're Jews and their lives don't matter. A psychopathic religion for a psychopathic people.

They've been thrown out of every single country that they've been to in any numbers. Psychopaths having no empathy themselves can only go by the feedback they get from the people they are exploiting. So they push and push to see what they can get away with. The normal people build up resentment towards them. Thinking "surely they will reform or repent" like a normal person who does wrong. Of course the Jews do not. They don't have the mental process for reform. Then in a huge mass outpouring of hate for the Jews, fed up with the refusal to reform their behavior, they attack and/or deport them. In this stage of the cycle the Big/Rich Jews escape and the little Jews are attacked.

Start over.

Even if it's wrong if you assume the Jews are a tribe of psychopaths you will never be surprised and Jew's behavior will make sense.

In order to predict Jews behavior read the great book on Psychopaths by Hervey Cleckley, "The Mask of Sanity". Here's a chapter you should read. It's about the psychopath Stanley. Who does all kinds of manic bullshit and spends all his time feeding people the most outrageous lies. Look at the astounding array of things he's able to get away with. Maybe it will remind you of a certain tribe. New meme. "They're pulling a Stanley". The whole book is on the web and worth reading.

http://www.energyenhancement.org/Psychopath/psychopath-Hervey-Cleckley-the-mask-of-sanity-SECTION-TWO-THE-MATERIAL-Part-1-The-disorder-in-full-clinical-manifestations-19-Stanley.html

I use the simplest of logic to determine this. Form follows function, Occam's Razor. Their behavior is exactly like psychopaths. Their religious beliefs are exactly like the internal dialog of psychopaths. I don't know but if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and swims like a duck. It's a duck and the Jews are a tribe of psychopaths. The MOST IMPORTANT PART is that the behavior of the Jews as a group over time can not be reliably separated from the behavior of psychopaths. Even if I'm wrong their behavior is the same so they should be treated as psychopaths. A very dangerous, powerful group with no empathy towards anyone but other Jews.

I don't know why Zionist get such a bad rap I want them all to go to Israel so I'm a Zionist too. I don't know if this guy is real or if it's true or not but there's a vast amount of information and cases which readily conform to the idea that everything he says is true. According to the witnesses in the dutroux-affair all the participants had to break the law to be in business with them on an intimate level. Mostly this was done through sexual abuse of children. Twenty years ago you might could laugh this off as some foolish rantings of conspiracy freaks but there's been too many verifiable cases with lots of physical evidence.

Pizzagate Pedogate Dutch Whistleblower Real Big Money Revelations by an Insider

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO4rAYk-420

I'm also not saying it's just Jews but I am saying they are the root of it all. They're the glue that keeps the whole thing together due to their insider grouping tribalism.

"There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root." – Henry David Thoreau

annamaria , April 22, 2017 at 5:19 pm GMT
@Naro Again To Summarize JEWS ARE THE BRAINIEST AND MOST ACCOMPLISHED HUMANS ALIVE TRYING TO SURVIVE IN A WORLD OF MORONS AND IMPRESSIONABLE IDIOTS! Examples of the psychopathology and idiocy of the Nazis is obvious on this thread-ironically in a web site owned by a Jew.
The envious losers, and political manipulators have always looked for scapegoats for their failures, and Jews were easy targets. Not any more. Jews are quite able to defend themselves ..thank you. You don't believe me? just try. " Jews are quite able to defend themselves .."

At least now you have prudently omitted references to Nazis, since you became educated from other posts that American Jews – see Kagans' clan of warmongers – are in bed with Ukrainian neo-Nazis and, moreover, that an Israeli citizen is known as a financier of the bloody neo-Nazi battalion that had burnt a score of civilians to death in Odessa.
American (and UK) Israel-firsters have betrayed western civilization for the benefit of mythological Eretz Israel. Your tribe was pushing for the slaughter in Iraq (see treasonous Wolfowitz and Feith and the despicable Kristol) and in Libya (the former pearl of North Africa, where citizens used to enjoy free education, free health care, and a sizable gold reserve – the latter stolen by the US "deciders"). Currently, it is an ongoing bloodbath in Syria, which Israel wants to prolong as much as possible in order to steal the Golan Heights. For the same reason your "most accomplished" Israeli generals proclaimed loudly their preference for ISIS. What have you claimed, that your tribe is the "brainiest?" – Relax. With such "activists" like the openly racist Avigdor Lieberman (ex-convict) and your half-wit hater Ayelet Shaked you are safely among mediocrities. As for the truly brainiest and ethical like Baruch Spinoza and Hanna Arend, they were rejected by your supremacist tribe. Check the location of Spinoza' grave.

annamaria , April 22, 2017 at 11:16 pm GMT
@Anonymous shut up naziscum. where is your thousand year reich? in the garbage An Israeli demonstrates her regular poor manners Aren't you trying to imply that Israelis are striving for their thousand-year reich? Good luck. Don't forget to take the neo-Nazi-loving Kagans' clan with you.
Johnny F. Ive , April 23, 2017 at 6:48 am GMT
What if the US Empire was financially bankrupted? How would it behave afterwards? I think it will end with military overstretch and bankruptcy or nuclear war. One or the other. Its sad that all this suffering is a tribal war. On man's way to civilization he forgot to leave that behind. Would the US behave after bankruptcy like the Soviets did after losing in Afghanistan or is the US going to be even more like a huge North Korea? Besides Israel there is the manipulations of other countries like the Europeans.

I agree Trump is very concerned about appearance and that makes him weak. He like the rest of the American Establishment is like Narcissus and in their pond the Empire is reflected back at them. They won't let go of it.

I disagree that the American people vote against war. The American people have had plenty of chances. They've had chances to turn the world's fortunes around plenty of times with Pat Buchanan, Ron Paul, Dennis Kucinich, and Ralph Nader. That pretty much covers the whole ideological spectrum except the neocons. The American people have consistently voted for war at least since 1992. They had these men who ran for president in order to save us all and the were consistently rejected by the electorate. Its not just the government. Its the 4th estate. The corporations. I'm now a pessimist. War will come and it will fail. The question is who will the Empire wage war against and who will survive the war?

Is Pauline Christianity legitimate? The problem with it has always been that it was built on a tribal story. A lot of good came from it. It was used to justify some bad things too. Its origins are not the classical world. That is probably why the alt-right has a fascination with modern pseudo-pagan religions. I think the real story is that the Ancient Greeks particularly the Epicureans have won the argument:
https://www.csun.edu/~hcfll004/Stoic-Epic-comp.html – these ideas are older than Christianity.

The AngloZionist tribe is now considered what the Catholics considered the pagans were. The word paganus means hick. Pagan now means new age and Christian in the West means hick. The AngloZionist don't even like them but require their obedience and support. Perhaps its only a matter of time before the Judeo-Christian fairy tail loses its political power and just becomes good literature. It has no hope especially with the transhumanist wonders about to bequeathed to the world. It can't compete. They avoided the truth for about 2000 years and couldn't develop a convincing response against Epicureanism. Genesis is the best they could muster against natural selection after thousands of years of knowing about it? Epikoros (Hebrew for heretic) in the end won! But the US Empire has an unhealthy appetite of playing chicken with nuclear powers and western Judeo-Christianity will not go peacefully into the night. Read More Agree: Beefcake the Mighty

Frankly Frivilous , April 23, 2017 at 6:50 am GMT
@Yevardian Um, the Golan Heights was officially annexed by Israel in 1981.

I enjoy your articles, but you can't be taken seriously whilst you keep making amateurish mistakes like this.

Ditto on Russia being the only country truly upholding Islamic values. If Israel officially annexed the Golan heights in 1981, why is Netanyahu making noise about it now? Seems insecure. Also consider that "true" Islamic or Christian values would be those proposed by the actual adherents. Would Russians have any reason to discount or misrepresent their stated values if they were altruistic and high minded? I suggest you try and critique the Sakers comments on their intended merits if you wish to be taken seriously.

Joe Franklin , April 23, 2017 at 7:05 pm GMT
@nsa ZIG is a more accurate acronym......as in INFESTED. Think parasites like bed bugs, ticks, lice, mites, termites, scabies, fleas, ringworm, etc. ZOP is accurate too, and ZOP is the specific cause of ZOG.

ZOP is Zionist Occupied People, and ZOP is a description of the US and Israeli voter obsession with and participation in a neurotic victim cult.

ZOP is the elephant in the room that nobody in broadcast media will discuss.

US and Israeli victim cult lobbyist are obsessed with cult dominance of national elections and society.

The US and Israel have a dominant victim cult that displays a neurotic persecution complex and frequently demands government remedies.

A US and Israeli victim cultist is conditioned to demand government reparations and entitlements in exchange for their votes.

A typical US and Israeli victim cultist is obsessed with Nazi and white supremacy, claiming that white-straight-Christian-males are deplorable Nazi or Nazi sympathizers.

The US and Israeli victim cult is aggressive toward foreign nations that are a perceived threat to the cult.

As an example, here are some of the government entitlements enjoyed by victim cultists in Israel:

https://electronicintifada.net/content/lawsuit-challenges-israels-discriminatory-citizenship-definition/8767

Israel refused to recognize an Israeli nationality at the country's establishment in 1948, making an unusual distinction between "citizenship" and "nationality." Although all Israelis qualify as "citizens of Israel," the state is defined as belonging to the "Jewish nation," meaning not only the 5.6 million Israeli Jews but also more than seven million Jews in the diaspora.

Critics say the special status of Jewish nationality has been a way to undermine the citizenship rights of non-Jews in Israel, especially the fifth of the population who are Arab. Some 30 laws in Israel specifically privilege Jews, including in the areas of immigration rights, naturalization, access to land and employment.

Arab leaders have also long complained that indications of "Arab" nationality on ID cards make it easy for police and government officials to target Arab citizens for harsher treatment.

The interior ministry has adopted more than 130 possible nationalities for Israeli citizens, most of them defined in religious or ethnic terms, with "Jewish" and "Arab" being the main categories.

Gene S. , April 23, 2017 at 9:02 pm GMT
@wayne Read about King David in the Bible. He was a genocidal psychopath. It states in the Bible how he vicioulsy murdered civilian prisoners of war. And on at least one occasion he gave his men all the pre-puberty girls to "do with as they pleased", which was after they had murdered their parents and all family members. I am sure this was a great sadistical delight to him and his troops. Men of God? No God damned way. Undoubtely men of Satan. Different time, different standards. You are judging him with the modern "for show" standards, by which the "civilized" nations, which have instituted them, do not abide. The US govt has killed 10s of millions of mostly civilians (men, women, children) since the end of WWII, around the world, and now their clients in the Middle East and Ukraine continue mass rapes and murder. David's crimes pale by comparison. Those in Washington D.C. will never face justice for what they are doing, at least in this world, nor do they repent at all. You can read about King David's repentance in the same Bible.
Anon , April 23, 2017 at 9:47 pm GMT
300 Words @Incitatus I deeply apologize, Anon/Keith. I overestimated you. Mea colpa.

The fable was intended to illustrate the difference between embarrassing irrational instinct (canine leg-humpers) and intelligent criticism. You excelled, once again, at the former, and proudly so. Knock yourself out. Polish those table legs.

"I know I confuse you."

The only one confused is you, Anon, the evader of any record who still fancies the distinction 'Keith.' Are you afraid that a record of your remarks will easily indict you for your narrow agenda and regurgitative screeds?

No matter.

You might look up Julius Streicher, your patron saint. A man so vile cardinal Nazis at Nüremberg avoided him as if he would leave excrement on them in any prolonged contact. They knew best. Keith ,

"Are you afraid that a record of your remarks will easily endict you".

Indict me for wanting to bring down the elephant in the room? Did the Jewnited states already pass hate speech laws, forbidding all criticism of Israel and for exposing Jewish power in America? Did the Jewmerica pass laws criminalizing Holocaust Revisionism? Did I wake up in a country without first amendment rights. Or is all of this wishful thinking on your part?

Should I be indicted for a hate crime for asking for an autopsy proving several million Jews were gassed at the Auschwitz labor camps? Should I be hung because there is no autopsy evidence?

Maybe this is the purpose of the Unz Review. My Unz Review remarks will be use to retro actively endict me for laws that weren't on the books when I made my forbidden remarks, just like the Germans were endicted, convicted and hung at Nuremberg?

It is you and the other Hasbara trolls who have a defensive agenda and regurgitate
the same old name calling " Its a trick, the Jews always use it"

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jUGVPBO9_cA

When the Jewish Bolshevik NeoCons take over America, I am convinced I will be one of the first to be put in a NKVD Gulag. I also know my cell mates will be other patriotic Unz Review Americans along with millions of others who want to bring down the elephant in the room.

I apologize for mentioning the forbidden news about Rabbis and Herpes and the Jewish Egypt slave myth. I know this upset you. Both of these stories were news published in the Israeli Haaretz News. I guess these stories were for Jews eyes only.

Anon , April 23, 2017 at 11:01 pm GMT
@Ace

Vietnam was not a military defeat.

Doesn't matter. It was a political defeat, and war is an extension of politics.

[May 05, 2017] Jared a billionaire arch-Zionist trust-fund baby

Some comments are over top, but the term "Kosher Nostra" is pretty interesting. Jared's father sevred a jail term...
Notable quotes:
"... 'Jewish-American organized crime emerged within the American Jewish community during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It has been referred to variously in media and popular culture as the Jewish Mob, Jewish Mafia, Kosher Mafia, Kosher Nostra, or Undzer Shtik (Yiddish: אונדזער שטיק‎). The last two of these terms refer to the Italian Cosa Nostra (Italian pronunciation: [kɔza nɔstra]); the former is a play on the word kosher, referring to Jewish dietary laws, while the latter is a direct translation of the phrase (Italian for "our thing") into Yiddish, which was at the time the predominant language of the Jewish diaspora in the United States ..."
"... In more recent years, Jewish-American organized crime has reappeared in the forms of both Israeli and Jewish-Russian mafia criminal groups, and Orthodox kidnapping gangs ..."
"... Several notable Jewish American mobsters provided financial support for Israel through donations to Jewish organizations since the country's creation in 1948. Jewish-American gangsters used Israel's Law of Return to flee criminal charges or face deportation ..."
"... Even the staff at his own Jewish day school were surprised he was accepted at Harvard. ..."
"... He was described as a lacklustre student his father bought his entry, and they were disappointed that more qualified students from his school didn't make the cut. ..."
"... They have good reason to hide him – he and his family have some shady business dealings – his father is a x-convict. How did he come into billions of dollars? They say that Jared inherited his money – how did that happen when his father is still living – did they get special tax treatment? ..."
"... p.s. Jared Kushner is 100% Zionist ..."
May 05, 2017 | ...

wayfarer , April 20, 2017 at 10:12 pm GMT

The problem with fiat money is that if one has enough of it, one can buy just about anything under the sun that they please, including even large parts of a country's political system and government.

Take for example, Jared (a.k.a. billionaire arch-Zionist trust-fund baby) Kushner

source: https://www.sott.net/article/348461-The-controversy-of-Jared-Kushner-A-suspected-gangster-within-the-Trump-White-House

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtf6TgQgWr4

Seraphim , April 20, 2017 at 11:52 pm GMT
@Talha Kosher Nostra!!!

Oh man - that was awesome!!!

Peace. It is not my invention. All From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"Jewish-American organized crime":

'Jewish-American organized crime emerged within the American Jewish community during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It has been referred to variously in media and popular culture as the Jewish Mob, Jewish Mafia, Kosher Mafia, Kosher Nostra, or Undzer Shtik (Yiddish: אונדזער שטיק‎). The last two of these terms refer to the Italian Cosa Nostra (Italian pronunciation: [kɔza nɔstra]); the former is a play on the word kosher, referring to Jewish dietary laws, while the latter is a direct translation of the phrase (Italian for "our thing") into Yiddish, which was at the time the predominant language of the Jewish diaspora in the United States

In more recent years, Jewish-American organized crime has reappeared in the forms of both Israeli and Jewish-Russian mafia criminal groups, and Orthodox kidnapping gangs .

Several notable Jewish American mobsters provided financial support for Israel through donations to Jewish organizations since the country's creation in 1948. Jewish-American gangsters used Israel's Law of Return to flee criminal charges or face deportation "

Anonymous , April 21, 2017 at 3:31 am GMT

@wayfarer

Even the staff at his own Jewish day school were surprised he was accepted at Harvard.

He was described as a lacklustre student his father bought his entry, and they were disappointed that more qualified students from his school didn't make the cut.

Art , April 21, 2017 at 6:56 pm GMT
@Alden

I just read the latest ADL diktat.

As of today any mention of Jared Kushner is deemed anti Semitic. Consequences will be severe. I just read the latest ADL diktat. As of today any mention of Jared Kushner is deemed anti Semitic. Consequences will be severe.

They have good reason to hide him – he and his family have some shady business dealings – his father is a x-convict. How did he come into billions of dollars? They say that Jared inherited his money – how did that happen when his father is still living – did they get special tax treatment?

Hmm?

Peace - Art

p.s. Jared Kushner is 100% Zionist

[May 03, 2017] Prez Trump You Can not Fight the Whole World by Eric Margolis

Notable quotes:
"... "We control America." -Former Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon ..."
"... IDF vs Hezbollah round 2 should be interesting. All the Pauly Shores and Jared Kushners in uniform shat their panties when they faced a tough disciplined adversary immune to air superiority. Asymmetrical warfare is the 21st century's antidote to gunboat diplomacy. ..."
"... Actually, Shel Adelson put all his casino chips in Rubio's corner, and considered Trump unreliable at best. Until Trump won. Then I guess Adelson did support him, though I doubt Trump is bought and paid for to the extent Rubio would have been. ..."
"... Trump, at the order of Netanyahu, will destroy Iran in order to establish Israel as the only hegemonic power over the whole Middle East and Northern Africa. That's why they are destroying one country after another according to sectarian and religious lines such as the Yinon Plan outlined. The whole chaos in the Middle East serves only Israel. Just recently, Netanyahu said that Israel is one of the superpowers. How right he is. ..."
"... Mr. Margolis. Everything in Trumpland has to be magnified to huge. The attack on the Iran agreement fits nicely in Trump's idiosyncrasy that every achievement of president Obama must be dragged through the mud and declared the worst thing ever done by a US president. As in the case of NAFTA Trump may actually do nothing after he has talked to two women: May and Merkel. There is even an outside chance that he will talk to a third: Le Pen. ..."
"... Kushner and the military have the foreign policy portfolio. Trump has no idea whats going on. All of a sudden everybody likes him. That's enough for Trump. So "we" have gone full Zio. Duck and cover! ..."
Apr 29, 2017 | www.unz.com

Maybe the president believes he's won a great victory over the wicked Syrians by lobbing cruise missiles at one of their underused air bases. Maybe Trump believes that he's scared the evil Russians and the too big for their sampans Chinese into obedience.

His 22,000 lb MOAB terror bomb on Afghanistan should keep those pesky Taliban quiet for a while even though the Pentagon claimed the intended target was a group- Khorosan – that may not actually exist.

Those major malefactors, the crazy North Koreans, could be about to feel America's full military might if they so much as twitch.

Not content with nearly stirring up a new war with North Korea, President Donald Trump is now waving the big stick at another of Washington's favorite bogeymen, Iran. For the Trumps, Iran is poison.

In recent days, President Trump has threatened to renounce the six-power nuclear agreement to freeze or shrink Iran's nuclear infrastructure. This sensible pact was signed during the Obama administration by the great powers: US, Britain, France, Russia, Germany and China. Trump appears willing to abrogate the treaty and outrage the other great powers just because he hates Iran for some reason and, it appears, Muslims in general.

The Trump administration seems increasingly influenced by Israel's far right Netanyahu government. In fact, PM Netanyahu often appears the most moderate member of his rightist coalition which is dominated by militant West Bank settlers.

Trump has surrounded himself with ardent supporters of Israel's right. One of his major bankrollers is casino mogul Sheldon Adelson who is a key supporter of Jewish expansion on the illegally occupied West Bank.

Israel's right has made a hate fetish of Iran and incessantly calls for war against the Islamic Republic. However, the mighty US Israel lobby twice failed to push the Obama administration to attack Iran. The US Congress, by contrast, is totally under the thumb of Israel's American lobby and pays more respect to PM Netanyahu than the president. He who pays the piper .

In fact, Congress sought to block sales of Boeing civilian airliners to Iran worth $16.6 billion even though it would have cost thousands of American jobs. Congress has been trying to sabotage the Iran nuclear deal ever since it was signed, putting American national interests on a collision course with those of Israel's right.

But now President Trump says he's found a new reason to sabotage the six-power deal: Iran, insists Trump, supports 'terrorism' and has bad intentions. This charge has been around for decades, cited by Israel as a compelling reason to attack Iran because Tehran supports the 'terrorist' Lebanese movement Hezbollah and the Palestinian movement Hamas.

The 'terrorist' label is slapped onto all enemies of Israel and the United States. It's a handy, meaningless sobriquet that automatically denies those so named political or moral justice.

I was with the Israel army when it invaded Lebanon in 1982 and saw first-hand how its arrogance turned formerly pro-Israel Shia Lebanese in the south into anti-Israel fighters. Israel actually encouraged and may have secretly financed the growth of Hezbollah and Hamas hoping they would drain support from the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Lebanon's Amal militia.

Israel hates Hamas and Hezbollah and is determined to eradicate them. The principal supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah has long been Syria. Large parts of Syria have now been destroyed by a US-engineered uprising and bands of Saudi-financed mercenaries. That has left Iran as the main supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah, and a principal backer of Syria's Assad government. The PLO has become a puppet of Israel and the US.

So Israel is now determined to destroy Hezbollah in its strongholds in Lebanon and then crush Hamas with Trump's blessing, so ending any dreams of a Palestinian state. Iran is now being blamed for all Washington's problems in the Mideast. So war fever against Iran is again mounting.

Interestingly, Iran

Mark Green , April 29, 2017 at 4:54 pm GMT \n

"The Trump administration seems increasingly influenced by Israel's far right Netanyahu government." -Eric Margolis

More to the point:

"We control America." -Former Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon

Timur The Lame , April 30, 2017 at 12:26 pm GMT \n
IDF vs Hezbollah round 2 should be interesting. All the Pauly Shores and Jared Kushners in uniform shat their panties when they faced a tough disciplined adversary immune to air superiority. Asymmetrical warfare is the 21st century's antidote to gunboat diplomacy.

We in the west got scant information of the drubbing the Edomites got in that scrap. If you read between the lines of major media coverage (as obviously should be done) one got the distinct impression that they ran out of euphemisms to try to paint that conflict as anywhere near positive.

It turns out that the mighty Israeli army had feet of clay. And hurt feelings too judging by the massive 48 hour air assault they conducted before the peace agreement came into effect.

My prediction is that the next time around the IDF will use all modern MOAB and fuel air ordnance weapons (gifted by Uncle Sugar) to clear the ground before their snowflake grunts appear on the scene. A real holocaust (by dictionary definition) as it were. Of course militarily it is the proper thing to do but politically problematic. If Hezbollah has accounted for this by burrowing ever more deeply, there will be dragons. Israel cannot allow for any kind of casualty count domestically.

It is written that the French killed 75,000 0f their own due to artillery barrages in WW1. Those days are long over.

Cheers-

KenH , April 30, 2017 at 1:22 pm GMT \n
It looks like Trump hasn't gotten Eric's memo. He's also not afraid to think really big. Besides, Trump is one of those people who double down and try to prove anyone wrong who says he can't do something, so we should prepare for war with Iran, Syria, N. Korea, and Russia no matter the consequences.

The Trump administration seems increasingly influenced by Israel's far right Netanyahu government.

Ditto that. Trump is a Judaized white man who was surrounded by many American Jews with longstanding ties to the Likud party, so I always thought his talk of non-interventionism and "America first" seemed fanciful and merely designed to ensnare "deplorabes". It was only a matter of time before his court Jews employed their wiles to change Trump from populist with a humble foreign policy into a cross between George W. Bush and Bibi Netanyahu bent on regime change and more reckless and insane than both combined.

Bragadocious , April 30, 2017 at 4:17 pm GMT \n
Actually, Shel Adelson put all his casino chips in Rubio's corner, and considered Trump unreliable at best. Until Trump won. Then I guess Adelson did support him, though I doubt Trump is bought and paid for to the extent Rubio would have been.

Let's look at the alternatives here. Any other Republican except for Rand Paul wanted confrontation with Iran, and on a faster timetable than Trump. Hillary was more hawkish than Trump, on that nearly everyone agrees. So really, the odds of any other major candidate starting a war with Iran were greater than they are with Trump.

But what of this?

Trump is a Judaized white man who was surrounded by many American Jews with longstanding ties to the Likud party, so I always thought his talk of non-interventionism and "America first" seemed fanciful and merely designed to ensnare "deplorabes."

Again, it would be nearly impossible for anyone to serve as President without "American Jews with longstanding ties to the Likud Party" to be lurking around somewhere. They are everywhere , in both parties, and at a synagogue near you. But if Trump gets into the morass of regime change, he's a one-term President and a massive failure. I think he knows that.

Ludwig Watzal , Website April 30, 2017 at 4:36 pm GMT \n
Donald Trump's rhetorical bravado in Syria and Afghanistan is a prelude of a looming attack on Iran that will evolve, at the end, into an outright war across the Middle East. Such a war of aggression will break America's neck and will be the beginning of the end of the State of Israel. Both crazy states have nuclear weapons and they will use them. Both, Israel and the US, don't have any ethics. They are driven by a domination of other peoples. The US have been waging wars since its establishment, except for 17 (!) years. A real peace-loving nation. The same holds true for Israel. Since 1948, Israel has been at war with its neighbors and threatens Iran with war.

Trump, at the order of Netanyahu, will destroy Iran in order to establish Israel as the only hegemonic power over the whole Middle East and Northern Africa. That's why they are destroying one country after another according to sectarian and religious lines such as the Yinon Plan outlined. The whole chaos in the Middle East serves only Israel. Just recently, Netanyahu said that Israel is one of the superpowers. How right he is.

Druid , May 1, 2017 at 12:52 am GMT \n
@Anonymous By all means sell all the guided missiles, sorry... airliners, that Persian hearts desire! They will go up in smoke, torched by 500 lb bombs, or maybe by Standard missiles while trying to hit a high-rise building in the civilized world.

And Israel wins without fighting yet again. Sun Tzu is smiling, but looks a bit tired. Sorry, 911, inside job!

Duglarri , May 2, 2017 at 6:26 am GMT \n
Hey Eric- in your list of threats by Trump, you skip his threats to Mexic0, China, Australia, Germany, Sweden, Britain, the EU, and most recently South Korea. And not to forget: Canada.

Of course, he's not threatening war against any of those. Just trade war.

Except China.

It's hard to tell whether he knows the difference between friends and foes.

Oh, wait, there is one country and one leader he has never threatened, never spoken a bad word of, and never so much as hinted at being any sort of issue for the United States.

Wonder why that is?

Proud_Srbin , May 2, 2017 at 9:44 am GMT \n
Thank you for frankness Mr. Margolis. Humanity always prevails, terrorists always lose!
God Bless Mankind!
george Archers , May 2, 2017 at 12:30 pm GMT \n
Only sure cure, to get Americans to stop terrorizing the planet earth-Remove/relocate UN into Palestine (West Bank).
Didi , May 2, 2017 at 12:30 pm GMT \n
Mr. Margolis. Everything in Trumpland has to be magnified to huge. The attack on the Iran agreement fits nicely in Trump's idiosyncrasy that every achievement of president Obama must be dragged through the mud and declared the worst thing ever done by a US president. As in the case of NAFTA Trump may actually do nothing after he has talked to two women: May and Merkel. There is even an outside chance that he will talk to a third: Le Pen.
mr meener , May 2, 2017 at 12:46 pm GMT \n
head rabbi in Israel .goyim were born to serve Israel. trump has been kosherized by all the traitor jews around him with the master of them all kosher Kushner. the Syrian air force base was bombed because Syria did shoot down an Israeli jet. even the NK fiasco is tied to Israel. when Israel bombed the Syrian reactor in 2006 they killed 10 north Korean scientists who they knew were there. EVERY foreign policy war blockades sanctions bombing are ALL for israel. there is utterly no hope for this country
mr meener , May 2, 2017 at 12:48 pm GMT \n
@Proud_Srbin Thank you for frankness Mr. Margolis. Humanity always prevails, terrorists always lose!

God Bless Mankind! when the terrorist army is ISIS Israel's private army they will not lose. they have the backing of the whole west and saudia arbia. keep dreaming evil never loses in a world controlled by satan and his spawn

bob balkas , May 2, 2017 at 1:19 pm GMT \n
China and Russia, both bordering Korea, have not yet drawn their redlines to any attack on NK.

And why not? Is it because they know or feel sure that US dares not wage a full scale war against NK?

Surely, surely mad US generals, fake MSM, fake Congress are not that mad to attack a country like Korea.
How about by a pinprick; similar to that on the Shayrat airbase?

Carroll Price , May 2, 2017 at 2:25 pm GMT \n

Israel hates Hamas and Hezbollah and is determined to eradicate them. The principal supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah has long been Syria. Large parts of Syria have now been destroyed by a US-engineered uprising and bands of Saudi-financed mercenaries. That has left Iran as the main supporter of Hamas and Hezbollah, and a principal backer of Syria's Assad government. The PLO has become a puppet of Israel and the US.

I've said all along that the war being waged by the US against Syria is for the purpose of destroying the supply line used to transfer advanced weapons from Iran to Hezbollah. Israel simply cannot abide the thought of being unable to invade Lebanon at will, and will never, ever get over having their plow cleaned by Hezbollah in 2006.

Don G. , May 2, 2017 at 5:19 pm GMT \n
Obama has left an indelible mark with his signing on of the US to the deal on Iran's nuclear program. It's irreversible now because Russia is a party to the deal. As is the Syria war because of Russia's influence and it's MAD deterrent. And North Korea is safe because of China's influence.

Throughout the world the situation is going to be different now for the US. Russia and China have stood up and drawn a line in the sand. The deterrent to US aggression that was missing since the fall of the Soviet Union is now back.

Don G. , May 2, 2017 at 5:33 pm GMT \n
@bob balkas China and Russia, both bordering Korea, have not yet drawn their redlines to any attack on NK.

And why not? Is it because they know or feel sure that US dares not wage a full scale war against NK?

Surely, surely mad US generals, fake MSM, fake Congress are not that mad to attack a country like Korea.
How about by a pinprick; similar to that on the Shayrat airbase? Make no mistake Bob, the red lines have been drawn by China and Russia that forbid a US strike against North Korea. Much goes on in the background that is not fed to the US media. This is why the US media is useless for letting us know what is really happening in foreign affairs that include the US. It's also the reason why 90% of what we read on antiwar.com is useless too.

Barzini , May 2, 2017 at 6:30 pm GMT \n
It's a good idea to avoid military action against Iran. No matter how many military victories you chalk up on the battlefield, you can't win in the long run fighting in an area in which the vast majority of the population does not want you there.
WorkingClass , May 2, 2017 at 8:27 pm GMT \n
Kushner and the military have the foreign policy portfolio. Trump has no idea whats going on. All of a sudden everybody likes him. That's enough for Trump. So "we" have gone full Zio. Duck and cover!
eric siverson , May 2, 2017 at 9:45 pm GMT \n
I think a lot of people are confusing the little independent State of Israel with the international bankers often referred to as the new world order NWO I don't agree they are the same force and Israel has been and will continue to be as much of a victim as all the rest of us .
Carroll Price , May 3, 2017 at 2:52 am GMT \n
@eric siverson I think a lot of people are confusing the little independent State of Israel with the international bankers often referred to as the new world order NWO I don't agree they are the same force and Israel has been and will continue to be as much of a victim as all the rest of us . With American tax payers forking over in excess of 5 billion dollars per year to Israel (and that's only what we know about) you could hardly refer to that shitty little aberration as an independent state.

[Apr 30, 2017] The Madder Trump Gets, the More Seriously the World Takes Him

Notable quotes:
"... The New York Times ..."
"... Robert Fisk writes for the Independent , where this column originally appeared. ..."
"... And my hope still is that Trump will prevent NATO and EU war on Russia, the war that indeed will end al wars, as already Wilson wanted, because this war will end all human life. ..."
"... How it then ends is well described in the novel On the Beach, Neville Shute, 1953, the New Zealand government distributing suicide pills when the radio active dust reaches the island. ..."
"... Trump got elected by declaring himself the enemy of international Zionist globalist bankers. Once in the White House he folded to their demands. He is now Clinton/Obama Mk 3. ..."
"... ..."
Apr 25, 2017 | www.unz.com
It's one thing to have a lunatic in the White House who watches late night television and tweets all day. But when the same lunatic goes to war, it now emerges, he's a safer bet for democracy, a strong President who stands up to tyrants (unless they happen to be Saudis, Turks or Egyptians) and who acts out of human emotion rather than cynicism.

How else can one account for the extraordinary report in The New York Times which recorded how Trump's "anguish" at the film of dying Syrian babies had led him to abandon "isolationism"?

Americans like action, but have typically confused Trump's infantile trigger finger with mature decision-making. What else is there to think when a normally sane US columnist like David Ignatius suddenly compares Trump to Harry Truman and praises his demented President for his "flexibility" and "pragmatism"?

This is preposterous. A madman who goofs off at something he doesn't like on CNN is just plain wacky. A man of unsound mind who attacks three Muslim countries – two of which were included in his seven Muslim nation refugee ban – is a danger to the world. Yet the moment he fires 59 missiles at Syria after more than 60 civilians die in an apparent chemical attack which he blames on Assad – but none after far more are massacred by a Syrian suicide bomber – even Angela Merkel takes leave of her senses and praises Trump, along with the Matron of Downing Street, Signora Mogherini and sundry other potentates. Hasn't someone cottoned on to the fact that Trump is now taking America into a shooting war?

Handing more power to the Pentagon – about the most perilous act of any US President – means that Defence Secretary James "Mad Dog" Mattis is now encouraging the head-chopping Saudis to bomb Yemen – adding even more American intelligence "assets" to this criminal enterprise - and encouraging the Gulf Arabs' delusional idea that Iran wants to conquer the Arab world. "Everywhere you look," Mattis told his Saudi hosts this month, "if there's trouble in the region, you find Iran."

Is that the case with Egypt, then, now under Isis attack as its President "disappears" thousands of his own people? Is that the case in Turkey whose even more crazed President has now locked up tens of thousands of his own people while turning himself into a dictator-by-law?

Let's just briefly take a look at Trump's reaction to Recep Tayyip Erdogan's dodgy referendum, which has given him a Caliph's power over Turkey. A round-up of the latest figures from Turkey by the French newspaper Liberation show that there have been 47,000 arrests since last year's attempted coup, 140,000 passports revoked, 120,000 men and women fired from their jobs (including 8,000 military officers, 5,000 academics, 4,000 judges and lawyers, 65 mayors and 2,000 journalists). One thousand two hundred schools and 15 universities have been closed down, 170 newspapers, television and radio stations shut.

And after the referendum which gave Erdogan a narrow (if very dubious) majority to legitimise these outrages, Trump called the Turkish President to congratulate him on his victory. Just as he continues to congratulate Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi in his "battle" against "terror", a war which al-Sisi – whose coup d'etat against Egypt's first elected president originally brought him to power – appears to be losing. Al-Sisi, Trump enthused, would be someone "very close to him".

We know that the US Special Forces raid on Yemen, in which Navy Seal William Owens died, killed more civilians than al-Qaeda members. We don't know (or, I suspect, care) very much what the "mother of all bombs" did in the Nangahar province of Afghanistan. First it killed 60 Isis fighters. Then it killed 100 Isis fighters and not a single civilian – surely a first in US military history? But then, weirdly, nobody has been allowed to go to the site of this monster bomb's explosion. Because civilians were indeed killed? Or because – and this is a fact – Isis survivors went on fighting American ground troops after the bombing?

Now Trump is sending a naval battle group to threaten North Korea, a past master at childish threats itself. Ye gods! And this is a man who is now "flexible" and "pragmatic"? It's instructive to note that after its first edition, The New York Times changed its headline about Trump's Syrian "anguish" to "Trump Upends His Own Foreign Policy", still gifting him with a "foreign policy" (which doesn't exist) while cutting out the "anguish". I am told the first original edition headline read: "On Syria Attack, Trump's Heart Came First". Intriguing. If that is correct, you can see how The New York Times slowly – far too slowly – realised it had itself started to fall in love with its shooting-from-the-hip President.

Now we await the battle for Korea, forgetting that earlier war which drowned the peninsula in blood, American and British as well as Korean and Chinese. Maybe Trump, in his vague, frightening way, has decided that Southeast Asia will be his real war. And there, of course, the comparison with Truman gets rather too close to home. For Truman only came in at the end of the Second World War, after Roosevelt's death, and his crowning wartime achievement was also in Southeast Asia: the atom-bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Heaven spare us the next 100 days.

Robert Fisk writes for the Independent , where this column originally appeared.

jilles dykstra, April 27, 2017 at 6:29 am GMT

I still do not see Trump as a crackpot.

Though I'm not sure about his ideas I still hope that he will end USA militarism, not because out of moral ideas, but because he sees, and his rich friends, that pursuing the goal of USA world hegemony will, or has already, ruined the USA.

The attack on Syria, and his warlike talk about N Korea, hogwash to confuse Deep State, and to satisfy his voters. The Dutch professor Laslo Maracs, university of Amsterdam, explains all this eloquently, alas only in Dutch, as far as I know.

And my hope still is that Trump will prevent NATO and EU war on Russia, the war that indeed will end al wars, as already Wilson wanted, because this war will end all human life.

How it then ends is well described in the novel On the Beach, Neville Shute, 1953, the New Zealand government distributing suicide pills when the radio active dust reaches the island.

ThereisaGod , April 27, 2017 at 7:31 am GMT

Trump got elected by declaring himself the enemy of international Zionist globalist bankers. Once in the White House he folded to their demands. He is now Clinton/Obama Mk 3.

Ignatius (not "normally sensible" but normally a blood-sucking Zionist warmonger) applauds Trump for his betrayal of those who elected him, for his submission to the usual suspects . by the way this guy (see below) explains what the power is that obedience-monkeys like Trump (and, more importantly, the rest of us) actually serve:

https://youtu.be/nEpcY5JU120

Art , April 27, 2017 at 7:35 am GMT
Trump underestimated the problems he was going to have in government. It is true – he is a good business negotiator – he has proven himself at making business deals. The goal of the participants in a business deal is to create an ongoing business. The all-encompassing goal of government is to maintain power – second is getting things done. Trump must learn a new game – he must learn the game power. The first rule of power is you need to instill fear – you need to take someone out!

Trump must use government power to crush someone (not twitter). Trump must take one of those jerk judges immediately to the supreme court. Trump needs to stick something that Schumer really wants, right where the sun don't shine. Using government power, Trump needs to make an example of some media person.

Trump dropped some bombs and the world now has respect – that's power politics.

He needs to do the same domestically.

Zogby , April 27, 2017 at 8:22 am GMT
Trump is not a mysogynist, just a straight horny male. With the rest I agree.
jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 9:41 am GMT
100 Words @ThereisaGod Trump got elected by declaring himself the enemy of international Zionist globalist bankers.

Once in the White House he folded to their demands.
He is now Clinton/Obama Mk 3.

Ignatius (not "normally sensible" but normally a blood-sucking Zionist warmonger) applauds Trump for his betrayal of those who elected him, for his submission to the usual suspects .... by the way ... this guy (see below) explains what the power is that obedience-monkeys like Trump (and, more importantly, the rest of us) actually serve:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEpcY5JU120&t=543s It is not easy, if that is what Trump wants, to turn around the policy of a country, that has been followed since Pearl Harbour.
The one and only period that the USA was not imperialistic was from 1919, when the American people discovered why their sons had died in Europe, until 1933, when Roosevelt got power. Read More

Robert Magill , April 27, 2017 at 10:16 am GMT
100 Words Donald Trump evokes in us the same distortion of reality as a funhouse mirror at an amusement park.
Apparently no one is immune to the phenomenon. Maybe it's black magic. Maybe it's Jungian.

Whatever it is; it's pretty dark. In fact, the Trump effect on us has become a Litmus Test of more

https://robertmagill.wordpress.com/2017/03/20/black-magic-or-jungian-shadow/ Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

dearieme , April 27, 2017 at 10:54 am GMT
@Wizard of Oz Just sometimes Robert Fisk says something interesting and convincing, or at least, believable. But what is one to make of his expert knowledge if he thinks Hiroshima and Nagasaki are in SE Asia? "what is one to make of his expert knowledge if he thinks Hiroshima and Nagasaki are in SE Asia?"

Maybe they were in 1945. Plates drift.

Or maybe he's just woefully ignorant of the meaning of South East? That's what my money's on. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

naro , April 27, 2017 at 11:25 am GMT
Robert Fisk the Iranian shill, and secret Shiia convert, doesn't even know that Hiroshima and Nagasaki are NOT in Southeast Asia. Thank God that Trump and Israel are a lot smarter than this turd. Read More
Sean , April 27, 2017 at 11:29 am GMT
@jilles dykstra It is not easy, if that is what Trump wants, to turn around the policy of a country, that has been followed since Pearl Harbour.
The one and only period that the USA was not imperialistic was from 1919, when the American people discovered why their sons had died in Europe, until 1933, when Roosevelt got power. The last American occupation troops did not leave Germany until the 1930′s. Read More
Logan , April 27, 2017 at 11:34 am GMT
@Wizard of Oz Just sometimes Robert Fisk says something interesting and convincing, or at least, believable. But what is one to make of his expert knowledge if he thinks Hiroshima and Nagasaki are in SE Asia? SE, NE, at this point in time what difference does it make? Read More
jacques sheete , April 27, 2017 at 11:46 am GMT
200 Words Trump, the malleable Chimp, is just the latest iteration of Cleopatra's monkeys, and the mask is off.

It's now reported that Trump just did a NAFTA flip-flop.

But at least the boob isn't Hillary, and maybe his simian antics will awaken a few more people to the reality of the futility of our political systems.

All the dreamers ought to wake up to the fact that the Amerika of their fantasies has been dead for some time, and will never be resurrected.

Somewhat different circumstances, but the idea is the same:

22 1 Scipio, when he looked upon the city as it was utterly perishing and in the last throes of its complete destruction, is said to have shed tears and wept openly for his enemies. 2 After being wrapped in thought for long, and realizing that all cities, nations, and authorities must, like men, meet their doom; that this happened to Ilium, once a prosperous city, to the empires of Assyria, Media, and Persia, the greatest of their time, and to Macedonia itself, the brilliance of which was so recent, either deliberately or the verses escaping him, he said:
A day will come when sacred Troy shall perish,
And Priam and his people shall be slain.1

1 Iliad VI.448 9.

-POLYBIUS , THE HISTORIES,Fragments of Book XXXVIII, p389

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/e/roman/texts/polybius/38*.html

Me? I ain't shedding any tears for any stinking state! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

Sean , April 27, 2017 at 11:53 am GMT
100 Words @Abdul Alhazred Actually its the British!....well they are bloody insane!
Anyone who says they reserve the right to make a thermonuclear "First Strike" is totally mad.

https://larouchepac.com/20170426/brits-nuclear-first-strike-jolly-good Anyone who wants to stage a preemptive nuclear attack wouldn't say so beforehand. No-one can come up with a scenario in which Britain would ever first use nukes, so refusing to rule it out is simply the practice of confronting potential aggression with uncertain consequences though being slow to say what you will do, and never saying what you won't.

Lets be clear: the British nukes are out in subs and if they got the coded order to fire off a first use strike (for some reason we cannot yet imagine) the Trident captain and crew would obey the command. Any statement to the contrary made by some politician on BBC radio years before is going to be bloody irrelevant. Read More

Sean , April 27, 2017 at 12:13 pm GMT
100 Words Fisk writes as if the current US president's puny actions are the cause of wars and despotism all around the globe, although many like the Yemen have seen the same sides fighting for five decades, wich an altered cast of outside help. They are are rooted in local conditions, all these things Fisk is complaining about. He sometime talks as if the Middle east would settle down in a trice without the US. But America is just a country, big and strong, but still in need of allies.Even if America decided to withdraw from all involvement, It cannot halt others' interventions in local conflicts by washing US hands clean. Fisk implies otherwise. Read More
quercusalba , April 27, 2017 at 12:16 pm GMT
200 Words I must disagree with Fisk on a number of his statements and to my surprise and chagrin he sounds almost unhinged in his article. Excuse me, but the misogynist claim is just too juvenile and so terribly, terribly boring. And those admittedly predominately Muslim countries from whom Trump wishes to ban immigration - they are also countries (with the exception of Iran, and we all know why it is on the list) which have no effective governments (thanks in good measure to policies of these United States), as a result there is very little background information available to our immigration officials for anyone wishing to come here from one of those countries. Wanting to find an improved 'vetting' process for such an individuals is prudent.

I found Trump's rhetoric about the 'alleged' chemical weapons use in Syria troubling to say the least. His authorization to bomb that airport though seemed like a pinprick action (to my delight) and appeared to be an action to shut up his critics. I'm unsure if that is so, of course.

Trump's tweeting is not 'crazed'. It is his only means to get out his own message as an extremely hostile and biased news media is not going to do it.

It is very hard to know what is true and what is not true anymore. I don't think Fisk in this possesses the truth anymore than the rest of us. Read More

jacques sheete , April 27, 2017 at 12:28 pm GMT
@Gleimhart The Trump Derangement Syndrome at Unz has gotten really tiring.

And no, not everyone gives the least crap about his "misogyny." Not me, anyway.

This site gets more anti-American by the day. Screw you leftwing dirtbags.

This site gets more anti-American by the day.

Which America you talkin about? The one it's become or the one in your dreams?

If you loved what America is supposed to stand for, you'd also be against what it's become.

You want a pity party er sumpin? Go elsewhere. Read More Agree: RadicalCenter

War for Blair Mountain , April 27, 2017 at 12:35 pm GMT
I'm looking forward to seeing the cockroach Ivanka Trump being prosecuted for War Crimes Read More Agree: Stephen R. Diamond Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Wizard of Oz , April 27, 2017 at 12:47 pm GMT
@Logan SE, NE, at this point in time what difference does it make? Indeed, why not the North Pole if you are aspiring to be an obscurely oracular pundit. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
Agent76 , April 27, 2017 at 1:07 pm GMT
Apr 22, 2017 How Reality Is Being Manufactured

Apr 9, 2017 No More

Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

nsa , April 27, 2017 at 1:25 pm GMT
Good to see the vile jooie trolls (((naroberg, seanstein, gleimowitz))) showing up early today to defend their butt boy, Der Swampster. You lads ever worry about the white and black trash masses catching on to you IzzyFirster traitors? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Anthony Chigurh , April 27, 2017 at 1:27 pm GMT
Crackpot?

Misogyny?

Where am I? The Guardian? What is this leftist trash? What has happened to Unz? This place was one of the last ones. Read More

Moi , April 27, 2017 at 1:51 pm GMT
@Art Trump underestimated the problems he was going to have in government.

It is true – he is a good business negotiator – he has proven himself at making business deals. The goal of the participants in a business deal is to create an ongoing business.

The all-encompassing goal of government is to maintain power – second is getting things done.

Trump must learn a new game – he must learn the game power.

The first rule of power is you need to instill fear – you need to take someone out!

Trump must use government power to crush someone (not twitter). Trump must take one of those jerk judges immediately to the supreme court. Trump needs to stick something that Schumer really wants, right where the sun don't shine. Using government power, Trump needs to make an example of some media person.

Trump dropped some bombs and the world now has respect – that's power politics.

He needs to do the same domestically. C'mon, Trump filed for bankruptcy FOUR times! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 1:56 pm GMT
400 Words

Yet the moment he fires 59 missiles at Syria after more than 60 civilians die in an apparent chemical attack which he blames on Assad – but none after far more are massacred by a Syrian suicide bomber – even Angela Merkel takes leave of her senses and praises Trump, along with the Matron of Downing Street, Signora Mogherini and sundry other potentates. Hasn't someone cottoned on to the fact that Trump is now taking America into a shooting war?

Well Fisk, having been pontificating about Middle Eastern issues for quite a long time, haven't you cottoned to the fact that Merkel and the "Matron of Downing Street" and all the rest of these whores of the Zio-West are nothing more than quislings for the international PTB (Rothschild/Soros, et al)?

I mean how ******** dumb can you be not to know that it's Israel that wants Assad out, and that just like with Saddam and Gadhafi and all the rest, it is Israel's bidding that is getting done here with all these serial and myriad atrocities and war crimes. Duh fucking duh!

And if Merkel and May and the entire length and breath of the CIA controlled msm are finally happy about something Trump did, then it's only because what he did pleases the Likudicks in Israel. Duh.

For a man of Fisk's stature in the realm of journalism to pretend that Merkel and May are acting the way they are independent of nefarious banking/war mongering/Zio-forces in the Western world is what is truly preposterous. Note to Fisk, Merkel and May are controlled, just like that other little bitch of Zion, Toady Blair.

What would Mr. Fisk make of this video I wonder. A remarkable coincidence?!

When Fisk pretends that there's no comprehensible reason for why the NYT all in the sudden gushes over Trump once he starts bombing Israel's foes, then you know it's all just dishonest blather.

Perhaps Mr. Fisk is simply 'smart' enough to understand the score, and like all intellectual whores, use his pen to obscure the truth, and please the PTB, rather than tempt them like Dr. Udo Ulfkotte did. Eh Robert?

As for N. Korea, whenever you want to understand the id of the Zio-Fiend, just look to this guy

"The North Koreans - this very erratic, unstable regime - may soon have the capability to harm us directly," Bolton said in an interview with John Catsimatidis that aired Sunday on New York's AM 970

http://thehill.com/policy/international/330080-former-un-ambassador-it-only-gets-worse-with-north-korea

when Bolton says "harm *us* directly", he isn't talking about the US now is he? Read More

jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 1:56 pm GMT
@Sean The last American occupation troops did not leave Germany until the 1930's. The WWII occupation troops never left. Read More
jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 2:10 pm GMT
200 Words @quercusalba I must disagree with Fisk on a number of his statements and to my surprise and chagrin he sounds almost unhinged in his article. Excuse me, but the misogynist claim is just too juvenile and so terribly, terribly boring. And those admittedly predominately Muslim countries from whom Trump wishes to ban immigration -- they are also countries (with the exception of Iran, and we all know why it is on the list) which have no effective governments (thanks in good measure to policies of these United States), as a result there is very little background information available to our immigration officials for anyone wishing to come here from one of those countries. Wanting to find an improved 'vetting' process for such an individuals is prudent.

I found Trump's rhetoric about the 'alleged' chemical weapons use in Syria troubling to say the least. His authorization to bomb that airport though seemed like a pinprick action (to my delight) and appeared to be an action to shut up his critics. I'm unsure if that is so, of course.

Trump's tweeting is not 'crazed'. It is his only means to get out his own message as an extremely hostile and biased news media is not going to do it.

It is very hard to know what is true and what is not true anymore. I don't think Fisk in this possesses the truth anymore than the rest of us. I speak four languages, it is amazingly simple in these internet times, by comparing 'news', to find out, not always dead sure, what the truth is.

On MH370 I still do not have more than suspicion, the USA again, the plane carried two groups of Chinese technicians experts in making planes invisible for radar.
The control of the plane was taken from the crew, from the outside, this is nowadays possible with any modern plane, on sept 11 there was a problem.
I suppose this failure led to some improvements.

MH17, someone leaked a secret Australian report, Ukraine used passenger jet flights as human shields for their bombers.
A BUK was nevertheless fired, dit not hit an Ukrainian bomber, but a passenger flight.
Dutch prime minister the afternoon of the carnage made a very secret phone call to his vice prime minister, the call had to be over a land line, the vice was so stupid to state in public, 'because the Russians should not be able to listen to the call'.
At that moment officially Rutte, prime minister, knew nothing about the cause.
The only conclusion possible for me is that he did know, and told Asscher, vice, that the Russians should be blamed.

Once one has understood who perpetrated sept 11, resulting in a very cynical view on politics, Ockam's Razor often gives the truth. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 2:11 pm GMT
@Sean The last American occupation troops did not leave Germany until the 1930's.

The last American occupation troops did not leave Germany until the 1930′s.

they never left..

they're still there

how many US military bases are there on German soil today? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 2:15 pm GMT
100 Words @Sean Fisk writes as if the current US president's puny actions are the cause of wars and despotism all around the globe, although many like the Yemen have seen the same sides fighting for five decades, wich an altered cast of outside help. They are are rooted in local conditions, all these things Fisk is complaining about. He sometime talks as if the Middle east would settle down in a trice without the US. But America is just a country, big and strong, but still in need of allies.Even if America decided to withdraw from all involvement, It cannot halt others' interventions in local conflicts by washing US hands clean. Fisk implies otherwise.

Even if America decided to withdraw from all involvement, It cannot halt others' interventions in local conflicts by washing US hands clean. Fisk implies otherwise.

as an American, I'm worried about our hands (souls) being clean

if you want to go suit up for the IDF and get involved with interventions, then be my guest, but America needs to come home (like Trump promised)

no more wars for Israel

wouldn't you agree Sean? Read More

Sam Shama , April 27, 2017 at 2:19 pm GMT
Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.

Trump and Pence are good men, their qualities, underestimated by many. Read More LOL: Astuteobservor II , L.K

Che Guava , April 27, 2017 at 2:20 pm GMT
100 Words

battle for Korea Trump, in his vague, frightening way, has decided that Southeast Asia will be his real

[Truman's] crowning wartime achievement was also in Southeast Asia: the atom-bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

I never knew that Japan and the Koreas were in south-east Asia.

Are the winters a collective delusion? Does it mean that parts of Russia and China are the only places in north-east Asia or even that there *is* no north-east Asia?

Oh no! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

Biff , April 27, 2017 at 2:20 pm GMT
Little geography lesson for Fisk – Hiroshima is not in Southeast Asia. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Mark Green , Website April 27, 2017 at 2:34 pm GMT
600 Words Fisk should have mentioned Trump's special affection for Israel and his unconditional support of Israeli militarism and Israeli brutality. This is key.

Zio-Washington's double-standards vis-a-vis Israel are at the root of ongoing US lawlessness. No bilateral arrangement in our nation's history epitomizes this moral/political fraud better. Washington's 'unshakable' alliance with the Zionist entity is artificial. Americans do not benefit by this arrangement. In fact, the opposite is true. Yet no one says a word. It's taboo.

Fragile, dubious myths involving US (and Israeli) exceptionalism endure and in plain view; this despite the fact that America (the 'proposition nation') is wedded to the ideas of 'Equality' and 'Freedom'.

Sure we are–except when it doesn't suit us; except when it doesn't suit Israel.

Thus, enforced inequality is just peachy in Israel. And American supremacism is how Washington implements its foreign policies. Zio-Washington decides.

Thus, when it comes to defending the rights and interests of Palestine or Iran or Syria, principles involving freedom, equality and sovereignty are sidelined. And any references to 'existential threats' are reserved for you-know-who. It's a one-way street.

Lesser peoples and 'bad' countries are not entitled to invoke their own interests and entitlements. Israel on the other hand, always is.

Indeed, Trump's preemptive missile attack on Syria is a great example of Zio-American privilege and Zio-American lawlessness. Legal restraints are for other nations. Not Zio-America. When Zio-Washington gets upset, Zio-Washington gets to invade and bomb sovereign states, even though these same states have not attacked us.

Washington has not only become 'the world's policeman', but the world's judge and jury.

Both the UN Charter and the Geneva Convention however identify aggressive war (including a 'first strike') as the supreme international crime. Shouldn't this matter?

Double-standard are nevertheless used routinely by Israel and Washington. This allows them to initiate serial warfare that lacks a clear legal foundation. It's all ad hoc. It subverts the rule of law.

And our pro-Zionist MSM sanitizes this conduct and worldview.

Special counties (and we know who they are) are therefore not bound by cumbersome restrictions that were designed to prevent war, expansion and aggression. Feelings and 'outrage' now matter more. This is part and parcel of Zio-American exceptionalism. Laws and ethics have been downgraded to accommodate political objectives and feelings.

This is why Trump's anti-Assad 'outrage' (and subsequent missile attack) did not focus on aggressive war or the unjustified killing of civilians. Because if it did, Zio-Washington would be caught with its own pants down.

Instead, Trump got weepy over the type of weapons used to kill civilians–not the slaughter itself.

After all, we 'good guys' kill civilians all the time. And in massive quantities.

The flimsy moral principle underlying Trump's strike on Syria strike is this:

Gas is uncool. But missiles are perfectly fine.

Gas, remember, is reminiscent of the Holocaust. And that's a no-no!

Hidden within this fake moral paradigm is the message to always respect Jewish taboos (!) when initiating violence. Kill properly.

These ethical distinctions however are politicized and empty. Murder is still murder. Aggression is still aggression. When will Zio-Washington take a look in the mirror?

This declining level of moral thinking undermines real legal principles. Possessing nuclear weapons (and threatening to use them) has become 'OK' for exceptional nations but 'evil' when bad (anti-Israel) nations follow suit. And it's Zio-Washington alone that gets to decide which is which and who is who.

This chicanery confers unique privilege. Our Zionized media gives cover to this fraud.

Fisk does correctly note that Trump is being steered into a pattern of malevolent neoconservatism. This means war. Ironically, as Trump reverses the stated policies and goals that got him elected (and in the direction of neocon aggression) the MSM has done a similar about-face (supporting Trump).

Trump is finally 'acting presidential'!

These deceptions and grotesque fairy tales benefit global militarists, government careerists, and of course, Zionists. Read More Agree: anarchyst

Che Guava , April 27, 2017 at 2:36 pm GMT
@jilles dykstra The WWII occupation troops never left. . . . and ROFL at Sean's

did not leave Germany until the 1930′s.

That is so strange, a typo can't explain it.

Alternative reality? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

War for Blair Mountain , April 27, 2017 at 2:45 pm GMT
The NeoCohen Spherial Cow Symmetrical Implosion Orange Head Glow Suicide Club!!!!

How do you day this in Russian? Read More

Che Guava , April 27, 2017 at 2:48 pm GMT
@Rurik

Yet the moment he fires 59 missiles at Syria after more than 60 civilians die in an apparent chemical attack which he blames on Assad – but none after far more are massacred by a Syrian suicide bomber – even Angela Merkel takes leave of her senses and praises Trump, along with the Matron of Downing Street, Signora Mogherini and sundry other potentates. Hasn't someone cottoned on to the fact that Trump is now taking America into a shooting war?
Well Fisk, having been pontificating about Middle Eastern issues for quite a long time, haven't you cottoned to the fact that Merkel and the "Matron of Downing Street" and all the rest of these whores of the Zio-West are nothing more than quislings for the international PTB (Rothschild/Soros, et al)?

I mean how ******** dumb can you be not to know that it's Israel that wants Assad out, and that just like with Saddam and Gadhafi and all the rest, it is Israel's bidding that is getting done here with all these serial and myriad atrocities and war crimes. Duh fucking duh!

And if Merkel and May and the entire length and breath of the CIA controlled msm are finally happy about something Trump did, then it's only because what he did pleases the Likudicks in Israel. Duh.

For a man of Fisk's stature in the realm of journalism to pretend that Merkel and May are acting the way they are independent of nefarious banking/war mongering/Zio-forces in the Western world is what is truly preposterous. Note to Fisk, Merkel and May are controlled, just like that other little bitch of Zion, Toady Blair.

What would Mr. Fisk make of this video I wonder. A remarkable coincidence?!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFEudf8NOuY

When Fisk pretends that there's no comprehensible reason for why the NYT all in the sudden gushes over Trump once he starts bombing Israel's foes, then you know it's all just dishonest blather.

Perhaps Mr. Fisk is simply 'smart' enough to understand the score, and like all intellectual whores, use his pen to obscure the truth, and please the PTB, rather than tempt them like Dr. Udo Ulfkotte did. Eh Robert?

As for N. Korea, whenever you want to understand the id of the Zio-Fiend, just look to this guy


"The North Koreans - this very erratic, unstable regime - may soon have the capability to harm us directly," Bolton said in an interview with John Catsimatidis that aired Sunday on New York's AM 970
http://thehill.com/policy/international/330080-former-un-ambassador-it-only-gets-worse-with-north-korea

when Bolton says "harm *us* directly", he isn't talking about the US now is he? Rurik,

I was just going to press 'Agree', but your last sentence mystifies me.

Bolton was, as usual, talking out of his arse, but assuming sincerity on his part (with great strain), which *us* do you think he meant? Read More

War for Blair Mountain , April 27, 2017 at 2:54 pm GMT
@War for Blair Mountain The NeoCohen Spherial Cow Symmetrical Implosion Orange Head Glow Suicide Club!!!!


How do you day this in Russian? The NeoCohen Fat Boy Trump Spherical Cow Symmetrical Explosion Orange Day Glow Shockwave Suicide Club!!!! topped off with the Slovenian Slut's SCRUMPTIOUS CHOCOLATE CAKE!!!! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Anonymous White Male , April 27, 2017 at 2:57 pm GMT
@Anthony Chigurh Crackpot?

Misogyny?

Where am I? The Guardian? What is this leftist trash? What has happened to Unz? This place was one of the last ones. Since I have been reading Utz, there have always been articles posted by leftist authors. I don't think Steve Sailer or the others agree with them. I think it is a know your enemy kind of thing. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Anonymous White Male , April 27, 2017 at 2:59 pm GMT
@jacques sheete

This site gets more anti-American by the day.
Which America you talkin about? The one it's become or the one in your dreams?

If you loved what America is supposed to stand for, you'd also be against what it's become.

You want a pity party er sumpin? Go elsewhere. What is America "supposed" to stand for and when was this agreed upon by anyone? Facts, remember. Not your "opinion". Read More Troll: jacques sheete Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 3:05 pm GMT
@Sam Shama Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.

Trump and Pence are good men, their qualities, underestimated by many.

Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.

tikkun olam = stealing the Golan Heights?

who knew? Read More

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 3:14 pm GMT
100 Words @Che Guava Rurik,

I was just going to press 'Agree', but your last sentence mystifies me.

Bolton was, as usual, talking out of his arse, but assuming sincerity on his part (with great strain), which *us* do you think he meant?

which *us* do you think he meant?

Hey Che,

when someone like Bolton says 'they directly threaten us'

you can take it to the bank that the "us" he's referring to is Israel

us, the Jews

he purports to mean the American people, but anyone on the planet who knows the first thing about Ziocons like Bolton, know damn well he'd see virtually every single American goyim ground up into the dirt rather that see one fingernail on one Jewish hand suffer harm.

N. Korea does not threaten America or our interests. If anything, it threatens its neighbors. And if so, then our trading partner China could effectively deal with it.

the only reason N. Korea is in the crosshairs is because somehow Israel considers it a threat Read More

JoaoAlfaiate , April 27, 2017 at 3:18 pm GMT
100 Words Syria and Hizbollah represent resistance to Israel and its client state, the USA. So when Trump attacked Syria he was immediately praised by the ziocohen controlled American media and Congress who have consistently placed Israeli interests ahead of American interests. This is by no means a new development in world affairs and I am surprised that Fisk is surprised. I'm guessing that the only folks who were really shocked were the people who believed what Trump said during his campaign about the uselessness of US intervention in the Middle East and how he was going to change US policy . Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Sam Shama , April 27, 2017 at 3:29 pm GMT
@Rurik

Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.
tikkun olam = stealing the Golan Heights?

who knew? Why spew the common nonsense? Read More

Socrates , April 27, 2017 at 3:30 pm GMT
American slaves, wake up and run for the mountains! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 3:32 pm GMT
200 Words @Mark Green Fisk should have mentioned Trump's special affection for Israel and his unconditional support of Israeli militarism and Israeli brutality. This is key.

Zio-Washington's double-standards vis-a-vis Israel are at the root of ongoing US lawlessness. No bilateral arrangement in our nation's history epitomizes this moral/political fraud better. Washington's 'unshakable' alliance with the Zionist entity is artificial. Americans do not benefit by this arrangement. In fact, the opposite is true. Yet no one says a word. It's taboo.

Fragile, dubious myths involving US (and Israeli) exceptionalism endure and in plain view; this despite the fact that America (the 'proposition nation') is wedded to the ideas of 'Equality' and 'Freedom'.

Sure we are--except when it doesn't suit us; except when it doesn't suit Israel.

Thus, enforced inequality is just peachy in Israel. And American supremacism is how Washington implements its foreign policies. Zio-Washington decides.

Thus, when it comes to defending the rights and interests of Palestine or Iran or Syria, principles involving freedom, equality and sovereignty are sidelined. And any references to 'existential threats' are reserved for you-know-who. It's a one-way street.

Lesser peoples and 'bad' countries are not entitled to invoke their own interests and entitlements. Israel on the other hand, always is.

Indeed, Trump's preemptive missile attack on Syria is a great example of Zio-American privilege and Zio-American lawlessness. Legal restraints are for other nations. Not Zio-America. When Zio-Washington gets upset, Zio-Washington gets to invade and bomb sovereign states, even though these same states have not attacked us.

Washington has not only become 'the world's policeman', but the world's judge and jury.

Both the UN Charter and the Geneva Convention however identify aggressive war (including a 'first strike') as the supreme international crime. Shouldn't this matter?

Double-standard are nevertheless used routinely by Israel and Washington. This allows them to initiate serial warfare that lacks a clear legal foundation. It's all ad hoc. It subverts the rule of law.

And our pro-Zionist MSM sanitizes this conduct and worldview.

Special counties (and we know who they are) are therefore not bound by cumbersome restrictions that were designed to prevent war, expansion and aggression. Feelings and 'outrage' now matter more. This is part and parcel of Zio-American exceptionalism. Laws and ethics have been downgraded to accommodate political objectives and feelings.

This is why Trump's anti-Assad 'outrage' (and subsequent missile attack) did not focus on aggressive war or the unjustified killing of civilians. Because if it did, Zio-Washington would be caught with its own pants down.

Instead, Trump got weepy over the type of weapons used to kill civilians--not the slaughter itself.

After all, we 'good guys' kill civilians all the time. And in massive quantities.

The flimsy moral principle underlying Trump's strike on Syria strike is this:

Gas is uncool. But missiles are perfectly fine.

Gas, remember, is reminiscent of the Holocaust. And that's a no-no!

Hidden within this fake moral paradigm is the message to always respect Jewish taboos (!) when initiating violence. Kill properly.

These ethical distinctions however are politicized and empty. Murder is still murder. Aggression is still aggression. When will Zio-Washington take a look in the mirror?

This declining level of moral thinking undermines real legal principles. Possessing nuclear weapons (and threatening to use them) has become 'OK' for exceptional nations but 'evil' when bad (anti-Israel) nations follow suit. And it's Zio-Washington alone that gets to decide which is which and who is who.

This chicanery confers unique privilege. Our Zionized media gives cover to this fraud.

Fisk does correctly note that Trump is being steered into a pattern of malevolent neoconservatism. This means war. Ironically, as Trump reverses the stated policies and goals that got him elected (and in the direction of neocon aggression) the MSM has done a similar about-face (supporting Trump).

Trump is finally 'acting presidential'!

These deceptions and grotesque fairy tales benefit global militarists, government careerists, and of course, Zionists.

Fisk should have mentioned Trump's special affection for Israel and his unconditional support of Israeli militarism and Israeli brutality. This is key.

it isn't only 'key' Mark. It's the frothing, slathering gorilla in the living room tossing hand grenades and breaking bones.

And yet Fisk, whose very identity is undistinguishable from Western (British) based, Middle Eastern journalism ~ can not mention it.

How the f are people supposed to get a glimmer of the things you (heroically) write about when the very people who are trusted to keep the West informed- would rather use their skills and position to specifically and methodically mislead and dissemble and obscure- by design?

You're too kind to these intellectual whores Mark, imho.

When Fisk writes about Trump's, (and Merkel's and May's) murderous treachery and folly in the Middle East by not mentioning *why* any of it is happening, he reminds me of Walter Duranty writing about the Soviet Union, and the ornery resistance to the agricultural reforms by certain classes of well-to-do peasants, who were just too greedy to understand the greatness of Stalin and his vision.

IOW they're nothing but professional liars and shills for the PTB. Period. And should be called out as such. No? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Fuzzy , April 27, 2017 at 3:45 pm GMT
My hopes for détente under Trump were obviously a pipe dream. He folded like a cheap lawn chair. Read More
Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 4:05 pm GMT
100 Words @Sam Shama Why spew the common nonsense?

Why spew the common nonsense?

you mean how the whole nightmarish holocaust of Eternal War and strife and horrors writ large in the Middle East today are mostly a consequence of Zionist $ubversion of our governments and media?

and that destroying Iraq and Libya and Syria (eventually Iran, Lebanon, etc..) are all part of a transparent agenda to remake the greater Levant into a giant concentration camp a la Palestine?

that 'common nonsense'?

or is it common knowledge? Read More

Jonathan Mason , April 27, 2017 at 4:26 pm GMT
100 Words I really doubt whether seeing pictures of dead Syrian children had anything to do with the decision to bomb the Syrian airfield.

Fake news is at its best when it seems almost plausible. In reality no candidate for leader of the free world since the time of King Herod would lose a moment of sleep over killing a few Syrian children. Remember Trump even succeeded in killing an American child in Yemen.

Trumpie, you're doing a heckuva job. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

wayfarer , April 27, 2017 at 4:34 pm GMT
100 Words Not a peep out of turncoat traitor Trump regarding "9/11 truth." The deafening silence on this matter as-well-as other harsh issues facing rank-and-file Americans and the western world, speaks volumes.

Now we've got masked gangs of ANTIFA punks running roughshod like spoiled brats and being handled with kid gloves, as law enforcement is ordered by owned politicians, to stand down.

The self-serving globalist "elite" (~0.01%) and their Zionist trust fund baby financiers continue to engineer civil war, as revolutionary war would be their worst nightmare. Read More

jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 4:51 pm GMT
200 Words @Rurik

Why spew the common nonsense?
you mean how the whole nightmarish holocaust of Eternal War and strife and horrors writ large in the Middle East today are mostly a consequence of Zionist $ubversion of our governments and media?

and that destroying Iraq and Libya and Syria (eventually Iran, Lebanon, etc..) are all part of a transparent agenda to remake the greater Levant into a giant concentration camp a la Palestine?

that 'common nonsense'?

or is it common knowledge? Not a concentration camp, just a gigantic destabilised region.
There access to oil and gas is simple and cheap.
And as anyone leaves they try to go to Europe, destroy the cultures of the European countries, so that Europe becomes a USA clone, where money reigns.
One just has to be enough cynical to see it all.

With me this cynicism began three years after sept 11, when I could no longer fool myself.
Then the question came 'how became our saviour of WWII become a rogue state ?'.
The answer was simple but shocking, Roosevelt was brought into politics in 1932 to wage war for USA world supremacy.

Charles A Beard published his book on Roosevelt politics in 1946, also the year where the Pearl Harbour investigation took place.
According to the democrats there had been no Roosevelt conspiracy, the republicans had other ideas.

Roosevelt needed an attack, he had promised his voters in 1940 'that USA boys would nog be sent overseas, unless the USA was attacked'.
His oil boycott succeeded, Japan attacked when it had oil left for three months.
The republican ideas have many times been confirmed since then. Read More

jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 4:59 pm GMT
100 Words @wayfarer Not a peep out of turncoat traitor Trump regarding "9/11 truth." The deafening silence on this matter as-well-as other harsh issues facing rank-and-file Americans and the western world, speaks volumes.

Now we've got masked gangs of ANTIFA punks running roughshod like spoiled brats and being handled with kid gloves, as law enforcement is ordered by owned politicians, to stand down.

The self-serving globalist "elite" (~0.01%) and their Zionist trust fund baby financiers continue to engineer civil war, as revolutionary war would be their worst nightmare. https://kenfm.de/untergang-der-humanitaet/

Warren Buffett, eine der reichsten Personen auf dieser Welt, war es, der den Begriff ?„Finanzielle Massenvernichtungswaffen" prägte. ??In einem Interview mit der New York Times am 26. November 2006 erklärte er zudem freimütig:

„Es herrscht Krieg Reich gegen Arm. Es ist meine Klasse, die Klasse der Reichen, ?die den Krieg begonnen hat ?und wir werden diesen Klassenkampf gewinnen"

Warren Bufett in 2006 'there is war between the rich and the poor, we, the rich, will win'.
Finanzielle Massenvernichtungswaffen: financial WMD's.
English is great in short expressions.

Since the rich buy farms all over the world, especially New Zealand, with own runways, long enough for private jets, one wonders if the rich are sure now about winning. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

peterike , April 27, 2017 at 5:22 pm GMT
Stopped reading at the idiot word "misogynist." Anyone who uses that word seriously is too pozzed to be trusted on anything, even the time of day. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
map , April 27, 2017 at 5:23 pm GMT
200 Words The litmus test for a Trump foreign policy is not disengagement and isolation from the rest of the world.

It is whether or not such foreign policy is calibrated to undermine the United States from within. Policies like rules of engagement and "war crimes" legal action designed to demoralize and kill US soldiers needlessly or refugee resettlement programs designed to give non-white enemies a fighting chance to kill Americans on their own soil.

The US projecting power around the world is something that it has always done since WWII. The difference of late, starting under Bill Clinton, was utilizing foreign interventions in a way that deliberately blow back on the United States and are designed to hurt it or the West in general from within.

So far, we have seen a pivot away from the anti-American foreign interventions of the recent past. Trump has pivoted to Asia which all but guarantees there won't be any boots-on-the-ground in North Korea. He has attempted to stem the flow of immigrants and refugees, so far, unsuccessfully, but it is still early in the game. Syria has not amounted to anything of note, but at least Trump is not propping up ISIS the way the Obama administration did.

Remember, that, for America, the enemy is here. It is the Left and its anti-White policies that are the real enemy. So far, I have seen Trump slowly rolling back this anti-Whitism. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

Sean , April 27, 2017 at 5:41 pm GMT
200 Words @Rurik

Even if America decided to withdraw from all involvement, It cannot halt others' interventions in local conflicts by washing US hands clean. Fisk implies otherwise.
as an American, I'm worried about our hands (souls) being clean

if you want to go suit up for the IDF and get involved with interventions, then be my guest, but America needs to come home (like Trump promised)

no more wars for Israel

wouldn't you agree Sean? If you want to have clean hands then spend the money you don't need to live on global famine relief, like Peter Singer the philosopher does and talks about. Individually few do that and I suspect even Singer doesn't to the extent his ethics would suggest. people die of famine and poverty and we live in luxury in the West : deal with that before droning on a bout some careful military operations. Dropping a few bombs on the airdrome facilities of Assad's baby killer pilots is hardly dirty war.

Assad is 100% responsible for this rebellion which started basically because his family had ran the country into the ground,and failing to see that his people really don't like him very much, he put up the price of basic necessities like fuel. Then he ignored the warnings of Obama's abortive bombing attempt, and brought in Russia (the Russians only came in after the US seemed impotent) to blast his unmotivated minority army to victory.

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Syria is a joke. If Israel wanted to oust Assad it could have done it with a mere maneuver within territory Israel already controls: a build up on the Golan , which Assad would have had to match by transferring his army away from fighting the rebels. The US could have overthrown Assad with one air raid on a manufactured pretext at any time.

Killing killers who hide among the innocent always involves collateral damage so American hands may be less than white, but America hands are clean by comparison with Assad's hands, which are dripping with the blood of Syrians. Read More

Sean , April 27, 2017 at 5:50 pm GMT
@Fuzzy My hopes for détente under Trump were obviously a pipe dream. He folded like a cheap lawn chair. A lawn chair cannot collapse like that, obviously it was the result of a controlled demolition Read More
Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 6:10 pm GMT
500 Words @jilles dykstra Not a concentration camp, just a gigantic destabilised region.
There access to oil and gas is simple and cheap.
And as anyone leaves they try to go to Europe, destroy the cultures of the European countries, so that Europe becomes a USA clone, where money reigns.
One just has to be enough cynical to see it all.

With me this cynicism began three years after sept 11, when I could no longer fool myself.
Then the question came 'how became our saviour of WWII become a rogue state ?'.
The answer was simple but shocking, Roosevelt was brought into politics in 1932 to wage war for USA world supremacy.

Charles A Beard published his book on Roosevelt politics in 1946, also the year where the Pearl Harbour investigation took place.
According to the democrats there had been no Roosevelt conspiracy, the republicans had other ideas.

Roosevelt needed an attack, he had promised his voters in 1940 'that USA boys would nog be sent overseas, unless the USA was attacked'.
His oil boycott succeeded, Japan attacked when it had oil left for three months.
The republican ideas have many times been confirmed since then. Hallo Jilles,

what a treat it is to see people from Europe here at the inimitable Unz Review!

Not a concentration camp, just a gigantic destabilised region.

well, I guess it's just a matter of perspective. What Libya or Iraq (or the Palestinian occupied territories) seem like to me are one big open air prison of hopelessness and despair. Wrought with daily horrors and death. At least in a concentration camp the young women might be able to walk the streets without being raped by savages unleashed upon the people, as it seems is the case in Libya. Or blown to bits by CIA/Mossad car bombs like Iraq. Or subjected to random torture, white phosphorous or having their organs harvested like in Gaza.

But then I guess it depends on the "concentration camp", since the ones Eisenhower ran for teenage German boys after the war was over are probably as bad as it gets. So perspective in all things, I suppose.

And as anyone leaves they try to go to Europe, destroy the cultures of the European countries, so that Europe becomes a USA clone,

that's what you call a twofer for the Zionists. Such a deal!

'how became our saviour of WWII become a rogue state ?'.

savior?!

the US was never your savior Jilles. That's just the propaganda speaking that all German (and American) children were/are marinated in following that evil war.

when a nation like America does to a people what American bombers did to cities like Dresden, it's hardly fitting to refer to such people as saviors. I read accounts where fighter pilots said that after the bombing, when the survivors were fleeing the holocaust, that they'd strafe anything with blonde hair, men women or children. That's not the talk of a savior, but of a race-hate crazed murderous demon. Remember, at the time Dresden was bombed, the war was effectively already over. They were unleashing genocidal hatred on the German people, not saving them.

The answer was simple but shocking, Roosevelt was brought into politics in 1932 to wage war for USA world supremacy.

it goes back farther than that, to W oodrow W ilson's I.
and the point was always to secure the founding of the state of Israel.

he had promised his voters in 1940 'that USA boys would nog be sent overseas, unless the USA was attacked'.
His oil boycott succeeded, Japan attacked when it had oil left for three months.

you really do have an excellent handle on things Jilles. But you're not cynical enough yet.

the fount of treachery starts with the charter of the Federal Reserve Bank, the original treason and betrayal of biblical enormity that has set in motion all of these wars and assorted horrors and atrocities. And threatens to make this century just as bloody and Satanic as the last one, unless we can somehow collectively manage to waylay these Fiends.

Prost -- Read More

woodNfish , April 27, 2017 at 6:18 pm GMT
@Gleimhart The Trump Derangement Syndrome at Unz has gotten really tiring.

And no, not everyone gives the least crap about his "misogyny." Not me, anyway.

This site gets more anti-American by the day. Screw you leftwing dirtbags. Trump is not a misogynist. He loves and desires women as does any normal man. Mysogynists hate women. "Feminists" are misogynists. Stop buying into the Left's narration. It is a lie. It is always a lie. That is what they are best at. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

woodNfish , April 27, 2017 at 6:19 pm GMT
This "article" is just more leftist crap from the crappy leftists. There is no truth in it. It is leftist opinion masquerading as fake news. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
bluedog , April 27, 2017 at 6:26 pm GMT
100 Words @Sean If you want to have clean hands then spend the money you don't need to live on global famine relief, like Peter Singer the philosopher does and talks about. Individually few do that and I suspect even Singer doesn't to the extent his ethics would suggest. people die of famine and poverty and we live in luxury in the West : deal with that before droning on a bout some careful military operations. Dropping a few bombs on the airdrome facilities of Assad's baby killer pilots is hardly dirty war.

Assad is 100% responsible for this rebellion which started basically because his family had ran the country into the ground,and failing to see that his people really don't like him very much, he put up the price of basic necessities like fuel. Then he ignored the warnings of Obama's abortive bombing attempt, and brought in Russia (the Russians only came in after the US seemed impotent) to blast his unmotivated minority army to victory.

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Syria is a joke. If Israel wanted to oust Assad it could have done it with a mere maneuver within territory Israel already controls: a build up on the Golan , which Assad would have had to match by transferring his army away from fighting the rebels. The US could have overthrown Assad with one air raid on a manufactured pretext at any time.

Killing killers who hide among the innocent always involves collateral damage so American hands may be less than white, but America hands are clean by comparison with Assad's hands, which are dripping with the blood of Syrians. Hmm Assad has a looong way to go to catch up with us, Nam Cambodia Thailand Philippines South America Iran Iraq Libya Syria and all other points on the compass, my your an ass for you don't even know your own history as you always try to blame others, the mark I presume of a real troll. Read More

The White Muslim Traditionalist , April 27, 2017 at 6:26 pm GMT
@Dan Hayes "...even Angela Merkel takes leave of her senses..."

What senses? Surely you jest! I find it interesting that people from America think that Merkel is some sort of crazed loon.

She's an incredibly astute, conservative, pious Lutheran politician. Read More

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 6:33 pm GMT
200 Words @Sean If you want to have clean hands then spend the money you don't need to live on global famine relief, like Peter Singer the philosopher does and talks about. Individually few do that and I suspect even Singer doesn't to the extent his ethics would suggest. people die of famine and poverty and we live in luxury in the West : deal with that before droning on a bout some careful military operations. Dropping a few bombs on the airdrome facilities of Assad's baby killer pilots is hardly dirty war.

Assad is 100% responsible for this rebellion which started basically because his family had ran the country into the ground,and failing to see that his people really don't like him very much, he put up the price of basic necessities like fuel. Then he ignored the warnings of Obama's abortive bombing attempt, and brought in Russia (the Russians only came in after the US seemed impotent) to blast his unmotivated minority army to victory.

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Syria is a joke. If Israel wanted to oust Assad it could have done it with a mere maneuver within territory Israel already controls: a build up on the Golan , which Assad would have had to match by transferring his army away from fighting the rebels. The US could have overthrown Assad with one air raid on a manufactured pretext at any time.

Killing killers who hide among the innocent always involves collateral damage so American hands may be less than white, but America hands are clean by comparison with Assad's hands, which are dripping with the blood of Syrians.

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Syria is a joke.

golly Sean

you could use that same argument with so many conflicts eh?

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Iraq is a joke.

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Libya is a joke.

it works just the same with them all, huh?

but then the notorious cowards in the IDF never like to get in harms way now do they, so just like with your hero general Ariel Sharon, they always prefer to stay in safety and get other goons to do their fighting for them, huh?

Killing killers who hide among the innocent always involves collateral damage so American hands may be less than white

isn't that pretty much what Sharon said about the Sabra and Shatila massacre?

funny how that's always your modus operendi.. to use false flags to get others to do your fighting for you?

like the Syrian false flag chemical attacks

or 9/11

or getting Druze Phalangist militia to slaughter women and children, lest one of them have a sharp object to fight back with, and pose a threat to a brave IDF soldier, huh?

I suspect Robert Fisk may even know a little about that proud episode in chronicles of Zio-brave warrior-history. Read More

jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 7:46 pm GMT
200 Words @Rurik Hallo Jilles,

what a treat it is to see people from Europe here at the inimitable Unz Review!


Not a concentration camp, just a gigantic destabilised region.
well, I guess it's just a matter of perspective. What Libya or Iraq (or the Palestinian occupied territories) seem like to me are one big open air prison of hopelessness and despair. Wrought with daily horrors and death. At least in a concentration camp the young women might be able to walk the streets without being raped by savages unleashed upon the people, as it seems is the case in Libya. Or blown to bits by CIA/Mossad car bombs like Iraq. Or subjected to random torture, white phosphorous or having their organs harvested like in Gaza.

But then I guess it depends on the "concentration camp", since the ones Eisenhower ran for teenage German boys after the war was over are probably as bad as it gets. So perspective in all things, I suppose.


And as anyone leaves they try to go to Europe, destroy the cultures of the European countries, so that Europe becomes a USA clone,
that's what you call a twofer for the Zionists. Such a deal!

'how became our saviour of WWII become a rogue state ?'.
savior?!

the US was never your savior Jilles. That's just the propaganda speaking that all German (and American) children were/are marinated in following that evil war.

when a nation like America does to a people what American bombers did to cities like Dresden, it's hardly fitting to refer to such people as saviors. I read accounts where fighter pilots said that after the bombing, when the survivors were fleeing the holocaust, that they'd strafe anything with blonde hair, men women or children. That's not the talk of a savior, but of a race-hate crazed murderous demon. Remember, at the time Dresden was bombed, the war was effectively already over. They were unleashing genocidal hatred on the German people, not saving them.


The answer was simple but shocking, Roosevelt was brought into politics in 1932 to wage war for USA world supremacy.
it goes back farther than that, to W oodrow W ilson's I.
and the point was always to secure the founding of the state of Israel.

he had promised his voters in 1940 'that USA boys would nog be sent overseas, unless the USA was attacked'.
His oil boycott succeeded, Japan attacked when it had oil left for three months.
you really do have an excellent handle on things Jilles. But you're not cynical enough yet. ;)

the fount of treachery starts with the charter of the Federal Reserve Bank, the original treason and betrayal of biblical enormity that has set in motion all of these wars and assorted horrors and atrocities. And threatens to make this century just as bloody and Satanic as the last one, unless we can somehow collectively manage to waylay these Fiends.

Prost -- Had you read earlier posts by me then you would have known that the Balfour declaration was the price Britain had to pay in 1917 in order to avoid capitulation in november 1917.
You then also would have known that I know that
Henry Morgenthau, 'Ambassador Morgenthau's Story', New York, 1918
was just war propaganda.
Morgenthau's hatred of Germany I attribute to the German antisemitism that began after the unification in 1870.
An anti semitism about which one Rothschildt wrote to another 'the only enemy of jews is jews'.
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA says about the same in softer words.
The Federal Reserve just is an institution.
What matters is who runs it with what purpose.
This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century, it never became democratic, money still rules the USA.
That this was and is possible I attribute to the lack of any culture in the USA, except hamburgers and oversized cars.
The USA is not a melting pot, it is stew, all the ingredients still are there. Read More

RadicalCenter , April 27, 2017 at 7:49 pm GMT
100 Words @jilles dykstra I still do not see Trump as a crackpot.
Though I'm not sure about his ideas I still hope that he will end USA militarism, not because out of moral ideas, but because he sees, and his rich friends, that pursuing the goal of USA world hegemony will, or has already, ruined the USA.

The attack on Syria, and his warlike talk about N Korea, hogwash to confuse Deep State, and to satisfy his voters.
The Dutch professor Laslo Maracs, university of Amsterdam, explains all this eloquently, alas only in Dutch, as far as I know.

And my hope still is that Trump will prevent NATO and EU war on Russia, the war that indeed will end al wars, as already Wilson wanted, because this war will end all human life.
How it then ends is well described in the novel On the Beach, Neville Shute, 1953, the New Zealand government distributing suicide pills when the radio active dust reaches the island. Don't be too sure that Trump voters favor this kind of mindless and dangerous violence abroad. On the contrary, for me, my family, and many Trump voters of our acquaintance.

Many of us voted for trump in part because he was proposing a less belligerent, less unreasonable attitude towards Russia, if not towards Iran. We voted for him because he continually lambasted the US invasions of Iraq and said that the US should stop invading and trying to dictate how other peoples should operate in their countries.

I don't think a majority of people who voted Trump OR a majority of people who voted Clinton favors attacking Syria or Iran or Russia. Yet here we are threatening each of them, attacking Assad's regime to the benefit of Islamists, and encircling& sanctioning & trying to humiliate and impoverish Russia.

Will check out the Kiwi book you mentioned. Man, that will be some cheerful beach reading Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

RadicalCenter , April 27, 2017 at 7:51 pm GMT
@jilles dykstra I still do not see Trump as a crackpot.
Though I'm not sure about his ideas I still hope that he will end USA militarism, not because out of moral ideas, but because he sees, and his rich friends, that pursuing the goal of USA world hegemony will, or has already, ruined the USA.

The attack on Syria, and his warlike talk about N Korea, hogwash to confuse Deep State, and to satisfy his voters.
The Dutch professor Laslo Maracs, university of Amsterdam, explains all this eloquently, alas only in Dutch, as far as I know.

And my hope still is that Trump will prevent NATO and EU war on Russia, the war that indeed will end al wars, as already Wilson wanted, because this war will end all human life.
How it then ends is well described in the novel On the Beach, Neville Shute, 1953, the New Zealand government distributing suicide pills when the radio active dust reaches the island. P.S. Any relation to Lenny? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

jilles dykstra , April 27, 2017 at 7:58 pm GMT
200 Words @The White Muslim Traditionalist I find it interesting that people from America think that Merkel is some sort of crazed loon.


She's an incredibly astute, conservative, pious Lutheran politician. Sure, because she's such a pious woman, Kohl today got one million euro's in damages, because the ghost writer of his memoirs published volume four without his permission, with his statements about Merkel like 'she put the dagger in my back and turned it'.

In 2001 or so there was a financial scandal in Kohl's party, Merkel made it public knowledge.
The other remark was 'she just has lust for power', or something like that.
I suppose now millions of copies of volume four will be sold.

I also like to recall Merkel's statement about the huge numbers of immigrants 'wird Deutschland für immer ändern', 'will change Germany forever'.
As if any German asked for this change, change for which Sarrazin already warned in 2010:
Thilo Sarrazin, 'Deutschland schafft sich ab, Wie wir unser Land aufs Spiel setzen', München 2010

Sarrazin warned that Germany is destroying itself through the immigration of large numbers of immigrants with low IQ.
Merkel fired him immediately. Read More Agree: Dan Hayes

Sean , April 27, 2017 at 8:11 pm GMT
100 Words @bluedog Hmm Assad has a looong way to go to catch up with us, Nam Cambodia Thailand Philippines South America Iran Iraq Libya Syria and all other points on the compass, my your an ass for you don't even know your own history as you always try to blame others, the mark I presume of a real troll. The US isn't as moral as it claim but who is? There is a thing called cognitive dissonance .Sounds like you believe the US should stay at home for ever after, because it was solely responsible for all deaths those conflicts, though many had started before US involvement. The lesson of US failure in Vietnam was that military strength was not enough against a opponent that was politically strong, Assad is not strong politically, the majority in Syria opposed him and dispute his inherited police state and even more ruthless army facing a rag tag piecemeal rebellion he would have lost by now without the Russians . The US is supposed to stay out and look on as Russia turns the rebels the US tried to protect into mincemeat and Assad sprays entire villages with poison gas like they were bugs, is it? Read More
The White Muslim Traditionalist , April 27, 2017 at 8:12 pm GMT
@jilles dykstra Sure, because she's such a pious woman, Kohl today got one million euro's in damages, because the ghost writer of his memoirs published volume four without his permission, with his statements about Merkel like 'she put the dagger in my back and turned it'.

In 2001 or so there was a financial scandal in Kohl's party, Merkel made it public knowledge.
The other remark was 'she just has lust for power', or something like that.
I suppose now millions of copies of volume four will be sold.

I also like to recall Merkel's statement about the huge numbers of immigrants 'wird Deutschland für immer ändern', 'will change Germany forever'.
As if any German asked for this change, change for which Sarrazin already warned in 2010:
Thilo Sarrazin, 'Deutschland schafft sich ab, Wie wir unser Land aufs Spiel setzen', München 2010

Sarrazin warned that Germany is destroying itself through the immigration of large numbers of immigrants with low IQ.
Merkel fired him immediately. Bro, how did that contradict anything that I just said?

All the Christian churches advocate taking in migrants, it's literally in the Bible. In the Qur'an and Hadith we have similar obligations, but they're more measured. Read More

anonymous , April 27, 2017 at 8:24 pm GMT
200 Words

The more dangerous America's crackpot President becomes, the saner the world believes him to be.

What does this mean? That the world is insane and that as Trump spins into greater insanity he becomes more in sync with the prevailing insanity? Prior to the election he seemed to be the peace candidate which is a major reason why he won. Therefore not everyone out there is insane, least of all "the world". The war hounds are a minority of people who are in a position to publicly lobby for war through their mass media and spread fear and hysteria. The leaders of various countries have more in common with each other than with their own citizens and trade notes on how to keep their rabble in line. This sudden turn towards belligerence and war has taken people by surprise and everyone is puzzled as to what's really going on.
The author's book "Pity the Nation" was a good read. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

Rurik , April 27, 2017 at 8:25 pm GMT
300 Words @jilles dykstra Had you read earlier posts by me then you would have known that the Balfour declaration was the price Britain had to pay in 1917 in order to avoid capitulation in november 1917.
You then also would have known that I know that
Henry Morgenthau, 'Ambassador Morgenthau's Story', New York, 1918
was just war propaganda.
Morgenthau's hatred of Germany I attribute to the German antisemitism that began after the unification in 1870.
An anti semitism about which one Rothschildt wrote to another 'the only enemy of jews is jews'.
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA says about the same in softer words.
The Federal Reserve just is an institution.
What matters is who runs it with what purpose.
This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century, it never became democratic, money still rules the USA.
That this was and is possible I attribute to the lack of any culture in the USA, except hamburgers and oversized cars.
The USA is not a melting pot, it is stew, all the ingredients still are there.

The Federal Reserve just is an institution.
What matters is who runs it with what purpose.
This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century, it never became democratic, money still rules the USA.

all too true

That this was and is possible I attribute to the lack of any culture in the USA, except hamburgers and oversized cars.

I can't argue with that too much, and I fully understand the hostility of so many people towards the US of A.

what's good about it? Not too much, but there are a few things that are worth mentioning. We still have the First Amendment and free speech. Something most of Euopre are sadly lacking, as you can be tossed in jail for saying 5,999,999 Jews died in gas chambers during the Holocaust, and not the holy number of six million. Here in the states we're allowed to say it's 5,999,999 Jews.

Also we still have the Second Amendment, that is the protector and guarantor of the First.

Sure, our culture is a open pipe of spiritual sewage gushing out into the rest of the world, but that's all being done by Hollywood types. Not traditional Americans, who simply want to be left alone.

most egregious however is the war mongering, and as you mentioned with FDR, (and Wilson and Obama and Trump, etc ) we always vote against the wars, but then always have it foisted upon us by the tribe. (as you mentioned, it's who owns the Fed).

Anyways God bless and please keep commenting.. Read More

Talha , April 27, 2017 at 8:27 pm GMT
@The White Muslim Traditionalist Bro, how did that contradict anything that I just said?


All the Christian churches advocate taking in migrants, it's literally in the Bible. In the Qur'an and Hadith we have similar obligations, but they're more measured. Salaam Bro,

Welcome to UNZ! Are you in the US or Germany? It sounded like you might be German.

Wa salaam Read More

jacques sheete , April 27, 2017 at 8:43 pm GMT
100 Words @Sam Shama Why spew the common nonsense?

Why spew the common nonsense?

You mean like this?

Sam Shama , Next New Comment
April 27, 2017 at 2:19 pm GMT

Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.

Trump and Pence are good men, their qualities, underestimated by many.

Read More
jacques sheete , April 27, 2017 at 8:45 pm GMT
@Fuzzy My hopes for détente under Trump were obviously a pipe dream. He folded like a cheap lawn chair.

He folded like a cheap lawn chair.

Or a really cheap camping toilet. Read More LOL: Talha Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

jacques sheete , April 27, 2017 at 8:51 pm GMT
@Sean A lawn chair cannot collapse like that, obviously it was the result of a controlled demolition

A lawn chair cannot collapse like that, obviously it was the result of a controlled demolition

Which is pretty good evidence that Trump's collapse was controlled if not altogether pre-determined.

Gee, I wonder who would do something like that. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

bluedog , April 27, 2017 at 9:00 pm GMT
100 Words You have to be nuts the only ones we tried to protect are the head choppers our creation and the sooner the Russians turn them into dog meat the better off the world will be,as far as Assad using gas on his own people post the proof chapter and verse and no bullshit from either the CIA or white helmets will be accepted for none exist, except for propaganda for we have prevented anyone from investigating it or where it came from Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
The White Muslim Traditionalist , April 27, 2017 at 9:02 pm GMT
@Talha Salaam Bro,

Welcome to UNZ! Are you in the US or Germany? It sounded like you might be German.

Wa salaam Wa alaikum as-salaam, I'm from a country called the Netherlands, but I'm currently a postgraduate in the United States. Thanks for the welcome, I appreciate it. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Sean , April 27, 2017 at 9:14 pm GMT
200 Words @Rurik

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Syria is a joke.
golly Sean

you could use that same argument with so many conflicts eh?

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Iraq is a joke.

The idea of Israel / US subversion of Libya is a joke.

it works just the same with them all, huh?

but then the notorious cowards in the IDF never like to get in harms way now do they, so just like with your hero general Ariel Sharon, they always prefer to stay in safety and get other goons to do their fighting for them, huh?


Killing killers who hide among the innocent always involves collateral damage so American hands may be less than white
isn't that pretty much what Sharon said about the Sabra and Shatila massacre?

funny how that's always your modus operendi.. to use false flags to get others to do your fighting for you?

like the Syrian false flag chemical attacks

or 9/11

or getting Druze Phalangist militia to slaughter women and children, lest one of them have a sharp object to fight back with, and pose a threat to a brave IDF soldier, huh?

I suspect Robert Fisk may even know a little about that proud episode in chronicles of Zio-brave warrior-history. Israel would hardly put effort into overthrowing Libyan or Egyptian governments without believing their replacement would be an improvement from Israel's point of view. It wouldn't because everyone in those counties hates Israel. I don't think there is any evidence at all that Israel wants Assad to be overthrown. No Syrian government is going to be anything but hostile to Israel and Syria has nothing Israel wants. Yes Israel would use a wedge on Arabs fighting one another to keep them at it, but it cannot create divisions within a country of between countries out of nothing. For example Iran and Iraq were at war in the 80s and Israel supplied both with arms to keep the war going, but it didn't create the conflict, which was a Persian versus Arab one with very ancient hational roots- just like the Iranian-Saudi proxy war playing out in Syria.

As for false flags, as I said it does seem insane for Assad to gas kids right now but Assad and his tiny leadership are very isolated from good advice and they have a proven ability to make incredibly bad decisions. One thing that weighs heavily against a false flag is that the US intelligence could have very professionally faked an attack last year and got a major US airstrike to break the back of Assad before the rebels had been virtually annihilated in the cities. So why a why would Assad use nerve gas now argument cuts both ways. Read More

englishmike , April 27, 2017 at 10:15 pm GMT
100 Words @Abdul Alhazred Actually its the British!....well they are bloody insane!
Anyone who says they reserve the right to make a thermonuclear "First Strike" is totally mad.

https://larouchepac.com/20170426/brits-nuclear-first-strike-jolly-good Actually its the British! .well they are bloody insane!

"Muhammed really is most popular baby name in the UK – as is Mohammed, Muhammad "
(Reported in The Independent, Monday 1 December 2014).

So do me a favour, Abdul, old chap: do stop blaming "the British" for what some of their politicians say. You wouldn't like them to make sweeping generalisations about British people called Mohammed being "bloody insane", now would you! Read More

jacques sheete , April 27, 2017 at 10:50 pm GMT
200 Words @jilles dykstra Had you read earlier posts by me then you would have known that the Balfour declaration was the price Britain had to pay in 1917 in order to avoid capitulation in november 1917.
You then also would have known that I know that
Henry Morgenthau, 'Ambassador Morgenthau's Story', New York, 1918
was just war propaganda.
Morgenthau's hatred of Germany I attribute to the German antisemitism that began after the unification in 1870.
An anti semitism about which one Rothschildt wrote to another 'the only enemy of jews is jews'.
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA says about the same in softer words.
The Federal Reserve just is an institution.
What matters is who runs it with what purpose.
This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century, it never became democratic, money still rules the USA.
That this was and is possible I attribute to the lack of any culture in the USA, except hamburgers and oversized cars.
The USA is not a melting pot, it is stew, all the ingredients still are there.

An anti semitism about which one Rothschildt wrote to another 'the only enemy of jews is jews'.
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA says about the same in softer words.

I'd appreciate a source for that quote.

This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century,

Depends.

Politically that's probably close to true except for the fact that back then we had at least a few politicians with spines and gonads. Now we just have slithering grubs and the intestinal parasites of swine, e.g. the Swine Large Roundworm, Ascaris suum.

Morally, it hasn't even left the Stone Age.

it never became democratic,

True and you obviously know more than most Americans do about that. Democracy, in this country, is nothing more than a deeply ingrained fetish. As you probably know, democracy only works in small, homogeneous, MORAL groups otherwise it's simply mob rule.

money still rules the USA.

More precisely, money is the main idol that's worshipped. The rulers are vicious, sociopathic, corrupt, insatiable, moneyed hyenas and jackals. And they are completely incorrigible. Read More Agree: bluedog

Alden , April 28, 2017 at 12:32 am GMT
@Sean The last American occupation troops did not leave Germany until the 1930's. The last American troops left Germany in 1923. The French stayed until 1935 when Hitler forced them out. Read More
Alden , April 28, 2017 at 12:38 am GMT
@Rurik

The Federal Reserve just is an institution.
What matters is who runs it with what purpose.
This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century, it never became democratic, money still rules the USA.
all too true

That this was and is possible I attribute to the lack of any culture in the USA, except hamburgers and oversized cars.
I can't argue with that too much, and I fully understand the hostility of so many people towards the US of A.

what's good about it? Not too much, but there are a few things that are worth mentioning. We still have the First Amendment and free speech. Something most of Euopre are sadly lacking, as you can be tossed in jail for saying 5,999,999 Jews died in gas chambers during the Holocaust, and not the holy number of six million. Here in the states we're allowed to say it's 5,999,999 Jews.

Also we still have the Second Amendment, that is the protector and guarantor of the First.

Sure, our culture is a open pipe of spiritual sewage gushing out into the rest of the world, but that's all being done by Hollywood types. Not traditional Americans, who simply want to be left alone.

most egregious however is the war mongering, and as you mentioned with FDR, (and Wilson and Obama and Trump, etc...) we always vote against the wars, but then always have it foisted upon us by the tribe. (as you mentioned, it's who owns the Fed).

Anyways God bless and please keep commenting.. A French Mayor of a medium sized town was just fined € 2,000 for noting that some of the schools in town are 90% Muslim immigrants. He's a supporter of Le Pen. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 9:53 am GMT
300 Words @Rurik

The Federal Reserve just is an institution.
What matters is who runs it with what purpose.
This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century, it never became democratic, money still rules the USA.
all too true

That this was and is possible I attribute to the lack of any culture in the USA, except hamburgers and oversized cars.
I can't argue with that too much, and I fully understand the hostility of so many people towards the US of A.

what's good about it? Not too much, but there are a few things that are worth mentioning. We still have the First Amendment and free speech. Something most of Euopre are sadly lacking, as you can be tossed in jail for saying 5,999,999 Jews died in gas chambers during the Holocaust, and not the holy number of six million. Here in the states we're allowed to say it's 5,999,999 Jews.

Also we still have the Second Amendment, that is the protector and guarantor of the First.

Sure, our culture is a open pipe of spiritual sewage gushing out into the rest of the world, but that's all being done by Hollywood types. Not traditional Americans, who simply want to be left alone.

most egregious however is the war mongering, and as you mentioned with FDR, (and Wilson and Obama and Trump, etc...) we always vote against the wars, but then always have it foisted upon us by the tribe. (as you mentioned, it's who owns the Fed).

Anyways God bless and please keep commenting.. I have no hostility whatsoever against the USA people in general.
Several offered me hospitality in their homes.

What struck me each time was the igorance, the lack of information.
Local tv is just stupid advertising.
None of my hosts watched serious tv news, nowhere did I see a serious paper, just something local about engagements, weddings and funerals.

One of my hosts I presented with the book of Anne Applebaum From West to East, I think the title was, she travelled from the Baltic sea to the Black see.
He read it, had never realised about so many peoples.
Even a well traveled more or less well known American I found very ignorant, who reads Readers Digest ?

A Berkeley assistant professor asked me what I knew about the Civil War, at the time, end of the seventies, very little, but when I explained to him that Europe had been wars galore, so why would I know much about an American war, he was shocked.

My strong objections are against USA society as a system, that allows a tiny minority to run foreign policy at their pleasure, at the cost, expense and blood of others, USA citizens and far more foreign citizens.
The death rate American soldiers against foreign casualties was calculated by Anatol Lieven as one to fifty.

On Okinawa is was 7000 USA soldiers against 100.000 Japanese soldiers and 40.000 civilians.

Being a social democrat it abhors me that the USA always has abundant money for death and destruction but seems incapable of providing decent affordable health care for all its citizens; Read More Agree: jacques sheete

jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 10:32 am GMT
200 Words @jacques sheete

An anti semitism about which one Rothschildt wrote to another 'the only enemy of jews is jews'.
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA says about the same in softer words.
I'd appreciate a source for that quote.

This brings us back to the root of all evil in the USA, the country is still in the second half of the 19th century,
Depends.

Politically that's probably close to true except for the fact that back then we had at least a few politicians with spines and gonads. Now we just have slithering grubs and the intestinal parasites of swine, e.g. the Swine Large Roundworm, Ascaris suum.

Morally, it hasn't even left the Stone Age.


it never became democratic,

True and you obviously know more than most Americans do about that. Democracy, in this country, is nothing more than a deeply ingrained fetish. As you probably know, democracy only works in small, homogeneous, MORAL groups otherwise it's simply mob rule.

money still rules the USA.
More precisely, money is the main idol that's worshipped. The rulers are vicious, sociopathic, corrupt, insatiable, moneyed hyenas and jackals. And they are completely incorrigible. The Rothschildt letter,
in one of the two following books.
Both books now are not where I am right now.
In about three weeks time I could check.

Ismar Schorsch, 'Jewish Reactions to German Anti-Semitism, 1870 – 1914′, New York 1972

Fritz Stern, 'Gold and Iron, Bismarck, Bleichröder, and the Building of the German Empire', New York, 1977.

Both are written by jews, you should read both in order to understand the emergence of anti semitism in Germany after 1870.
Who morally is to blame, one can debate for a very long time.

In any case my idea is that jews behaved stupidly, the Schorsch book explains abundantly how jews in articles, books and creating organisations tried to show they were not to blame.

That agreement among jews, even that was not realised, about the blame, would change nothing about the feelings of 'real' Germans, never seems to have occurred to them.

One sees the same attitude now when Israel is critisized. Read More

jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 10:36 am GMT
@Alden The last American troops left Germany in 1923. The French stayed until 1935 when Hitler forced them out. If you refer to the occupation of the Ruhr area by Belgian and French troops, as far as I know they left in 1925.
Rhineland and Saar is another matter.
Saar, maybe just after the 1936 election there.
Rhineland, maybe 1938. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
jacques sheete , April 28, 2017 at 12:18 pm GMT
100 Words @jilles dykstra The Rothschildt letter,
in one of the two following books.
Both books now are not where I am right now.
In about three weeks time I could check.

Ismar Schorsch, 'Jewish Reactions to German Anti-Semitism, 1870 - 1914', New York 1972

Fritz Stern, 'Gold and Iron, Bismarck, Bleichröder, and the Building of the German Empire', New York, 1977.

Both are written by jews, you should read both in order to understand the emergence of anti semitism in Germany after 1870.
Who morally is to blame, one can debate for a very long time.

In any case my idea is that jews behaved stupidly, the Schorsch book explains abundantly how jews in articles, books and creating organisations tried to show they were not to blame.

That agreement among jews, even that was not realised, about the blame, would change nothing about the feelings of 'real' Germans, never seems to have occurred to them.

One sees the same attitude now when Israel is critisized. Many thanks to you, fine sir!

You appear to be one of the few who seems to have a grip on reality and I find your comments and insights informative and refreshing.

Please continue to comment here even though the place is sometimes polluted by a few of the usual supercilious state worshiping trolls with trailer park opinions who obviously feel compelled to parrot the usual tiresome propaganda, and who have never learned to question anything. Read More Agree: bluedog Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

jacques sheete , April 28, 2017 at 12:32 pm GMT
100 Words @jilles dykstra I have no hostility whatsoever against the USA people in general.
Several offered me hospitality in their homes.

What struck me each time was the igorance, the lack of information.
Local tv is just stupid advertising.
None of my hosts watched serious tv news, nowhere did I see a serious paper, just something local about engagements, weddings and funerals.

One of my hosts I presented with the book of Anne Applebaum From West to East, I think the title was, she travelled from the Baltic sea to the Black see.
He read it, had never realised about so many peoples.
Even a well traveled more or less well known American I found very ignorant, who reads Readers Digest ?

A Berkeley assistant professor asked me what I knew about the Civil War, at the time, end of the seventies, very little, but when I explained to him that Europe had been wars galore, so why would I know much about an American war, he was shocked.

My strong objections are against USA society as a system, that allows a tiny minority to run foreign policy at their pleasure, at the cost, expense and blood of others, USA citizens and far more foreign citizens.
The death rate American soldiers against foreign casualties was calculated by Anatol Lieven as one to fifty.

On Okinawa is was 7000 USA soldiers against 100.000 Japanese soldiers and 40.000 civilians.

Being a social democrat it abhors me that the USA always has abundant money for death and destruction but seems incapable of providing decent affordable health care for all its citizens;

What struck me each time was the igorance, the lack of information.

I'm a native, and agree with that. What's even more shocking is the smug, even hostile resistance to learning anything beyond the National Anthem and such.

It's a continuous struggle especially when you're dealing with people such as you describe such as "professors."

There is a locally well known personality, a "professor" of history, who is in great demand here for his presentation of the American Civil War ( poor label that), who disgorges"patriotic" nonsense as nauseating as it is mythical. Listening to one of his talks is as much an exercise of extreme self flagellation on my part as it is mental masturbation on his part yet people practically worship the sappy stuff he spews. There is no point in even attempting to counter what he sez.

His audiences are completely deaf to anything but self (national) praise. It's as if nearly the whole nation positively delights in wallowing in prideful ignorance and they turn to the tube for their daily doses of it. Read More

jacques sheete , April 28, 2017 at 12:45 pm GMT
@jilles dykstra The Rothschildt letter,
in one of the two following books.
Both books now are not where I am right now.
In about three weeks time I could check.

Ismar Schorsch, 'Jewish Reactions to German Anti-Semitism, 1870 - 1914', New York 1972

Fritz Stern, 'Gold and Iron, Bismarck, Bleichröder, and the Building of the German Empire', New York, 1977.

Both are written by jews, you should read both in order to understand the emergence of anti semitism in Germany after 1870.
Who morally is to blame, one can debate for a very long time.

In any case my idea is that jews behaved stupidly, the Schorsch book explains abundantly how jews in articles, books and creating organisations tried to show they were not to blame.

That agreement among jews, even that was not realised, about the blame, would change nothing about the feelings of 'real' Germans, never seems to have occurred to them.

One sees the same attitude now when Israel is critisized.

Both are written by jews, you should read both

Orders placed.

Thanks! Read More

Bill , April 28, 2017 at 3:10 pm GMT
@Sean Fisk writes as if the current US president's puny actions are the cause of wars and despotism all around the globe, although many like the Yemen have seen the same sides fighting for five decades, wich an altered cast of outside help. They are are rooted in local conditions, all these things Fisk is complaining about. He sometime talks as if the Middle east would settle down in a trice without the US. But America is just a country, big and strong, but still in need of allies.Even if America decided to withdraw from all involvement, It cannot halt others' interventions in local conflicts by washing US hands clean. Fisk implies otherwise. Indeed. Nobody ever does anything wrong. How could they? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
Rurik , April 28, 2017 at 3:28 pm GMT
@Sean Israel would hardly put effort into overthrowing Libyan or Egyptian governments without believing their replacement would be an improvement from Israel's point of view. It wouldn't because everyone in those counties hates Israel. I don't think there is any evidence at all that Israel wants Assad to be overthrown. No Syrian government is going to be anything but hostile to Israel and Syria has nothing Israel wants. Yes Israel would use a wedge on Arabs fighting one another to keep them at it, but it cannot create divisions within a country of between countries out of nothing. For example Iran and Iraq were at war in the 80s and Israel supplied both with arms to keep the war going, but it didn't create the conflict, which was a Persian versus Arab one with very ancient hational roots- just like the Iranian-Saudi proxy war playing out in Syria.

As for false flags, as I said it does seem insane for Assad to gas kids right now but Assad and his tiny leadership are very isolated from good advice and they have a proven ability to make incredibly bad decisions. One thing that weighs heavily against a false flag is that the US intelligence could have very professionally faked an attack last year and got a major US airstrike to break the back of Assad before the rebels had been virtually annihilated in the cities. So why a why would Assad use nerve gas now argument cuts both ways.

I don't think there is any evidence at all that Israel wants Assad to be overthrown.

imbecile Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

annamaria , April 28, 2017 at 3:59 pm GMT
200 Words @naro Robert Fisk the Iranian shill, and secret Shiia convert, doesn't even know that Hiroshima and Nagasaki are NOT in Southeast Asia. Thank God that Trump and Israel are a lot smarter than this turd. Why don't you simply praise Trump for being obedient to Israel? "Never again," naro? You should have already noticed that the ordinary Americans are getting to realize that the US has been used as a living host by the paraziotid Israel that needs the US to implement the Oded Yinon plan for Eretz Israel. It also obvious that the implementation could end up with a glassy Middle East, where Israel would become a heap of ashes. Or you are ready to cry antisemitism, Holocaust, and special victimhood, despite your bloody subhuman ziocons that have arranged the slaughter of millions of human beings in the Middle East?
Your people are collaborating with ISIS in the struggling Syria and with neo-Nazis in the deteriorating Ukraine. The Israel-firsters have "convinced" the US government to channel the country' resources towards the wars of aggression in the Middle East – all in the name of Eretz Israel (and war profits). Very moral. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 4:00 pm GMT
100 Words @jacques sheete

Both are written by jews, you should read both...
Orders placed.

Thanks! First time in maybe ten years that anyone really wants to read books.
The wonderful thing about old books is that they're cheap, easy to get these days, and, most important 'often history books tell more about the time they're written than about the time they describe'.
In other words, they carry the old bias, not the bias of today.

If you're interested in Islam
Reuben Levy, 'The social structure of Islam', London, New York, 1931, 1932, 1957, 1971
Richard Fletcher, 'Moorish Spain', Berkeley 1992

And if you're interested in other writing about Islam, especially Bernard Lewis, try to find ' Lewis dissected', Sephardic Newsletter.
Do hope I remember the title well.
If rabbi David Shasha still runs the site, you can ask him. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

annamaria , April 28, 2017 at 4:08 pm GMT
100 Words @Sean Fisk writes as if the current US president's puny actions are the cause of wars and despotism all around the globe, although many like the Yemen have seen the same sides fighting for five decades, wich an altered cast of outside help. They are are rooted in local conditions, all these things Fisk is complaining about. He sometime talks as if the Middle east would settle down in a trice without the US. But America is just a country, big and strong, but still in need of allies.Even if America decided to withdraw from all involvement, It cannot halt others' interventions in local conflicts by washing US hands clean. Fisk implies otherwise. Lets be precise: the ongoing wars in the Middle East have been planned and pushed by the US/UK ziocons to protect and enlarge the territory of Israel. Both Libya and Syria were doing quite well (particularly Libya) until the ziocon "ameliorators" came to fix the situation in the Middle East. The "big and strong" America and her resources have been used by the tribe to protect their supremacist home of shameless colonizers. Instead of developing trade and cooperation, the US came to the Midde East with weapons of mass destruction. The Israel-firsters cooked the plan for the interventions. Millions died as a result. Read More
annamaria , April 28, 2017 at 4:14 pm GMT
@Sam Shama Why spew the common nonsense? Well, why don't you explain the UNZ readers the rationale for Israelis' collaboration with ISIS? This collaboration is well-documented and it has been discussed in Israeli press.
So, why does Israel help to and protect ISIS? Read More
annamaria , April 28, 2017 at 4:21 pm GMT
100 Words @Sean The US isn't as moral as it claim but who is? There is a thing called cognitive dissonance .Sounds like you believe the US should stay at home for ever after, because it was solely responsible for all deaths those conflicts, though many had started before US involvement. The lesson of US failure in Vietnam was that military strength was not enough against a opponent that was politically strong, Assad is not strong politically, the majority in Syria opposed him and dispute his inherited police state and even more ruthless army facing a rag tag piecemeal rebellion he would have lost by now without the Russians . The US is supposed to stay out and look on as Russia turns the rebels the US tried to protect into mincemeat and Assad sprays entire villages with poison gas like they were bugs, is it? China and Russia:
" regardless of the circumstances, we will not change our policy of deepening and developing our strategic partnership and cooperation; our policy, based on joint development and prosperity, will not change; and our joint efforts to defend peace and justice and promote cooperation in the world will not change. These were the words of President Xi Jinping."

http://thesaker.is/breaking-personal-message-from-xi-jinping-to-vladimir-putin-our-friendship-is-unbreakable/

Imagine: crazy US brass wielding various weapons of mass destruction over Europe, Middle East, and Asia. Versus the Silk Road – a net of trade connections between Asia and Europe. Read More

Rurik , April 28, 2017 at 4:23 pm GMT
600 Words @jilles dykstra I have no hostility whatsoever against the USA people in general.
Several offered me hospitality in their homes.

What struck me each time was the igorance, the lack of information.
Local tv is just stupid advertising.
None of my hosts watched serious tv news, nowhere did I see a serious paper, just something local about engagements, weddings and funerals.

One of my hosts I presented with the book of Anne Applebaum From West to East, I think the title was, she travelled from the Baltic sea to the Black see.
He read it, had never realised about so many peoples.
Even a well traveled more or less well known American I found very ignorant, who reads Readers Digest ?

A Berkeley assistant professor asked me what I knew about the Civil War, at the time, end of the seventies, very little, but when I explained to him that Europe had been wars galore, so why would I know much about an American war, he was shocked.

My strong objections are against USA society as a system, that allows a tiny minority to run foreign policy at their pleasure, at the cost, expense and blood of others, USA citizens and far more foreign citizens.
The death rate American soldiers against foreign casualties was calculated by Anatol Lieven as one to fifty.

On Okinawa is was 7000 USA soldiers against 100.000 Japanese soldiers and 40.000 civilians.

Being a social democrat it abhors me that the USA always has abundant money for death and destruction but seems incapable of providing decent affordable health care for all its citizens;

My strong objections are against USA society as a system, that allows a tiny minority to run foreign policy at their pleasure, at the cost, expense and blood of others, USA citizens and far more foreign citizens.

I can't argue with that Jilles

and you're right about the general ignorance and bovine stupidity of most Americans, but that has been very carefully created by the PTB, who don't want an educated, thinking populace.

what was it papa Bush said?

"if the American people knew what we have done, they would string us up from the lamp posts"

if the American people could think, the results would be the same. If the American people could think and were in possession of a moral soul, then they'd know that wars based on lies should be repudiated and the war criminals brought to justice. But the American sheople have been systematically dumbed down to the point of zombies, infatuated with Kim Kardashian's ass. Today Idiocracy is a reality. It's true.

But, let me just say on behalf of Americans, that I don't really see it any better across the pond. Sure, the Europeans are better educated, and generally speak at least two languages, and have heard of Yalta and Copernicus, but with all that education, they just don't seem to me to be any more principled or moral than the zombified Americans.

Sure, it is the US military that is the biggest bully on the block, but does that excuse the other little bullies that stand behind him and give him moral support? There were French jets bombing Libya just as ferociously as any American ones. The Brits have never seen an act of aggression from the US military that they don't reverently applaud. And the Germans, whose government goes along with every war crime America commits in principle, are today complicit in a racial supremacist, genocidal holocaust against a completely innocent victim whose only crime is that they existed – in Palestine, on land that some Jewish supremacist coveted for themselves.

The irony? That these very same Germans feel excruciating and debilitating guilt for a crime that they had nothing to do with, while at the same time facilitating the same crime of genocide today, in their names, by funding and arming and providing "moral" cover for the Zionists.

So sure, Europeans are far more educated, but seem to fall very short when it comes to using that education to augment a moral foundation for their actions and the actions of their respective governments. There seems to me to be a sort of all-pervasive cowardice in Western Europe, and a Pavlovian, knee-jerk propensity to wallow in prostrate abasement and self-flagellate as soon as anyone says "Holocaust". Sort of what they used to be able to bludgeon Americans with by the pejorative "racist", until it became a joke.

Anyways, yes, we're ignorant, and bovine and dangerous, but morally, I just don't see too many paragons of virtue or honor to hold up as examples today. Uruguay perhaps, and I would include Putin's Russia insofar as he's trying to put out the fires the Zio-Western-fiend is lighting all over the place, but then he too bolsters their agenda by antagonizing the former Soviet satellite states with ultra-nationalistic chest thumping over the "great war", (that the Bolsheviks in Russia were mainly responsible for). Note to Putin, let it rest! The great victory that you celebrate in May was a catastrophe for Eastern Europe (and millions of Russians too)

sorry, I tend to rant at times.. Read More

jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 4:36 pm GMT
200 Words @jacques sheete

What struck me each time was the igorance, the lack of information.
I'm a native, and agree with that. What's even more shocking is the smug, even hostile resistance to learning anything beyond the National Anthem and such.

It's a continuous struggle especially when you're dealing with people such as you describe such as "professors."

There is a locally well known personality, a "professor" of history, who is in great demand here for his presentation of the American Civil War ( poor label that), who disgorges"patriotic" nonsense as nauseating as it is mythical. Listening to one of his talks is as much an exercise of extreme self flagellation on my part as it is mental masturbation on his part yet people practically worship the sappy stuff he spews. There is no point in even attempting to counter what he sez.

His audiences are completely deaf to anything but self (national) praise. It's as if nearly the whole nation positively delights in wallowing in prideful ignorance and they turn to the tube for their daily doses of it. Houston Stewart Chamberlain, 'Die Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts', 1898- 1907, München

If you can read German, I can recommend it.
He was the brother of the 1938 Chamberlain, had a strange youth, attended gymnasia in different European countries.
He was flabbergasted how the same history was taught differently in different countries.

I long ago wrote a USA correspondent how European countries considered waging war over the Monroe Doctrine.
The reply was 'it is still taught here in glowing terms', well, in Europe it was seen as colonialism, as many in S America feel they're still under the USA colonial yoke.
Eduardo Galeano, 'Open Veins of Latin America', Five centuries of the pillage of a continent', 1971, 2009, Londen.

Your Civil War, for the liberation of slaves.
My knowledge is from different books, and of course there were people concerned with slavery.
But the real reasons were quite different, destroying a cosmopolitan culture in the south, quite different from the NE, for NE hegemony over the whole USA, and demand for industrial labour, slavery does not work in factories.
The liberated slaves soon found out that they often were worse off, especially in old age, at the plantations they could stay until their deaths. Read More

jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 4:38 pm GMT
@annamaria China and Russia:
"...regardless of the circumstances, we will not change our policy of deepening and developing our strategic partnership and cooperation; our policy, based on joint development and prosperity, will not change; and our joint efforts to defend peace and justice and promote cooperation in the world will not change. These were the words of President Xi Jinping."
http://thesaker.is/breaking-personal-message-from-xi-jinping-to-vladimir-putin-our-friendship-is-unbreakable/
Imagine: crazy US brass wielding various weapons of mass destruction over Europe, Middle East, and Asia. Versus the Silk Road - a net of trade connections between Asia and Europe. There were allegations that Hillary was prepared to wage an atomic war in Europe. Read More
jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 4:43 pm GMT
100 Words @annamaria Lets be precise: the ongoing wars in the Middle East have been planned and pushed by the US/UK ziocons to protect and enlarge the territory of Israel. Both Libya and Syria were doing quite well (particularly Libya) until the ziocon "ameliorators" came to fix the situation in the Middle East. The "big and strong" America and her resources have been used by the tribe to protect their supremacist home of shameless colonizers. Instead of developing trade and cooperation, the US came to the Midde East with weapons of mass destruction. The Israel-firsters cooked the plan for the interventions. Millions died as a result. I was in Syria, 1987 or so.
Of course it was dictatorial, secret services galore, five it was said.
But the country was peaceful, not rich, but also not as poor as I experienced India some ten years before.
Aleppo was the most cosmopolitan city I ever visited, anything accepted, from miniskirts to burka's.
The sukh, now destroyed, was wonderful, medieval, happy looking people. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 4:46 pm GMT
@annamaria Well, why don't you explain the UNZ readers the rationale for Israelis' collaboration with ISIS? This collaboration is well-documented and it has been discussed in Israeli press.
So, why does Israel help to and protect ISIS? Maybe already 20 years ago studies appeared in Israel, stating that the destabilisation of the ME was the goal. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
Sam Shama , April 28, 2017 at 4:50 pm GMT
100 Words @jacques sheete

Why spew the common nonsense?
You mean like this?

Sam Shama , Next New Comment
April 27, 2017 at 2:19 pm GMT

Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.

Trump and Pence are good men, their qualities, underestimated by many.

No. Like these ones:

jacques sheete ,
April 27, 2017 at 11:46 am GMT

• 200 Words

Trump, the malleable Chimp, is just the latest iteration of Cleopatra's monkeys, and the mask is off.

All the dreamers ought to wake up to the fact that the Amerika of their fantasies has been dead for some time, and will never be resurrected.

[...]
Me? I ain't shedding any tears for any stinking state!

Bitterness of such intensity is impossible to miss. If you ain't shedding tears for no stinkin' state, you must consider yourself stateless. Who did you support in the last POTUS elections? Are you a communist anarchist? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

jilles dykstra , April 28, 2017 at 4:51 pm GMT
100 Words @jilles dykstra Houston Stewart Chamberlain, 'Die Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts', 1898- 1907, München

If you can read German, I can recommend it.
He was the brother of the 1938 Chamberlain, had a strange youth, attended gymnasia in different European countries.
He was flabbergasted how the same history was taught differently in different countries.

I long ago wrote a USA correspondent how European countries considered waging war over the Monroe Doctrine.
The reply was 'it is still taught here in glowing terms', well, in Europe it was seen as colonialism, as many in S America feel they're still under the USA colonial yoke.
Eduardo Galeano, 'Open Veins of Latin America', Five centuries of the pillage of a continent', 1971, 2009, Londen.

Your Civil War, for the liberation of slaves.
My knowledge is from different books, and of course there were people concerned with slavery.
But the real reasons were quite different, destroying a cosmopolitan culture in the south, quite different from the NE, for NE hegemony over the whole USA, and demand for industrial labour, slavery does not work in factories.
The liberated slaves soon found out that they often were worse off, especially in old age, at the plantations they could stay until their deaths. Rereading, I do not want to defend slavery, not even in the USA, where it seems to have been far better for slaves than in Brazil

Herbert Aptheker, 'Negro Slave Revolts in the United States 1526 – 1860 ', New York 1939

Giorgio Marotti, 'Black Characters in the Brazilian Novel, Afro-American culture & society monograph series CAAS', 1987 Los Angelos Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Sam Shama , April 28, 2017 at 4:56 pm GMT
@Sean Israel would hardly put effort into overthrowing Libyan or Egyptian governments without believing their replacement would be an improvement from Israel's point of view. It wouldn't because everyone in those counties hates Israel. I don't think there is any evidence at all that Israel wants Assad to be overthrown. No Syrian government is going to be anything but hostile to Israel and Syria has nothing Israel wants. Yes Israel would use a wedge on Arabs fighting one another to keep them at it, but it cannot create divisions within a country of between countries out of nothing. For example Iran and Iraq were at war in the 80s and Israel supplied both with arms to keep the war going, but it didn't create the conflict, which was a Persian versus Arab one with very ancient hational roots- just like the Iranian-Saudi proxy war playing out in Syria.

As for false flags, as I said it does seem insane for Assad to gas kids right now but Assad and his tiny leadership are very isolated from good advice and they have a proven ability to make incredibly bad decisions. One thing that weighs heavily against a false flag is that the US intelligence could have very professionally faked an attack last year and got a major US airstrike to break the back of Assad before the rebels had been virtually annihilated in the cities. So why a why would Assad use nerve gas now argument cuts both ways. Very good comment, Sean Read More LOL: Rurik Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Sean , April 28, 2017 at 5:13 pm GMT
@Alden The last American troops left Germany in 1923. The French stayed until 1935 when Hitler forced them out. Thank you for taking the trouble to point out my error, Most embarrassing. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
Sean , April 28, 2017 at 5:27 pm GMT
100 Words @jilles dykstra There were allegations that Hillary was prepared to wage an atomic war in Europe. The US has contingency plans for nuking in almost every scenario without ever intending to do it. Very different from intending to carry out a nuclear first strike. I would not be surprised if the US has the targeting dating for a nuclear strike on Britain, just in case there was a need someday. But no way would the US ever dream of actually using nuclear weapons in Europe, because no ally country would agree to be a nuclear battlefield and hitting the enemy homeland would mean a nuclear strike on the US mainland in response. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
Sam Shama , April 28, 2017 at 5:28 pm GMT
100 Words @annamaria Well, why don't you explain the UNZ readers the rationale for Israelis' collaboration with ISIS? This collaboration is well-documented and it has been discussed in Israeli press.
So, why does Israel help to and protect ISIS? Israel has a free press in which a great deal of speculation is tolerated, even welcomed. I haven't seen any articles in any of the major journals, or even in the smaller ones, where Daesh is described as a collaborator.

To Israeli society's credit, humour is a normal and common enjoyment, in which spirit, some skits produced – Eretz Nehderet being the most prominent one – portray a darkly humourous relationship between Israeli doctors [and IDF medical corps] and Daesh operating in the Golan.

So, Israeli med corps will, as modern protocol demands, aid any and all injured. Read More

Sam Shama , April 28, 2017 at 6:18 pm GMT
1,400 Words @jilles dykstra Houston Stewart Chamberlain, 'Die Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts', 1898- 1907, München

If you can read German, I can recommend it.
He was the brother of the 1938 Chamberlain, had a strange youth, attended gymnasia in different European countries.
He was flabbergasted how the same history was taught differently in different countries.

I long ago wrote a USA correspondent how European countries considered waging war over the Monroe Doctrine.
The reply was 'it is still taught here in glowing terms', well, in Europe it was seen as colonialism, as many in S America feel they're still under the USA colonial yoke.
Eduardo Galeano, 'Open Veins of Latin America', Five centuries of the pillage of a continent', 1971, 2009, Londen.

Your Civil War, for the liberation of slaves.
My knowledge is from different books, and of course there were people concerned with slavery.
But the real reasons were quite different, destroying a cosmopolitan culture in the south, quite different from the NE, for NE hegemony over the whole USA, and demand for industrial labour, slavery does not work in factories.
The liberated slaves soon found out that they often were worse off, especially in old age, at the plantations they could stay until their deaths. Egad! Houston Stewart Chamberlain was a neurotic character. I haven't read his Grundlagen , but Shirer's description of it is sufficient. Chamberlain wrote in spurts, gripped by a demonic fervour; he says so in his autobiography, Lebenswege , that he was often unable to recognise them as his own work because they surpassed his expectations!

French scholar of Germanism Edmond Vermeil said Chamberlain's ideas were essentially "shoddy."

Here is Shirer:

[MORE]

This son of an English admiral, nephew of a British field marshal, Sir Neville Chamberlain, and of two British generals, and eventually son-in-law of Richard Wagner, was born at Portsmouth in 1855. He was destined for the British Army or Navy, but his delicate health made such a calling out of the question and he was educated in France and Geneva, where French became his first language.

Between the ages of fifteen and nineteen fate brought him into touch with two Germans and thereafter he was drawn irresistibly toward Germany, of which he ultimately became a citizen and one of the foremost thinkers and in whose language he wrote all of his many books, several of which had an almost blinding influence on Wilhelm II, Adolf Hitler and countless lesser Germans.

In 1870, when he was fifteen, Chamberlain landed in the hands of a remarkable tutor, Otto Kuntze, a Prussian of the Prussians, who for four years imprinted on his receptive mind and sensitive soul the glories of militant, conquering Prussia and also – apparently unmindful of the contrasts – of such artists and poets as Beethoven, Goethe, Schiller andWagner. At nineteen Chamberlain fell madly in love with Anna Horst, also a Prussian, ten years his senior and, like him, highly neurotic. In 1882, at the age of twenty-seven, he journeyed from Geneva, where he had beer, immersed for three years in studies of philosophy, natural history, physics, chemistry and medicine, to Bayreuth. There he met Wagner who, as he says, became the sun of his life, and Cosima, the composer's wife, to whom he would remain passionately and slavishly devoted all the rest of his days. From 1885, when he went with Anna Horst, who had become his wife, to live for four years in Dresden, he became a German in thought and in language, moving on to Vienna in 1889 for a decade and finally in 1909 to Bayreuth, where he dwelt until his death in 1927.

He divorced his idolized Prussian wife in 1905, when she was sixty and even more mentally and physically ill than he (the separation was so painful that he said it almost drove him mad) and three years later he married Eva Wagner and settled down near Wahnfried, where he could be near his wife's mother, the revered, strong-willed Cosima.

Hypersensitive and neurotic and subject to frequent nervous breakdowns, Chamberlain was given to seeing demons who, by his own account, drove him on relentlessly to seek new fields of study and get on with his prodigious writings. One vision after another forced him to change from biology to botany to the fine arts, to music, to philosophy, to biography to history. Once, in 1896, when he was returning from Italy, the presence of a demon became so forceful that he got off the train at Gardone, shut himself up in a hotel room for eight days and, abandoning some work on music that he had contemplated, wrote feverishly on a biological thesis until he had the germ of the theme that would dominate all of his later works: race and history.

Whatever its blemishes, his mind had a vast sweep ranging over the fields of literature, music, biology, botany, religion, history and politics. There was, as Jean Real has pointed out, a profound unity of inspiration in all his published works and they had a remarkable coherence. Since he felt himself goaded on by demons, his books (on Wagner, Goethe, Kant, Christianity and race) were written in the grip of a terrible fever, a veritable trance, a state of self-induced intoxication, so that, as he says in his autobiography, Lebenswege, he was often unable to recognize them as his own work, because they surpassed his expectations.

Minds more balanced than his have subsequently demolished his theories of race and much of his history, and to such a French scholar of Germanism as Edmond Vermeil Chamberlain's ideas were essentially "shoddy." Yet to the anti-Nazi German biographer of Hitler, Konrad Heiden, who deplored the influence of his racial teachings, Chamberlain "was one of the most astonishing talents in the history of the German mind, a mine of knowledge and profound
ideas."

The book which most profoundly influenced that mind, which sent Wilhelm II into ecstasies and provided the Nazis with their racial aberrations, was Foundations of the Nineteenth Century (Grundlagen des Neunzehnten Jahrhunderts) a work of some twelve hundred pages which Chamberlain, again possessed of one of his "demons," wrote in nineteen months between April 1, 1897, and October 31, 1898, in Vienna, and which was published in 1899.

As with Gobineau, whom he admired, Chamberlain found the key to history, indeed the basis of civilization, to be race. To explain the nineteenth century, that is, the contemporary world, one had to consider first what it had been bequeathed from ancient times. Three things, said Chamberlain: Greek philosophy and art, Roman law and the personality of Christ. There were also three legatees: the Jews and the Germans, the "two pure races," and the half-breed Latins of the Mediterranean – "a chaos of peoples," he called them. The Germans alone deserved such a splendid heritage. They had, it is true, come into history late, not until the thirteenth century. But even before that, in destroying the Roman Empire, they had proved their worth, "It is not true," he says, " that the Teutonic barbarian conjured up the so-called 'Night of the Middle Ages'; this night followed rather upon the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of the raceless chaos of humanity which the dying Roman Empire had nurtured; but for the Teuton, everlasting night would have settled upon the world." At the time he was writing he saw in the Teuton the only hope of the world. Chamberlain included among the "Teutons" the Celts and the Slavs, though the Teutons were the most important element. However, he is quite woolly in his definitions and at one point declares that "whoever behaves as a Teuton is a Teuton whatever his racial origin." Perhaps here he was thinking of his own non-German origin. Whatever he was, the Teuton, according to Chamberlain, was "the soul of our culture. The importance of each nation as a living power today is dependent upon the proportion of genuinely Teutonic blood in its population. . . True history begins at the moment when the Teuton, with his masterful hand, lays his grip upon the legacy of antiquity."

And the Jews? The longest chapter in Foundations is devoted to them. As we have seen, Chamberlain claimed that the Jews and the Teutons were the only pure races left in the West. And in this chapter he condemns "stupid and revolting anti-Semitism." The Jews, he says, are not "inferior" to the Teuton, merely "different." They have their own grandeur; they realize the "sacred duty" of man to guard the purity of race. And yet as he proceeds to analyze the Jews, Chamberlain slips into the very vulgar anti-Semitism which he condemns in others and which leads, in the end, to the obscenities of Julius Streicher's caricatures of the Jews in Der Stuermer in Hitler's time. Indeed a good deal of the "philosophical" basis of Nazi anti-Semitism stems from this chapter.

The preposterousness of Chamberlain's views is quickly evident. He has declared that the personality of Christ is one of the three great bequests of antiquity to modern civilization. He then sets out to "prove" that Jesus was not a Jew. His Galilean origins, his inability to utter correctly the Aramaic gutturals, are to Chamberlain "clear signs" that Jesus had "a large proportion of non-Semitic blood." He then makes a typically fiat statement: "Whoever claimed that Jesus was a Jew was either being stupid or telling a lie .. . Jesus was not a Jew."

What was he then?

Chamberlain answers: Probably an Aryan!

To take Chamberlain's ideas seriously today is to indulge in a dangerous delusion. On balance, I prefer the refreshing American attitude you call "uninformed" over this all too perilous European "wisdom". 1939 anyone? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

anarchyst , April 28, 2017 at 6:59 pm GMT
300 Words @jilles dykstra I have no hostility whatsoever against the USA people in general.
Several offered me hospitality in their homes.

What struck me each time was the igorance, the lack of information.
Local tv is just stupid advertising.
None of my hosts watched serious tv news, nowhere did I see a serious paper, just something local about engagements, weddings and funerals.

One of my hosts I presented with the book of Anne Applebaum From West to East, I think the title was, she travelled from the Baltic sea to the Black see.
He read it, had never realised about so many peoples.
Even a well traveled more or less well known American I found very ignorant, who reads Readers Digest ?

A Berkeley assistant professor asked me what I knew about the Civil War, at the time, end of the seventies, very little, but when I explained to him that Europe had been wars galore, so why would I know much about an American war, he was shocked.

My strong objections are against USA society as a system, that allows a tiny minority to run foreign policy at their pleasure, at the cost, expense and blood of others, USA citizens and far more foreign citizens.
The death rate American soldiers against foreign casualties was calculated by Anatol Lieven as one to fifty.

On Okinawa is was 7000 USA soldiers against 100.000 Japanese soldiers and 40.000 civilians.

Being a social democrat it abhors me that the USA always has abundant money for death and destruction but seems incapable of providing decent affordable health care for all its citizens; Your conception of American health care is incorrect. Yes, there are flaws, but ANYONE can walk into an American hospital emergency room and they will be treated REGARDLESS OF ABILITY TO PAY. Even illegal aliens will be treated
Patients in countries with "socialized medicine" quite often, have interminable wait times for procedures that are routine here in the USA. Even Canada, our neighbor to the north, has problems with timely availability of services. Canada has first-rate medical personnel, who have to work under the constraints of a public system.
It is interesting to note, that in most countries with "socialized medicine" there is a two-tier system of treatment those with private health insurance (or money) can (and do) get better treatment than those who depend on the "public system".
In addition, there are life saving drugs that are unavailable in the public system as they are considered "too expensive"
Witness Great Britain's "National Health Service" (NHS) with its NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence), which refuses to pay for certain breast cancer drugs, deeming them to be "too expensive". One could argue that NICE is a "death panel" relegating those who are unfortunate enough to need care relegated to death.
Go outside the NHS system to pay for your own care, and the door closes and locks behind you. "NHS has invoked a policy of refusing care altogether to patients who, often upon physician recommendation, choose to pay out-of-pocket for best-available drug treatments".
A breast cancer patient in the UK "Found that out the hard way when she tried to buy Avastin out of her own pocket, only to have her doctor inform her that if she did so, she would have to pay for all her treatment." Yet she has been paying income taxes of 20 to 45 percent for her "government provided free healthcare".
American health care needs improvement, but socializing it is not the answer Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Fidelios Automata , April 28, 2017 at 7:07 pm GMT
Why can't Trump be more like Putin? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Gleimhart , April 28, 2017 at 7:08 pm GMT
100 Words @jacques sheete

This site gets more anti-American by the day.
Which America you talkin about? The one it's become or the one in your dreams?

If you loved what America is supposed to stand for, you'd also be against what it's become.

You want a pity party er sumpin? Go elsewhere. You haven't the least clue of my assessment of America. I already DO hate what it has become.

And where did I ask for a pity party? Show me.

Your problem is that you read into my comment things I did not say.

jacques sheete, you are the dictionary definition of presumptuous.

Don't ever address me again unless you have something intelligent to offer. Okay? Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

annamaria , April 28, 2017 at 7:42 pm GMT
100 Words @Sam Shama Israel has a free press in which a great deal of speculation is tolerated, even welcomed. I haven't seen any articles in any of the major journals, or even in the smaller ones, where Daesh is described as a collaborator.

To Israeli society's credit, humour is a normal and common enjoyment, in which spirit, some skits produced - Eretz Nehderet being the most prominent one - portray a darkly humourous relationship between Israeli doctors [and IDF medical corps] and Daesh operating in the Golan.

So, Israeli med corps will, as modern protocol demands, aid any and all injured. You should be more diligent in your search. Israel has been cooperating with ISIS and the Israeli generals have loudly proclaimed their preference for ISIS over sovereign Syria.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/alliance-of-convenience-israel-supports-syrias-isis-terror-group/5587203

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3315347/Watch-heart-pounding-moment-Israeli-commandos-save-Islamic-militants-Syrian-warzone-risking-lives-sworn-enemies.html

http://21stcenturywire.com/2015/02/19/un-report-reveals-how-israel-is-coordinating-with-isis-militants-inside-syria/

http://ahtribune.com/world/north-africa-south-west-asia/1633-moshe-yaalon.html

And please spare us your lecturing on special moral qualities of IDF and Israelis at large. Listen to your bloody Shaked; she is a Minister of Justice in your morally-lost lands: https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israeli-lawmakers-call-genocide-palestinians-gets-thousands-facebook-likes
"Israelis gather on hillsides to watch and cheer as military drops bombs on Gaza:" https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
The ongoing blood bath in the Middle East (millions died) is directly related to Oded Yinon plan for Eretz Israel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RC1Mepk_Sw Read More

Abdul Alhazred , April 28, 2017 at 8:46 pm GMT
200 Words @Sean Anyone who wants to stage a preemptive nuclear attack wouldn't say so beforehand. No-one can come up with a scenario in which Britain would ever first use nukes, so refusing to rule it out is simply the practice of confronting potential aggression with uncertain consequences though being slow to say what you will do, and never saying what you won't.

Lets be clear: the British nukes are out in subs and if they got the coded order to fire off a first use strike (for some reason we cannot yet imagine) the Trident captain and crew would obey the command. Any statement to the contrary made by some politician on BBC radio years before is going to be bloody irrelevant. Sean,
I think you are underestimating the utter evil and horror of such a pronouncement which is an act of war and terrorism that is and has been standard operating practice of the British Empire. There are two operative words at play "Gunboat Diplomacy" where the emphasis is upon a canon in the face. Boom Baboom, but that's not gunpowder, nor iron ball, but a big flash of a sun exploding

But there are those who think they can have a limited nuclear war
And "The Bitch Set Him Up!"

http://www.larouchepub.com/eiw/public/2017/2017_10-19/2017-15/pdf/02-03_4415.pdf

Yeah its LaRouche, he is the only one who called this, Donny doing the 180, and why because Trump invoked the American System of Economics and was ready for peace with Russia and China and because the DEAL, the real deal, the only Deal is the invitation by the The Chinese and Russians as concerns the New Silk Road and One Belt Initiatives, which Lyndon and Helga Zepp LaRouche and associates are noted architects of this strategic move that would end British Empire Geopolotics Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Sam Shama , April 28, 2017 at 8:56 pm GMT
300 Words @annamaria You should be more diligent in your search. Israel has been cooperating with ISIS and the Israeli generals have loudly proclaimed their preference for ISIS over sovereign Syria.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/alliance-of-convenience-israel-supports-syrias-isis-terror-group/5587203
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3315347/Watch-heart-pounding-moment-Israeli-commandos-save-Islamic-militants-Syrian-warzone-risking-lives-sworn-enemies.html
http://21stcenturywire.com/2015/02/19/un-report-reveals-how-israel-is-coordinating-with-isis-militants-inside-syria/
http://ahtribune.com/world/north-africa-south-west-asia/1633-moshe-yaalon.html

And please spare us your lecturing on special moral qualities of IDF and Israelis at large. Listen to your bloody Shaked; she is a Minister of Justice in your morally-lost lands: https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israeli-lawmakers-call-genocide-palestinians-gets-thousands-facebook-likes
"Israelis gather on hillsides to watch and cheer as military drops bombs on Gaza:" https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
The ongoing blood bath in the Middle East (millions died) is directly related to Oded Yinon plan for Eretz Israel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RC1Mepk_Sw You remind me of someone I can't quite remember this moment, flitting hither and thither, the busy little bee, nary a thought to what they are actually reading.

Take e.g., the Daily Mail article you deposited, apparently a bolster for you claim. The Mail piece headlines say:

Saving their sworn enemy: Heartstopping footage shows Israeli commandos rescuing wounded men from Syrian warzone – but WHY are they risking their lives for Islamic militants?
++ Elite Israeli troops rescue wounded Syrians from the world's worst war almost every night

++They have saved more than 2,000 people since 2013, at a cost of 50 million shekels (£8.7million)

++Many are enemies of Israel and some may even be fighters for groups affiliated to Al Qaeda

++MailOnline embedded with Israeli commandos stationed on the border between Israel and Syria

++Dramatic video filmed by MailOnline and the Israeli army shows these operations taking place

++Israel says that the operation is purely humanitarian but analysts believe Israel also has strategic reasons

Go on, read the whole damned article. Take it from one of the victims, Ahmed, treated by IDF medical corps:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3315347/Watch-heart-pounding-moment-Israeli-commandos-save-Islamic-militants-Syrian-warzone-risking-lives-sworn-enemies.html

The casualties lavished praise on Israel:

'I will not fight against Israel in the future. Israel looks after wounded people better than the Arabs. The Arabs are dogs,' said a wiry rebel fighter who gave his name as Ahmed, 23, who was recovering from a gunshot wound to the groin.

This is overwhelmingly what Israel is doing there. At most, what you twist and label a collaboration, is the realpolitik behind Israel's work in this regard, to form an alliance of convenience, such that rockets are not launched into Israel, especially in the North. And why shouldn't she?

You start your post, as usual, by instructing me to be more diligent in my readings. As I note that proposal with the seriousness it deserves, I take the occasion to remind you that you adopt the same attitude more broadly, as exempli gratia, when you bake goods, not inflict your male relatives with cordite when the bite was expectant of a sweet morsel. Read More

S2 , April 28, 2017 at 9:58 pm GMT
@Che Guava Rurik,

I was just going to press 'Agree', but your last sentence mystifies me.

Bolton was, as usual, talking out of his arse, but assuming sincerity on his part (with great strain), which *us* do you think he meant?

"which *us* do you think he meant?"

http://rense.com/general88/hist.htm

So if you meet me
Have some courtesy
Have some sympathy, and some taste
Use all your well-learned politesse
Or I'll lay your soul to waste, mm yeah

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, mm yeah Read More

annamaria , April 29, 2017 at 12:11 pm GMT
300 Words @Sam Shama You remind me of someone I can't quite remember this moment, flitting hither and thither, the busy little bee, nary a thought to what they are actually reading.

Take e.g., the Daily Mail article you deposited, apparently a bolster for you claim. The Mail piece headlines say:


Saving their sworn enemy: Heartstopping footage shows Israeli commandos rescuing wounded men from Syrian warzone - but WHY are they risking their lives for Islamic militants?
++ Elite Israeli troops rescue wounded Syrians from the world's worst war almost every night

++They have saved more than 2,000 people since 2013, at a cost of 50 million shekels (£8.7million)

++Many are enemies of Israel and some may even be fighters for groups affiliated to Al Qaeda

++MailOnline embedded with Israeli commandos stationed on the border between Israel and Syria

++Dramatic video filmed by MailOnline and the Israeli army shows these operations taking place

++Israel says that the operation is purely humanitarian but analysts believe Israel also has strategic reasons

Go on, read the whole damned article. Take it from one of the victims, Ahmed, treated by IDF medical corps:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3315347/Watch-heart-pounding-moment-Israeli-commandos-save-Islamic-militants-Syrian-warzone-risking-lives-sworn-enemies.html

The casualties lavished praise on Israel:

'I will not fight against Israel in the future. Israel looks after wounded people better than the Arabs. The Arabs are dogs,' said a wiry rebel fighter who gave his name as Ahmed, 23, who was recovering from a gunshot wound to the groin.

This is overwhelmingly what Israel is doing there. At most, what you twist and label a collaboration, is the realpolitik behind Israel's work in this regard, to form an alliance of convenience, such that rockets are not launched into Israel, especially in the North. And why shouldn't she?

You start your post, as usual, by instructing me to be more diligent in my readings. As I note that proposal with the seriousness it deserves, I take the occasion to remind you that you adopt the same attitude more broadly, as exempli gratia, when you bake goods, not inflict your male relatives with cordite when the bite was expectant of a sweet morsel. "This is overwhelmingly what Israel is doing there."
Then why had not the Israelis' medics followed their "moral values" and rushed to save Palestinian children when the "most moral " IDF had been slaughtering the tightly-packed civilian population in Israel-occupied Gaza? http://gaza.ochaopt.org/2015/06/key-figures-on-the-2014-hostilities/ :
"Of the Palestinian fatalities, 551 were children and 299 women. 11,231 Palestinians were injured including 3,436 children and 3,540 women, 10 percent of whom suffer permanent disability." Again, why the Israelis risk their lives to save ISIS "freedom fighters?"
As for Israel's collaboration with ISIS, there are other links:

http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/israel-and-isis-are-allies-there-we-said-it/ri19708

The collaboration explains this revelation: "ISIS Apologized To Israel For Attacking IDF Soldiers" http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-28/isis-apologized-israel-attacking-idf-soldiers
"You can assume that these terrorists are fighting for Israel. If they aren't part of the regular Israeli army, they're fighting for Israel. Israel has common goals with Turkey, the United States, France, Britain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other countries," Ynet quoted Assad " Sounds logical.

On your sweet morsel of moral relativism: " what you twist and label a collaboration, is the realpolitik behind Israel's work in this regard "
For some time, the state of Israel was hailed as a "moral" project. Here is one of the minor facts to dispel the nonsense: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
"Israelis sit on a hill to watch air strikes on Gaza, some bring drinks and snacks as they cheer the explosions a few miles away." Never again, in short.
Meanwhile the warmongering Kagans' clan has got into collaboration with neo-Nazis:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-u-s-has-installed-a-neo-nazi-government-in-ukraine/5371554 https://consortiumnews.com/2015/03/20/a-family-business-of-perpetual-war/

http://www.voltairenet.org/article182892.html

Here is an Israeli citizen who was involved in financing the neo-Nazis thugs that burned the scores of civilians alive in Odessa. The ziocons-run Wall Street Journal wrote a flattering article on the bloody Kolomojsky who also used to be a leader of Jewish community in Ukraine: https://www.rt.com/news/159168-kiev-businessman-massacre-mariupol/
Not a peep from Israel and the "righteous" Jewish organizations, which invoke the memory of Holocaust to nick any criticism of Israel, but which are dead silent in the case of ziocons' collaboration with neo-Nazis. Your post calls this "realpolitic." Nothing to look at Though, how much have Jewish victims of WWII extracted from Germany for "moral sufferings and more?" Read More

Che Guava , April 29, 2017 at 2:56 pm GMT
200 Words @Rurik

which *us* do you think he meant?
Hey Che,

when someone like Bolton says 'they directly threaten us'

you can take it to the bank that the "us" he's referring to is Israel

us, the Jews ;)

he purports to mean the American people, but anyone on the planet who knows the first thing about Ziocons like Bolton, know damn well he'd see virtually every single American goyim ground up into the dirt rather that see one fingernail on one Jewish hand suffer harm.

N. Korea does not threaten America or our interests. If anything, it threatens its neighbors. And if so, then our trading partner China could effectively deal with it.

the only reason N. Korea is in the crosshairs is because somehow Israel considers it a threat Hello Rurik.

Having thought about it, there are a few, but I will not list the others.

The real and plausible threat (anybody knowing about the effects of nuclear weapons will know about the effects of US stratospheric tests of megaton weapons in the early '60s and understand) is beyond the technical capabilities of the DPRK.

Their atomic bombs, on seismic data, are all damp fizzers. They don't have the lift to do maximum economic damage, either.

They do seem to have the capacity to sink an attacking carrier battle group or two with conventional weapons.

I would assign the highest probability, for ZOG USA, to the confrontation with Nth. Korea just being a shadow-play aimed at Iran.

I vaguely recall the Izzy government being good buddies with DPRK.

Will add one digression that is of interest, in old, turn-of-last century photos of party conferences in the DPRK, several officials in military uniform are cleary from former Warsaw Pact places, or from the USSR, but I have never seen an article to mention it. Read More

annamaria , April 29, 2017 at 4:40 pm GMT
"Wikileaks Founder and Editor-in-Chief Julian Assange joins the Liberty Report [with Ron Paul] to discuss the latest push by the Trump Administration to bring charges against him and his organization for publishing US Government documents:" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwkrtpXp-wg Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Sam Shama , April 29, 2017 at 5:25 pm GMT
100 Words @annamaria "This is overwhelmingly what Israel is doing there."
Then why had not the Israelis' medics followed their "moral values" and rushed to save Palestinian children when the "most moral " IDF had been slaughtering the tightly-packed civilian population in Israel-occupied Gaza? http://gaza.ochaopt.org/2015/06/key-figures-on-the-2014-hostilities/:
"Of the Palestinian fatalities, 551 were children and 299 women. 11,231 Palestinians were injured including 3,436 children and 3,540 women, 10 percent of whom suffer permanent disability." Again, why the Israelis risk their lives to save ISIS "freedom fighters?"
As for Israel's collaboration with ISIS, there are other links:
http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/israel-and-isis-are-allies-there-we-said-it/ri19708
The collaboration explains this revelation: "ISIS Apologized To Israel For Attacking IDF Soldiers" http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-28/isis-apologized-israel-attacking-idf-soldiers
"You can assume that these terrorists are fighting for Israel. If they aren't part of the regular Israeli army, they're fighting for Israel. Israel has common goals with Turkey, the United States, France, Britain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other countries," Ynet quoted Assad " Sounds logical.

On your sweet morsel of moral relativism: "...what you twist and label a collaboration, is the realpolitik behind Israel's work in this regard..."
For some time, the state of Israel was hailed as a "moral" project. Here is one of the minor facts to dispel the nonsense: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
"Israelis sit on a hill to watch air strikes on Gaza, some bring drinks and snacks as they cheer the explosions a few miles away." Never again, in short.
Meanwhile the warmongering Kagans' clan has got into collaboration with neo-Nazis:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-u-s-has-installed-a-neo-nazi-government-in-ukraine/5371554 https://consortiumnews.com/2015/03/20/a-family-business-of-perpetual-war/
http://www.voltairenet.org/article182892.html
Here is an Israeli citizen who was involved in financing the neo-Nazis thugs that burned the scores of civilians alive in Odessa. The ziocons-run Wall Street Journal wrote a flattering article on the bloody Kolomojsky who also used to be a leader of Jewish community in Ukraine: https://www.rt.com/news/159168-kiev-businessman-massacre-mariupol/
Not a peep from Israel and the "righteous" Jewish organizations, which invoke the memory of Holocaust to nick any criticism of Israel, but which are dead silent in the case of ziocons' collaboration with neo-Nazis. Your post calls this "realpolitic." Nothing to look at... Though, how much have Jewish victims of WWII extracted from Germany for "moral sufferings and more?" The usual dribblings.

You manage to get the Kagans inserted in there somehow, although miss Nudelman (is that it?).

Reading your posts are similar to tolerating the tiresome, repetitive adverts which plague television these days, mostly peddling shaky pharmaceuticals. You ought to end or preface each with the usual disclaimers on side effects, which in this case are mostly benign and somnambulic in effect.

As to Gaza, I only remark that rocket attacks on Sderot will elicit a response; so that the cure is simple: stop the rockets.

As to realpolitik, my comment pertained to ISIS in Syria; that Israel does what she can to prevent the lunatics from sending rockets to Northern Israel. But feel free to twist it to your heart's content and somehow link it to .Gaza!! There are no realpolitik interests in Gaza; do get that through your head. Read More

Rurik , April 29, 2017 at 5:51 pm GMT
100 Words @Che Guava Hello Rurik.

Having thought about it, there are a few, but I will not list the others.

The real and plausible threat (anybody knowing about the effects of nuclear weapons will know about the effects of US stratospheric tests of megaton weapons in the early '60s and understand) is beyond the technical capabilities of the DPRK.

Their atomic bombs, on seismic data, are all damp fizzers. They don't have the lift to do maximum economic damage, either.

They do seem to have the capacity to sink an attacking carrier battle group or two with conventional weapons.

I would assign the highest probability, for ZOG USA, to the confrontation with Nth. Korea just being a shadow-play aimed at Iran.

I vaguely recall the Izzy government being good buddies with DPRK.

Will add one digression that is of interest, in old, turn-of-last century photos of party conferences in the DPRK, several officials in military uniform are cleary from former Warsaw Pact places, or from the USSR, but I have never seen an article to mention it. Hey Che,

I would assign the highest probability, for ZOG USA, to the confrontation with Nth. Korea just being a shadow-play aimed at Iran.

I just read something from one of the commenters here (Kiza) that the saber-rattling at DPRK is a less than oblique threat to Russia and China, as the need for Rothschild, et al- to exercise absolute and unilateral domination of the entire planet is growing to an event horizon type imperative. (I'm not quoting, but I think that's the gist)

and that's as good of an analysis as I've seen yet, and it's consistent with everything I know about human nature and history and everything I know about Rothschild, et al Read More

Rurik , April 29, 2017 at 5:54 pm GMT
@Sam Shama The usual dribblings.

You manage to get the Kagans inserted in there somehow, although miss Nudelman (is that it?).

Reading your posts are similar to tolerating the tiresome, repetitive adverts which plague television these days, mostly peddling shaky pharmaceuticals. You ought to end or preface each with the usual disclaimers on side effects, which in this case are mostly benign and somnambulic in effect.

As to Gaza, I only remark that rocket attacks on Sderot will elicit a response; so that the cure is simple: stop the rockets.

As to realpolitik, my comment pertained to ISIS in Syria; that Israel does what she can to prevent the lunatics from sending rockets to Northern Israel. But feel free to twist it to your heart's content and somehow link it to ....Gaza!! There are no realpolitik interests in Gaza; do get that through your head.

stop the rockets.

then stop the occupation

- and murder and theft and oppression and torture and daily horrors and humiliations

simple it'z Sammy ; )

just join the human race! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Caterina , April 29, 2017 at 6:09 pm GMT
Fisk = another idiot looking for relevance.

These people need to shut their pie holes and stop seeking to be lauded by the masses. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments

annamaria , April 29, 2017 at 9:27 pm GMT
300 Words @Sam Shama The usual dribblings.

You manage to get the Kagans inserted in there somehow, although miss Nudelman (is that it?).

Reading your posts are similar to tolerating the tiresome, repetitive adverts which plague television these days, mostly peddling shaky pharmaceuticals. You ought to end or preface each with the usual disclaimers on side effects, which in this case are mostly benign and somnambulic in effect.

As to Gaza, I only remark that rocket attacks on Sderot will elicit a response; so that the cure is simple: stop the rockets.

As to realpolitik, my comment pertained to ISIS in Syria; that Israel does what she can to prevent the lunatics from sending rockets to Northern Israel. But feel free to twist it to your heart's content and somehow link it to ....Gaza!! There are no realpolitik interests in Gaza; do get that through your head. "There are no realpolitik interests in Gaza "
Because the illegally occupied Gazans are defenseless, like dwellers of the former ghettos in Europe?
By the way, why are you taking everything personally in my posts and then insert some cheap childish insults into every response-comment, instead of answering point by point to the documented facts ?
One of the main points of my posts is the congruence of ziocons' policies in the Middle East with Oded Yinon plan. Another point is the incongruence of Israelis' pretense on being in possession of superior morality (this one always goes with references to Holocaust) in the context of the extraordinary influence of Israel-firsters on making military decision by the US/NATO in the Middle East. You have been steadily avoiding these two points, as if you have some case of cognitive blindness. Though to be fair, you did utter something about realpoitic (moral relativism, in other words) being factored in Israel's policies. But if you recognize this relativism, then your tribe should stop pestering Germans, reminding them again and again about their guilt. It is over. Israel's policies, beginning with the open terrorism in the 30-s and 40-s and up to the promoting the ongoing slaughter in the Middle East, have already concealed any pretense on victimhood. Whether in Europe, damaged by the influx of refugees from the ME and of low-IQ migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, or in the US, irritated by the price for the illegal wars in the ME, the citizenry is taking on a rather sour attitude towards the Lobby and other Friends of Israel. The floods of refugees (of various kinds) make a point for the populace. The cause of the wars and the Israel-firsters' efforts towards initiating these wars have been under discussion. The Israel-firsters love their mythological fatherland so much that they put the well-being of their countries of residence second to Israel. Not good for national policies. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Che Guava , April 30, 2017 at 1:53 am GMT
@S2

"which *us* do you think he meant?"
http://rense.com/general88/hist.htm

So if you meet me
Have some courtesy
Have some sympathy, and some taste
Use all your well-learned politesse
Or I'll lay your soul to waste, mm yeah

Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, mm yeah Thanks for the link and amusing comment. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Druid , April 30, 2017 at 4:09 am GMT
@Sam Shama Although some of Trump's actions appear erratic, the much loftier and worthy goal of fixing and rebuilding the world remains intact.

Trump and Pence are good men, their qualities, underestimated by many. You Ziofascists are so predictable! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Druid , April 30, 2017 at 4:14 am GMT
@englishmike Actually its the British! .well they are bloody insane!

"Muhammed really is most popular baby name in the UK - as is Mohammed, Muhammad..."
(Reported in The Independent, Monday 1 December 2014).

So do me a favour, Abdul, old chap: do stop blaming "the British" for what some of their politicians say. You wouldn't like them to make sweeping generalisations about British people called Mohammed being "bloody insane", now would you! True! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Druid , April 30, 2017 at 4:18 am GMT
@Sam Shama Israel has a free press in which a great deal of speculation is tolerated, even welcomed. I haven't seen any articles in any of the major journals, or even in the smaller ones, where Daesh is described as a collaborator.

To Israeli society's credit, humour is a normal and common enjoyment, in which spirit, some skits produced - Eretz Nehderet being the most prominent one - portray a darkly humourous relationship between Israeli doctors [and IDF medical corps] and Daesh operating in the Golan.

So, Israeli med corps will, as modern protocol demands, aid any and all injured. It also has apartheid, land theft, a large concentration camp called Gaza, extrajudicial murders, crazy fundamentalist psycho settlers, supporters like you, amoral gambler supporters all over the US, etc., etc. Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Druid , April 30, 2017 at 4:22 am GMT
@annamaria "This is overwhelmingly what Israel is doing there."
Then why had not the Israelis' medics followed their "moral values" and rushed to save Palestinian children when the "most moral " IDF had been slaughtering the tightly-packed civilian population in Israel-occupied Gaza? http://gaza.ochaopt.org/2015/06/key-figures-on-the-2014-hostilities/:
"Of the Palestinian fatalities, 551 were children and 299 women. 11,231 Palestinians were injured including 3,436 children and 3,540 women, 10 percent of whom suffer permanent disability." Again, why the Israelis risk their lives to save ISIS "freedom fighters?"
As for Israel's collaboration with ISIS, there are other links:
http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/israel-and-isis-are-allies-there-we-said-it/ri19708
The collaboration explains this revelation: "ISIS Apologized To Israel For Attacking IDF Soldiers" http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-28/isis-apologized-israel-attacking-idf-soldiers
"You can assume that these terrorists are fighting for Israel. If they aren't part of the regular Israeli army, they're fighting for Israel. Israel has common goals with Turkey, the United States, France, Britain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other countries," Ynet quoted Assad " Sounds logical.

On your sweet morsel of moral relativism: "...what you twist and label a collaboration, is the realpolitik behind Israel's work in this regard..."
For some time, the state of Israel was hailed as a "moral" project. Here is one of the minor facts to dispel the nonsense: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/20/israelis-cheer-gaza-bombing
"Israelis sit on a hill to watch air strikes on Gaza, some bring drinks and snacks as they cheer the explosions a few miles away." Never again, in short.
Meanwhile the warmongering Kagans' clan has got into collaboration with neo-Nazis:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-u-s-has-installed-a-neo-nazi-government-in-ukraine/5371554 https://consortiumnews.com/2015/03/20/a-family-business-of-perpetual-war/
http://www.voltairenet.org/article182892.html
Here is an Israeli citizen who was involved in financing the neo-Nazis thugs that burned the scores of civilians alive in Odessa. The ziocons-run Wall Street Journal wrote a flattering article on the bloody Kolomojsky who also used to be a leader of Jewish community in Ukraine: https://www.rt.com/news/159168-kiev-businessman-massacre-mariupol/
Not a peep from Israel and the "righteous" Jewish organizations, which invoke the memory of Holocaust to nick any criticism of Israel, but which are dead silent in the case of ziocons' collaboration with neo-Nazis. Your post calls this "realpolitic." Nothing to look at... Though, how much have Jewish victims of WWII extracted from Germany for "moral sufferings and more?" What do you expect from Ziofascists like Sam et al Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Druid , April 30, 2017 at 4:41 am GMT
@Rurik

My strong objections are against USA society as a system, that allows a tiny minority to run foreign policy at their pleasure, at the cost, expense and blood of others, USA citizens and far more foreign citizens.
I can't argue with that Jilles

and you're right about the general ignorance and bovine stupidity of most Americans, but that has been very carefully created by the PTB, who don't want an educated, thinking populace.

what was it papa Bush said?

"if the American people knew what we have done, they would string us up from the lamp posts"

if the American people could think, the results would be the same. If the American people could think and were in possession of a moral soul, then they'd know that wars based on lies should be repudiated and the war criminals brought to justice. But the American sheople have been systematically dumbed down to the point of zombies, infatuated with Kim Kardashian's ass. Today Idiocracy is a reality. It's true.

But, let me just say on behalf of Americans, that I don't really see it any better across the pond. Sure, the Europeans are better educated, and generally speak at least two languages, and have heard of Yalta and Copernicus, but with all that education, they just don't seem to me to be any more principled or moral than the zombified Americans.

Sure, it is the US military that is the biggest bully on the block, but does that excuse the other little bullies that stand behind him and give him moral support? There were French jets bombing Libya just as ferociously as any American ones. The Brits have never seen an act of aggression from the US military that they don't reverently applaud. And the Germans, whose government goes along with every war crime America commits in principle, are today complicit in a racial supremacist, genocidal holocaust against a completely innocent victim whose only crime is that they existed - in Palestine, on land that some Jewish supremacist coveted for themselves.

The irony? That these very same Germans feel excruciating and debilitating guilt for a crime that they had nothing to do with, while at the same time facilitating the same crime of genocide today, in their names, by funding and arming and providing "moral" cover for the Zionists.

So sure, Europeans are far more educated, but seem to fall very short when it comes to using that education to augment a moral foundation for their actions and the actions of their respective governments. There seems to me to be a sort of all-pervasive cowardice in Western Europe, and a Pavlovian, knee-jerk propensity to wallow in prostrate abasement and self-flagellate as soon as anyone says "Holocaust". Sort of what they used to be able to bludgeon Americans with by the pejorative "racist", until it became a joke.

Anyways, yes, we're ignorant, and bovine and dangerous, but morally, I just don't see too many paragons of virtue or honor to hold up as examples today. Uruguay perhaps, and I would include Putin's Russia insofar as he's trying to put out the fires the Zio-Western-fiend is lighting all over the place, but then he too bolsters their agenda by antagonizing the former Soviet satellite states with ultra-nationalistic chest thumping over the "great war", (that the Bolsheviks in Russia were mainly responsible for). Note to Putin, let it rest! The great victory that you celebrate in May was a catastrophe for Eastern Europe (and millions of Russians too)

sorry, I tend to rant at times.. Rant away. Makes complete sense! Read More Reply Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments

Che Guava , April 30, 2017 at 2:46 pm GMT
100 Words @Rurik Hey Che,

I would assign the highest probability, for ZOG USA, to the confrontation with Nth. Korea just being a shadow-play aimed at Iran.
I just read something from one of the commenters here (Kiza) that the saber-rattling at DPRK is a less than oblique threat to Russia and China, as the need for Rothschild, et al- to exercise absolute and unilateral domination of the entire planet is growing to an event horizon type imperative. (I'm not quoting, but I think that's the gist)

and that's as good of an analysis as I've seen yet, and it's consistent with everything I know about human nature and history and everything I know about Rothschild, et al Hello Rurik.

Have you read the Illuminatus! trilogy? I have, twice, once before and once after struggling through Anna Rosenbaum's Atlas Shrugged.

It was better the second time, because it is partly a parody of Ayn Rand.

It is dirty hippy material, but it is fun.

All of these ideas, the Rothschilds, the Brit. Royal family, etc. do it all, they work even less than the Protocols of the Elders, which seems to be a template for reality, and the claims for it to just to being malicious fake are on very shallow foundations.

Sure, I have no doubt that the Rothschild clan is mainly evil, but I do not see any sense in ideas that they have some solo supevillain role.

If you have not read the book(s), it was originally published in three, I recommend, it should make you laugh at times.


[Apr 22, 2017] Idiocy as WMD

Apr 22, 2017 | www.unz.com
May 13, 2012 1,000 Words

Borges writes, "dictatorships foster oppression, dictatorships foster servitude, dictatorships foster cruelty; more abominable is the fact that they foster idiocy." As a preeminent mind, Borges rightly considers the mind to be a man's greatest asset, for without mind, a man is nothing. The more oppressive a political system, then, the greater its assault on its subjects' minds, for it's not enough for any dictator, king or totalitarian system to oppress and exploit, but it must, and I mean must, make its people idiotic as well. Every wrongful bullet is preceded and accompanied, then followed up by a series of idiotic lies, but we're so used to such a moronic diet by now, our trepanned intelligentsia don't even squirm in their tenured chairs.

Sane men and women don't consent to kill, rob and rape, much less be killed, robbed and raped, least of all to enrich their masters , and that's why their minds must be molested as early and as much as possible. Hence our nonstop media brainwashing us from the cradle, literally, to the grave. Fixated by flickering boxes, even infants are now mind-conditioned to become scatterbrained idiots before they stagger into kindergarten, to begin a lifelong process of becoming docile and slogan-shouting Democrats and Republicans.

Yes, savages killed, but, like apes, our ancestors, they mostly tried to intimidate and trash talk their way out of conflicts. Take the Maoris: from all accounts, they were a rather belligerent people, but their killing of each other really took off with the introduction of the musket. The greater a civilization, the greater its ability to accomplish great tasks, including massacre. A savage tribe could never imagine wiping out entire cities by defecating exploding metal from the sky, or sitting in a brightly lit and spic-and-span office stroking a joy stick to ejaculate missiles half a planet away. Drone hell fire for y'all, with sides of bank-sponsored debt slavery and austerity, plus an unlimited refill of American pop bullshit. Would you like a public suicide with that? No, sir, these savages need to take webcast courses from us sophisticates when it comes to genocide, or ecocide, or any other kind of cides you can think of. When it comes to pure, unadulterated savagery, these quaint brutes ain't got shit on us plugged-in netizens chillaxin' in that shiny upside down condo on da capital-punishment-for the-entire-world, y'all, hill.

You'd think that a government with absolute power would not bother with expensive parades and elaborately-staged rallies in stadia, as are routine in North Korea, but such is the importance of propaganda and mind-control. America has gone way beyond Kim Jong-Un and his Nuremberg-styled pageantry, however, because the Yankee Magical Show is relentlessly pumped into our minds via television and the internet, at home, in office or even as we're walking down the street, so that we're always swarmed by sexy sale pitches, soft and hard porn, asinine righteousness and imbecilic trivia. All day long, we can stuff ourselves with unlimited kitsch. Today's urgent topic, "Sylvester Stalone Spotted in 16th Century Painting." Yesterday's, "Tom Cruise's Daughter Gets Inked." Imagine a triple-amputee Iraq vet or an unemployed mother, sitting in an about to be foreclosed home with unpaid bills scattered across her kitchen table, staring at such headlines. At 48, I'm old enough to remember when it wasn't this overwhelmingly stupid, though the dumbing down of America will only accelerate as this cornered and bankrupt country becomes ever more vicious to its citizens and foreigners alike.

Not content to kill and loot, America must do it to pulsating music; cool, orgasmic dancing; raunchy reality shows and violence-filled Hollywood blockbusters, and these are also meant for its victims, no less. In a 1997 article published by the US Army War College, Ralph Peters gushes about a "personally intrusive" and "lethal" cultural assault as a key tactic in the American quest for global supremacy. As information master, the American Empire will destroy its "information victims." What's more, "our victims volunteer" because they are unable to resist the seductiveness of American culture.

Defining democracy as "that deft liberal form of imperialism," Peters reveals how the word is conceived and used these days by every American leader, whether talking about Libya, Syria, Iran or America itself. Recognizing that the lumpens of his country are also victims of empire, Peters frankly acknowledges that "laid-off blue-collar worker in America and the Taliban militiaman in Afghanistan are brothers in suffering."

Much has been made of the internet as enabling democracy and protest, but whatever utility it may have for the disenfranchised and/or rebellious, the Web is most useful to our rulers. As Dmitry Orlov points out in a recent blog, the internet is a powerful surveillance tool for the state and, what's more, it also keeps the masses distracted and pacified. Echoing Queen Victoria's remark, "Give my people plenty of beer, good and cheap beer, and you will have no revolution among them," Orlov observes that virtual sex thwarts rebellion. In sum, while the internet may empower some people, as in allowing John Michael Greer , Paul Craig Roberts or Orlov to publish their unflinching commentaries, the same internet also drowns them out with an unprecedented flood of drivel. Defending the empire, Ralph Peters cheerfully agrees, "The internet is to the techno-capable disaffected what the United Nations is to marginal states: it offers the illusion of empowerment and community."

Though our only hope is to be expelled from this sick matrix, many of us will cling even more fiercely to these illusions of knowledge, love, sex and community as we blunder forward. A breathing and tactile life will become even more alien, I'm afraid. Here and there, a band of unplugged weirdos, to be hunted down and exterminated, with their demise shown on TV as warning and entertainment. Inhabiting a common waste land, we can each lounge in our private electronic ghetto. Until the juice finally runs out, that is.

[Apr 17, 2017] Zero chance of any attack on Korea beyond a prearranged choreographed pinprick

Apr 17, 2017 | www.unz.com

nsa , April 16, 2017 at 2:01 pm

@Willem Hendrik

If there were ever a Just Cause for the Yanks to invade and bring democracy somewhere, it would be North Korea. The horrors that generations of North Koreans in concentration camps are enduring, would even make the holo-jews cringe.

Then again, is Israel ready to take a second row seat on the holocaust narrative and let the North Koreans take the gold medal of international victimhood?

And what do you do with millions of people coping with culture shock, paranoia, etc.? And, last but not least, who would make our clothing for 5 cents a piece?

All in all. I do not think the Israeli's would let the USA attack North Korea.

Zero chance of any attack on Korea beyond a prearranged choreographed pinprick. The explanation is simple: nothing in it for the Jooies and Izzies who worked overtime to install a US government of the jooies, by the jooies, for the jooies. Why would they waste their satrap's assets when they could be used on Iran?

[Apr 17, 2017] Clinton was always a sleazy dealer on word of whom only fool can rely

Apr 17, 2017 | www.unz.com

Agent76 , April 16, 2017 at 3:19 pm GMT \n

October 18, 1994 Remarks on the Nuclear Agreement With North Korea William J. Clinton

Good afternoon. I am pleased that the United States and North Korea yesterday reached agreement on the text of a framework document on North Korea's nuclear program.

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=49319

[Apr 17, 2017] What Would Korean War II Look Like? by Eric Margolis

Notable quotes:
"... A conventional US attack on North Korea would be far more difficult. The North is a small nation of only 24.8 million. Its air and sea forces are obsolete and ineffective. They would be vaporized on the first day of a war. But North Korea's million-man army has been training and digging in for decades to resist a US invasion. Pyongyang's 88,000-man Special Forces are poised for suicide attacks on South Korea's political and military command and control and to cripple key US and South Korean air bases, notably Osan and Kunsan. ..."
"... The stupidity, cultural ignorance and geopolitical autism of the people that actually have their fingers on the trigger on our side in today's world is mind blowing. ..."
"... Starting a war with N Korea is crazy. Are we going to start a war that would kill millions in order to stop a war that does not exist? There has been little blood spilled between the Koreas in the last 60 years – let's try for another 60 years. ..."
"... How is Trump protecting us, if we are killing and dying in a far-off land? The truth is that our homeland is a very long way from being attacked by N Korea – PERIOD. ..."
"... North Korea has got nothing anyone wants so they won't be attacked. It is all a lot of bluffing, except if the Chinese (aghast at Trump's avowed view that China is raping the US economy) try to placate him by promising to give the North Koreans the cold shoulder. ..."
"... China cannot accept a collapse of North Korea into the US client south. ..."
"... China is the central, most important actor on the peninsula, and China controls whatever happens there. ..."
"... America's main weakness is its utterly delusional political and military leadership. ..."
"... We have not fought a peer since 1945, and since 1945 we have a long record of failure. At present, we are fighting and losing to lightly armed Third World militias. ..."
"... It is an open question as to whether we can defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and we certainly cannot unless we ally ourselves with Iran, Russia, Hezbollah and Assad. ..."
"... What we are watching today is the collapse of the American military and empire. ..."
"... Lots of murkkans , the Trumpsters, are crying foul, They are 'betrayed' by Trump who now 'surrender to the deep state', 'the neocons have finally gotten to Trump', blah blah blah . ..."
"... Astute obsevers like Vltchek, Engdahl, Draistser ..reminded murkkans about the exercise in futility in the 'election circus' long ago. ..."
"... Mathematically, Ian Fleming's fundamental law of probability practically guarantees that the 45th POTUS would be same as the old boss, MIC front man who speaks with forked tongue. ..."
"... As the pathetic hack Fareed Zakaria of Times magazine would gush after the Syria bombing, ' With this act, Trump has just become POTUS ' He didnt know how right he's, hehehehe ..."
"... That will not sit very well with American global full spectrum dominance and end the day that American can commit war crimes, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity on the phantom WMD allegation as humanitarian intervention. ..."
"... The simple scenario germane to this article is if Trump deploys a carrier fleet even closer to the proximity of the Norks. ..."
"... To those interested in the Korean War, I highly recommend David Halberstam's posthumous book, The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War. It is not a standard military chronicle instead a spellbinding journalistic read. Major theme, MacArthur's super ego, pomposity and geo-political ignorance resulting in catastrophe. American troops experienced the thrill of Stalingrad. In an eerie way, Trump now has a chance of becoming American Caesar 2.0 and in the very same playground. History repeats, rhymes whatever.... ..."
"... The only book I've read on the Korean War is IF Stone's firsthand account, The Hidden History of the Korean War. It is absolutely staggering. Why was it fought? No reason. It was a military exercise for MacArthur, just kind of for the hell of it. ..."
Apr 15, 2017 | unz.com
Memory of the bloody, indecisive first Koran War, 1950-53, which killed close to 3 million people, has faded. Few Americans have any idea how ferocious a conventional second Korean War could be. They are used to seeing Uncle Sam beat up small, nearly defenseless nations like Iraq, Libya or Syria that dare defy the Pax Americana.

The US could literally blow North Korea off the map using tactical nuclear weapons based in Japan, South Korea and at sea with the 7th Fleet. Or delivered by B-52 and B-1 bombers and cruise missiles. But this would cause clouds of lethal radiation and radioactive dust to blanket Japan, South Korea and heavily industrialized northeast China, including the capital, Beijing.

China would be expected to threaten retaliation against the United States, Japan and South Korea to deter a nuclear war in next door Korea. At the same time, if heavily attacked, a fight-to-the-end North Korea may fire off a number of nuclear-armed medium-range missiles at Tokyo, Osaka, Okinawa and South Korea. These missiles are hidden in caves in the mountains on wheeled transporters and hard to identify and knock out.

This is a huge risk. Such a nuclear exchange would expose about a third of the world's economy to nuclear contamination, not to mention spreading nuclear winter around the globe.

A conventional US attack on North Korea would be far more difficult. The North is a small nation of only 24.8 million. Its air and sea forces are obsolete and ineffective. They would be vaporized on the first day of a war. But North Korea's million-man army has been training and digging in for decades to resist a US invasion. Pyongyang's 88,000-man Special Forces are poised for suicide attacks on South Korea's political and military command and control and to cripple key US and South Korean air bases, notably Osan and Kunsan.

North Korea may use chemical weapons such as VX and Sarin to knock out the US/South Korean and Japanese airbases, military depots, ports and communications hubs. Missile attacks would be launched against US bases in Guam and Okinawa.

Short of using nuclear weapons, the US would be faced with mounting a major invasion of mountainous North Korea, something for which it is today unprepared. It took the US six months to assemble a land force in Saudi Arabia just to attack feeble Iraq. Taking on the tough North Korean army and militia in their mountain redoubts will prove a daunting challenge.

US analysts have in the past estimated a US invasion of North Korea would cost some 250,000 American casualties and at least $10 billion, though I believe such a war would cost four times that much today. The Army, Air Force and Marines would have to mobilize reserves to wage a war in Korea. Already overstretched US forces would have to be withdrawn from Europe and the Mideast. Military conscription might have to be re-introduced.

Timur The Lame says: April 16, 2017 at 5:18 pm GMT

Indeed. It was a sorrowful read with the exception of the heroics of the First Marines at Chosin Reservoir. Wiki called that action a victory as if rearguard actions or successful retreats could ever be put in a victory column.

The big point now is what do the Chinese think. They were the reason that there even was a Korean War for those who prefer headlines over history or happen to be in elective office in the US government (or Pentagon).

The stupidity, cultural ignorance and geopolitical autism of the people that actually have their fingers on the trigger on our side in today's world is mind blowing.

" Hit the dirt, join the crowd, lookee mamma, a mushroom cloud" from MAD magazine, in the sixties, a kids rag that makes some people wonder why the non funny, non witty Onion even exists.

Today that cloud thing suddenly becomes real possibility. Did I say MAD?

Cheers-

Art , April 16, 2017 at 5:29 pm GMT
Who do we have to fear the most – Kim or Trump?

Starting a war with N Korea is crazy. Are we going to start a war that would kill millions in order to stop a war that does not exist? There has been little blood spilled between the Koreas in the last 60 years – let's try for another 60 years.

How is Trump protecting us, if we are killing and dying in a far-off land? The truth is that our homeland is a very long way from being attacked by N Korea – PERIOD.

It is time to deescalate – it is time to trade with the bastard – it is time to open up N Korea. Send in the food. Help the people. Be better than the dictator. Give his people what he cannot deliver. Give them the power to demand freedom. It is hard to see – but when dictator governments trade with others, they evolve to freedom.

Peace - Art

p.s. The Trump Whisperer – Ivanka – needs to get in daddy's ear and say "cool it Pops."

Sean , April 16, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMT
North Korea has got nothing anyone wants so they won't be attacked. It is all a lot of bluffing, except if the Chinese (aghast at Trump's avowed view that China is raping the US economy) try to placate him by promising to give the North Koreans the cold shoulder.

History shows that the leadership of states in danger of losing their independent status will choose uncertain and perilous courses of action . The best thing is this will fizzle out. If China tries to pressure Kim, he would seriously consider starting a conventional war. He couldn't possibly win, but that is the point: China cannot accept a collapse of North Korea into the US client south. Nuclear weapons will not be used in any event.

Avery , April 16, 2017 at 7:32 pm GMT
@bob sykes Any discussion of a new Korean War that does not emphasize China is asinine, like this one. China is the central, most important actor on the peninsula, and China controls whatever happens there.

China will not permit an American ally on the Yalu River. Any state bordering China on the Yalu must be explicitly pro-Chinese. If a war does break out on the peninsula, China will intervene on the side of the North Koreans.

To call the first Korean War inconclusive is tendentious: China decisively defeated the US/NATO forces, and did so with with a primitive WW I style army and no navy or air force to speak of. Human wave assaults sufficed then. They did not occupy the whole peninsula because their primitive army lacked the logistical capacity to do so.

Today China has a large modern military with a full spectrum of capabilities, including tactical and strategic nuclear weapons and a large amphibious force. China would crush the US, Japanese and South Korean militaries, even assuming Russia stands aside. It didn't in Korea I and Vietnam. And China's strategic nuclear forces would prevent the US from using nuclear weapons on the peninsula. Anyway, the antique nuclear weapons we have today may not even work.

America's main weakness is its utterly delusional political and military leadership. The military that invaded Iraq no longer exists, and it was smaller than the one that liberated Kuwait. The US military has been downsized to the point that it cannot meet our treaty commitments. Sequestration has stripped the remaining military of funds needed for training and maintenance. Only a third of our fighter/bombers are available for war, and the pilots get only half the hours needed to maintain their skills. We do not practice combined arms warfare any more.

We have not fought a peer since 1945, and since 1945 we have a long record of failure. At present, we are fighting and losing to lightly armed Third World militias. The use of the MOAB against ISIS in Afghanistan was an indicator of panic in our military command there and at home. It is an open question as to whether we can defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and we certainly cannot unless we ally ourselves with Iran, Russia, Hezbollah and Assad.

What we are watching today is the collapse of the American military and empire.

{We have not fought a peer since 1945, and since 1945 we have a long record of failure. }

Almost true.

Imperial Japan was no Nazi Germany.

Although Japanese were tenacious fighters and they had first-rate military hardware*, U.S. and U.S. Navy were a rung above the Imperial Japanese military. Japan simply did not have the resources or the industrial might of U.S.

By the time Allies (really the U.S.) landed in Europe in 1944, Wehrmacht was a spent force: 80% of its best, toughest units were destroyed on the Eastern Front. Even then, at the Battle of the Bulge U.S. troops ran from the advancing Germans (mostly ** ). GIs were saved by the powerful USAF when the skies cleared up.

So we don't really have a good example of peer-to-peer land warfare for US military (other than the US Civil War).

--
* Zero was considered superior to US equipment in the beginning.
** Heroic defense of Bastogne.

Avery , April 16, 2017 at 7:48 pm GMT
@anon It's really China's problem.

And the only thing that has kept Japan and South Korea non nuclear is the US. A real threat would be for the US to simply to go home. When Trump was tweeting that exactly -- it was seen as quite threatening.

A nuclear North Korea which is barely in the nuclear club and doesn't have the economy to militarize is simply an annoyance to China. Japan and South Korea could be real threats quite quickly. And there is no love lost between any of them.

An irony is that the US has effectively disarmed Europe via NATO, and if the US told Germany to take care of themselves, Russia wouldn't feel threatened, they would be threatened.

The truth is that the US hasn't won a war since we decided to constrain our military in Korea. They wanted to nuke China, and also wanted to use them in Vietnam.

North Korea's only threat is nuclear, which is hollow, since they are assured of massive retaliation in kind. I suppose China has been OK with the situation, since it annoys us to no end and hasn't cost them much. So far. {The truth is that the US hasn't won a war since we decided to constrain our military in Korea. They wanted to nuke China, and also wanted to use them in Vietnam.}

This an enduring myth that was created to salve the psych wound of being beaten by 'inferior' yellow-man.

Other than using atomic bombs, there were no constraints on US military. US military was given a free hand to bomb and destroy anything and everything, including civilian targets* in both wars.

As to nukes.

China had no nukes during Korean war, but Soviet Union did.

First SU nuke test: Aug 1949.
First US thermonuke test: Nov 1952
First SU thermonuke test: Aug 1953.

POTUS Truman fired delusional Gen McArthur because he knew SU would most certainly use tac nukes in Korea if US did.
If you recall, Truman had no compunction using nukes on civilian targets, so he must have had good reason to restrain the crazy generals.

Same with Viet Nam: yes US military wanted to nuke Hanoi in desperation, but cooler civilian heads prevailed. Again, there was near-certainty that SU would respond in kind in Viet Nam.
--
* targeted deliberately: war crimes.

denk , April 17, 2017 at 2:35 am GMT
'" If China is not going to solve North Korea , we will."

With this porky pie,
Trump becomes the 45th 'bald faced liars' elected by the murkkans.

And .
With the bombing of Syria, Yemen
Trump joins the 'prestigious' ranks of the previous 44 war criminals in WH.

Lots of murkkans , the Trumpsters, are crying foul, They are 'betrayed' by Trump who now 'surrender to the deep state', 'the neocons have finally gotten to Trump', blah blah blah .

B.S. --

Astute obsevers like Vltchek, Engdahl, Draistser ..reminded murkkans about the exercise in futility in the 'election circus' long ago.

Mathematically, Ian Fleming's fundamental law of probability practically guarantees that the 45th POTUS would be same as the old boss, MIC front man who speaks with forked tongue.

As the pathetic hack Fareed Zakaria of Times magazine would gush after the Syria bombing, ' With this act, Trump has just become POTUS ' He didnt know how right he's, hehehehe

Joe Wong says: April 17, 2017 at 11:11 am GMT @Vendetta
Why not allow that? That will not sit very well with American global full spectrum dominance and end the day that American can commit war crimes, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity on the phantom WMD allegation as humanitarian intervention.
daniel le mouche , April 17, 2017 at 12:17 pm GMT @Timur The Lame
I picked up a batch of old Rollingstone magazines from my local library for pennies to use as bathroom/breakfast reading. One issue had Matt Taibbi following Trump on the campaign trail while still battling for the Republican party nomination. In this leg of his tour he talked about how big insurance conglomerates were setting the prices to their liking and how he as president would bust them up etc.. Then came the commentary from Duck Dynasty types on how they are sick and tired of paying high premiums and so on. It gave me a minor epiphany, namely that this guy is, was and always will be full of shit in other words nothing but a super salesman.

While I was happy that he blew away the syphilitic structure of the mainstream parties and the press I now realize that the volatile and insane world now has a monkey with a machine gun in a major position of power. This can't end well.

The Great Pumpkin cut his jib by beating up other businessmen in the vicious world of East coast real estate. In this world he had the MacArthur motto for there being 'no substitute for victory'. If he transmogrifies his business instincts onto the world stage, stock up on rice and beans (and iodine tablets).

The simple scenario germane to this article is if Trump deploys a carrier fleet even closer to the proximity of the Norks. Who thinks fat boy Jong-Un is sane? Ivanka? Sending even just conventional missiles across the bow is well within his mental construct. With their faulty accuracy they could accidentally hit the target. A carrier sunk. What options does Trump have now? None really. It's show time and by probable extension, "overture, curtains, lights, this is it night of nights..."

To those interested in the Korean War, I highly recommend David Halberstam's posthumous book, The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War. It is not a standard military chronicle instead a spellbinding journalistic read. Major theme, MacArthur's super ego, pomposity and geo-political ignorance resulting in catastrophe. American troops experienced the thrill of Stalingrad. In an eerie way, Trump now has a chance of becoming American Caesar 2.0 and in the very same playground. History repeats, rhymes whatever....

Cheers- The only book I've read on the Korean War is IF Stone's firsthand account, The Hidden History of the Korean War. It is absolutely staggering. Why was it fought? No reason. It was a military exercise for MacArthur, just kind of for the hell of it.

[Apr 17, 2017] What Would Korean War II Look Like? by Eric Margolis

Notable quotes:
"... A conventional US attack on North Korea would be far more difficult. The North is a small nation of only 24.8 million. Its air and sea forces are obsolete and ineffective. They would be vaporized on the first day of a war. But North Korea's million-man army has been training and digging in for decades to resist a US invasion. Pyongyang's 88,000-man Special Forces are poised for suicide attacks on South Korea's political and military command and control and to cripple key US and South Korean air bases, notably Osan and Kunsan. ..."
"... The stupidity, cultural ignorance and geopolitical autism of the people that actually have their fingers on the trigger on our side in today's world is mind blowing. ..."
"... Starting a war with N Korea is crazy. Are we going to start a war that would kill millions in order to stop a war that does not exist? There has been little blood spilled between the Koreas in the last 60 years – let's try for another 60 years. ..."
"... How is Trump protecting us, if we are killing and dying in a far-off land? The truth is that our homeland is a very long way from being attacked by N Korea – PERIOD. ..."
"... North Korea has got nothing anyone wants so they won't be attacked. It is all a lot of bluffing, except if the Chinese (aghast at Trump's avowed view that China is raping the US economy) try to placate him by promising to give the North Koreans the cold shoulder. ..."
"... China cannot accept a collapse of North Korea into the US client south. ..."
"... China is the central, most important actor on the peninsula, and China controls whatever happens there. ..."
"... America's main weakness is its utterly delusional political and military leadership. ..."
"... We have not fought a peer since 1945, and since 1945 we have a long record of failure. At present, we are fighting and losing to lightly armed Third World militias. ..."
"... It is an open question as to whether we can defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and we certainly cannot unless we ally ourselves with Iran, Russia, Hezbollah and Assad. ..."
"... What we are watching today is the collapse of the American military and empire. ..."
"... Lots of murkkans , the Trumpsters, are crying foul, They are 'betrayed' by Trump who now 'surrender to the deep state', 'the neocons have finally gotten to Trump', blah blah blah . ..."
"... Astute obsevers like Vltchek, Engdahl, Draistser ..reminded murkkans about the exercise in futility in the 'election circus' long ago. ..."
"... Mathematically, Ian Fleming's fundamental law of probability practically guarantees that the 45th POTUS would be same as the old boss, MIC front man who speaks with forked tongue. ..."
"... As the pathetic hack Fareed Zakaria of Times magazine would gush after the Syria bombing, ' With this act, Trump has just become POTUS ' He didnt know how right he's, hehehehe ..."
"... That will not sit very well with American global full spectrum dominance and end the day that American can commit war crimes, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity on the phantom WMD allegation as humanitarian intervention. ..."
"... The simple scenario germane to this article is if Trump deploys a carrier fleet even closer to the proximity of the Norks. ..."
"... To those interested in the Korean War, I highly recommend David Halberstam's posthumous book, The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War. It is not a standard military chronicle instead a spellbinding journalistic read. Major theme, MacArthur's super ego, pomposity and geo-political ignorance resulting in catastrophe. American troops experienced the thrill of Stalingrad. In an eerie way, Trump now has a chance of becoming American Caesar 2.0 and in the very same playground. History repeats, rhymes whatever.... ..."
"... The only book I've read on the Korean War is IF Stone's firsthand account, The Hidden History of the Korean War. It is absolutely staggering. Why was it fought? No reason. It was a military exercise for MacArthur, just kind of for the hell of it. ..."
Apr 15, 2017 | unz.com
Memory of the bloody, indecisive first Koran War, 1950-53, which killed close to 3 million people, has faded. Few Americans have any idea how ferocious a conventional second Korean War could be. They are used to seeing Uncle Sam beat up small, nearly defenseless nations like Iraq, Libya or Syria that dare defy the Pax Americana.

The US could literally blow North Korea off the map using tactical nuclear weapons based in Japan, South Korea and at sea with the 7th Fleet. Or delivered by B-52 and B-1 bombers and cruise missiles. But this would cause clouds of lethal radiation and radioactive dust to blanket Japan, South Korea and heavily industrialized northeast China, including the capital, Beijing.

China would be expected to threaten retaliation against the United States, Japan and South Korea to deter a nuclear war in next door Korea. At the same time, if heavily attacked, a fight-to-the-end North Korea may fire off a number of nuclear-armed medium-range missiles at Tokyo, Osaka, Okinawa and South Korea. These missiles are hidden in caves in the mountains on wheeled transporters and hard to identify and knock out.

This is a huge risk. Such a nuclear exchange would expose about a third of the world's economy to nuclear contamination, not to mention spreading nuclear winter around the globe.

A conventional US attack on North Korea would be far more difficult. The North is a small nation of only 24.8 million. Its air and sea forces are obsolete and ineffective. They would be vaporized on the first day of a war. But North Korea's million-man army has been training and digging in for decades to resist a US invasion. Pyongyang's 88,000-man Special Forces are poised for suicide attacks on South Korea's political and military command and control and to cripple key US and South Korean air bases, notably Osan and Kunsan.

North Korea may use chemical weapons such as VX and Sarin to knock out the US/South Korean and Japanese airbases, military depots, ports and communications hubs. Missile attacks would be launched against US bases in Guam and Okinawa.

Short of using nuclear weapons, the US would be faced with mounting a major invasion of mountainous North Korea, something for which it is today unprepared. It took the US six months to assemble a land force in Saudi Arabia just to attack feeble Iraq. Taking on the tough North Korean army and militia in their mountain redoubts will prove a daunting challenge.

US analysts have in the past estimated a US invasion of North Korea would cost some 250,000 American casualties and at least $10 billion, though I believe such a war would cost four times that much today. The Army, Air Force and Marines would have to mobilize reserves to wage a war in Korea. Already overstretched US forces would have to be withdrawn from Europe and the Mideast. Military conscription might have to be re-introduced.

Timur The Lame says: April 16, 2017 at 5:18 pm GMT

Indeed. It was a sorrowful read with the exception of the heroics of the First Marines at Chosin Reservoir. Wiki called that action a victory as if rearguard actions or successful retreats could ever be put in a victory column.

The big point now is what do the Chinese think. They were the reason that there even was a Korean War for those who prefer headlines over history or happen to be in elective office in the US government (or Pentagon).

The stupidity, cultural ignorance and geopolitical autism of the people that actually have their fingers on the trigger on our side in today's world is mind blowing.

" Hit the dirt, join the crowd, lookee mamma, a mushroom cloud" from MAD magazine, in the sixties, a kids rag that makes some people wonder why the non funny, non witty Onion even exists.

Today that cloud thing suddenly becomes real possibility. Did I say MAD?

Cheers-

Art , April 16, 2017 at 5:29 pm GMT
Who do we have to fear the most – Kim or Trump?

Starting a war with N Korea is crazy. Are we going to start a war that would kill millions in order to stop a war that does not exist? There has been little blood spilled between the Koreas in the last 60 years – let's try for another 60 years.

How is Trump protecting us, if we are killing and dying in a far-off land? The truth is that our homeland is a very long way from being attacked by N Korea – PERIOD.

It is time to deescalate – it is time to trade with the bastard – it is time to open up N Korea. Send in the food. Help the people. Be better than the dictator. Give his people what he cannot deliver. Give them the power to demand freedom. It is hard to see – but when dictator governments trade with others, they evolve to freedom.

Peace - Art

p.s. The Trump Whisperer – Ivanka – needs to get in daddy's ear and say "cool it Pops."

Sean , April 16, 2017 at 6:45 pm GMT
North Korea has got nothing anyone wants so they won't be attacked. It is all a lot of bluffing, except if the Chinese (aghast at Trump's avowed view that China is raping the US economy) try to placate him by promising to give the North Koreans the cold shoulder.

History shows that the leadership of states in danger of losing their independent status will choose uncertain and perilous courses of action . The best thing is this will fizzle out. If China tries to pressure Kim, he would seriously consider starting a conventional war. He couldn't possibly win, but that is the point: China cannot accept a collapse of North Korea into the US client south. Nuclear weapons will not be used in any event.

Avery , April 16, 2017 at 7:32 pm GMT
@bob sykes Any discussion of a new Korean War that does not emphasize China is asinine, like this one. China is the central, most important actor on the peninsula, and China controls whatever happens there.

China will not permit an American ally on the Yalu River. Any state bordering China on the Yalu must be explicitly pro-Chinese. If a war does break out on the peninsula, China will intervene on the side of the North Koreans.

To call the first Korean War inconclusive is tendentious: China decisively defeated the US/NATO forces, and did so with with a primitive WW I style army and no navy or air force to speak of. Human wave assaults sufficed then. They did not occupy the whole peninsula because their primitive army lacked the logistical capacity to do so.

Today China has a large modern military with a full spectrum of capabilities, including tactical and strategic nuclear weapons and a large amphibious force. China would crush the US, Japanese and South Korean militaries, even assuming Russia stands aside. It didn't in Korea I and Vietnam. And China's strategic nuclear forces would prevent the US from using nuclear weapons on the peninsula. Anyway, the antique nuclear weapons we have today may not even work.

America's main weakness is its utterly delusional political and military leadership. The military that invaded Iraq no longer exists, and it was smaller than the one that liberated Kuwait. The US military has been downsized to the point that it cannot meet our treaty commitments. Sequestration has stripped the remaining military of funds needed for training and maintenance. Only a third of our fighter/bombers are available for war, and the pilots get only half the hours needed to maintain their skills. We do not practice combined arms warfare any more.

We have not fought a peer since 1945, and since 1945 we have a long record of failure. At present, we are fighting and losing to lightly armed Third World militias. The use of the MOAB against ISIS in Afghanistan was an indicator of panic in our military command there and at home. It is an open question as to whether we can defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq, and we certainly cannot unless we ally ourselves with Iran, Russia, Hezbollah and Assad.

What we are watching today is the collapse of the American military and empire.

{We have not fought a peer since 1945, and since 1945 we have a long record of failure. }

Almost true.

Imperial Japan was no Nazi Germany.

Although Japanese were tenacious fighters and they had first-rate military hardware*, U.S. and U.S. Navy were a rung above the Imperial Japanese military. Japan simply did not have the resources or the industrial might of U.S.

By the time Allies (really the U.S.) landed in Europe in 1944, Wehrmacht was a spent force: 80% of its best, toughest units were destroyed on the Eastern Front. Even then, at the Battle of the Bulge U.S. troops ran from the advancing Germans (mostly ** ). GIs were saved by the powerful USAF when the skies cleared up.

So we don't really have a good example of peer-to-peer land warfare for US military (other than the US Civil War).

--
* Zero was considered superior to US equipment in the beginning.
** Heroic defense of Bastogne.

Avery , April 16, 2017 at 7:48 pm GMT
@anon It's really China's problem.

And the only thing that has kept Japan and South Korea non nuclear is the US. A real threat would be for the US to simply to go home. When Trump was tweeting that exactly -- it was seen as quite threatening.

A nuclear North Korea which is barely in the nuclear club and doesn't have the economy to militarize is simply an annoyance to China. Japan and South Korea could be real threats quite quickly. And there is no love lost between any of them.

An irony is that the US has effectively disarmed Europe via NATO, and if the US told Germany to take care of themselves, Russia wouldn't feel threatened, they would be threatened.

The truth is that the US hasn't won a war since we decided to constrain our military in Korea. They wanted to nuke China, and also wanted to use them in Vietnam.

North Korea's only threat is nuclear, which is hollow, since they are assured of massive retaliation in kind. I suppose China has been OK with the situation, since it annoys us to no end and hasn't cost them much. So far. {The truth is that the US hasn't won a war since we decided to constrain our military in Korea. They wanted to nuke China, and also wanted to use them in Vietnam.}

This an enduring myth that was created to salve the psych wound of being beaten by 'inferior' yellow-man.

Other than using atomic bombs, there were no constraints on US military. US military was given a free hand to bomb and destroy anything and everything, including civilian targets* in both wars.

As to nukes.

China had no nukes during Korean war, but Soviet Union did.

First SU nuke test: Aug 1949.
First US thermonuke test: Nov 1952
First SU thermonuke test: Aug 1953.

POTUS Truman fired delusional Gen McArthur because he knew SU would most certainly use tac nukes in Korea if US did.
If you recall, Truman had no compunction using nukes on civilian targets, so he must have had good reason to restrain the crazy generals.

Same with Viet Nam: yes US military wanted to nuke Hanoi in desperation, but cooler civilian heads prevailed. Again, there was near-certainty that SU would respond in kind in Viet Nam.
--
* targeted deliberately: war crimes.

denk , April 17, 2017 at 2:35 am GMT
'" If China is not going to solve North Korea , we will."

With this porky pie,
Trump becomes the 45th 'bald faced liars' elected by the murkkans.

And .
With the bombing of Syria, Yemen
Trump joins the 'prestigious' ranks of the previous 44 war criminals in WH.

Lots of murkkans , the Trumpsters, are crying foul, They are 'betrayed' by Trump who now 'surrender to the deep state', 'the neocons have finally gotten to Trump', blah blah blah .

B.S. --

Astute obsevers like Vltchek, Engdahl, Draistser ..reminded murkkans about the exercise in futility in the 'election circus' long ago.

Mathematically, Ian Fleming's fundamental law of probability practically guarantees that the 45th POTUS would be same as the old boss, MIC front man who speaks with forked tongue.

As the pathetic hack Fareed Zakaria of Times magazine would gush after the Syria bombing, ' With this act, Trump has just become POTUS ' He didnt know how right he's, hehehehe

Joe Wong says: April 17, 2017 at 11:11 am GMT @Vendetta
Why not allow that? That will not sit very well with American global full spectrum dominance and end the day that American can commit war crimes, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity on the phantom WMD allegation as humanitarian intervention.
daniel le mouche , April 17, 2017 at 12:17 pm GMT @Timur The Lame
I picked up a batch of old Rollingstone magazines from my local library for pennies to use as bathroom/breakfast reading. One issue had Matt Taibbi following Trump on the campaign trail while still battling for the Republican party nomination. In this leg of his tour he talked about how big insurance conglomerates were setting the prices to their liking and how he as president would bust them up etc.. Then came the commentary from Duck Dynasty types on how they are sick and tired of paying high premiums and so on. It gave me a minor epiphany, namely that this guy is, was and always will be full of shit in other words nothing but a super salesman.

While I was happy that he blew away the syphilitic structure of the mainstream parties and the press I now realize that the volatile and insane world now has a monkey with a machine gun in a major position of power. This can't end well.

The Great Pumpkin cut his jib by beating up other businessmen in the vicious world of East coast real estate. In this world he had the MacArthur motto for there being 'no substitute for victory'. If he transmogrifies his business instincts onto the world stage, stock up on rice and beans (and iodine tablets).

The simple scenario germane to this article is if Trump deploys a carrier fleet even closer to the proximity of the Norks. Who thinks fat boy Jong-Un is sane? Ivanka? Sending even just conventional missiles across the bow is well within his mental construct. With their faulty accuracy they could accidentally hit the target. A carrier sunk. What options does Trump have now? None really. It's show time and by probable extension, "overture, curtains, lights, this is it night of nights..."

To those interested in the Korean War, I highly recommend David Halberstam's posthumous book, The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War. It is not a standard military chronicle instead a spellbinding journalistic read. Major theme, MacArthur's super ego, pomposity and geo-political ignorance resulting in catastrophe. American troops experienced the thrill of Stalingrad. In an eerie way, Trump now has a chance of becoming American Caesar 2.0 and in the very same playground. History repeats, rhymes whatever....

Cheers- The only book I've read on the Korean War is IF Stone's firsthand account, The Hidden History of the Korean War. It is absolutely staggering. Why was it fought? No reason. It was a military exercise for MacArthur, just kind of for the hell of it.

[Apr 17, 2017] Zero chance of any attack on Korea beyond a prearranged choreographed pinprick

Apr 17, 2017 | www.unz.com

nsa , April 16, 2017 at 2:01 pm

@Willem Hendrik

If there were ever a Just Cause for the Yanks to invade and bring democracy somewhere, it would be North Korea. The horrors that generations of North Koreans in concentration camps are enduring, would even make the holo-jews cringe.

Then again, is Israel ready to take a second row seat on the holocaust narrative and let the North Koreans take the gold medal of international victimhood?

And what do you do with millions of people coping with culture shock, paranoia, etc.? And, last but not least, who would make our clothing for 5 cents a piece?

All in all. I do not think the Israeli's would let the USA attack North Korea.

Zero chance of any attack on Korea beyond a prearranged choreographed pinprick. The explanation is simple: nothing in it for the Jooies and Izzies who worked overtime to install a US government of the jooies, by the jooies, for the jooies. Why would they waste their satrap's assets when they could be used on Iran?

[Apr 12, 2017] Regime change in Syria? That would be a mistake by Prof Michael John Williams

Notable quotes:
"... The intervention triggers resentment and hostility at the new government, the legitimacy of which is reduced through the participation of an outside government. ..."
"... In late 2015, Eren Erdem, a Turkish MP, said in Parliament that the Turkish state was permitting Da'esh to send sarin precursors to Syria. He had a file of evidence, so was accused of treason for accessing and publicizing confidential material. The investigation into the people responsible for the transfer of toxic chemicals was shut down. ..."
"... Al-Assad is certainly capable of murdering opponents, and not bothering too much about collateral damage, but strategically it makes no sense for him to do this now, when peace talks under the aegis of Russia and Iran have begun, and the world is watching. Also, Assad has been engaged in a reconciliation process, allowing members of the FSA to return to the Syrian army, and Aleppans remain in Damascus if they didn't wish to go to Idlib. At such a juncture, using chemical weapons would be counter-productive. If Sarin was used at his command, he should be properly prosecuted: but bombing a Syrian air base merely assists Da'esh and its cronies. ..."
"... I have just watched the press conference in which Trump labelled Assad a butcher, and went on again about dead babies. I just wish that someone at one of these conferences would have the guts to point out to Trump his own butchery. ..."
"... Anyone watching this performance would think that US forces had never been responsible for killing innocent civilians, men, women, children and babies. To listen to Trump, you wouldn't think that US forces had ever killed over 150 civilians in Mosul, dozens in Raqqa, or had bombed hospitals in Afghanistan, or schools in Iraq, or were supporting the Saudi blockade of Yemen resulting in the starvation of children and babies, or had destroyed wedding parties with drones,.....I could go on. ..."
"... If Assad is a butcher, he is only a junior, apprentice, corner-shop butcher. Trump is the real thing, the large-scale, wholesale, expert butcher. ..."
"... Gotta get that pipeline in for the Saudi's, eh, no matter how many children's carcasses it crosses, yay, regime change again, yay, and a heap of new terrorists for our kids in the west to dodge and duck, yay. ..."
"... Despite the several misrepresentations, the facts are that Britain has been one of the main protagonists in prosecuting this war against Syria , which is a proxy war against Iran. ..."
"... Britain was at the forefront in setting up the Al Nusra Front and in hosting the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights to disseminate deeply negative propaganda about the Syrian Government and armed forces. ..."
"... Every step of this including the media campaign which has comprised a major part of the military campaign against Syria, has been an attempt to delegitimize the Sovereign government and its institutions and to gain consensus from the somnambulistic British and US public for yet another direct military campaign against another Middle Eastern country. ..."
"... Assad's removal would be catastrophic. There would be no stable government in Syria, it would be controlled by warlords backed by Saudi Arabia, al-Qaeda or ISIS and millions of refugees would have no country to return to or to live in. This will mean more refugees in Europe, more destabilisation and more money drained from our treasuries. ..."
Apr 12, 2017 | www.theguardian.com

The intervention triggers resentment and hostility at the new government, the legitimacy of which is reduced through the participation of an outside government.

Soon, the new regime is considered a "puppet" and its existence is questioned by the people. Interestingly, the Middle East has proven particularly resistant to durable regime change and democratization, further making the success of any US-led intervention doubtful.

The situation will be even more fraught if other external actors turn any attempt at regime change into a proxy war, as Russia and Iran are likely to do. The US experienced the downside of this during the ill-conceived war in Vietnam. During the Soviet-led war in Afghanistan, the US played the spoiler of Soviet efforts, funnelling money and weapons to the anti-Soviet mujahideen, turning the USSR's intervention into a protracted, bloody war.

Prof Michael John Williams is Director of the International Relations Program at New York University.

ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 17:57
Those interested in how the MSM fell in love with terrorists in Syria should go back and check out Charlie Skelton's illuminating piece from The Guardian 2012 .
Ciarán Here , 12 Apr 2017 17:48
The Gulf of Tonkin, WMD in Iraq...
Ciarán Here , 12 Apr 2017 17:46
Did the USA bomb war planes that they said had been used to carry chemical weapons - a chemical attack!
Robert Rudolph , 12 Apr 2017 17:40
Instead, the western powers have followed the example cited by Machiavelli: "in order to prove their liberality, they allowed Pistoia to be destroyed."

... ... ..

1Cedar , 12 Apr 2017 17:39
In late 2015, Eren Erdem, a Turkish MP, said in Parliament that the Turkish state was permitting Da'esh to send sarin precursors to Syria. He had a file of evidence, so was accused of treason for accessing and publicizing confidential material. The investigation into the people responsible for the transfer of toxic chemicals was shut down.

That surely ought to make us at least ask evidence-seeking questions about the Idlib gas attack before yet again demanding regime change.

Al-Assad is certainly capable of murdering opponents, and not bothering too much about collateral damage, but strategically it makes no sense for him to do this now, when peace talks under the aegis of Russia and Iran have begun, and the world is watching. Also, Assad has been engaged in a reconciliation process, allowing members of the FSA to return to the Syrian army, and Aleppans remain in Damascus if they didn't wish to go to Idlib. At such a juncture, using chemical weapons would be counter-productive. If Sarin was used at his command, he should be properly prosecuted: but bombing a Syrian air base merely assists Da'esh and its cronies.

unsouthbank , 12 Apr 2017 17:32
I have just watched the press conference in which Trump labelled Assad a butcher, and went on again about dead babies. I just wish that someone at one of these conferences would have the guts to point out to Trump his own butchery.

Anyone watching this performance would think that US forces had never been responsible for killing innocent civilians, men, women, children and babies. To listen to Trump, you wouldn't think that US forces had ever killed over 150 civilians in Mosul, dozens in Raqqa, or had bombed hospitals in Afghanistan, or schools in Iraq, or were supporting the Saudi blockade of Yemen resulting in the starvation of children and babies, or had destroyed wedding parties with drones,.....I could go on.

If Assad is a butcher, he is only a junior, apprentice, corner-shop butcher. Trump is the real thing, the large-scale, wholesale, expert butcher.

Ruthie Riegler , 12 Apr 2017 17:21
...Indeed, Richard Spencer last week protested outside the White House against the airstrikes on the regime airbase carrying a sign that read "No more wars 4 Israel."
NezPerce macmarco , 12 Apr 2017 17:37

There are two possible regimes, the Assad fascists, or the rebel jihadist

The Syrian government is Baathist, it was elected.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Socialist_Ba%27ath_Party_–_Syria_Region

http://www.france24.com/en/20160417-syria-bashar-assad-baath-party-wins-majority-parliamentary-vote

Latest update : 2016-04-17

Syria's ruling Baath party and its allies won a majority of seats in parliamentary elections last week across government-held parts of the country, the national electoral commission announced late Saturday.

Who are the rebels supported by Washington and Westminster?

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/aleppo-falls-to-syrian-regime-bashar-al-assad-rebels-uk-government-more-than-one-story-robert-fisk-a7471576.html

And we're going to learn a lot more about the "rebels" whom we in the West – the US, Britain and our head-chopping mates in the Gulf – have been supporting.

They did, after all, include al-Qaeda (alias Jabhat al-Nusra, alias Jabhat Fateh al-Sham), the "folk" – as George W Bush called them – who committed the crimes against humanity in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania on 11 September 2001. Remember the War on Terror? Remember the "pure evil" of al-Qaeda. Remember all the warnings from our beloved security services in the UK about how al-Qaeda can still strike terror in London?

jimbo2000M , 12 Apr 2017 16:55
Gotta get that pipeline in for the Saudi's, eh, no matter how many children's carcasses it crosses, yay, regime change again, yay, and a heap of new terrorists for our kids in the west to dodge and duck, yay.
unsouthbank , 12 Apr 2017 16:40
I agree that Bashar al-Assad is not a "good person". It is impossible to be an authoritarian leader, struggling to maintain the unity, or even existence, of a nation state, and at the same time be a kind and gentle person. However, I do not believe him to be the psychopathic monster that he is portrayed as being, either. He is almost certainly not personally responsible for the chemical attack in Idlib province.

Presidents do not normally make detailed decisions on what sort of weapons should be used on every airstrike made by their aircraft. He may be a dictator, but he is not a complete imbecile. Even the dimmest of politicians could have foreseen that this chemical attack would end up being a massive own-goal. Nobody as cynically calculating as Assad is supposed to be, would be that stupid. My own hunch, (and that is all it is) is that sarin was used due to a blunder by a low or medium ranking Syrian airforce officer.

Yes, of course Assad bears responsibility for overall strategy in this vicious war of survival, and as such, has blood on his hands. But, so does Trump, so does Obama, so does Putin so does Erdogan, so does May, and so do all the leaders who have supplied the numerous rebel groups with billions of pounds worth of weapons, and have therefore kept the pot boiling.

Last year, Theresa May stood up in parliament and proudly proclaimed her willingness to commit mass indiscriminate murder on a scale that would make Syria look like a pinprick. She declared her willingness to press the nuclear button and therefore slaughter hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of completely innocent men, women, children and babies. She not only has blood on her hands, she is proud of it. Perhaps we should remember that, when she comes out with one of her sanctimonious, nauseatingly hypocritical statements about Syria.

martinusher , 12 Apr 2017 16:35
Assad was democratically elected more than once so he must be doing something right. (OK, so they're democracy might not be our democracy but 'our' democracy has brought us Trump, Brexit and the like so its really six to one, a half dozen to the other). Syria until we started messing with it -- creating, supporting and even arming opposition groups -- was stable, wasn't messing with its neighbors and had significant religious and cultural freedoms compared to other countries in the area. (Our actions might suggest that we really don't want stable, peaceful, countries in that region, we need them to be weak and riven by internal factions.)

Anyway, given our outstanding track record of success with regime change in that part of the world we should probably adopt a hands-off approach -- all we seem to do is make an unsatisfactory situation dire. Hardly the way to win friends and influence people.

KhalijFars , 12 Apr 2017 16:07
Despite the several misrepresentations, the facts are that Britain has been one of the main protagonists in prosecuting this war against Syria , which is a proxy war against Iran.

Britain was at the forefront in setting up the Al Nusra Front and in hosting the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights to disseminate deeply negative propaganda about the Syrian Government and armed forces.

Every step of this including the media campaign which has comprised a major part of the military campaign against Syria, has been an attempt to delegitimize the Sovereign government and its institutions and to gain consensus from the somnambulistic British and US public for yet another direct military campaign against another Middle Eastern country.

The whole which has visited terrible and incalculable suffering, on the Syrian people. Syria was a paradise before the British and US did their usual work. The journalists, government and security services in Britain who have wrought this mess , I'm sure will not escape the consequences of their actions. One hopes they experience a 1000 times of the hell they have visited on Syria. These actions are truly despicable acts of cowardice and absolute wickedness.

TomasStedron KhalijFars , 12 Apr 2017 16:27
Syria was a paradise for those who rule Syria........ the Assad regime brutally repressed any opposition to their rule. In 1982 Assad´s father killed probably more than 30,000 in the siege of Hama. As well as sheltering a number of terrorist organisations who have their headquarters in Damascus....... he also armed and supported the fledgling Al-Quaeda resistance to the coalition in Iraq, giving them asylum in Syria........now the IS ....... I can think of Paradise in different ways......
MacMeow KhalijFars , 12 Apr 2017 17:30

Britain has been one of the main protagonists in prosecuting this war against Syria

Link please. Because without evidence the rest of your post collapses.

KhalijFars MacMeow , 12 Apr 2017 17:50
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/01/trial-swedish-man-accused-terrorism-offences-collapse-bherlin-gildo

The prosecution of a Swedish national accused of terrorist activities in Syria has collapsed at the Old Bailey after it became clear Britain's security and intelligence agencies would have been deeply embarrassed had a trial gone ahead, the Guardian can reveal.

His lawyers argued that British intelligence agencies were supporting the same Syrian opposition groups as he was, and were party to a secret operation providing weapons and non-lethal help to the groups, including the Free Syrian Army.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2013/aug/30/syria-chemical-attack-war-intervention-oil-gas-energy-pipelines

Leaked emails from the private intelligence firm Stratfor including notes from a meeting with Pentagon officials confirmed US-UK training of Syrian opposition forces since 2011 aimed at eliciting "collapse" of Assad's regime "from within."

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-05-23/secret-pentagon-report-reveals-us-created-isis-tool-overthrow-syrias-president-assad

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/03/05/the-redirection

Jermaine Charles , 12 Apr 2017 16:02
More guff from the guardian/ Mr Williams, with just a little realistic sense, but who can replace Assad and in Syria he remains very popular, despite the western media like lies!
johnbonn , 12 Apr 2017 16:00
Russia has to move quickly to secure a 100 year lease for the Latakia port and airbase. Otherwise the US will soon attempt to render it useless as well, regardless of which of the moderate rebel factions it decides to install.

... Spirits die hard, and those of the Arab spring and the Orange Revolution are still alive in the halls of the Pentagon.

.... A controlled cold war however, is the only way to a avoid a larger mess than what the West has already inflicted on the innocent Syrian people by using the most abortive war design that has ever been conceived by the war college or any other war commander.

...... At the current rate there will be more Syrians in Germany than those remaining in Syria.

......... Is it hard to wonder why Syrians might hold a grudge against the, US?

BlueCollar , 12 Apr 2017 15:59
Regime change ? All in the name of democracy as we see it.Why not try it in the Kingdom of family owned country KSA or why not another family owned enterprises called UAE.
stratplaya , 12 Apr 2017 15:58
History tells us replacing Assad would be a bad idea. We should have learned the lesson with Hussain and Iraq, but didn't. We would go on to replace Gaddafi of Libya and boom, it trigged ISIS.

The hard lesson here is that for some reason Muslim majority countries have a strong central authoritarian leader. No matter if that leaders is called president, king, prime minister, or whatever. When that strong leaders is deposed, chaos ensues.

Pier16 , 12 Apr 2017 15:58
The Americans have a fetish with regime change. Up until recently they were discrete about it and did it in secret, now they are all in the open. People who are against regime change are considered anti-Americans and tools of the Soviets...ahm.... Russia. The amazing thing is Tillerson said Assad's faith should be left with the Syrian people, the American establishment in unison said how could he says such a terrible thing, "we should decide what Syrian people want."

These are the same people who elected Trump, maybe they should let Syrian people select the US president. The result may end up better.

freeandfair , 12 Apr 2017 15:53
> Bashar al-Assad is not a good person. He has reduced once great Syrian cities such as Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged. Worse still, more than 500,000 Syrian civilians have been killed in the civil war, 6.1 million have been internally displaced and another 4.8 million are seeking refuge abroad.

Yes, Assad is not a good person. But what about American politicians such as Hillary Clinton, who armed "moderate rebels" and supported the opposition in pursuit of regime change? And Syria is not the only country were this happened. Will there ever any responsibility taken for their actions by the US and NATO?

First, they make a manageable problem into a huge problem, then just hightail back home, living local people to pick up the pieces.

Those half millions of deaths - are they all responsibility of Assad or do the sponsors of jihadists and jihadists themselves have some responsibility as well?

GlozzerBoy1 , 12 Apr 2017 15:40
Absolutely, stay the hell out, we should have no footprint in that awful part of the world.
Tom1982 , 12 Apr 2017 15:35
The choice as I see it is this:

A. A horrible authoritarian regime that tortures and murders it's opponents...........but women can wear what they like in public, get a good education courtesy of the State, and embark on a career.

B. A horrible authoritarian regime that tortures and murders it's opponents...........where women are denied education, made virtual prisoners in their own homes, and have acid flung in their faces for having the temerity to appear unveiled when they do go out in public.

It's not a great choice, but one is definitely better than the other.

Weefox Tom1982 , 12 Apr 2017 15:43
Also worth remembering that under Assad people are allowed religious freedom. I know two Syrian Christians who are terrified of what will happen if the rebels take control of their country.
Tom1982 Weefox , 12 Apr 2017 15:46
I'd imagine the Shia feel the same.
freeandfair Tom1982 , 12 Apr 2017 16:06
Choice B also includes Sharia law, full extermination of other faiths and death sentence for rejection of Islam. Basically Choice B is another Saudi Arabia, but a lot of people will have to die first.
oddballs , 12 Apr 2017 15:35
Assad would stand a good chance of winning a fair and honest election,

Still waiting for evidence by forensic experts over the chemical weapons , who did what and where.

Until proof is given hat prove otherwise the rebels are the most likly suspects. --> normankirk , 12 Apr 2017 15:35

SHA2014 , 12 Apr 2017 14:24
The world's biggest superpower is willing to risk a nuclear war with mass destruction of billions and possible extinction of life on earth on an unproven assertion made by Al Qaeda sympathisers that the Syrian government bombed them with sarin? OBL must be laughing in his grave.
aleph SHA2014 , 12 Apr 2017 14:45
1. Who is threatening a nuclear war? The Russians? I haven't heard them threaten that. Probably because no-one would seriously believe them.

2. An intellectually honest person should not describe young children as terrorist sympathisers. Let alone imply they somehow deserve to be deliberately targeted by nerve gas as a result.

Fort Sumpter aleph , 12 Apr 2017 14:54
If you have the evidence of a nerve gas agent being present please supply it forthwith.

I keep asking you guys, who must be on the ground in Idlib such is your certainty, to provide the proof but you always refuse. Why is that?

SHA2014 aleph , 12 Apr 2017 14:56
An intellectually honest person should question the veracity of a report that is unverified by a terrorist organisation. The children were never described by me as 'terrorist sympathisers' so you make a dishonest accusation, the terrorist sympathisers are those who produced the report on which the whole story is based. It is not about the death of the children which is of course a crime, but they are being used by the terrorists for thier purposes.

An intellectually honest person would also show outrage about the mass murder of civilians, including children in Mosul and by a US bombing in Syria that seem to not arouse the same outrage.

SHA2014 , 12 Apr 2017 14:13
Regime change by US has been used at least three times against democracies, in Chili, in Iran and in Ukraine. Attempted regime change has also been used often in South America to oust populist rulers because of US interests. Although the above analysis raises the very good point that change has to come from the bottom up, it starts with the same fallacies of assuming that all of the death and destruction in Syria comes from one person which is an extremely flawed point to start from. The point that is to be made is that there is no military solution to the conflict except in an anti terrorist capacity. The problem is that all of those against the Syrian government in the current conflict are either outright terrorists or those who collaborate heavily with terrorists making it difficult to have a conventional peace process.
Imperialist , 12 Apr 2017 14:07
America should not be the one who decides who is an acceptable government, and sends soldiers to enforce its will.

The UN should have done that long ago. To Assad. To Kim. Stopped the Khmer Rouge. Or Rwanda.

Yet the only time they ever have actually fought is in the Korean War.

Fort Sumpter Imperialist , 12 Apr 2017 14:55
*cough* The US supported the Khmer Rouge *cough*
Mauryan , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
America engaged in regime changes to suit American interests during the cold war and the New world order drive. The fact that they supported dictatorships worldwide and helped them overthrow democratically elected governments tells clearly that imposing democracy forcibly was not their intention. Intervention in global conflicts is mainly for controlling pathways for resources and gaining ground for business opportunities for their multinational giant corporations.
diddoit Mauryan , 12 Apr 2017 13:58
It's all about what's best for the US and the incredibly powerful(in the US) Israel lobby. The UK just goes along with it.
NezPerce , 12 Apr 2017 13:52
The West's narrative has fallen apart, nobody believes that the Syrian rebels are peace loving democrats. We have ample evidence that they are infinitely worse than Assad.

We also have plenty of evidence that the Western deep state, not the public, wants another regime change in the middle east and will stop at nothing to achieve its end including false flag gas attacks. This article goes into detail.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-08/false-flag-how-us-armed-syrian-rebels-set-excuse-attack-assad

False Flag: How the U.S. Armed Syrian Rebels to Set Up an Excuse to Attack Assad

Evidence suggests a false flag chemical weapons attack on the Syrian people was initiated by Syrian rebels with the help of the United States in order to justify Thursday night's U.S. Military attack on a Syrian base.

The Left is very opposed to war in Syria, the Libertarian right is very opposed to war in Syria but a hugely powerful Deep State will stop at nothing to achieve its ends.

Nat-Nat aka Kyl Shinra , 12 Apr 2017 13:50
"Worse still, more than 500,000 Syrian civilians have been killed in the civil war, 6.1 million have been internally displaced and another 4.8 million are seeking refuge abroad. "

well, you cannot put the blame on Assad only. He never asked for that war for a start and a lot of the refugees you're talking about may very well be pro-Assad.

This said, I agree, leave Assad and Syria alone.

Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:48
Finally an article which still sticks to logical thinking when it comes to Syria. Assad is a terrible leader but atleast with him, most of the factions within the country can be sorted. The West's obsession with stuffing democracy down the throats of every oil producing country in the Middle East has resulted in the Mad Max wasteland i.e. Libya and the unsolvable puzzle i.e. Iraq. Both Gaddafi and Saddam were terrible human beings but removing them left a vacuum which has cost the lives of thousands and displaced millions. The West must make its peace with Assad for now, stop supporting the rebels and try to find common ground with Russia against the real enemy - ISIS.
diddoit Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
The west - as the US/UK like to themselves, couldn't give a damn about democracy . They want compliance , not democracy. A good(brutal) dictator is better than a 'difficult' democratically elected leader , look at events in Egypt for example.

Our own democracies are pretty ropey, certainly not up there with the Scandinavian best practice.

dusktildawn Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
You're kidding right? The West stuffing democracy down the throats of the Gulf countries. More like defending them against the threat of democracy by arming them to the teeth and stationing troops there. Have you heard of Bahrain?
diddoit Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
call themselves. -typo
dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:47
The only plausible solution to this conflict is partition assuming of course the imminent defeat of Isis.

While getting rid of Assad would create a dangerous power vacuum and is in any case perhaps impossible given Russias backing, the sheer scale of the killing he's done and destruction he's unleashed on his own people - of a totally different scale to Saddam Hussein and even his father, from whom he seems to have inherited his psychopathic tendencies -renders the idea that he could continue to rule a "united" Syria or even the majority of it, laughable.

Mauryan dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:52
Partition would create more Assads.
Jemima15 , 12 Apr 2017 13:46
If you get rid of Assad, whoever replaces him is going to have a very difficult task. How on Earth do you enforce any sort of civilized law and order in a country which has some of the worst terrorist organizations the world has ever known. With organizations like ISIS around, a government is gong to need to take a firm hand somewhere. It's not as if you can send Jihadists on community service and expect them to come back as reformed characters.
DanielDee , 12 Apr 2017 13:46
Regime change? Why not?

Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi would make a fine statesman!

Pipcosta DanielDee , 12 Apr 2017 14:03
Until he turns on his mater
IamDolf , 12 Apr 2017 13:45
Fact is that Assad still enjoys considerable support among Syrians. In particular among those who have no problem with a woman going to the beach in a bikini and driving a car to work. He is not giong anywhere soon. And if he did, the situation would be worse. As in the case of the butcher Saddam Hussein and the crazy dictator Khadaffi, who also were supposedly removed in an attempt to bring "freedom and democracy to the people."
diddoit IamDolf , 12 Apr 2017 13:49
Syria was one of the few countries in the ME where you could drink alcohol. Does anyone believe whoever follows Assad be it someone picked by the US/Israel/KSA/Qatar will be quite so tolerant?
Patin , 12 Apr 2017 13:43
Why can't world leaders be held to account for their crimes against humanity? Is it not about time that they are compelled to comply with international law and for the United Nations Assembly to make them so by enforceable resolutions passed by a majority vote?

Assad is a tyrant who should be removed from office and held accountable for his crimes against humanity. Syrians should be entitled to a government that is respectful of their human rights.

The UN should take responsibility for enforcing a permanent ceasefire and brokering talks to secure Syria's future. It should require as a condition of UN membership compliance with and adherence to international law protecting human rights. Non compliance should be met with expulsion and the economic isolation of the country concerned from the rest of the world.

freeandfair Patin , 12 Apr 2017 16:19
> Why can't world leaders be held to account for their crimes against humanity?

You should start with American leaders like Bush. If you are serious about this.

roachclip , 12 Apr 2017 13:42

There is no shortcut to lasting peace. As uncomfortable as it is, the best that western governments can do is provide aid and assistance to those in distress, while pressuring those countries that continue to feed money and weapons to the combatants to change their positions.

You are absolutely right.

Such a pity then that the western governments in question, the UK, America and to a lesser extent, France, are in fact the same entities, via their surrogate power in the middle east, Saudi Arabia, who are the ones providing the weapons and money.

Just as they did in Iraq and Libya, and always for the same reason, to achieve regime change against the Middle Eastern leaders who were threatening their control of the oil market.

This situation is nothing new, these Western Powers have been attacking various parts of the Middle East for nigh on a century. Winston Churchill was responsible for bombing Iraq in the 1920's. That also was to achieve regime change.

All of the deaths and the destruction in the Middle East can ultimately be laid at the door of the 'Western Powers' and their willingness to do anything to protect their oil interests.

Taku2 , 12 Apr 2017 13:35
One of the most despicable thing about the West's attempts to bribe, entice and force Russia into abandoning the Syrian Government, so that America, France, Britain and Saudi Arabia can rush in, like hyenas to finish off a wounded animal, is how patronising they have been towards the Russians and Iranians. Granted that their racism towards the Russians might not be what it is towards the Syrian state, which they want to deny a voice and disrespect to the extent of talking to the Russians, and ignoring the Syrian government.

Yes, the West is behaving towards the Syrian state as if it is just something for it to manipulate, as it does with the global economy. Not having made any progress in manipulating the Syrian proxy conflict into the outcomes it wants, the West has now resorted to making merciless and unjustified attacks on Russian and the Iranians. Despite the fact that it is Russia and the Syrian government forces and their Hezbollah allies who have broken the impasse in this terrible war.

It is scurrilous that there should now be this coordinated media and political campaign to make Russia out to be 'the bad guy', the 'devil', as it were.

As for 'the liberals', well, guess what, if you want to do something constructive. Then stop blaming Russia and demonising the Russians, the Syrian Government and their allies. Look closer to home, to America, To Britain, to France and Saudi Arabia. There you will find more demons disguised as 'humanitarians' and 'angels' than probably in all of Russia and Syria.

The guys in the West who are posturing as angels are no less culpable than the Syrian government.

Of course the West should not destroy the Syrian state and government. But, since when has logic prevented this cartel from exercising its destructive force? As Libya, Iraq and Yemen have proven? The liberals need to grow up and stop being allied to the right.

Arapas Taku2 , 12 Apr 2017 13:42

so that America, France, Britain and Saudi Arabia can rush in, like hyenas to finish off a wounded animal

Your point is of great importance.

Now that Russia has done the dirty work at great cost, pushing them out of the way.........................

That will not happen, Rex was told by Sergei.

Arapas , 12 Apr 2017 13:34
robust belief in a supposed American ability to fix what is wrong.

Is meant to be the joke of the month.

What did they ever fix ? Just look what the Korean war has lead to.

Vietnam, where the Americans were defeated, is now a united and peaceful country.

On the other hand, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and other regime change candidates have been reduced to failed states.

In Syria, the fate of the Alwites will be the same of that of women and children cowering in St Sophia in 1453.

Utter slaughter!

ganaruvian , 12 Apr 2017 13:32
Firstly, we have yet to see the results of any impartial investigation checking out the Syrian/Russian version of events about the gas in Idlib province, which could be true. Nobody that I can see is 'supporting' the use of gas against civilians, but it is known that the bigger terrorist organisations such as ISIS and al Qaeda do have stocks of poison gas. Secondly,so many uninformed commentators have not understood that Syria's 6 year war has been and remains a religious war! Asad's Shiite/ Alawite/Christian/ Druse/ Ismaili communities and other minorities supported by Iran and Lebanon's Shiites, fighting for their very survival against Saudi/ Qatari/Gulf States' extremist Wahhabi fighters, who via ISIS ,Al Qaeda and similar Islamists, want to wipe them off the face of the earth (with Turkey playing a double game). At this very moment people are condemning Assad for bombing civilians, whilst the US-led coalition including our own RAF, is doing exactly the same thing in the ISIS held city of Mosul -for the same reasons. The rebels take over and then surround themselves in cities, with civilians, hoping that these horrors will raise western public opinion against the government forces trying to defeat them. The 'half- informed' public opinion is now behaving in exactly this predictable way against the Syrian government, trying to deal with its own religious extremist rebels, many of whom are not even Syrians. It was always a war that the west should stay out of -other peoples religious wars are incomprehensible to non-believers in that particular faith. To talk now of replacing Asad is juvenile and mischievous - maybe that's why Boris is so engaged?
Nolens , 12 Apr 2017 13:20
Assad is the lesser of two evils. Those who are hailed as rebels pose an enormous threat to our security.
jonnyross Nolens , 12 Apr 2017 13:44
There is an equality of evil between Assad and ISIS. That said, Assad's forces and their Shia allies have slaughtered the vast majority of the victims.

Both Assad and ISIS will lose eventually. How many Syrians are slaughtered in the meantime is anyone's guess.

Why murderous dictators are so popular btl is a mystery.

john evans , 12 Apr 2017 13:20
Syria is finished.

According to Wikipedia Estimates of deaths in the Syrian Civil War, per opposition activist groups, vary between 321,358 and 470,000.

On 23 April 2016, the United Nations and Arab League Envoy to Syria put out an estimate of 400,000 that had died in the war.

Also,according to Wikipedia I n 2016, the United Nations (UN) identified 13.5 million Syrians requiring humanitarian assistance, of which more than 6 million are internally displaced within Syria, and over 4.8 million are refugees outside of Syria. In January 2017, UNHCR counted 4,863,684 registered refugees.

Turkey is the largest host country of registered refugees with over 2.7 million Syrian refugees.

Before the troubles,Syria had a population of 23 million.

No country could go back to normality after that upheaval.

Arapas john evans , 12 Apr 2017 13:37

No country could go back to normality after that upheaval.

It can --

Look at Chechnya! A newly rebuilt Grosny, living in peace.

Bearing in mind Iraq, Libya etc who wants to see that --

NativeBornTexan Arapas , 12 Apr 2017 14:08
Chechnya is ruled by a Russian puppet dictator who executes gay men.
Shad O NativeBornTexan , 12 Apr 2017 15:13
That's because politics is heartlessly, ruthlessly, compassionlessly pragmatic. If having a pet local petty king in the area keeps it stable and does not a politically costly military operation, everything else is seen as "acceptable collateral damage".

It's funny but western foreign policy is fundamentally the same in the methods, just different in goals. If the goal of regime change is achieved and political points collected, everything else is completely irrelevant. Opposition can become "moderately islamist", "democratic" rebels may implement sharia law, "precision strikes" may cause tens of thousands of civilian casualties, but it's all for the greater good.

Pipcosta , 12 Apr 2017 13:18
Why do we send a sewer rat to the UN as our ambassador
brianboru1014 , 12 Apr 2017 13:14
Every time the West especially the Anglo west of the USA and Britain intervene in another countries affairs, the end product is a disaster so for that reason alone these two societies which can only communicate in English should leave this to the Russians.
Ruby4 , 12 Apr 2017 13:13
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

Albert Einstein

Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alberteins133991.html

Chilcot report: Findings at-a-glance:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36721645

FFC800 , 12 Apr 2017 13:08
This almost manages to achieve sense, and it's good to see an article not promoting regime change for once, but it still falls short of stating the truth that the correct policy in Syria is to help Assad win the war, and then impose conditions on his conduct in the peace.

He has reduced once great Syrian cities such as Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged.

Most of that was done by rebels.
jackrousseau , 12 Apr 2017 13:03
I must now begrudgingly thank the Trump Administration for causing me to realize a profound and universal truth. History doesn't rhyme at all; it parodies.

The build up to our inevitable Syria invasion is essentially an SNL parody of our Iraq invasion. All the way down to allegations of to "hidden stockpiles of WMDs", "gassing own citizens", "violation of no WMD agreement", "weapons inspectors not doing job", and most recently "Assad/Saddam is Hitler". All that's left is the final piece of evidence to tip public opinion in...the holy grail, "yellowcake uranium".

Of course, 6 months ago --with full knowledge of Saddam's gassing of the Kurds--Trump said toppling Hussein was a "uge" mistake and defended him as an "efficient killer of terrorists". "Efficient" indeed... https://cnn.com/cnn/2016/07/05/politics/donald-trump-saddam-hussein-iraq-terrorism/index.html

I'm not sure exactly what comes next (presumably Trump declaring an "Axis of Evil" consisting of Syria, ISIS, Iran, N.Korea...and perhaps Russia and/or China or both...thus setting the stage for a hilarious parody of WWII).

Who knows...I guess at least it's interesting.

John Smythe , 12 Apr 2017 13:03
Perhaps dear Boris should have had more talks with the British government to find out what is the political position of the conservative government over Syria, and more importantly with Russia. So far the American have by the look of things, telling the British Government in what they want, not bothering to ask what Britain thinks what is important.

There is actually no point in swapping one master the EU, to handcuff ourselves to the a far more right wing America.

bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 13:00
I find the commments on here quite confusing...

Take Isil and jihadists out of the equation and what you're left with are people that want to oust a tyrannical and unelected leader who clearly has nothing but disdain for his people (groups of at least).

Those rebels (or freedom fighters) are being seen as the bad guys it seems to me...?

The only reason I can see for this is that they have slight support from the United States.

Had the boot been on the other foot and the US we're supporting Assad and Russia,the rebels (freedom fighters) I'm quite sure public opinion (Guardian readers at least) would be quite different.

So what do the Syrian rebels who are looking to overthrow a dictator have to do to be put on a pedestal of righteousness as Castro was for effectively trying to achieve the same end goal....

Oh, that's right, Castro was trying to stick it to the Yanks.... now I get it.

dusktildawn bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 13:34
I think there's a definite strain of anti-Americanism on display however cautiously we have to view their actions after Iraq and give their closeness to the Gulf States. A quarter of the country has fled Assad, some 10 million internally displaced not to mention the incredible numbers of dead and wounded.

And yet there's a close minded reflex to say that things will be better off with him in charge ignoring even the possibility of partition, which strikes me as the most plausible option. The idea that Assad can now after all he's done rule a united country indefinitely putting a lid on refugees and terrorism strikes me as utterly preposterous.

bemusedfromdevon dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 14:11
My sentiments entirely and it shocks me that there are a considerable number of Assad apologists commenting on here as he is clearly seen as a better 'devil' than Trump...

I'm just very pleased I don't live in Syria and I think the run of the mill Syrian dying in their droves due to gas, bombs or simply drowning in the Med would be horrified to read a large number of comments on here in relation to this article and how Assad 'isn't such a bad old stick!'

I'm embarrassed to be honest....

Shad O bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 15:25

Take Isil and jihadists out of the equation and what you're left with

what you are left is nothing. This was the big point since 2013, when Nusra began taking over the last remnants of the FSA. Since then Cameron (or was it Hammond) had to coin the term "relatively hardline islamists" to make some of the jihadi groups somewhat acceptable.

In its latest iteration, Nusra (now rebranded yet againTahrir al-Sham) has formally absorbed several other "rebel" group, including the Nour al-Din al-Zenki, who were in the past equipped by the US, and were quoted by various agencies (including this paper) as "opposition" during the recapture of Aleppo.

Ah, yes, you also have the Kurds, who are building their own state. But if there is something all the local powers agree on (Russia, US, Turkey, Syria, Iraq...) is that they don't want an independent Kurdish state.

NezPerce , 12 Apr 2017 12:58

President Obama was heavily criticized for not doing more in Syria, but he made a difficult decision that was in many ways the right on.

Obama required cover from the British Parliament. Bombing Syria was incredibly unpopular with the UK public from right to left. David Miliband listened to the public and stopped the bombing of Syria. Nobody expected a Labour politician to dare to oppose the US war machine, it took them all by surprise.

Bombing Syria was incredibly unpopular with the US public and the European public, Miliband saved us from ISIS and Al Nusra both al Qaeda franchises running Syria.

The BBC routinely portrays the Libertarian right wing in the USA as Isolationists but if you hear it from them they are anti-war. The American working class understands what war is like in the middle east because many of them have experienced it. They are clearly anti another war in the middle east. proof:

https://www.infowars.com/exclusive-michael-savage-begs-trump-to-stop-wwiii/

In this off the cuff interview Michael Savage begs Donald Trump to not plunge the world into another world war that could destroy life as we know it

.

Trump has been subjugated by the deep state, his base is outraged and in despair.

dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 12:58
You could argue this isn't about regime change per se but prosecuting a dictator for targeting and massacring civilians. And surely the same rationale can be used against Isis. In other words you don't allow mass murderers to take. Over but prosecute them as well.
Mates Braas dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 15:05
You can start proceedings against your own war criminals. There is a long list of them, stretching from, Paris, London, Washington and Tel Aviv.
freeandfair dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 16:41
In that case North Korea and Saudi Arabia should be on top of the list.
Trekkie555 , 12 Apr 2017 12:57
Good article. Hits the nail on the head. Regime change may be required for Syria the G7 and Arab countries must come together to carefully plan what happens afterwards.
Nolens , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
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diddoit , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
'Monster' Assad was courted by western leaders: Remember the Assads pictured taking tea at Buckingham Palace with the Queen(google it) , Blair all smiles in Damascus. The Kerry family pictured in Damascus enjoying a late evening supper with the Assads(google it).

But Bashar al-Assad is a stubborn man , he wouldn't distance himself from Iran and their proxies such as Hezbollah, thus his fate was sealed.

zolotoy diddoit , 12 Apr 2017 12:59
Nope, wrong. Assad wouldn't give the USA, Qatar, and Turkey a nice pipeline to kneecap Russian natural gas sales in Europe.

It's all about oil and money, petrodollars and ensuring American worldwide hegemony.

sokkynick zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 13:07
+1
diddoit zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 13:42
Well it's all tied in . People talk about Israel wanting the Golan Heights permanently in part due to oil interests, they talk about Qatar and the gas pipeline to Europe Assad refuses. They talk about the KSA being unnerved by Iran's growing influence in the region after the Iraq war, and how it would suit KSA , Israel and the US for Sunni leadership to emerge in Syria to rebalance the region.

I think it's all of the above . Which isn't what US/UK populations are being told.

Ilan Klinger , 12 Apr 2017 12:53
A regime changing in Syria?

Can someone here try and convince me that the State of Syria still exists?

And change it from what to what?From a Murderouscracy to a Oppressionocracy?

peterwiv , 12 Apr 2017 12:52
The West learns nothing from its mistakes. Can't we understand that our real enemy is ISIS and that springs directly from our disastrous invasion of Iraq? Assad may be pretty awful but surely we should be able to comprehend that he is an ally in the fight against ISIS just as the far more horrible Stalin was an ally against the Nazis.

Just because Trump suddenly talks about "beautiful babies", we all go mad again.

aleph , 12 Apr 2017 12:51
Syria is going to need serious amounts of aid and foreign investment to recover when peace starts to take hold. But Assad cannot travel internationally because he will be subject to arrest. At least in any civilised country. So he will be gone one way or antithetical. Putin has backed the wrong horse. It's too handicapped to run.
elaine naude aleph , 12 Apr 2017 15:43
Who should he have backed? - Isis?
algae64 , 12 Apr 2017 12:47
Until the Saudis, US & UK decide that enough is enough, then this idiocy will continue. Assad is a better leader for Syria than Isis, Al Qaeda, or the other Saudi-backed groups would be.

Syria was secular and religiously tolerant under Assad. It won't be either of those things if Assad is deposed. More than likely, it would end up as a Saudi-style Islamic theocracy with the harshest head-chopping, hand-chopping version of sharia law.

BorisMalden , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble

Did Assad deliberately bring his country into civil war? When his forces are being attacked by rebels sponsored by foreign groups, he really only has two choices: give up leadership and allow the rebels to take over the country, or fight back. Given that you're arguing that a regime change is a bad idea it logically follows that you support the second option, so it hardly seems fair to criticise him for the consequences of that resistance. You might do better to blame the rebels and those who sponsor them for bringing war to what was previously a (relatively) peaceful country.

Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
This Regime Change Policy adopted by the US and in many, if not all cases, supported by the UK, whilst in some case toppling Dictators, has left nothing but chaos in its wake.

We need to consider the case of Syria, very carefully, as we may well find ourselves handing the Country to ISIL on a plate.

Better to help Assad stabilise the Country, and then discuss political change.

The rhetoric coming from the Foreign and Defence Secretaries, can do nothing to help, but make the UK look stupid.

aleph Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:56
"Better to help Assad stabilise the Country"

Hahahahaha, collude with crimes against humanity in the name of stability and call it progress because after six years we cannot think of an alternative. Great.

Oldfranky aleph , 12 Apr 2017 13:58
Are you sure it's only Assad, laugh all you will.
BorisMalden , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble

Did Assad deliberately bring his country into civil war? When his forces are being attacked by rebels sponsored by foreign groups, he really only has two choices: give up leadership and allow the rebels to take over the country, or fight back. Given that you're arguing that a regime change is a bad idea it logically follows that you support the second option, so it hardly seems fair to criticise him for the consequences of that resistance. You might do better to blame the rebels and those who sponsor them for bringing war to what was previously a (relatively) peaceful country.

Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
This Regime Change Policy adopted by the US and in many, if not all cases, supported by the UK, whilst in some case toppling Dictators, has left nothing but chaos in its wake.

We need to consider the case of Syria, very carefully, as we may well find ourselves handing the Country to ISIL on a plate.

Better to help Assad stabilise the Country, and then discuss political change.

The rhetoric coming from the Foreign and Defence Secretaries, can do nothing to help, but make the UK look stupid.

aleph Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:56
"Better to help Assad stabilise the Country"

Hahahahaha, collude with crimes against humanity in the name of stability and call it progress because after six years we cannot think of an alternative. Great.

Oldfranky aleph , 12 Apr 2017 13:58
Are you sure it's only Assad, laugh all you will.
Foracivilizedworld , 12 Apr 2017 12:44

Regime change in Syria? That would be a mistake

Absolutely no... it will be a colossal disaster... and would explode the entire region affecting not only all ME countries including Israel, but will extend to Europe and NA, You can't keep it all "Over There"

And I think Trump would do it.

SaracenBlade , 12 Apr 2017 12:43
Regime change, evidently the US has n't learned from the past experience. Look at Iraq, Lybia, regime change has resulted in complete chaos, instability, and perpetual conflict. Syrian population is strictly divided on sectarian line - Sunnis, Shias, Christians, Kurds. Who is going to make a cohesive government capable of running the affairs of the state? Bashar Assaad's father, Hafiz Assaad ruled Syria with an iron grip, he understood Syrian sectarian divide.
notDonaldTrump SaracenBlade , 12 Apr 2017 12:49
'regime change has resulted in complete chaos, instability, and perpetual conflict.'

If one tried to think impartially the evidence might lead one to think that was the plan all along.

BlueCollar notDonaldTrump , 12 Apr 2017 15:50
If any country needs regime change, it is Saudi Arabia. All important positions are controlled by hundreds of Royals of Al Saud, even honest criticism of royals brings you closer to the back swing of executioner .
timefliesby , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
Have we learnt nothing?
zolotoy timefliesby , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
Some of us have learned to be very comfortable with scraps from the war machine table -- Western legacy media in particular.
moreorless2 , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
My newsagent loves Assad. Why because he's a Syrian Christian. Assad is the only hope for the minority's in Syria. All of the opposition groups are some variation on Islamic nationalists. They will all happily slaughter anyone not of their faith. Assad is a murdering bastard but he kills those that threaten him. In Middle Eastern terms he's a liberal.
Terra_Infirma , 12 Apr 2017 12:39
Quite right. What the people of Syria need is stability and an end to the fighting. All else is secondary. In particular, the greatest crime that the West has committed in recent decades is the attempt to foist democracy on countries like Syria and Iraq, where it simply does not work. Even now, Western liberals dream of sitting Sunni, Shia, Alevi, Kurds, secularists and Islamic militants around a table to talk through to a democratic and mutually acceptable future for Syria. This is a fantasy - as democracy always is in heavily tribalised societies. It can only end in renewed civil war and inevitable dictatorship. I often wonder whether the West is just naive in these attempts at liberal cultural imperialism, or whether they are in fact a cynical front to mask the equally egregious aim of checkmating Russian influence in the region. Either way, shame on us.
StrongMachine Terra_Infirma , 12 Apr 2017 12:47
Are you calling George W Bush a liberal?
PSmd Terra_Infirma , 12 Apr 2017 13:07
It's not liberal cultural imperialism. It's painted as that to sell to domestic audiences.

It's liberal economic imperialism.

sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
Now to be fair, no one knows really what the president is thinking, not even apparently his chief diplomat or his UN envoy, who have sent conflicting messages. But let's cut to the chase – this is a very, very bad idea.

WW3 is definately a very very bad idea.

The idea that the US can change the government of another country for the better is born of US arrogance and lying manipulation.

juster , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
It's a bit funny that we just casually mention that the country harping on about the respect of the international rule book sinc 2014 vaiolate one of the core UN charter principles 72 times and is openly speaking of braking it the 73th time.

Jsut picture China saying openly their goal is to change the Abe regime in Tokio or Russia to change the regime in Kiev. They can't even have a pefered presidential candidate without mass interference hysteria and we just feel like it's A OK to go around the world changing who's in charge of countries.

freeandfair juster , 12 Apr 2017 16:58
> They can't even have a pefered presidential candidate without mass interference hysteria and we just feel like it's A OK to go around the world changing who's in charge of countries.

An excellent point.

bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 12:35
There are two main choices... Regime change... which hasn't worked out well where it's been attempted or just let the despots get on with it...

There are no easy answers but perhaps the only way is to let dictators crush and annihilate their opposition, utilise death squads to make dissenters disappear in the dead of night and, outwardly at least pretend everything is rosey....

If we, as a civilised society are able to 'look the other way' then that might be the simple answer... just hope everyone can sleep well at night and be grateful that, however much you hate our present government they aren't out gassing (allegedly) Guardian readers.

Jared Hall bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
Not gassing people no, but still killing plenty of "innocent little babies" bombing hospitals and helping the Saudis cluster bomb fishing villages. Why don't we see pictures on TV of Yemeni kids mutilated by American bombs? How do we sleep with that?
bemusedfromdevon Jared Hall , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
We're pulling the trigger??

And that makes supporting a tyrant who will do anything a satisfactory solution to you?

Sounds like crocodile tears to me.

SterlingPound Jared Hall , 12 Apr 2017 13:11
Well, we saw the aftermath of a deliberate attack by Saudis planes on a clearly demarcated Yemeni hospital on the BBC last year. The first rocket hit an arriving ambulance with civilian casualties and a doctor on board. The response of the Saudi shills in the Commons - what is it about the British upper class and the Arabs, I wonder - was to demand forcefully that the Saudis set up an inquiry to examine the evidence of a war crime.

It should have been sadly obvious from the get-go that we had to back Assad before he attempted to beat his father's record for murder and repression, the whole family's fucking insane, but it's long past too late now. He's soiled goods and Tillerson's untutored idea of elections is surely farcical.

Muzzledagain , 12 Apr 2017 12:35
Fair article, although ISI and rebels actively participated in the destruction of Syria. If Assad falls, anarchy due to vacuum will follow, guaranteed. Agree with the last paragraph in particular and still wondering why they (the West) don't do it especially pressuring the countries that feed the rebels, and they are not so moderate, with money and weapon. Unless this is because of the infamous pipeline. Tragic state of affair indeed.
Aethelfrith , 12 Apr 2017 12:31
Decade after decade, the west has interfered or overthrown government after governemnt , all over the world , mainly for the benefit of capitalist puppeteers . America has been the worst , one only has to look at the CIA's track record in South America when legitimately elected governments were ousted by force so that "American business" interest were looked after.

This same vested self interest has been the driving force over the last few years. The interventions in Iraq , Libya, Afghanistan have all been total disasters fro the regions and resulted in more deaths than any tin pot dictator could have achieved. Backing so called "moderate" terrorists seems to be the excuse to get involved.

More moral achievement and good could have been achieved by widespread dropping of food around the world , or even the cost of the military hegemony being given as cash handouts to poor people , but this simplistic altruism does not allow for the geopolitical control games that is the true beating heart of western aggression.

austinpratt , 12 Apr 2017 12:30
And it will serve as a welcome distraction from the lack of domestic achievements by the U.S. govt.
Fort Sumpter austinpratt , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
Theresa could also do with some distraction from her shambolic government and the whole Brexit disaster.
timefliesby austinpratt , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
Got to agree. Dead cat. Nobody is talking about links and the FBI any more and Putin is mentioned on a new context.

Approval ratings from US voters?

Moo1234 Fort Sumpter , 12 Apr 2017 12:45
We are all Brexiteers now. I voted remain, but accept the democratic will of the people. Blame David Cameron and get on with the job of making a success of it, rather than whining about it....
dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 12:30
What if this was Apartheid era South Africa and the white minority were bombing the hell out of the majority black civilians who wanted them out?
duthealla dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 12:49
Nobody intervened in South Africa despite massacres like Sharpeville....perhaps it would've let to full on racial war though?
dusktildawn duthealla , 12 Apr 2017 12:55
I'm just saying people making the case for the West to back off would probably be saying the opposite in that case if the white minority were massacring black people on the scale of Syria. Isn't that hypocrisy?
Fort Sumpter dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:04
It isn't hypocrisy because your South African scenario bears little resemblance to what is happening in Syria. Simple as that.
Moo1234 , 12 Apr 2017 12:28
Boris obviously has a more pressing engagement over Easter.
BeanstalkJack , 12 Apr 2017 12:27
Regime change - a phrase that reminds us imperialism is alive and well.
Gandalf66 BeanstalkJack , 12 Apr 2017 12:47
The successful regime changes mentioned in the article such as Poland and the rest of the Eastern bloc were initiated by the people themselves, rather than the the "help" of a foreign power.
BeanstalkJack Gandalf66 , 12 Apr 2017 13:03
The people did it all by themselves did they? So nothing to do with the economic collapse of the Soviet Union caused by an arms race ramped up by President Reagan. Nothing to do with a very costly war in Afghanistan?
sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:27
Given the situation, it is understandable why some people may think ousting Assad is necessary. Such thinking has a long pedigree in the United States, where there is a robust belief in a supposed American ability to fix what is wrong.

I think the word is arrogance rather than belief.

Mates Braas sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 14:51
I think the word is arrogance rather than belief...............and exceptionalism.
brucebaby , 12 Apr 2017 12:26
Trump is the new boy on the block, trying to use missiles as a penis substitute.

Sorry, but simple definitions are sometimes correct.

yshani brucebaby , 12 Apr 2017 13:19
Would you have said the same thing in 1917 and 1940. Would you have said the same thing in the duration of the cold war. If US did not have a bigger penis then you would not be around to comment about it.

Long live the US penis and may it grow longer and stronger.

brucebaby yshani , 12 Apr 2017 13:26
WW2 was won principally by the USSR, who suffered many more casualties than the western alliances. The cold war would not have happened if not for the USA.

Sorry, the USA is more of a threat to the planet than any country, and Trump is unintelligent, a real threat to the world.

MacMeow brucebaby , 12 Apr 2017 17:01

WW2 was won principally by the USSR

That old clunker again, it's like the war in the Pacific never happened.

Sorry4Soul , 12 Apr 2017 12:26
Why it would be a mistake ?

Libya was such a success story.

Trumbledon , 12 Apr 2017 12:24
Finally, at long last, some sense.

I agree wholeheartedly; by far the best analysis I've read in this paper.

sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:24
If the US wants Assad ousted, they should support a UN investigation to find out WHO was at fault. Shoot first questions later? Hollywood Wild West thinking. The US has zero credibility. You simply cannot blame someone without having the facts independently checked out. Yet they didn't wait and decided to break interantional law instead.
joAnn chartier , 12 Apr 2017 12:23
There seems to be a crucial component of reality lacking in this opinion piece: rather than bombing and droning and etc, why does the 'world order' not stop the manufacture and distribution of weapons of mass destruction like barrel bombs, nuclear warheads etc etc -- where profits are made by arms manufacturers and their investors--oh, could that be the reason?
Fakecharitybuster , 12 Apr 2017 12:20
Quite. Assad is awful, but he is less awful that the Islamist alternatives, which are the only realistic alternatives. We should stop posturing and accept this unpalatable reality.
ganaruvian Fakecharitybuster , 12 Apr 2017 13:40
Spot-on!
Viva_Kidocelot , 12 Apr 2017 12:20
Much more level reporting, but still is framing the narrative as a brutal gas attack and is still a rush to judgement when the case is that bombs were dropped on a supply of toxic gas, most likely Phosgene.
Moo1234 , 12 Apr 2017 12:19
At last, some common sense. like Saddam and Gaddafi, Assad is a ruthless tyrant. What the West, including the petulant Boris Johnson need to realise is that Syria ISN'T the West. Don't impose your values on a country that isn't ready for them. The sickening hypocrisy of the British government would look very foolish if Putin pulled out and allowed Syria to fall to isis. Would Boris and Theresa put British troops on the ground to keep the extremists out of Turkey?
Gandalf66 Moo1234 , 12 Apr 2017 12:51
Why isn't Syria ready for Western values? After what the country has been through the people would probably leap at the chance of free elections. Prior to the conflict Syria was a multi-ethnic patchwork. Whatever happens to the country needs to be decided by the Syrians themselves.
Mates Braas Gandalf66 , 12 Apr 2017 14:50
"Why isn't Syria ready for Western values?"

The geopolitical status quo in the Middle East is unstable, and tribal affiliations/religious/ ethnic allegiances need to be carefully balanced and controlled. Something Lebanon, Libya, Syria and Iraq achieved reasonably peacefully for many years before all the US led interventions.

There is no evidence that the terrorists are fighting for democracy, although if westerners ask them that is what they will likely say.

shockolat1 , 12 Apr 2017 12:18
So Trump is unfit to govern because of his locker room humour and possible antics, but gas a few thousand people and hey presto! A darling of the left.
bemusedfromdevon shockolat1 , 12 Apr 2017 12:22
That's how it seems...
Fort Sumpter shockolat1 , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
Not the left. These writers are pro-British Establishment, pro mixed economy liberals. Soft right if anything.
zolotoy Fort Sumpter , 12 Apr 2017 12:51
You're talking about this rag. Take a look at what's coming out of Howard Dean's mouth, or Bernie Sanders's, or practically any Democrat in Washington not named Tulsi Gabbard.

Or, if you have a really strong stomach, take a look at Daily Kos.

They're what passes for "left" in America, unfortunately, because the number of SWP and Green Party members is statistically insignificant.

richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:17
"Given the situation, it is understandable why some people may think ousting Assad is necessary"

The Guardian reported that in Libya, the last country to benefit from US and "our" attempts at regime change there are now open air slave auctions.

So yeah, why not do the same in Syria; what is there to lose?

Mates Braas , 12 Apr 2017 12:16
Regime change is illegal under international law, except to the rogues of course found in western capitals, and their Gulf vassals. These are the only group of people in the entire planet who talk openly about overthrowing sovereign governments of other countries.

Imperial hubris knows no bounds.

tjt77 Mates Braas , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
The unfortunate truth is that, along with the ongoing decline of western civilization, one 'by-product' is that International Law is continually disdained. The USA, having lack of insightful leadership, does as it wants, when it wants .. the result is that perpetual wars seem to be a given .. meanwhile, Asia continues to rise and is growing real and genuine wealth by producing and exporting the goods the rest of the world consumes and is doing it very well..
jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:16
President Trump didn't do enough (yet) by bombing an air base at night. The people of Syria need weapons, tanks, missiles, air support, etc. from a country like the USA that stands for freedom and human rights. Assad, who lives by the sword should also die by the sword. For the U.S. to stand by and watch these atrocities unchallenged would simply be not who we are. I don't agree with President Trump on a lot of things, but on this point he is right. I have changed from not liking him at all to liking him just a bit more.
sceptic64 jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:24
And what comes after?
duthealla sceptic64 , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
That'd be a problem for the EU. We cook , you clean - as some neocon asshat said about Iraq.
richmanchester duthealla , 12 Apr 2017 13:14
Well the Guardian was reporting on open air slave auctions in

Libya this week.

So clearly arming "the people" and supplying air support worked well there.

Obviously the same course should be followed in Syria.

richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:15
"All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged. "

And that's Assad'd fault?

Or is it the fault of the originally US and still Gulf states/Turkey backed Wahhabis that have damaged them?

Trumbledon richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
All Assad's fault, if he hadn't tried to liberate Palmyra, it'd still be standi... Oh wait.
richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:14
"The logic is that by removing and replacing an undesirable leader, the political situation in the country will change. "

Absolute tosh.

The logic behind nearly all attempts at cold war regime change was to replace a regime which aligned itself with the USSR with one that aligned itself with the USA.

The internal situation, politically or otherwise was of no concern

Elinore richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:23
It would work in the USA.
Nietzschestache , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
Good piece. Regime change has been such a resounding success, you only have to look at Iraq and Libya to see that. Nor does a country which has a history of using napalm and carcinogenic defoliants any room to take the moral high ground.
sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
If Assad, is so bad, how come most of the civilian population prefer his areas to those of the rebels? The one certainty in all of this is that the MSM has sold its credibility. Most of what I see is vested interest propaganda.
pete8s sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:21
Isn't the main reason that people prefer Assad's areas because he doesn't bomb them.

There is no love of Assad anywhere.

If the US were to limit itself to punishing strikes against Assad whenever his forces committed war crimes – bombing hospitals using poison gas etc then a minor at the level of civilisation creeps back into the equation.

bemusedfromdevon sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
Perhaps because the rebel areas are getting the shit bombed out of them by the Russians and Assad...

How many heavy bombers and fighters do those fighting Assad have...?

Just think about it a little....

Fort Sumpter pete8s , 12 Apr 2017 12:26

There is no love of Assad anywhere.

How many Syrians do you know and how many times have you been there?

scipioafricanus , 12 Apr 2017 12:10
The situation will be even more fraught if other external actors turn any attempt at regime change into a proxy war, as Russia and Iran are likely to do.

A proxy war between the United States and Russia is the thing we all have to fear. In Trump and Putin you have two leaders who use brinkmanship to get what they want and who will never back down from any position no matter what the consequences. They'd rather pursue a misguided policy rathen than lose face. I'd like to think the recent war of words between the two countries is just bluster, but as each day goes by I'm no longer sure anymore.

Amanzim , 12 Apr 2017 12:10
Regime change should work if all parties believe in democracy and respect each other. That does not seem likely in the middle east. We have seen what that means forcing that idea in Iraq, Egypt and Libya. A secular SOB is better than somebody who believes in laws of yesteryears.
zankaon , 12 Apr 2017 12:09
Another way: reducing accidental use of chemical weapons?

Always drop 2 bombs; one from each side of ammunition dump. That way, one of such unmarked ordinance is likely to be conventional explosives. The latter would further disperse, and dilute (reduce density) of the chemical gas; hence lessening lethality.

Elinore , 12 Apr 2017 12:08
You could put Assad in the White House and Trump in Syria and and nothing would change except that the White House might be a tad more intelligent.
Gandalf66 Elinore , 12 Apr 2017 12:59
Assad is actually a qualified doctor so he's pretty intelligent. Strange that he's ignoring the Hippocratic Oath on a daily basis.
jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:08
So we agree on the final result (need for regime change which by the way the article conflicts with its own title), but we disagree on the method. Many bottoms-up revolutions would not have been successful without outside help. The French helped America achieve freedom although their reason was somewhat revengeful. The people of Syria have no chance against an army and tanks ruled by a ruthless evil dictator like Assad without outside assistance. If you think they are not shedding enough blood for their freedom, then you are living in a hole in the ground.
Mickmarrs jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:18
Yeah and the guys that get in are head loppers
ProfJake , 12 Apr 2017 12:05
Well said. Worth taking a look at Global Peace Index, which is produced annually by the Sydney-based Institute for Economics and Peace:

http://visionofhumanity.org/indexes/global-peace-index /

In the latest iteration for 2016, the bottom ten places in the Index, reserved for the least peaceful countries on earth, include Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya: four countries where "regime change" has been brought about – or, in Syria's case, where there is arguably an ongoing attempt to bring it about – by the use of military force.

The evidence so far is that the use of force to topple regimes does not make things better, even when the behaviour of those regimes is/was objectionable in many ways.

Fort Sumpter , 12 Apr 2017 12:05

He has reduced once great Syrian cities such as Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged.

Nope. Most of Homs and Aleppo are intact. The areas occupied by foreign Jihadists using the local populace as human shields were heavily bombed but now they have been liberated.

Who was it who destroyed these heritage sites? Not the SAA. The Jihadists even filmed themselves doing it and posted the videos online for goodness sake.

mp66 , 12 Apr 2017 12:04
Bashar al-Assad is not a good person. He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco World Heritage sites have been damaged.

So thousands of mostly foreign jihadists occupying parts of those cities had nothing to do with it? Did the US led forces in now n Mosul, or before that in Fallujah find the way to dislodge terrorists from urban strongholds without devastation of the city? Also for all world heritage sites in Syria, they were defended by Syrian troops, and everything that could be moved was moved to safe place. It was exclusively jihadists that were destroying temples, churches, shrines, even muslim graveyards when they found the funeral momunent "too tall". In all of these efforts to save the history of the humanity, syrian govermnent got no help nor acknowledgment. To add insult to injury, the western "cultural" response was touring 3D model of Palmyra gates through western capitals but while Daesh was methodically blowing it up under clear desert skies, there was interestingly not a single american drone to be found anywhere. It was syrian, iranian and russian blood spilled to liberate it twice from the death cult.

ID1941743 , 12 Apr 2017 12:02
Yep. There isn't a solution to this problem, but the one thing I'm 99.999% convinved will not work is 'the west' dusting off it's world policeman uniform and bombing the heck out of Syria.
ariaclast , 12 Apr 2017 12:01
This is precisely why the west has largely stayed out of the Syrian conflict; despite having a policy favouring the removal of Assad there hasn't been an attempt (or even the suggestion of an attempt at a policy level) at regime change.

One does wonder, though, at what point the conflict becomes so abhorrent and the civilian casualties so grotesque that our intervention could scarcely make things any worse

Vetinary ariaclast , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
Are you actually blind?
ariaclast Vetinary , 12 Apr 2017 12:15
Who said that?
LucyandTomDog , 12 Apr 2017 12:00
The US?

Syria?

Regime change?

Moi?

It seems that Spicer, the White House Press Secretary, whilst putting all his cerebral energy into attempting to apologise for his jaw-droppingly ignorant statement that Hitler never used chemical weapons on his own people, failed to stop his mouth making yet another gaffe;

"I needed to make sure that I clarified, and was not in any shape or form any more of a distraction from the president's decisive action in Syria and the attempts that he is making to destabilise the region and root out ISIS out of Syria."

(my emphasis)

Spicer speaks about the president's attempts to destabilise the region in a CNN television interview too.

As people are beginning to ask, does Spicer actually know what distabilise means?

zolotoy LucyandTomDog , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
I'm sure it was an unintentional but very revealing Freudian slip.

The advantage of letting dunces speak is that they're not very good at hiding what they think.

LucyandTomDog LucyandTomDog , 12 Apr 2017 13:21
Typo

'As people are beginning to ask, does Spicer actually know what distabilise means?'

Should be destabilise

Guy1ncognito , 12 Apr 2017 11:59

Bashar al-Assad is not a good person.

Don't hold back...

Moo1234 Guy1ncognito , 12 Apr 2017 12:22
Daesh/ isis are even less good people......
Gandalf66 Guy1ncognito , 12 Apr 2017 13:00
More like Assad is the least worst.
davshev , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
It bothers me that Trump is suddenly showing such concern toward innocent Syrians. Yet, at the same time he wants a ban on immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Syria.
sceptic64 davshev , 12 Apr 2017 12:15
Don't you think the timing here is - for Trump - rather convenient? Just when he is under pressure for being a Russian patsy, something happens to allow him to portray himself as 'standing up to Putin'.

This whole thing stinks.

davshev sceptic64 , 12 Apr 2017 12:26
Right. Also, the question should be...if Putin is sleazy enough to be complicit with Syria, then why wouldn't they be sleazy enough to be involved in trying to swing the American election?
zolotoy davshev , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
Good question. How sleazy is it to be complicit with Al Qaeda, the only entity on the planet that the USA is semiofficially at war with?
scipioafricanus , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
In essence there must be incremental change in the political climate and culture of a state amongst the masses before it culminates in regime change at the top.

The political climate is no longer there because Assad has systematically murdered everyone who could have formed a credible oppostion to his regime; opposition activitsts, aid workers, doctors and nurses, journalists - all have either been killed, have fled to Europe, or are currently being tortured in one of his detention centres. There is no one left to rise up against him.

The intervention triggers resentment and hostility at the new government whose legitimacy is reduced through the participation of an outside government. Soon the new regime is considered a 'puppet' and its own existence is questioned by the people.

This is indeed true. However backing Assad also has its costs; where is the legitimacy of someone who is now merely a "puppet" for Russia and Iran's ambitions in the region?

As uncomfortable as it is the best western governments can do is to provide aid and assistance to those in distress, whilst pressuring those countries that continue to feed money and weapons to the combatants to change their positions.

As reasonable as this sounds, I'm afraid this is just wishful thinking.

Mates Braas scipioafricanus , 12 Apr 2017 14:37
"The political climate is no longer there because Assad has systematically murdered everyone who could have formed a credible oppostion to his regime;"

There is a credible position inside Syria which has been largely ignored by the western MSM and governments, because it does not support the uprisisng or the violent overthrow of the Syrian government. It was refused participation when the first peace talks were arranged.

lemonsuckingpedant , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
Wow, a Guardian article I can finally wholeheartedly agree with. Does this Professor chap have a hotline to Trump and the rest of the Western leaders itching for a fight with Assad?
zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 11:53
Why do I get the feeling this is just another one of those "Now that Trump is in charge, we shouldn't do regime change" pieces? I note that the author nowhere comes out against fighting an eternal war in Syria -- he just doesn't want Trump doing the "regime change."

Yeah, he blabbers on about "aid and assistance" and "pressuring those countries that continue to feed money and weapons to the combatants to change their positions" -- obviously choosing to ignore how several western governments provide money and weapons to the combatants (should they be "pressuring" themselves?) But the pinnacle of his cluelessness -- or his agenda -- is reached with this whopper:

The situation will be even more fraught if other external actors turn any attempt at regime change into a proxy war, as Russia and Iran are likely to do.

--as if this hadn't been a proxy war for years already, one in which his own country has been quite actively engaged.
Janeira1 zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
Didn't notice Iraq faring too well the last time the US intervened in regime change.
jamie evans , 12 Apr 2017 11:50
Trump told him over some cake?

This idiot has got to go, he is not rational. He clearly has not an inkling of the gravity of his actions. Nor does he care. How did we get to this? We always thought that a rogue state would be the end of us all. We were wrong. This moron is doing it all by himself. Some one needs to step in, take back control. This is frightening stuff.

Assad's removal would be catastrophic. There would be no stable government in Syria, it would be controlled by warlords backed by Saudi Arabia, al-Qaeda or ISIS and millions of refugees would have no country to return to or to live in. This will mean more refugees in Europe, more destabilisation and more money drained from our treasuries.

Russia would also be far from pleased and if the conflict erupted into a confrontation between NATO affiliated forces in Syria against Russia, the Eastern European front will become a lot more precarious (at a time when Britain is cutting back on military spending and very few European countries adequately contribute towards NATO). Do we really want a repeat of tensions from the pre-1991 era? I don't think so, especially with the combined threat of domestic Islamic terrorism throughout Europe and with the continental debt crisis that cannot afford more wars that are not in its interests. Russia will quickly mobilise its forces into the non-Russian caucuses, already closely aligned with Armenia and potentially link up with Iran territoriality. And what about Turkey? They cannot be relied upon.

So what benefit exactly is it to create anarchy in Syria for Britain's immediate and long-term interests? The destruction of Libya has created nothing but chaos and a stream of migrants from across Africa. Why Boris Johnson is waltzing around the world demanding hard action against Russia when we are cutting back on our armed forces is startling. A better question would be in whose immediate economic and geopolitical interests is the destruction of Assad beneficial? Well... there's two countries in the Middle East which come to mind... not hard to guess.

dusktildawn Jack1R , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
That's fair enough but what if Assad stays in power? Will the refugees, who mainly fled him, return? Will anyone invest in rebuilding the country? WIll anyone deal with the country other than Russia or Iran? Above all will the hatred of Assad, terrorism or indeed the conflict as a whole recede?
Jack1R dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:02
They didn't flee him... they fled the war. Most people, in any country, are apolitical. I expect the refugees in the Middle East and Anatolia will return to Syria and those in the West must be forced to return back.

The problem with Syria now is that it has become such a hot plate. If the West concedes to Russia and allows Syria to survive under the rule of Assad then we will lose face internationally... and it would be domestically embarrassing. No doubt Saudi Arabia, Israel and the Gulf monarchies would be less than pleased, and we depend on them for a lot of our oil.

It's a difficult question but what we do know is that there are no other credible groups that can rule Syria at the moment, other than Assad's Alawite minority. If we decide to nation-build, that will cost billions, possibly even trillions with no concrete result as our attempt in Iraq shows and we have no idea who we would put in charge. The Christians have about as much legitimacy as the Alawites. Perhaps the only conceivable outcome would be the breakup of Syria. The Christian and Alawite regions go towards Lebanon, the Kurdish regions are given independence and the Sunni areas are also given an independent state. But of course, the Sunni and Christian areas are intertwined and many Sunni's support Assad, or at least do not oppose him. And Turkey, as well as Iran, would never allow an independent Kurdistan. Iran would be less than pleased with the breakup of Syria as well.

I want to see a post-Assad plan. We all know what happens to non-Sunni minorities when a secular Arab leader is toppled. No one has yet to provide a coherent post-Assad state-structure. Unless of course they want Turkey to territoriality expand... we want to preserve the post-Ottoman borders and state-system yet at the same time we're waging war against the forces actively preserving it.

There is no simple answer. Assad is a pawn of Russia and Iran, yet the other options are either Turkish expansion (which, the last time they did that, they had sizeable European territories) or Saudi expansion (which I hope everyone agrees is less than desirable). We have no friends in the Middle East, other than Jordan, Egypt and Israel. But they all have their own interests and I suspect their friendships are determined upon those interests. I think our aim is to maintain the balance of power. Perhaps only the growth of Israel could act as a counter-weight to Sunni and Shia interests.

Alderbaran Jack1R , 12 Apr 2017 13:04
Would you support another leader from perhaps the same party taking over as an interim measure whilst different factions are brought together to defeat ISIS?

In an ideal world, I would love to see this happening, along with a form of truth and reconciliation commission, and a commitment from the international community and other bodies independent of the Syrian government to assist in tackling issues such as warlordism and corruption. The dogmatic belief that there can be no leader other than Assad is one that might have ultimately cost millions of lives and it would be wrong to use the old dictator's mantra of 'me or chaos'. And to be fair, Assad does not have a great track record in Syria.

And a final question - do you believe Russia should be doing more to put pressure on Assad or do you think it will be happy to put its international credibility on the line for him? (There is something pathological I believe in Putin's willingness to support other dictators)

Laurence Bury , 12 Apr 2017 11:50
How can one call for 'peaceful transition to a new society' when the original opposition to Assad was sponsored by multifarious power-hungry foreign actors? They exploited the Arab Spring pro-democracy utopianism then messed up their insurrectional strategy disastrously. The country now needs to be made a protectorate of an international peace-keeping force until a representative transitional government is agreed upon.
WellmeaningBob Laurence Bury , 12 Apr 2017 12:11
A little contradictory, no? Oh we fucked up, so you need to be colonised anyway.
Laurence Bury WellmeaningBob , 12 Apr 2017 12:19
No, that sounds like the pseudo-leftist neo-colonial discourse that Obama was so fond of.

The counter-argument to regime change is more that by now Assad controls most cities again, the opposition are awful sectarians who should be let nowhere near power and it may still be possible to contain IS to a manageable extent while Assad maintains a dictatorship indefinitely.

WellmeaningBob Laurence Bury , 12 Apr 2017 12:27
Not quite sure what you mean. Just saying that the "man on the street" would more likely than not understand "protectorate" pretty much the same as e.g. the Moroccans did.
Mates Braas elan , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
Civil war means that both sides are killing their own people.
zolotoy jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 11:57
Only because his opposition is even more barbaric.
Fort Sumpter jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 12:09
'indiscriminate weapons'

Oh dear, are they rally still pushing this 'our weapons don't kill civilians' BS?

No need for evidence of chlorine gas bombs apparently.

And anyone who questions the MSM narrative and who is sickened by endless war is an 'apologist'. What are you but an apologist for war?

Mates Braas jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 12:23
Unfortunately, there is no way to make war nice.
SeeNOevilHearNOevil , 12 Apr 2017 11:42
Regime change in Syria was being talked directly since 9/11 and it never stopped. It's on the record. So is john Kerry, on record on TV, stating gulf states offered to cover part of the costs of a US invasion in Syria at least twice way before the so called ''civil war'' even started.

They prepared it for years but the poor taste Iraq/Libya left on the US public meant the US pulled out of the deal (all because of the planed gas pipelines from Qatar to Europe that has to go through Syria).

The Saudis along with Qatar, Turkey and Israel believed they could force the hand of the US and acted alone initiating the takeover. This is why despite the intel, organisation and provision of what is estimated to be 300k(german estimates) foreign jihadists eventually came to a standstill without direct US support.

The Jihadists then prematurely jumped the gun fragmented creating ISIS (something meant to take place behind the scenes after they defeated Assad)

The point is of course...it's all about oil...nothing about democracy or Gas or any of that crap

hpe974 SeeNOevilHearNOevil , 12 Apr 2017 16:26
Of course it is!! The USA is truly the biggest sponsor of terror and mayhem and destruction in the M.E.
namjodh , 12 Apr 2017 11:38
Yes, this is all quite true. What the USA almost always seems to do is create a power vacuum in the countries it attempts to "save" and, inevitably it seems, the USA always chooses the wrong damn party or person to support in said vacuum. A stunning misreading and proof of the failure of American foreign policy "experts" and CIA strategists to grasp the realities on the ground.
HuckelburryPin namjodh , 12 Apr 2017 11:46

Yes, this is all quite true. What the USA almost always seems to do is create a power vacuum in the countries it attempts to "save" and, inevitably it seems, the USA always chooses the wrong damn party or person to support in said vacuum.

Like in Japan. Just that Japan is ... Shinto. Or something. Not M.........

WellmeaningBob namjodh , 12 Apr 2017 12:04
I'm sure its fair to say that for many instability, disorder, mayhem and the like are entirely desirable. Witness Kissinger who out-and-out advocated/advocates looking after US long-term interests through war, disease and starvation.
ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 11:37
Scott Ritter has been commenting on the alleged Assad gas attacks . Unlike the MSM the former Iraq weapons inspector seems far from convinced.
Levant1998 ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 13:46
Former UN weapons inspector Richard Lloyd, and Professor Theodore Posto of MIT also authored a piece:

http://m.dw.com/en/is-assad-to-blame-for-the-chemical-weapons-attack-in-syria/a-38330217

jadamsj ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 17:12

Scott Ritter has been commenting on the alleged Assad gas attacks. Unlike the MSM the former Iraq weapons inspector seems far from convinced.

What that before or after Russia blocked an investigation into it?

ploughmanlunch , 12 Apr 2017 11:35
'The on-going devastation in Syria cries out for a response, 'do something' is the inherent plea.'

Might I suggest sending generous quantities of bubble wrap to each of the 'something must be done' brigade. Popping those bubbles is relaxing and calming. They will otherwise impatiently agitate for some ineffective, or more likely counter-productive measure that makes things drastically worse.

zolotoy ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 11:46
Not very sensible, actually -- see the comment by capatriot above (or below, if you do "newest first"). Rather appalling that someone with academic credentials would (1) engage in a comic book-style analysis of world politics (big bad nearly omnipotent supervillain!) and (2) put all the blame for the carnage and destruction on one side.
EdmundLange , 12 Apr 2017 11:29
We tried to change the leader in Iraq. It didn't work, and now the country is a hotbed of terrorism and incredibly corrupt and ineffectual government. We tried to change the leader in Libya. It didn't work, and now the country is a hotbed of terrorism and incredibly corrupt and ineffectual government. I guess we could try to change the leader in Syria, if we really, really want.
EdmundLange jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 11:58
Excellent, I'm glad we're going to topple Assad so the Jihadists can take control. Just what we needed.
capatriot , 12 Apr 2017 11:26

He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble.

What, he, personally? What is he, superman? And I wonder why he'd choose to do that to his own nation's cities?

But wait, you mean that there was a rebellion against the recognized government which developed into a civil war, aided and abetted by sectarian outsiders and terrorists and the United States/West, with political and religious/ethnic overtones? And that later, as it looked like the recognized govt was going to fail, other interested outsiders like Russia and Iran intervened to help it?

Gosh, I wonder what the least worst outcome for the people of Syria actually is here ... perhaps we should leave it to them?

zolotoy jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
It's actually a very serious question. How much control does Assad have over his government, let alone his armed forces? He's a trained dentist, ferchrissakes, and his older brother was the one groomed for the <strike>throne</strike> presidency. It makes sense to assume that his powers over an entrenched nomenklatura, to say nothing of all of the different armed factions nominally serving him, aren't limitless.

[Apr 12, 2017] Did Assad Really Use Sarin

Notable quotes:
"... Paul Gottinger ..."
"... is a journalist based in Madison, WI whose work focuses on the Middle East. He can be reached via Twitter @paulgottinger or email: [email protected] ..."
Apr 12, 2017 | www.counterpunch.org

Almost immediately after video of the alleged chemical weapons attack in Idlib hit Western media, Assad was declared guilty by US news networks and political commentators. The front page of the New York Times on April 5 th showed a heartbreaking image of a child wounded in the alleged chemical attack with a headline claiming Assad was responsible.

By the afternoon of April 7, a US attack seemed inevitable as both Rex Tillerson and Trump said action would be taken.

Between Democrats and Republicans, a bipartisan consensus emerged, rare in the Trump presidency, whereby Assad was deemed guilty and Trump was goaded on to attack. The few voices of dissent seemed mostly concerned with the lack of constitutional approval for the strike

The night of the strike, US media snapped into DPRK-style, state media mode. TV pundits fell into a trance while expressing the " beauty " of American power being unleashed on a country already destroyed by 6 years of war.

Pundits described the attack as "surgical" despite the pentagon quietly admitting one of the missiles missed its target and they don't know where it landed. My questions to both CENTCOM and the Secretary of Defense Office on the missing cruise missile have thus far gone unanswered. However, Syrian sources claim civilians were killed in the missile strike.

Trump justified the attack by invoking religiously themed buzzwords and unconvincing blather on the "beautiful babies" murdered in the chemical attack.

Following the attack, Trump officials' statements indicated there was a shift towards regime change. UN ambassador Nikki Haley said Sunday that removing Assad is now a priority.

The Neocon sharks have started circling too. Bill Kristol tweeted that these strikes should be used to move towards regime change in Iran. Marco Rubio, Lindsey Graham, and John McCain have all joined in too, their mouths watering at the thought of ousting Assad.

But was Assad really responsible for the attack?

To ask such a question is to be deemed an "Assadist" by pundits and discourse police across the political spectrum.

Neither the lack of an independent investigation, nor the fact that nearly all the information on the alleged attack has come from rebel sources, who stand to benefit from a US response, is deemed sufficient cause for skepticism.

In a civilized society an actor is be presumed to be innocent until proven guilty. If guilt is determined, a legally justified course of action is taken. In the US however, if the accused is a US enemy, no evidence is needed, and even deranged conspiracies are given play in mainstream media coverage.

The best recent example of this is the US media's conspiracy about Russia stealing the US election and working for Trump. The US media has stooped so low as to even push bizarre conspiracies by Louise Mensch . She recently claimed the 2014 uprising in Ferguson was a Russian plot.

In the case of the alleged attack on Khan Sheikhun, US officials and pro-war experts immediately declared Assad's guilty and then cheered on an illegal use of force. This is all very reminiscent of the lead up to the Iraq war.

In an eerie coincidence, Michael R. Gordon, who with Judith Miller helped sell the Iraq WMD story to Americans, coauthored the New York Times April 4th article on Assad's alleged sarin attack at Khan Sheikhun.

To help sell the sarin narrative, the US media brought on a doctor to describe the alleged attack that has been accused of helping kidnap journalists in his work with extremists.

When the US investigated its own airstrike in Mosul this March, it took a number of days before it admitted it had killed hundreds of civilians. Yet, guilt was immediately assigned in the Khan Sheikhun attack.

In 2013, the US media also rushed to the conclusion Assad used sarin in a horrific incident in Ghouta. The US was on the verge of attacking Assad then, but Obama decided against it. Obama claimed he held off because US intelligence voiced skepticism about Assad's guilt.

The UN investigation on the Ghouta attack took almost a month and even its conclusions have been disputed.

In December of 2013, Seymour Hersh published a lengthy investigation into the 2013 attack in Ghouta and found reason to doubt Assad's responsibility for attack. He was forced to publish it in the London Review of Books after the New York Times and the Washington Post refused to run it.

He reported that classified US reports claimed that Syria's al Qaeda affiliate had "mastered the mechanics of creating sarin".

A month after Hersh's piece appeared, a MIT study cast further doubt on the US government's story by demonstrating that the rockets used in the Ghouta attack couldn't have flown as far as the US government claimed.

Ted Postol, one of the authors of the study said, "We were within a whisker of war based on egregious errors."

In this latest alleged gas attack, a few individuals have dared question the state narrative.

The journalist Robert Parry has recently claimed there is much to be made of the fact that Mike Pompeo, the CIA Director, wasn't among those helping sell this latest sarin story to the American people. He believes it indicates doubt in the CIA over Assad's involvement.

Scott Ritter, a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq, has raised skepticism over Assad's involvement. He says rebels have had chemical weapons facilities in Syria and some of the witnesses' statements describe a strong smell during the attack, which indicates something other than sarin was used.

The Canadian government originally called for an investigation and stopped short of blaming Assad at the UN, but then later championed Trump's strikes.

Groups like Organizations for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and Human Rights Watch are still investigating the alleged attack in Khan Sheikhun.

Whether these groups or others will be able to conduct an independent investigation is not known. But in usual fashion, the US had no interest in investigating facts, which may provide the wrong answers.

It's possible that Assad carried out the attack, but just because he's a reprehensible figure doesn't mean there is no need to present evidence and conduct an independent investigation.

What's clear now is that the US attack benefitted jihadi groups, has made further US military action more likely, and has increased the chances of a direct military confrontation with Russia. All of these results are very dangerous.

Future US military action in Syria should be resisted with popular pressure. History shows we can't count on the media or pundits to act as the voice of reason. Join the debate on Facebook

Paul Gottinger is a journalist based in Madison, WI whose work focuses on the Middle East. He can be reached via Twitter @paulgottinger or email: [email protected]

[Apr 12, 2017] Regime change in Syria? That would be a mistake by Prof Michael John Williams

Notable quotes:
"... The intervention triggers resentment and hostility at the new government, the legitimacy of which is reduced through the participation of an outside government. ..."
"... In late 2015, Eren Erdem, a Turkish MP, said in Parliament that the Turkish state was permitting Da'esh to send sarin precursors to Syria. He had a file of evidence, so was accused of treason for accessing and publicizing confidential material. The investigation into the people responsible for the transfer of toxic chemicals was shut down. ..."
"... Al-Assad is certainly capable of murdering opponents, and not bothering too much about collateral damage, but strategically it makes no sense for him to do this now, when peace talks under the aegis of Russia and Iran have begun, and the world is watching. Also, Assad has been engaged in a reconciliation process, allowing members of the FSA to return to the Syrian army, and Aleppans remain in Damascus if they didn't wish to go to Idlib. At such a juncture, using chemical weapons would be counter-productive. If Sarin was used at his command, he should be properly prosecuted: but bombing a Syrian air base merely assists Da'esh and its cronies. ..."
"... I have just watched the press conference in which Trump labelled Assad a butcher, and went on again about dead babies. I just wish that someone at one of these conferences would have the guts to point out to Trump his own butchery. ..."
"... Anyone watching this performance would think that US forces had never been responsible for killing innocent civilians, men, women, children and babies. To listen to Trump, you wouldn't think that US forces had ever killed over 150 civilians in Mosul, dozens in Raqqa, or had bombed hospitals in Afghanistan, or schools in Iraq, or were supporting the Saudi blockade of Yemen resulting in the starvation of children and babies, or had destroyed wedding parties with drones,.....I could go on. ..."
"... If Assad is a butcher, he is only a junior, apprentice, corner-shop butcher. Trump is the real thing, the large-scale, wholesale, expert butcher. ..."
"... Gotta get that pipeline in for the Saudi's, eh, no matter how many children's carcasses it crosses, yay, regime change again, yay, and a heap of new terrorists for our kids in the west to dodge and duck, yay. ..."
"... Despite the several misrepresentations, the facts are that Britain has been one of the main protagonists in prosecuting this war against Syria , which is a proxy war against Iran. ..."
"... Britain was at the forefront in setting up the Al Nusra Front and in hosting the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights to disseminate deeply negative propaganda about the Syrian Government and armed forces. ..."
"... Every step of this including the media campaign which has comprised a major part of the military campaign against Syria, has been an attempt to delegitimize the Sovereign government and its institutions and to gain consensus from the somnambulistic British and US public for yet another direct military campaign against another Middle Eastern country. ..."
"... Assad's removal would be catastrophic. There would be no stable government in Syria, it would be controlled by warlords backed by Saudi Arabia, al-Qaeda or ISIS and millions of refugees would have no country to return to or to live in. This will mean more refugees in Europe, more destabilisation and more money drained from our treasuries. ..."
Apr 12, 2017 | www.theguardian.com

The intervention triggers resentment and hostility at the new government, the legitimacy of which is reduced through the participation of an outside government.

Soon, the new regime is considered a "puppet" and its existence is questioned by the people. Interestingly, the Middle East has proven particularly resistant to durable regime change and democratization, further making the success of any US-led intervention doubtful.

The situation will be even more fraught if other external actors turn any attempt at regime change into a proxy war, as Russia and Iran are likely to do. The US experienced the downside of this during the ill-conceived war in Vietnam. During the Soviet-led war in Afghanistan, the US played the spoiler of Soviet efforts, funnelling money and weapons to the anti-Soviet mujahideen, turning the USSR's intervention into a protracted, bloody war.

Prof Michael John Williams is Director of the International Relations Program at New York University.

ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 17:57
Those interested in how the MSM fell in love with terrorists in Syria should go back and check out Charlie Skelton's illuminating piece from The Guardian 2012 .
Ciarán Here , 12 Apr 2017 17:48
The Gulf of Tonkin, WMD in Iraq...
Ciarán Here , 12 Apr 2017 17:46
Did the USA bomb war planes that they said had been used to carry chemical weapons - a chemical attack!
Robert Rudolph , 12 Apr 2017 17:40
Instead, the western powers have followed the example cited by Machiavelli: "in order to prove their liberality, they allowed Pistoia to be destroyed."

... ... ..

1Cedar , 12 Apr 2017 17:39
In late 2015, Eren Erdem, a Turkish MP, said in Parliament that the Turkish state was permitting Da'esh to send sarin precursors to Syria. He had a file of evidence, so was accused of treason for accessing and publicizing confidential material. The investigation into the people responsible for the transfer of toxic chemicals was shut down.

That surely ought to make us at least ask evidence-seeking questions about the Idlib gas attack before yet again demanding regime change.

Al-Assad is certainly capable of murdering opponents, and not bothering too much about collateral damage, but strategically it makes no sense for him to do this now, when peace talks under the aegis of Russia and Iran have begun, and the world is watching. Also, Assad has been engaged in a reconciliation process, allowing members of the FSA to return to the Syrian army, and Aleppans remain in Damascus if they didn't wish to go to Idlib. At such a juncture, using chemical weapons would be counter-productive. If Sarin was used at his command, he should be properly prosecuted: but bombing a Syrian air base merely assists Da'esh and its cronies.

unsouthbank , 12 Apr 2017 17:32
I have just watched the press conference in which Trump labelled Assad a butcher, and went on again about dead babies. I just wish that someone at one of these conferences would have the guts to point out to Trump his own butchery.

Anyone watching this performance would think that US forces had never been responsible for killing innocent civilians, men, women, children and babies. To listen to Trump, you wouldn't think that US forces had ever killed over 150 civilians in Mosul, dozens in Raqqa, or had bombed hospitals in Afghanistan, or schools in Iraq, or were supporting the Saudi blockade of Yemen resulting in the starvation of children and babies, or had destroyed wedding parties with drones,.....I could go on.

If Assad is a butcher, he is only a junior, apprentice, corner-shop butcher. Trump is the real thing, the large-scale, wholesale, expert butcher.

Ruthie Riegler , 12 Apr 2017 17:21
...Indeed, Richard Spencer last week protested outside the White House against the airstrikes on the regime airbase carrying a sign that read "No more wars 4 Israel."
NezPerce macmarco , 12 Apr 2017 17:37

There are two possible regimes, the Assad fascists, or the rebel jihadist

The Syrian government is Baathist, it was elected.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Socialist_Ba%27ath_Party_–_Syria_Region

http://www.france24.com/en/20160417-syria-bashar-assad-baath-party-wins-majority-parliamentary-vote

Latest update : 2016-04-17

Syria's ruling Baath party and its allies won a majority of seats in parliamentary elections last week across government-held parts of the country, the national electoral commission announced late Saturday.

Who are the rebels supported by Washington and Westminster?

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/aleppo-falls-to-syrian-regime-bashar-al-assad-rebels-uk-government-more-than-one-story-robert-fisk-a7471576.html

And we're going to learn a lot more about the "rebels" whom we in the West – the US, Britain and our head-chopping mates in the Gulf – have been supporting.

They did, after all, include al-Qaeda (alias Jabhat al-Nusra, alias Jabhat Fateh al-Sham), the "folk" – as George W Bush called them – who committed the crimes against humanity in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania on 11 September 2001. Remember the War on Terror? Remember the "pure evil" of al-Qaeda. Remember all the warnings from our beloved security services in the UK about how al-Qaeda can still strike terror in London?

jimbo2000M , 12 Apr 2017 16:55
Gotta get that pipeline in for the Saudi's, eh, no matter how many children's carcasses it crosses, yay, regime change again, yay, and a heap of new terrorists for our kids in the west to dodge and duck, yay.
unsouthbank , 12 Apr 2017 16:40
I agree that Bashar al-Assad is not a "good person". It is impossible to be an authoritarian leader, struggling to maintain the unity, or even existence, of a nation state, and at the same time be a kind and gentle person. However, I do not believe him to be the psychopathic monster that he is portrayed as being, either. He is almost certainly not personally responsible for the chemical attack in Idlib province.

Presidents do not normally make detailed decisions on what sort of weapons should be used on every airstrike made by their aircraft. He may be a dictator, but he is not a complete imbecile. Even the dimmest of politicians could have foreseen that this chemical attack would end up being a massive own-goal. Nobody as cynically calculating as Assad is supposed to be, would be that stupid. My own hunch, (and that is all it is) is that sarin was used due to a blunder by a low or medium ranking Syrian airforce officer.

Yes, of course Assad bears responsibility for overall strategy in this vicious war of survival, and as such, has blood on his hands. But, so does Trump, so does Obama, so does Putin so does Erdogan, so does May, and so do all the leaders who have supplied the numerous rebel groups with billions of pounds worth of weapons, and have therefore kept the pot boiling.

Last year, Theresa May stood up in parliament and proudly proclaimed her willingness to commit mass indiscriminate murder on a scale that would make Syria look like a pinprick. She declared her willingness to press the nuclear button and therefore slaughter hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of completely innocent men, women, children and babies. She not only has blood on her hands, she is proud of it. Perhaps we should remember that, when she comes out with one of her sanctimonious, nauseatingly hypocritical statements about Syria.

martinusher , 12 Apr 2017 16:35
Assad was democratically elected more than once so he must be doing something right. (OK, so they're democracy might not be our democracy but 'our' democracy has brought us Trump, Brexit and the like so its really six to one, a half dozen to the other). Syria until we started messing with it -- creating, supporting and even arming opposition groups -- was stable, wasn't messing with its neighbors and had significant religious and cultural freedoms compared to other countries in the area. (Our actions might suggest that we really don't want stable, peaceful, countries in that region, we need them to be weak and riven by internal factions.)

Anyway, given our outstanding track record of success with regime change in that part of the world we should probably adopt a hands-off approach -- all we seem to do is make an unsatisfactory situation dire. Hardly the way to win friends and influence people.

KhalijFars , 12 Apr 2017 16:07
Despite the several misrepresentations, the facts are that Britain has been one of the main protagonists in prosecuting this war against Syria , which is a proxy war against Iran.

Britain was at the forefront in setting up the Al Nusra Front and in hosting the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights to disseminate deeply negative propaganda about the Syrian Government and armed forces.

Every step of this including the media campaign which has comprised a major part of the military campaign against Syria, has been an attempt to delegitimize the Sovereign government and its institutions and to gain consensus from the somnambulistic British and US public for yet another direct military campaign against another Middle Eastern country.

The whole which has visited terrible and incalculable suffering, on the Syrian people. Syria was a paradise before the British and US did their usual work. The journalists, government and security services in Britain who have wrought this mess , I'm sure will not escape the consequences of their actions. One hopes they experience a 1000 times of the hell they have visited on Syria. These actions are truly despicable acts of cowardice and absolute wickedness.

TomasStedron KhalijFars , 12 Apr 2017 16:27
Syria was a paradise for those who rule Syria........ the Assad regime brutally repressed any opposition to their rule. In 1982 Assad´s father killed probably more than 30,000 in the siege of Hama. As well as sheltering a number of terrorist organisations who have their headquarters in Damascus....... he also armed and supported the fledgling Al-Quaeda resistance to the coalition in Iraq, giving them asylum in Syria........now the IS ....... I can think of Paradise in different ways......
MacMeow KhalijFars , 12 Apr 2017 17:30

Britain has been one of the main protagonists in prosecuting this war against Syria

Link please. Because without evidence the rest of your post collapses.

KhalijFars MacMeow , 12 Apr 2017 17:50
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/01/trial-swedish-man-accused-terrorism-offences-collapse-bherlin-gildo

The prosecution of a Swedish national accused of terrorist activities in Syria has collapsed at the Old Bailey after it became clear Britain's security and intelligence agencies would have been deeply embarrassed had a trial gone ahead, the Guardian can reveal.

His lawyers argued that British intelligence agencies were supporting the same Syrian opposition groups as he was, and were party to a secret operation providing weapons and non-lethal help to the groups, including the Free Syrian Army.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2013/aug/30/syria-chemical-attack-war-intervention-oil-gas-energy-pipelines

Leaked emails from the private intelligence firm Stratfor including notes from a meeting with Pentagon officials confirmed US-UK training of Syrian opposition forces since 2011 aimed at eliciting "collapse" of Assad's regime "from within."

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-05-23/secret-pentagon-report-reveals-us-created-isis-tool-overthrow-syrias-president-assad

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/03/05/the-redirection

Jermaine Charles , 12 Apr 2017 16:02
More guff from the guardian/ Mr Williams, with just a little realistic sense, but who can replace Assad and in Syria he remains very popular, despite the western media like lies!
johnbonn , 12 Apr 2017 16:00
Russia has to move quickly to secure a 100 year lease for the Latakia port and airbase. Otherwise the US will soon attempt to render it useless as well, regardless of which of the moderate rebel factions it decides to install.

... Spirits die hard, and those of the Arab spring and the Orange Revolution are still alive in the halls of the Pentagon.

.... A controlled cold war however, is the only way to a avoid a larger mess than what the West has already inflicted on the innocent Syrian people by using the most abortive war design that has ever been conceived by the war college or any other war commander.

...... At the current rate there will be more Syrians in Germany than those remaining in Syria.

......... Is it hard to wonder why Syrians might hold a grudge against the, US?

BlueCollar , 12 Apr 2017 15:59
Regime change ? All in the name of democracy as we see it.Why not try it in the Kingdom of family owned country KSA or why not another family owned enterprises called UAE.
stratplaya , 12 Apr 2017 15:58
History tells us replacing Assad would be a bad idea. We should have learned the lesson with Hussain and Iraq, but didn't. We would go on to replace Gaddafi of Libya and boom, it trigged ISIS.

The hard lesson here is that for some reason Muslim majority countries have a strong central authoritarian leader. No matter if that leaders is called president, king, prime minister, or whatever. When that strong leaders is deposed, chaos ensues.

Pier16 , 12 Apr 2017 15:58
The Americans have a fetish with regime change. Up until recently they were discrete about it and did it in secret, now they are all in the open. People who are against regime change are considered anti-Americans and tools of the Soviets...ahm.... Russia. The amazing thing is Tillerson said Assad's faith should be left with the Syrian people, the American establishment in unison said how could he says such a terrible thing, "we should decide what Syrian people want."

These are the same people who elected Trump, maybe they should let Syrian people select the US president. The result may end up better.

freeandfair , 12 Apr 2017 15:53
> Bashar al-Assad is not a good person. He has reduced once great Syrian cities such as Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged. Worse still, more than 500,000 Syrian civilians have been killed in the civil war, 6.1 million have been internally displaced and another 4.8 million are seeking refuge abroad.

Yes, Assad is not a good person. But what about American politicians such as Hillary Clinton, who armed "moderate rebels" and supported the opposition in pursuit of regime change? And Syria is not the only country were this happened. Will there ever any responsibility taken for their actions by the US and NATO?

First, they make a manageable problem into a huge problem, then just hightail back home, living local people to pick up the pieces.

Those half millions of deaths - are they all responsibility of Assad or do the sponsors of jihadists and jihadists themselves have some responsibility as well?

GlozzerBoy1 , 12 Apr 2017 15:40
Absolutely, stay the hell out, we should have no footprint in that awful part of the world.
Tom1982 , 12 Apr 2017 15:35
The choice as I see it is this:

A. A horrible authoritarian regime that tortures and murders it's opponents...........but women can wear what they like in public, get a good education courtesy of the State, and embark on a career.

B. A horrible authoritarian regime that tortures and murders it's opponents...........where women are denied education, made virtual prisoners in their own homes, and have acid flung in their faces for having the temerity to appear unveiled when they do go out in public.

It's not a great choice, but one is definitely better than the other.

Weefox Tom1982 , 12 Apr 2017 15:43
Also worth remembering that under Assad people are allowed religious freedom. I know two Syrian Christians who are terrified of what will happen if the rebels take control of their country.
Tom1982 Weefox , 12 Apr 2017 15:46
I'd imagine the Shia feel the same.
freeandfair Tom1982 , 12 Apr 2017 16:06
Choice B also includes Sharia law, full extermination of other faiths and death sentence for rejection of Islam. Basically Choice B is another Saudi Arabia, but a lot of people will have to die first.
oddballs , 12 Apr 2017 15:35
Assad would stand a good chance of winning a fair and honest election,

Still waiting for evidence by forensic experts over the chemical weapons , who did what and where.

Until proof is given hat prove otherwise the rebels are the most likly suspects. --> normankirk , 12 Apr 2017 15:35

SHA2014 , 12 Apr 2017 14:24
The world's biggest superpower is willing to risk a nuclear war with mass destruction of billions and possible extinction of life on earth on an unproven assertion made by Al Qaeda sympathisers that the Syrian government bombed them with sarin? OBL must be laughing in his grave.
aleph SHA2014 , 12 Apr 2017 14:45
1. Who is threatening a nuclear war? The Russians? I haven't heard them threaten that. Probably because no-one would seriously believe them.

2. An intellectually honest person should not describe young children as terrorist sympathisers. Let alone imply they somehow deserve to be deliberately targeted by nerve gas as a result.

Fort Sumpter aleph , 12 Apr 2017 14:54
If you have the evidence of a nerve gas agent being present please supply it forthwith.

I keep asking you guys, who must be on the ground in Idlib such is your certainty, to provide the proof but you always refuse. Why is that?

SHA2014 aleph , 12 Apr 2017 14:56
An intellectually honest person should question the veracity of a report that is unverified by a terrorist organisation. The children were never described by me as 'terrorist sympathisers' so you make a dishonest accusation, the terrorist sympathisers are those who produced the report on which the whole story is based. It is not about the death of the children which is of course a crime, but they are being used by the terrorists for thier purposes.

An intellectually honest person would also show outrage about the mass murder of civilians, including children in Mosul and by a US bombing in Syria that seem to not arouse the same outrage.

SHA2014 , 12 Apr 2017 14:13
Regime change by US has been used at least three times against democracies, in Chili, in Iran and in Ukraine. Attempted regime change has also been used often in South America to oust populist rulers because of US interests. Although the above analysis raises the very good point that change has to come from the bottom up, it starts with the same fallacies of assuming that all of the death and destruction in Syria comes from one person which is an extremely flawed point to start from. The point that is to be made is that there is no military solution to the conflict except in an anti terrorist capacity. The problem is that all of those against the Syrian government in the current conflict are either outright terrorists or those who collaborate heavily with terrorists making it difficult to have a conventional peace process.
Imperialist , 12 Apr 2017 14:07
America should not be the one who decides who is an acceptable government, and sends soldiers to enforce its will.

The UN should have done that long ago. To Assad. To Kim. Stopped the Khmer Rouge. Or Rwanda.

Yet the only time they ever have actually fought is in the Korean War.

Fort Sumpter Imperialist , 12 Apr 2017 14:55
*cough* The US supported the Khmer Rouge *cough*
Mauryan , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
America engaged in regime changes to suit American interests during the cold war and the New world order drive. The fact that they supported dictatorships worldwide and helped them overthrow democratically elected governments tells clearly that imposing democracy forcibly was not their intention. Intervention in global conflicts is mainly for controlling pathways for resources and gaining ground for business opportunities for their multinational giant corporations.
diddoit Mauryan , 12 Apr 2017 13:58
It's all about what's best for the US and the incredibly powerful(in the US) Israel lobby. The UK just goes along with it.
NezPerce , 12 Apr 2017 13:52
The West's narrative has fallen apart, nobody believes that the Syrian rebels are peace loving democrats. We have ample evidence that they are infinitely worse than Assad.

We also have plenty of evidence that the Western deep state, not the public, wants another regime change in the middle east and will stop at nothing to achieve its end including false flag gas attacks. This article goes into detail.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-08/false-flag-how-us-armed-syrian-rebels-set-excuse-attack-assad

False Flag: How the U.S. Armed Syrian Rebels to Set Up an Excuse to Attack Assad

Evidence suggests a false flag chemical weapons attack on the Syrian people was initiated by Syrian rebels with the help of the United States in order to justify Thursday night's U.S. Military attack on a Syrian base.

The Left is very opposed to war in Syria, the Libertarian right is very opposed to war in Syria but a hugely powerful Deep State will stop at nothing to achieve its ends.

Nat-Nat aka Kyl Shinra , 12 Apr 2017 13:50
"Worse still, more than 500,000 Syrian civilians have been killed in the civil war, 6.1 million have been internally displaced and another 4.8 million are seeking refuge abroad. "

well, you cannot put the blame on Assad only. He never asked for that war for a start and a lot of the refugees you're talking about may very well be pro-Assad.

This said, I agree, leave Assad and Syria alone.

Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:48
Finally an article which still sticks to logical thinking when it comes to Syria. Assad is a terrible leader but atleast with him, most of the factions within the country can be sorted. The West's obsession with stuffing democracy down the throats of every oil producing country in the Middle East has resulted in the Mad Max wasteland i.e. Libya and the unsolvable puzzle i.e. Iraq. Both Gaddafi and Saddam were terrible human beings but removing them left a vacuum which has cost the lives of thousands and displaced millions. The West must make its peace with Assad for now, stop supporting the rebels and try to find common ground with Russia against the real enemy - ISIS.
diddoit Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
The west - as the US/UK like to themselves, couldn't give a damn about democracy . They want compliance , not democracy. A good(brutal) dictator is better than a 'difficult' democratically elected leader , look at events in Egypt for example.

Our own democracies are pretty ropey, certainly not up there with the Scandinavian best practice.

dusktildawn Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
You're kidding right? The West stuffing democracy down the throats of the Gulf countries. More like defending them against the threat of democracy by arming them to the teeth and stationing troops there. Have you heard of Bahrain?
diddoit Jayesh Iyer , 12 Apr 2017 13:55
call themselves. -typo
dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:47
The only plausible solution to this conflict is partition assuming of course the imminent defeat of Isis.

While getting rid of Assad would create a dangerous power vacuum and is in any case perhaps impossible given Russias backing, the sheer scale of the killing he's done and destruction he's unleashed on his own people - of a totally different scale to Saddam Hussein and even his father, from whom he seems to have inherited his psychopathic tendencies -renders the idea that he could continue to rule a "united" Syria or even the majority of it, laughable.

Mauryan dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:52
Partition would create more Assads.
Jemima15 , 12 Apr 2017 13:46
If you get rid of Assad, whoever replaces him is going to have a very difficult task. How on Earth do you enforce any sort of civilized law and order in a country which has some of the worst terrorist organizations the world has ever known. With organizations like ISIS around, a government is gong to need to take a firm hand somewhere. It's not as if you can send Jihadists on community service and expect them to come back as reformed characters.
DanielDee , 12 Apr 2017 13:46
Regime change? Why not?

Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi would make a fine statesman!

Pipcosta DanielDee , 12 Apr 2017 14:03
Until he turns on his mater
IamDolf , 12 Apr 2017 13:45
Fact is that Assad still enjoys considerable support among Syrians. In particular among those who have no problem with a woman going to the beach in a bikini and driving a car to work. He is not giong anywhere soon. And if he did, the situation would be worse. As in the case of the butcher Saddam Hussein and the crazy dictator Khadaffi, who also were supposedly removed in an attempt to bring "freedom and democracy to the people."
diddoit IamDolf , 12 Apr 2017 13:49
Syria was one of the few countries in the ME where you could drink alcohol. Does anyone believe whoever follows Assad be it someone picked by the US/Israel/KSA/Qatar will be quite so tolerant?
Patin , 12 Apr 2017 13:43
Why can't world leaders be held to account for their crimes against humanity? Is it not about time that they are compelled to comply with international law and for the United Nations Assembly to make them so by enforceable resolutions passed by a majority vote?

Assad is a tyrant who should be removed from office and held accountable for his crimes against humanity. Syrians should be entitled to a government that is respectful of their human rights.

The UN should take responsibility for enforcing a permanent ceasefire and brokering talks to secure Syria's future. It should require as a condition of UN membership compliance with and adherence to international law protecting human rights. Non compliance should be met with expulsion and the economic isolation of the country concerned from the rest of the world.

freeandfair Patin , 12 Apr 2017 16:19
> Why can't world leaders be held to account for their crimes against humanity?

You should start with American leaders like Bush. If you are serious about this.

roachclip , 12 Apr 2017 13:42

There is no shortcut to lasting peace. As uncomfortable as it is, the best that western governments can do is provide aid and assistance to those in distress, while pressuring those countries that continue to feed money and weapons to the combatants to change their positions.

You are absolutely right.

Such a pity then that the western governments in question, the UK, America and to a lesser extent, France, are in fact the same entities, via their surrogate power in the middle east, Saudi Arabia, who are the ones providing the weapons and money.

Just as they did in Iraq and Libya, and always for the same reason, to achieve regime change against the Middle Eastern leaders who were threatening their control of the oil market.

This situation is nothing new, these Western Powers have been attacking various parts of the Middle East for nigh on a century. Winston Churchill was responsible for bombing Iraq in the 1920's. That also was to achieve regime change.

All of the deaths and the destruction in the Middle East can ultimately be laid at the door of the 'Western Powers' and their willingness to do anything to protect their oil interests.

Taku2 , 12 Apr 2017 13:35
One of the most despicable thing about the West's attempts to bribe, entice and force Russia into abandoning the Syrian Government, so that America, France, Britain and Saudi Arabia can rush in, like hyenas to finish off a wounded animal, is how patronising they have been towards the Russians and Iranians. Granted that their racism towards the Russians might not be what it is towards the Syrian state, which they want to deny a voice and disrespect to the extent of talking to the Russians, and ignoring the Syrian government.

Yes, the West is behaving towards the Syrian state as if it is just something for it to manipulate, as it does with the global economy. Not having made any progress in manipulating the Syrian proxy conflict into the outcomes it wants, the West has now resorted to making merciless and unjustified attacks on Russian and the Iranians. Despite the fact that it is Russia and the Syrian government forces and their Hezbollah allies who have broken the impasse in this terrible war.

It is scurrilous that there should now be this coordinated media and political campaign to make Russia out to be 'the bad guy', the 'devil', as it were.

As for 'the liberals', well, guess what, if you want to do something constructive. Then stop blaming Russia and demonising the Russians, the Syrian Government and their allies. Look closer to home, to America, To Britain, to France and Saudi Arabia. There you will find more demons disguised as 'humanitarians' and 'angels' than probably in all of Russia and Syria.

The guys in the West who are posturing as angels are no less culpable than the Syrian government.

Of course the West should not destroy the Syrian state and government. But, since when has logic prevented this cartel from exercising its destructive force? As Libya, Iraq and Yemen have proven? The liberals need to grow up and stop being allied to the right.

Arapas Taku2 , 12 Apr 2017 13:42

so that America, France, Britain and Saudi Arabia can rush in, like hyenas to finish off a wounded animal

Your point is of great importance.

Now that Russia has done the dirty work at great cost, pushing them out of the way.........................

That will not happen, Rex was told by Sergei.

Arapas , 12 Apr 2017 13:34
robust belief in a supposed American ability to fix what is wrong.

Is meant to be the joke of the month.

What did they ever fix ? Just look what the Korean war has lead to.

Vietnam, where the Americans were defeated, is now a united and peaceful country.

On the other hand, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and other regime change candidates have been reduced to failed states.

In Syria, the fate of the Alwites will be the same of that of women and children cowering in St Sophia in 1453.

Utter slaughter!

ganaruvian , 12 Apr 2017 13:32
Firstly, we have yet to see the results of any impartial investigation checking out the Syrian/Russian version of events about the gas in Idlib province, which could be true. Nobody that I can see is 'supporting' the use of gas against civilians, but it is known that the bigger terrorist organisations such as ISIS and al Qaeda do have stocks of poison gas. Secondly,so many uninformed commentators have not understood that Syria's 6 year war has been and remains a religious war! Asad's Shiite/ Alawite/Christian/ Druse/ Ismaili communities and other minorities supported by Iran and Lebanon's Shiites, fighting for their very survival against Saudi/ Qatari/Gulf States' extremist Wahhabi fighters, who via ISIS ,Al Qaeda and similar Islamists, want to wipe them off the face of the earth (with Turkey playing a double game). At this very moment people are condemning Assad for bombing civilians, whilst the US-led coalition including our own RAF, is doing exactly the same thing in the ISIS held city of Mosul -for the same reasons. The rebels take over and then surround themselves in cities, with civilians, hoping that these horrors will raise western public opinion against the government forces trying to defeat them. The 'half- informed' public opinion is now behaving in exactly this predictable way against the Syrian government, trying to deal with its own religious extremist rebels, many of whom are not even Syrians. It was always a war that the west should stay out of -other peoples religious wars are incomprehensible to non-believers in that particular faith. To talk now of replacing Asad is juvenile and mischievous - maybe that's why Boris is so engaged?
Nolens , 12 Apr 2017 13:20
Assad is the lesser of two evils. Those who are hailed as rebels pose an enormous threat to our security.
jonnyross Nolens , 12 Apr 2017 13:44
There is an equality of evil between Assad and ISIS. That said, Assad's forces and their Shia allies have slaughtered the vast majority of the victims.

Both Assad and ISIS will lose eventually. How many Syrians are slaughtered in the meantime is anyone's guess.

Why murderous dictators are so popular btl is a mystery.

john evans , 12 Apr 2017 13:20
Syria is finished.

According to Wikipedia Estimates of deaths in the Syrian Civil War, per opposition activist groups, vary between 321,358 and 470,000.

On 23 April 2016, the United Nations and Arab League Envoy to Syria put out an estimate of 400,000 that had died in the war.

Also,according to Wikipedia I n 2016, the United Nations (UN) identified 13.5 million Syrians requiring humanitarian assistance, of which more than 6 million are internally displaced within Syria, and over 4.8 million are refugees outside of Syria. In January 2017, UNHCR counted 4,863,684 registered refugees.

Turkey is the largest host country of registered refugees with over 2.7 million Syrian refugees.

Before the troubles,Syria had a population of 23 million.

No country could go back to normality after that upheaval.

Arapas john evans , 12 Apr 2017 13:37

No country could go back to normality after that upheaval.

It can --

Look at Chechnya! A newly rebuilt Grosny, living in peace.

Bearing in mind Iraq, Libya etc who wants to see that --

NativeBornTexan Arapas , 12 Apr 2017 14:08
Chechnya is ruled by a Russian puppet dictator who executes gay men.
Shad O NativeBornTexan , 12 Apr 2017 15:13
That's because politics is heartlessly, ruthlessly, compassionlessly pragmatic. If having a pet local petty king in the area keeps it stable and does not a politically costly military operation, everything else is seen as "acceptable collateral damage".

It's funny but western foreign policy is fundamentally the same in the methods, just different in goals. If the goal of regime change is achieved and political points collected, everything else is completely irrelevant. Opposition can become "moderately islamist", "democratic" rebels may implement sharia law, "precision strikes" may cause tens of thousands of civilian casualties, but it's all for the greater good.

Pipcosta , 12 Apr 2017 13:18
Why do we send a sewer rat to the UN as our ambassador
brianboru1014 , 12 Apr 2017 13:14
Every time the West especially the Anglo west of the USA and Britain intervene in another countries affairs, the end product is a disaster so for that reason alone these two societies which can only communicate in English should leave this to the Russians.
Ruby4 , 12 Apr 2017 13:13
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

Albert Einstein

Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/alberteins133991.html

Chilcot report: Findings at-a-glance:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36721645

FFC800 , 12 Apr 2017 13:08
This almost manages to achieve sense, and it's good to see an article not promoting regime change for once, but it still falls short of stating the truth that the correct policy in Syria is to help Assad win the war, and then impose conditions on his conduct in the peace.

He has reduced once great Syrian cities such as Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged.

Most of that was done by rebels.
jackrousseau , 12 Apr 2017 13:03
I must now begrudgingly thank the Trump Administration for causing me to realize a profound and universal truth. History doesn't rhyme at all; it parodies.

The build up to our inevitable Syria invasion is essentially an SNL parody of our Iraq invasion. All the way down to allegations of to "hidden stockpiles of WMDs", "gassing own citizens", "violation of no WMD agreement", "weapons inspectors not doing job", and most recently "Assad/Saddam is Hitler". All that's left is the final piece of evidence to tip public opinion in...the holy grail, "yellowcake uranium".

Of course, 6 months ago --with full knowledge of Saddam's gassing of the Kurds--Trump said toppling Hussein was a "uge" mistake and defended him as an "efficient killer of terrorists". "Efficient" indeed... https://cnn.com/cnn/2016/07/05/politics/donald-trump-saddam-hussein-iraq-terrorism/index.html

I'm not sure exactly what comes next (presumably Trump declaring an "Axis of Evil" consisting of Syria, ISIS, Iran, N.Korea...and perhaps Russia and/or China or both...thus setting the stage for a hilarious parody of WWII).

Who knows...I guess at least it's interesting.

John Smythe , 12 Apr 2017 13:03
Perhaps dear Boris should have had more talks with the British government to find out what is the political position of the conservative government over Syria, and more importantly with Russia. So far the American have by the look of things, telling the British Government in what they want, not bothering to ask what Britain thinks what is important.

There is actually no point in swapping one master the EU, to handcuff ourselves to the a far more right wing America.

bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 13:00
I find the commments on here quite confusing...

Take Isil and jihadists out of the equation and what you're left with are people that want to oust a tyrannical and unelected leader who clearly has nothing but disdain for his people (groups of at least).

Those rebels (or freedom fighters) are being seen as the bad guys it seems to me...?

The only reason I can see for this is that they have slight support from the United States.

Had the boot been on the other foot and the US we're supporting Assad and Russia,the rebels (freedom fighters) I'm quite sure public opinion (Guardian readers at least) would be quite different.

So what do the Syrian rebels who are looking to overthrow a dictator have to do to be put on a pedestal of righteousness as Castro was for effectively trying to achieve the same end goal....

Oh, that's right, Castro was trying to stick it to the Yanks.... now I get it.

dusktildawn bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 13:34
I think there's a definite strain of anti-Americanism on display however cautiously we have to view their actions after Iraq and give their closeness to the Gulf States. A quarter of the country has fled Assad, some 10 million internally displaced not to mention the incredible numbers of dead and wounded.

And yet there's a close minded reflex to say that things will be better off with him in charge ignoring even the possibility of partition, which strikes me as the most plausible option. The idea that Assad can now after all he's done rule a united country indefinitely putting a lid on refugees and terrorism strikes me as utterly preposterous.

bemusedfromdevon dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 14:11
My sentiments entirely and it shocks me that there are a considerable number of Assad apologists commenting on here as he is clearly seen as a better 'devil' than Trump...

I'm just very pleased I don't live in Syria and I think the run of the mill Syrian dying in their droves due to gas, bombs or simply drowning in the Med would be horrified to read a large number of comments on here in relation to this article and how Assad 'isn't such a bad old stick!'

I'm embarrassed to be honest....

Shad O bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 15:25

Take Isil and jihadists out of the equation and what you're left with

what you are left is nothing. This was the big point since 2013, when Nusra began taking over the last remnants of the FSA. Since then Cameron (or was it Hammond) had to coin the term "relatively hardline islamists" to make some of the jihadi groups somewhat acceptable.

In its latest iteration, Nusra (now rebranded yet againTahrir al-Sham) has formally absorbed several other "rebel" group, including the Nour al-Din al-Zenki, who were in the past equipped by the US, and were quoted by various agencies (including this paper) as "opposition" during the recapture of Aleppo.

Ah, yes, you also have the Kurds, who are building their own state. But if there is something all the local powers agree on (Russia, US, Turkey, Syria, Iraq...) is that they don't want an independent Kurdish state.

NezPerce , 12 Apr 2017 12:58

President Obama was heavily criticized for not doing more in Syria, but he made a difficult decision that was in many ways the right on.

Obama required cover from the British Parliament. Bombing Syria was incredibly unpopular with the UK public from right to left. David Miliband listened to the public and stopped the bombing of Syria. Nobody expected a Labour politician to dare to oppose the US war machine, it took them all by surprise.

Bombing Syria was incredibly unpopular with the US public and the European public, Miliband saved us from ISIS and Al Nusra both al Qaeda franchises running Syria.

The BBC routinely portrays the Libertarian right wing in the USA as Isolationists but if you hear it from them they are anti-war. The American working class understands what war is like in the middle east because many of them have experienced it. They are clearly anti another war in the middle east. proof:

https://www.infowars.com/exclusive-michael-savage-begs-trump-to-stop-wwiii/

In this off the cuff interview Michael Savage begs Donald Trump to not plunge the world into another world war that could destroy life as we know it

.

Trump has been subjugated by the deep state, his base is outraged and in despair.

dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 12:58
You could argue this isn't about regime change per se but prosecuting a dictator for targeting and massacring civilians. And surely the same rationale can be used against Isis. In other words you don't allow mass murderers to take. Over but prosecute them as well.
Mates Braas dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 15:05
You can start proceedings against your own war criminals. There is a long list of them, stretching from, Paris, London, Washington and Tel Aviv.
freeandfair dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 16:41
In that case North Korea and Saudi Arabia should be on top of the list.
Trekkie555 , 12 Apr 2017 12:57
Good article. Hits the nail on the head. Regime change may be required for Syria the G7 and Arab countries must come together to carefully plan what happens afterwards.
Nolens , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
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diddoit , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
'Monster' Assad was courted by western leaders: Remember the Assads pictured taking tea at Buckingham Palace with the Queen(google it) , Blair all smiles in Damascus. The Kerry family pictured in Damascus enjoying a late evening supper with the Assads(google it).

But Bashar al-Assad is a stubborn man , he wouldn't distance himself from Iran and their proxies such as Hezbollah, thus his fate was sealed.

zolotoy diddoit , 12 Apr 2017 12:59
Nope, wrong. Assad wouldn't give the USA, Qatar, and Turkey a nice pipeline to kneecap Russian natural gas sales in Europe.

It's all about oil and money, petrodollars and ensuring American worldwide hegemony.

sokkynick zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 13:07
+1
diddoit zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 13:42
Well it's all tied in . People talk about Israel wanting the Golan Heights permanently in part due to oil interests, they talk about Qatar and the gas pipeline to Europe Assad refuses. They talk about the KSA being unnerved by Iran's growing influence in the region after the Iraq war, and how it would suit KSA , Israel and the US for Sunni leadership to emerge in Syria to rebalance the region.

I think it's all of the above . Which isn't what US/UK populations are being told.

Ilan Klinger , 12 Apr 2017 12:53
A regime changing in Syria?

Can someone here try and convince me that the State of Syria still exists?

And change it from what to what?From a Murderouscracy to a Oppressionocracy?

peterwiv , 12 Apr 2017 12:52
The West learns nothing from its mistakes. Can't we understand that our real enemy is ISIS and that springs directly from our disastrous invasion of Iraq? Assad may be pretty awful but surely we should be able to comprehend that he is an ally in the fight against ISIS just as the far more horrible Stalin was an ally against the Nazis.

Just because Trump suddenly talks about "beautiful babies", we all go mad again.

aleph , 12 Apr 2017 12:51
Syria is going to need serious amounts of aid and foreign investment to recover when peace starts to take hold. But Assad cannot travel internationally because he will be subject to arrest. At least in any civilised country. So he will be gone one way or antithetical. Putin has backed the wrong horse. It's too handicapped to run.
elaine naude aleph , 12 Apr 2017 15:43
Who should he have backed? - Isis?
algae64 , 12 Apr 2017 12:47
Until the Saudis, US & UK decide that enough is enough, then this idiocy will continue. Assad is a better leader for Syria than Isis, Al Qaeda, or the other Saudi-backed groups would be.

Syria was secular and religiously tolerant under Assad. It won't be either of those things if Assad is deposed. More than likely, it would end up as a Saudi-style Islamic theocracy with the harshest head-chopping, hand-chopping version of sharia law.

BorisMalden , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble

Did Assad deliberately bring his country into civil war? When his forces are being attacked by rebels sponsored by foreign groups, he really only has two choices: give up leadership and allow the rebels to take over the country, or fight back. Given that you're arguing that a regime change is a bad idea it logically follows that you support the second option, so it hardly seems fair to criticise him for the consequences of that resistance. You might do better to blame the rebels and those who sponsor them for bringing war to what was previously a (relatively) peaceful country.

Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
This Regime Change Policy adopted by the US and in many, if not all cases, supported by the UK, whilst in some case toppling Dictators, has left nothing but chaos in its wake.

We need to consider the case of Syria, very carefully, as we may well find ourselves handing the Country to ISIL on a plate.

Better to help Assad stabilise the Country, and then discuss political change.

The rhetoric coming from the Foreign and Defence Secretaries, can do nothing to help, but make the UK look stupid.

aleph Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:56
"Better to help Assad stabilise the Country"

Hahahahaha, collude with crimes against humanity in the name of stability and call it progress because after six years we cannot think of an alternative. Great.

Oldfranky aleph , 12 Apr 2017 13:58
Are you sure it's only Assad, laugh all you will.
BorisMalden , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble

Did Assad deliberately bring his country into civil war? When his forces are being attacked by rebels sponsored by foreign groups, he really only has two choices: give up leadership and allow the rebels to take over the country, or fight back. Given that you're arguing that a regime change is a bad idea it logically follows that you support the second option, so it hardly seems fair to criticise him for the consequences of that resistance. You might do better to blame the rebels and those who sponsor them for bringing war to what was previously a (relatively) peaceful country.

Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:46
This Regime Change Policy adopted by the US and in many, if not all cases, supported by the UK, whilst in some case toppling Dictators, has left nothing but chaos in its wake.

We need to consider the case of Syria, very carefully, as we may well find ourselves handing the Country to ISIL on a plate.

Better to help Assad stabilise the Country, and then discuss political change.

The rhetoric coming from the Foreign and Defence Secretaries, can do nothing to help, but make the UK look stupid.

aleph Oldfranky , 12 Apr 2017 12:56
"Better to help Assad stabilise the Country"

Hahahahaha, collude with crimes against humanity in the name of stability and call it progress because after six years we cannot think of an alternative. Great.

Oldfranky aleph , 12 Apr 2017 13:58
Are you sure it's only Assad, laugh all you will.
Foracivilizedworld , 12 Apr 2017 12:44

Regime change in Syria? That would be a mistake

Absolutely no... it will be a colossal disaster... and would explode the entire region affecting not only all ME countries including Israel, but will extend to Europe and NA, You can't keep it all "Over There"

And I think Trump would do it.

SaracenBlade , 12 Apr 2017 12:43
Regime change, evidently the US has n't learned from the past experience. Look at Iraq, Lybia, regime change has resulted in complete chaos, instability, and perpetual conflict. Syrian population is strictly divided on sectarian line - Sunnis, Shias, Christians, Kurds. Who is going to make a cohesive government capable of running the affairs of the state? Bashar Assaad's father, Hafiz Assaad ruled Syria with an iron grip, he understood Syrian sectarian divide.
notDonaldTrump SaracenBlade , 12 Apr 2017 12:49
'regime change has resulted in complete chaos, instability, and perpetual conflict.'

If one tried to think impartially the evidence might lead one to think that was the plan all along.

BlueCollar notDonaldTrump , 12 Apr 2017 15:50
If any country needs regime change, it is Saudi Arabia. All important positions are controlled by hundreds of Royals of Al Saud, even honest criticism of royals brings you closer to the back swing of executioner .
timefliesby , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
Have we learnt nothing?
zolotoy timefliesby , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
Some of us have learned to be very comfortable with scraps from the war machine table -- Western legacy media in particular.
moreorless2 , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
My newsagent loves Assad. Why because he's a Syrian Christian. Assad is the only hope for the minority's in Syria. All of the opposition groups are some variation on Islamic nationalists. They will all happily slaughter anyone not of their faith. Assad is a murdering bastard but he kills those that threaten him. In Middle Eastern terms he's a liberal.
Terra_Infirma , 12 Apr 2017 12:39
Quite right. What the people of Syria need is stability and an end to the fighting. All else is secondary. In particular, the greatest crime that the West has committed in recent decades is the attempt to foist democracy on countries like Syria and Iraq, where it simply does not work. Even now, Western liberals dream of sitting Sunni, Shia, Alevi, Kurds, secularists and Islamic militants around a table to talk through to a democratic and mutually acceptable future for Syria. This is a fantasy - as democracy always is in heavily tribalised societies. It can only end in renewed civil war and inevitable dictatorship. I often wonder whether the West is just naive in these attempts at liberal cultural imperialism, or whether they are in fact a cynical front to mask the equally egregious aim of checkmating Russian influence in the region. Either way, shame on us.
StrongMachine Terra_Infirma , 12 Apr 2017 12:47
Are you calling George W Bush a liberal?
PSmd Terra_Infirma , 12 Apr 2017 13:07
It's not liberal cultural imperialism. It's painted as that to sell to domestic audiences.

It's liberal economic imperialism.

sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
Now to be fair, no one knows really what the president is thinking, not even apparently his chief diplomat or his UN envoy, who have sent conflicting messages. But let's cut to the chase – this is a very, very bad idea.

WW3 is definately a very very bad idea.

The idea that the US can change the government of another country for the better is born of US arrogance and lying manipulation.

juster , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
It's a bit funny that we just casually mention that the country harping on about the respect of the international rule book sinc 2014 vaiolate one of the core UN charter principles 72 times and is openly speaking of braking it the 73th time.

Jsut picture China saying openly their goal is to change the Abe regime in Tokio or Russia to change the regime in Kiev. They can't even have a pefered presidential candidate without mass interference hysteria and we just feel like it's A OK to go around the world changing who's in charge of countries.

freeandfair juster , 12 Apr 2017 16:58
> They can't even have a pefered presidential candidate without mass interference hysteria and we just feel like it's A OK to go around the world changing who's in charge of countries.

An excellent point.

bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 12:35
There are two main choices... Regime change... which hasn't worked out well where it's been attempted or just let the despots get on with it...

There are no easy answers but perhaps the only way is to let dictators crush and annihilate their opposition, utilise death squads to make dissenters disappear in the dead of night and, outwardly at least pretend everything is rosey....

If we, as a civilised society are able to 'look the other way' then that might be the simple answer... just hope everyone can sleep well at night and be grateful that, however much you hate our present government they aren't out gassing (allegedly) Guardian readers.

Jared Hall bemusedfromdevon , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
Not gassing people no, but still killing plenty of "innocent little babies" bombing hospitals and helping the Saudis cluster bomb fishing villages. Why don't we see pictures on TV of Yemeni kids mutilated by American bombs? How do we sleep with that?
bemusedfromdevon Jared Hall , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
We're pulling the trigger??

And that makes supporting a tyrant who will do anything a satisfactory solution to you?

Sounds like crocodile tears to me.

SterlingPound Jared Hall , 12 Apr 2017 13:11
Well, we saw the aftermath of a deliberate attack by Saudis planes on a clearly demarcated Yemeni hospital on the BBC last year. The first rocket hit an arriving ambulance with civilian casualties and a doctor on board. The response of the Saudi shills in the Commons - what is it about the British upper class and the Arabs, I wonder - was to demand forcefully that the Saudis set up an inquiry to examine the evidence of a war crime.

It should have been sadly obvious from the get-go that we had to back Assad before he attempted to beat his father's record for murder and repression, the whole family's fucking insane, but it's long past too late now. He's soiled goods and Tillerson's untutored idea of elections is surely farcical.

Muzzledagain , 12 Apr 2017 12:35
Fair article, although ISI and rebels actively participated in the destruction of Syria. If Assad falls, anarchy due to vacuum will follow, guaranteed. Agree with the last paragraph in particular and still wondering why they (the West) don't do it especially pressuring the countries that feed the rebels, and they are not so moderate, with money and weapon. Unless this is because of the infamous pipeline. Tragic state of affair indeed.
Aethelfrith , 12 Apr 2017 12:31
Decade after decade, the west has interfered or overthrown government after governemnt , all over the world , mainly for the benefit of capitalist puppeteers . America has been the worst , one only has to look at the CIA's track record in South America when legitimately elected governments were ousted by force so that "American business" interest were looked after.

This same vested self interest has been the driving force over the last few years. The interventions in Iraq , Libya, Afghanistan have all been total disasters fro the regions and resulted in more deaths than any tin pot dictator could have achieved. Backing so called "moderate" terrorists seems to be the excuse to get involved.

More moral achievement and good could have been achieved by widespread dropping of food around the world , or even the cost of the military hegemony being given as cash handouts to poor people , but this simplistic altruism does not allow for the geopolitical control games that is the true beating heart of western aggression.

austinpratt , 12 Apr 2017 12:30
And it will serve as a welcome distraction from the lack of domestic achievements by the U.S. govt.
Fort Sumpter austinpratt , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
Theresa could also do with some distraction from her shambolic government and the whole Brexit disaster.
timefliesby austinpratt , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
Got to agree. Dead cat. Nobody is talking about links and the FBI any more and Putin is mentioned on a new context.

Approval ratings from US voters?

Moo1234 Fort Sumpter , 12 Apr 2017 12:45
We are all Brexiteers now. I voted remain, but accept the democratic will of the people. Blame David Cameron and get on with the job of making a success of it, rather than whining about it....
dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 12:30
What if this was Apartheid era South Africa and the white minority were bombing the hell out of the majority black civilians who wanted them out?
duthealla dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 12:49
Nobody intervened in South Africa despite massacres like Sharpeville....perhaps it would've let to full on racial war though?
dusktildawn duthealla , 12 Apr 2017 12:55
I'm just saying people making the case for the West to back off would probably be saying the opposite in that case if the white minority were massacring black people on the scale of Syria. Isn't that hypocrisy?
Fort Sumpter dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:04
It isn't hypocrisy because your South African scenario bears little resemblance to what is happening in Syria. Simple as that.
Moo1234 , 12 Apr 2017 12:28
Boris obviously has a more pressing engagement over Easter.
BeanstalkJack , 12 Apr 2017 12:27
Regime change - a phrase that reminds us imperialism is alive and well.
Gandalf66 BeanstalkJack , 12 Apr 2017 12:47
The successful regime changes mentioned in the article such as Poland and the rest of the Eastern bloc were initiated by the people themselves, rather than the the "help" of a foreign power.
BeanstalkJack Gandalf66 , 12 Apr 2017 13:03
The people did it all by themselves did they? So nothing to do with the economic collapse of the Soviet Union caused by an arms race ramped up by President Reagan. Nothing to do with a very costly war in Afghanistan?
sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:27
Given the situation, it is understandable why some people may think ousting Assad is necessary. Such thinking has a long pedigree in the United States, where there is a robust belief in a supposed American ability to fix what is wrong.

I think the word is arrogance rather than belief.

Mates Braas sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 14:51
I think the word is arrogance rather than belief...............and exceptionalism.
brucebaby , 12 Apr 2017 12:26
Trump is the new boy on the block, trying to use missiles as a penis substitute.

Sorry, but simple definitions are sometimes correct.

yshani brucebaby , 12 Apr 2017 13:19
Would you have said the same thing in 1917 and 1940. Would you have said the same thing in the duration of the cold war. If US did not have a bigger penis then you would not be around to comment about it.

Long live the US penis and may it grow longer and stronger.

brucebaby yshani , 12 Apr 2017 13:26
WW2 was won principally by the USSR, who suffered many more casualties than the western alliances. The cold war would not have happened if not for the USA.

Sorry, the USA is more of a threat to the planet than any country, and Trump is unintelligent, a real threat to the world.

MacMeow brucebaby , 12 Apr 2017 17:01

WW2 was won principally by the USSR

That old clunker again, it's like the war in the Pacific never happened.

Sorry4Soul , 12 Apr 2017 12:26
Why it would be a mistake ?

Libya was such a success story.

Trumbledon , 12 Apr 2017 12:24
Finally, at long last, some sense.

I agree wholeheartedly; by far the best analysis I've read in this paper.

sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:24
If the US wants Assad ousted, they should support a UN investigation to find out WHO was at fault. Shoot first questions later? Hollywood Wild West thinking. The US has zero credibility. You simply cannot blame someone without having the facts independently checked out. Yet they didn't wait and decided to break interantional law instead.
joAnn chartier , 12 Apr 2017 12:23
There seems to be a crucial component of reality lacking in this opinion piece: rather than bombing and droning and etc, why does the 'world order' not stop the manufacture and distribution of weapons of mass destruction like barrel bombs, nuclear warheads etc etc -- where profits are made by arms manufacturers and their investors--oh, could that be the reason?
Fakecharitybuster , 12 Apr 2017 12:20
Quite. Assad is awful, but he is less awful that the Islamist alternatives, which are the only realistic alternatives. We should stop posturing and accept this unpalatable reality.
ganaruvian Fakecharitybuster , 12 Apr 2017 13:40
Spot-on!
Viva_Kidocelot , 12 Apr 2017 12:20
Much more level reporting, but still is framing the narrative as a brutal gas attack and is still a rush to judgement when the case is that bombs were dropped on a supply of toxic gas, most likely Phosgene.
Moo1234 , 12 Apr 2017 12:19
At last, some common sense. like Saddam and Gaddafi, Assad is a ruthless tyrant. What the West, including the petulant Boris Johnson need to realise is that Syria ISN'T the West. Don't impose your values on a country that isn't ready for them. The sickening hypocrisy of the British government would look very foolish if Putin pulled out and allowed Syria to fall to isis. Would Boris and Theresa put British troops on the ground to keep the extremists out of Turkey?
Gandalf66 Moo1234 , 12 Apr 2017 12:51
Why isn't Syria ready for Western values? After what the country has been through the people would probably leap at the chance of free elections. Prior to the conflict Syria was a multi-ethnic patchwork. Whatever happens to the country needs to be decided by the Syrians themselves.
Mates Braas Gandalf66 , 12 Apr 2017 14:50
"Why isn't Syria ready for Western values?"

The geopolitical status quo in the Middle East is unstable, and tribal affiliations/religious/ ethnic allegiances need to be carefully balanced and controlled. Something Lebanon, Libya, Syria and Iraq achieved reasonably peacefully for many years before all the US led interventions.

There is no evidence that the terrorists are fighting for democracy, although if westerners ask them that is what they will likely say.

shockolat1 , 12 Apr 2017 12:18
So Trump is unfit to govern because of his locker room humour and possible antics, but gas a few thousand people and hey presto! A darling of the left.
bemusedfromdevon shockolat1 , 12 Apr 2017 12:22
That's how it seems...
Fort Sumpter shockolat1 , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
Not the left. These writers are pro-British Establishment, pro mixed economy liberals. Soft right if anything.
zolotoy Fort Sumpter , 12 Apr 2017 12:51
You're talking about this rag. Take a look at what's coming out of Howard Dean's mouth, or Bernie Sanders's, or practically any Democrat in Washington not named Tulsi Gabbard.

Or, if you have a really strong stomach, take a look at Daily Kos.

They're what passes for "left" in America, unfortunately, because the number of SWP and Green Party members is statistically insignificant.

richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:17
"Given the situation, it is understandable why some people may think ousting Assad is necessary"

The Guardian reported that in Libya, the last country to benefit from US and "our" attempts at regime change there are now open air slave auctions.

So yeah, why not do the same in Syria; what is there to lose?

Mates Braas , 12 Apr 2017 12:16
Regime change is illegal under international law, except to the rogues of course found in western capitals, and their Gulf vassals. These are the only group of people in the entire planet who talk openly about overthrowing sovereign governments of other countries.

Imperial hubris knows no bounds.

tjt77 Mates Braas , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
The unfortunate truth is that, along with the ongoing decline of western civilization, one 'by-product' is that International Law is continually disdained. The USA, having lack of insightful leadership, does as it wants, when it wants .. the result is that perpetual wars seem to be a given .. meanwhile, Asia continues to rise and is growing real and genuine wealth by producing and exporting the goods the rest of the world consumes and is doing it very well..
jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:16
President Trump didn't do enough (yet) by bombing an air base at night. The people of Syria need weapons, tanks, missiles, air support, etc. from a country like the USA that stands for freedom and human rights. Assad, who lives by the sword should also die by the sword. For the U.S. to stand by and watch these atrocities unchallenged would simply be not who we are. I don't agree with President Trump on a lot of things, but on this point he is right. I have changed from not liking him at all to liking him just a bit more.
sceptic64 jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:24
And what comes after?
duthealla sceptic64 , 12 Apr 2017 12:54
That'd be a problem for the EU. We cook , you clean - as some neocon asshat said about Iraq.
richmanchester duthealla , 12 Apr 2017 13:14
Well the Guardian was reporting on open air slave auctions in

Libya this week.

So clearly arming "the people" and supplying air support worked well there.

Obviously the same course should be followed in Syria.

richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:15
"All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged. "

And that's Assad'd fault?

Or is it the fault of the originally US and still Gulf states/Turkey backed Wahhabis that have damaged them?

Trumbledon richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:36
All Assad's fault, if he hadn't tried to liberate Palmyra, it'd still be standi... Oh wait.
richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:14
"The logic is that by removing and replacing an undesirable leader, the political situation in the country will change. "

Absolute tosh.

The logic behind nearly all attempts at cold war regime change was to replace a regime which aligned itself with the USSR with one that aligned itself with the USA.

The internal situation, politically or otherwise was of no concern

Elinore richmanchester , 12 Apr 2017 12:23
It would work in the USA.
Nietzschestache , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
Good piece. Regime change has been such a resounding success, you only have to look at Iraq and Libya to see that. Nor does a country which has a history of using napalm and carcinogenic defoliants any room to take the moral high ground.
sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
If Assad, is so bad, how come most of the civilian population prefer his areas to those of the rebels? The one certainty in all of this is that the MSM has sold its credibility. Most of what I see is vested interest propaganda.
pete8s sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:21
Isn't the main reason that people prefer Assad's areas because he doesn't bomb them.

There is no love of Assad anywhere.

If the US were to limit itself to punishing strikes against Assad whenever his forces committed war crimes – bombing hospitals using poison gas etc then a minor at the level of civilisation creeps back into the equation.

bemusedfromdevon sokkynick , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
Perhaps because the rebel areas are getting the shit bombed out of them by the Russians and Assad...

How many heavy bombers and fighters do those fighting Assad have...?

Just think about it a little....

Fort Sumpter pete8s , 12 Apr 2017 12:26

There is no love of Assad anywhere.

How many Syrians do you know and how many times have you been there?

scipioafricanus , 12 Apr 2017 12:10
The situation will be even more fraught if other external actors turn any attempt at regime change into a proxy war, as Russia and Iran are likely to do.

A proxy war between the United States and Russia is the thing we all have to fear. In Trump and Putin you have two leaders who use brinkmanship to get what they want and who will never back down from any position no matter what the consequences. They'd rather pursue a misguided policy rathen than lose face. I'd like to think the recent war of words between the two countries is just bluster, but as each day goes by I'm no longer sure anymore.

Amanzim , 12 Apr 2017 12:10
Regime change should work if all parties believe in democracy and respect each other. That does not seem likely in the middle east. We have seen what that means forcing that idea in Iraq, Egypt and Libya. A secular SOB is better than somebody who believes in laws of yesteryears.
zankaon , 12 Apr 2017 12:09
Another way: reducing accidental use of chemical weapons?

Always drop 2 bombs; one from each side of ammunition dump. That way, one of such unmarked ordinance is likely to be conventional explosives. The latter would further disperse, and dilute (reduce density) of the chemical gas; hence lessening lethality.

Elinore , 12 Apr 2017 12:08
You could put Assad in the White House and Trump in Syria and and nothing would change except that the White House might be a tad more intelligent.
Gandalf66 Elinore , 12 Apr 2017 12:59
Assad is actually a qualified doctor so he's pretty intelligent. Strange that he's ignoring the Hippocratic Oath on a daily basis.
jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:08
So we agree on the final result (need for regime change which by the way the article conflicts with its own title), but we disagree on the method. Many bottoms-up revolutions would not have been successful without outside help. The French helped America achieve freedom although their reason was somewhat revengeful. The people of Syria have no chance against an army and tanks ruled by a ruthless evil dictator like Assad without outside assistance. If you think they are not shedding enough blood for their freedom, then you are living in a hole in the ground.
Mickmarrs jman57 , 12 Apr 2017 12:18
Yeah and the guys that get in are head loppers
ProfJake , 12 Apr 2017 12:05
Well said. Worth taking a look at Global Peace Index, which is produced annually by the Sydney-based Institute for Economics and Peace:

http://visionofhumanity.org/indexes/global-peace-index /

In the latest iteration for 2016, the bottom ten places in the Index, reserved for the least peaceful countries on earth, include Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya: four countries where "regime change" has been brought about – or, in Syria's case, where there is arguably an ongoing attempt to bring it about – by the use of military force.

The evidence so far is that the use of force to topple regimes does not make things better, even when the behaviour of those regimes is/was objectionable in many ways.

Fort Sumpter , 12 Apr 2017 12:05

He has reduced once great Syrian cities such as Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco world heritage sites have been damaged.

Nope. Most of Homs and Aleppo are intact. The areas occupied by foreign Jihadists using the local populace as human shields were heavily bombed but now they have been liberated.

Who was it who destroyed these heritage sites? Not the SAA. The Jihadists even filmed themselves doing it and posted the videos online for goodness sake.

mp66 , 12 Apr 2017 12:04
Bashar al-Assad is not a good person. He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble. All six of Syria's Unesco World Heritage sites have been damaged.

So thousands of mostly foreign jihadists occupying parts of those cities had nothing to do with it? Did the US led forces in now n Mosul, or before that in Fallujah find the way to dislodge terrorists from urban strongholds without devastation of the city? Also for all world heritage sites in Syria, they were defended by Syrian troops, and everything that could be moved was moved to safe place. It was exclusively jihadists that were destroying temples, churches, shrines, even muslim graveyards when they found the funeral momunent "too tall". In all of these efforts to save the history of the humanity, syrian govermnent got no help nor acknowledgment. To add insult to injury, the western "cultural" response was touring 3D model of Palmyra gates through western capitals but while Daesh was methodically blowing it up under clear desert skies, there was interestingly not a single american drone to be found anywhere. It was syrian, iranian and russian blood spilled to liberate it twice from the death cult.

ID1941743 , 12 Apr 2017 12:02
Yep. There isn't a solution to this problem, but the one thing I'm 99.999% convinved will not work is 'the west' dusting off it's world policeman uniform and bombing the heck out of Syria.
ariaclast , 12 Apr 2017 12:01
This is precisely why the west has largely stayed out of the Syrian conflict; despite having a policy favouring the removal of Assad there hasn't been an attempt (or even the suggestion of an attempt at a policy level) at regime change.

One does wonder, though, at what point the conflict becomes so abhorrent and the civilian casualties so grotesque that our intervention could scarcely make things any worse

Vetinary ariaclast , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
Are you actually blind?
ariaclast Vetinary , 12 Apr 2017 12:15
Who said that?
LucyandTomDog , 12 Apr 2017 12:00
The US?

Syria?

Regime change?

Moi?

It seems that Spicer, the White House Press Secretary, whilst putting all his cerebral energy into attempting to apologise for his jaw-droppingly ignorant statement that Hitler never used chemical weapons on his own people, failed to stop his mouth making yet another gaffe;

"I needed to make sure that I clarified, and was not in any shape or form any more of a distraction from the president's decisive action in Syria and the attempts that he is making to destabilise the region and root out ISIS out of Syria."

(my emphasis)

Spicer speaks about the president's attempts to destabilise the region in a CNN television interview too.

As people are beginning to ask, does Spicer actually know what distabilise means?

zolotoy LucyandTomDog , 12 Apr 2017 12:44
I'm sure it was an unintentional but very revealing Freudian slip.

The advantage of letting dunces speak is that they're not very good at hiding what they think.

LucyandTomDog LucyandTomDog , 12 Apr 2017 13:21
Typo

'As people are beginning to ask, does Spicer actually know what distabilise means?'

Should be destabilise

Guy1ncognito , 12 Apr 2017 11:59

Bashar al-Assad is not a good person.

Don't hold back...

Moo1234 Guy1ncognito , 12 Apr 2017 12:22
Daesh/ isis are even less good people......
Gandalf66 Guy1ncognito , 12 Apr 2017 13:00
More like Assad is the least worst.
davshev , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
It bothers me that Trump is suddenly showing such concern toward innocent Syrians. Yet, at the same time he wants a ban on immigration from seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Syria.
sceptic64 davshev , 12 Apr 2017 12:15
Don't you think the timing here is - for Trump - rather convenient? Just when he is under pressure for being a Russian patsy, something happens to allow him to portray himself as 'standing up to Putin'.

This whole thing stinks.

davshev sceptic64 , 12 Apr 2017 12:26
Right. Also, the question should be...if Putin is sleazy enough to be complicit with Syria, then why wouldn't they be sleazy enough to be involved in trying to swing the American election?
zolotoy davshev , 12 Apr 2017 12:42
Good question. How sleazy is it to be complicit with Al Qaeda, the only entity on the planet that the USA is semiofficially at war with?
scipioafricanus , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
In essence there must be incremental change in the political climate and culture of a state amongst the masses before it culminates in regime change at the top.

The political climate is no longer there because Assad has systematically murdered everyone who could have formed a credible oppostion to his regime; opposition activitsts, aid workers, doctors and nurses, journalists - all have either been killed, have fled to Europe, or are currently being tortured in one of his detention centres. There is no one left to rise up against him.

The intervention triggers resentment and hostility at the new government whose legitimacy is reduced through the participation of an outside government. Soon the new regime is considered a 'puppet' and its own existence is questioned by the people.

This is indeed true. However backing Assad also has its costs; where is the legitimacy of someone who is now merely a "puppet" for Russia and Iran's ambitions in the region?

As uncomfortable as it is the best western governments can do is to provide aid and assistance to those in distress, whilst pressuring those countries that continue to feed money and weapons to the combatants to change their positions.

As reasonable as this sounds, I'm afraid this is just wishful thinking.

Mates Braas scipioafricanus , 12 Apr 2017 14:37
"The political climate is no longer there because Assad has systematically murdered everyone who could have formed a credible oppostion to his regime;"

There is a credible position inside Syria which has been largely ignored by the western MSM and governments, because it does not support the uprisisng or the violent overthrow of the Syrian government. It was refused participation when the first peace talks were arranged.

lemonsuckingpedant , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
Wow, a Guardian article I can finally wholeheartedly agree with. Does this Professor chap have a hotline to Trump and the rest of the Western leaders itching for a fight with Assad?
zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 11:53
Why do I get the feeling this is just another one of those "Now that Trump is in charge, we shouldn't do regime change" pieces? I note that the author nowhere comes out against fighting an eternal war in Syria -- he just doesn't want Trump doing the "regime change."

Yeah, he blabbers on about "aid and assistance" and "pressuring those countries that continue to feed money and weapons to the combatants to change their positions" -- obviously choosing to ignore how several western governments provide money and weapons to the combatants (should they be "pressuring" themselves?) But the pinnacle of his cluelessness -- or his agenda -- is reached with this whopper:

The situation will be even more fraught if other external actors turn any attempt at regime change into a proxy war, as Russia and Iran are likely to do.

--as if this hadn't been a proxy war for years already, one in which his own country has been quite actively engaged.
Janeira1 zolotoy , 12 Apr 2017 12:13
Didn't notice Iraq faring too well the last time the US intervened in regime change.
jamie evans , 12 Apr 2017 11:50
Trump told him over some cake?

This idiot has got to go, he is not rational. He clearly has not an inkling of the gravity of his actions. Nor does he care. How did we get to this? We always thought that a rogue state would be the end of us all. We were wrong. This moron is doing it all by himself. Some one needs to step in, take back control. This is frightening stuff.

Assad's removal would be catastrophic. There would be no stable government in Syria, it would be controlled by warlords backed by Saudi Arabia, al-Qaeda or ISIS and millions of refugees would have no country to return to or to live in. This will mean more refugees in Europe, more destabilisation and more money drained from our treasuries.

Russia would also be far from pleased and if the conflict erupted into a confrontation between NATO affiliated forces in Syria against Russia, the Eastern European front will become a lot more precarious (at a time when Britain is cutting back on military spending and very few European countries adequately contribute towards NATO). Do we really want a repeat of tensions from the pre-1991 era? I don't think so, especially with the combined threat of domestic Islamic terrorism throughout Europe and with the continental debt crisis that cannot afford more wars that are not in its interests. Russia will quickly mobilise its forces into the non-Russian caucuses, already closely aligned with Armenia and potentially link up with Iran territoriality. And what about Turkey? They cannot be relied upon.

So what benefit exactly is it to create anarchy in Syria for Britain's immediate and long-term interests? The destruction of Libya has created nothing but chaos and a stream of migrants from across Africa. Why Boris Johnson is waltzing around the world demanding hard action against Russia when we are cutting back on our armed forces is startling. A better question would be in whose immediate economic and geopolitical interests is the destruction of Assad beneficial? Well... there's two countries in the Middle East which come to mind... not hard to guess.

dusktildawn Jack1R , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
That's fair enough but what if Assad stays in power? Will the refugees, who mainly fled him, return? Will anyone invest in rebuilding the country? WIll anyone deal with the country other than Russia or Iran? Above all will the hatred of Assad, terrorism or indeed the conflict as a whole recede?
Jack1R dusktildawn , 12 Apr 2017 13:02
They didn't flee him... they fled the war. Most people, in any country, are apolitical. I expect the refugees in the Middle East and Anatolia will return to Syria and those in the West must be forced to return back.

The problem with Syria now is that it has become such a hot plate. If the West concedes to Russia and allows Syria to survive under the rule of Assad then we will lose face internationally... and it would be domestically embarrassing. No doubt Saudi Arabia, Israel and the Gulf monarchies would be less than pleased, and we depend on them for a lot of our oil.

It's a difficult question but what we do know is that there are no other credible groups that can rule Syria at the moment, other than Assad's Alawite minority. If we decide to nation-build, that will cost billions, possibly even trillions with no concrete result as our attempt in Iraq shows and we have no idea who we would put in charge. The Christians have about as much legitimacy as the Alawites. Perhaps the only conceivable outcome would be the breakup of Syria. The Christian and Alawite regions go towards Lebanon, the Kurdish regions are given independence and the Sunni areas are also given an independent state. But of course, the Sunni and Christian areas are intertwined and many Sunni's support Assad, or at least do not oppose him. And Turkey, as well as Iran, would never allow an independent Kurdistan. Iran would be less than pleased with the breakup of Syria as well.

I want to see a post-Assad plan. We all know what happens to non-Sunni minorities when a secular Arab leader is toppled. No one has yet to provide a coherent post-Assad state-structure. Unless of course they want Turkey to territoriality expand... we want to preserve the post-Ottoman borders and state-system yet at the same time we're waging war against the forces actively preserving it.

There is no simple answer. Assad is a pawn of Russia and Iran, yet the other options are either Turkish expansion (which, the last time they did that, they had sizeable European territories) or Saudi expansion (which I hope everyone agrees is less than desirable). We have no friends in the Middle East, other than Jordan, Egypt and Israel. But they all have their own interests and I suspect their friendships are determined upon those interests. I think our aim is to maintain the balance of power. Perhaps only the growth of Israel could act as a counter-weight to Sunni and Shia interests.

Alderbaran Jack1R , 12 Apr 2017 13:04
Would you support another leader from perhaps the same party taking over as an interim measure whilst different factions are brought together to defeat ISIS?

In an ideal world, I would love to see this happening, along with a form of truth and reconciliation commission, and a commitment from the international community and other bodies independent of the Syrian government to assist in tackling issues such as warlordism and corruption. The dogmatic belief that there can be no leader other than Assad is one that might have ultimately cost millions of lives and it would be wrong to use the old dictator's mantra of 'me or chaos'. And to be fair, Assad does not have a great track record in Syria.

And a final question - do you believe Russia should be doing more to put pressure on Assad or do you think it will be happy to put its international credibility on the line for him? (There is something pathological I believe in Putin's willingness to support other dictators)

Laurence Bury , 12 Apr 2017 11:50
How can one call for 'peaceful transition to a new society' when the original opposition to Assad was sponsored by multifarious power-hungry foreign actors? They exploited the Arab Spring pro-democracy utopianism then messed up their insurrectional strategy disastrously. The country now needs to be made a protectorate of an international peace-keeping force until a representative transitional government is agreed upon.
WellmeaningBob Laurence Bury , 12 Apr 2017 12:11
A little contradictory, no? Oh we fucked up, so you need to be colonised anyway.
Laurence Bury WellmeaningBob , 12 Apr 2017 12:19
No, that sounds like the pseudo-leftist neo-colonial discourse that Obama was so fond of.

The counter-argument to regime change is more that by now Assad controls most cities again, the opposition are awful sectarians who should be let nowhere near power and it may still be possible to contain IS to a manageable extent while Assad maintains a dictatorship indefinitely.

WellmeaningBob Laurence Bury , 12 Apr 2017 12:27
Not quite sure what you mean. Just saying that the "man on the street" would more likely than not understand "protectorate" pretty much the same as e.g. the Moroccans did.
Mates Braas elan , 12 Apr 2017 12:25
Civil war means that both sides are killing their own people.
zolotoy jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 11:57
Only because his opposition is even more barbaric.
Fort Sumpter jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 12:09
'indiscriminate weapons'

Oh dear, are they rally still pushing this 'our weapons don't kill civilians' BS?

No need for evidence of chlorine gas bombs apparently.

And anyone who questions the MSM narrative and who is sickened by endless war is an 'apologist'. What are you but an apologist for war?

Mates Braas jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 12:23
Unfortunately, there is no way to make war nice.
SeeNOevilHearNOevil , 12 Apr 2017 11:42
Regime change in Syria was being talked directly since 9/11 and it never stopped. It's on the record. So is john Kerry, on record on TV, stating gulf states offered to cover part of the costs of a US invasion in Syria at least twice way before the so called ''civil war'' even started.

They prepared it for years but the poor taste Iraq/Libya left on the US public meant the US pulled out of the deal (all because of the planed gas pipelines from Qatar to Europe that has to go through Syria).

The Saudis along with Qatar, Turkey and Israel believed they could force the hand of the US and acted alone initiating the takeover. This is why despite the intel, organisation and provision of what is estimated to be 300k(german estimates) foreign jihadists eventually came to a standstill without direct US support.

The Jihadists then prematurely jumped the gun fragmented creating ISIS (something meant to take place behind the scenes after they defeated Assad)

The point is of course...it's all about oil...nothing about democracy or Gas or any of that crap

hpe974 SeeNOevilHearNOevil , 12 Apr 2017 16:26
Of course it is!! The USA is truly the biggest sponsor of terror and mayhem and destruction in the M.E.
namjodh , 12 Apr 2017 11:38
Yes, this is all quite true. What the USA almost always seems to do is create a power vacuum in the countries it attempts to "save" and, inevitably it seems, the USA always chooses the wrong damn party or person to support in said vacuum. A stunning misreading and proof of the failure of American foreign policy "experts" and CIA strategists to grasp the realities on the ground.
HuckelburryPin namjodh , 12 Apr 2017 11:46

Yes, this is all quite true. What the USA almost always seems to do is create a power vacuum in the countries it attempts to "save" and, inevitably it seems, the USA always chooses the wrong damn party or person to support in said vacuum.

Like in Japan. Just that Japan is ... Shinto. Or something. Not M.........

WellmeaningBob namjodh , 12 Apr 2017 12:04
I'm sure its fair to say that for many instability, disorder, mayhem and the like are entirely desirable. Witness Kissinger who out-and-out advocated/advocates looking after US long-term interests through war, disease and starvation.
ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 11:37
Scott Ritter has been commenting on the alleged Assad gas attacks . Unlike the MSM the former Iraq weapons inspector seems far from convinced.
Levant1998 ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 13:46
Former UN weapons inspector Richard Lloyd, and Professor Theodore Posto of MIT also authored a piece:

http://m.dw.com/en/is-assad-to-blame-for-the-chemical-weapons-attack-in-syria/a-38330217

jadamsj ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 17:12

Scott Ritter has been commenting on the alleged Assad gas attacks. Unlike the MSM the former Iraq weapons inspector seems far from convinced.

What that before or after Russia blocked an investigation into it?

ploughmanlunch , 12 Apr 2017 11:35
'The on-going devastation in Syria cries out for a response, 'do something' is the inherent plea.'

Might I suggest sending generous quantities of bubble wrap to each of the 'something must be done' brigade. Popping those bubbles is relaxing and calming. They will otherwise impatiently agitate for some ineffective, or more likely counter-productive measure that makes things drastically worse.

zolotoy ID4352889 , 12 Apr 2017 11:46
Not very sensible, actually -- see the comment by capatriot above (or below, if you do "newest first"). Rather appalling that someone with academic credentials would (1) engage in a comic book-style analysis of world politics (big bad nearly omnipotent supervillain!) and (2) put all the blame for the carnage and destruction on one side.
EdmundLange , 12 Apr 2017 11:29
We tried to change the leader in Iraq. It didn't work, and now the country is a hotbed of terrorism and incredibly corrupt and ineffectual government. We tried to change the leader in Libya. It didn't work, and now the country is a hotbed of terrorism and incredibly corrupt and ineffectual government. I guess we could try to change the leader in Syria, if we really, really want.
EdmundLange jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 11:58
Excellent, I'm glad we're going to topple Assad so the Jihadists can take control. Just what we needed.
capatriot , 12 Apr 2017 11:26

He has reduced once great Syrian cities like Homs and Aleppo to rubble.

What, he, personally? What is he, superman? And I wonder why he'd choose to do that to his own nation's cities?

But wait, you mean that there was a rebellion against the recognized government which developed into a civil war, aided and abetted by sectarian outsiders and terrorists and the United States/West, with political and religious/ethnic overtones? And that later, as it looked like the recognized govt was going to fail, other interested outsiders like Russia and Iran intervened to help it?

Gosh, I wonder what the least worst outcome for the people of Syria actually is here ... perhaps we should leave it to them?

zolotoy jonnyross , 12 Apr 2017 11:56
It's actually a very serious question. How much control does Assad have over his government, let alone his armed forces? He's a trained dentist, ferchrissakes, and his older brother was the one groomed for the <strike>throne</strike> presidency. It makes sense to assume that his powers over an entrenched nomenklatura, to say nothing of all of the different armed factions nominally serving him, aren't limitless.

[Apr 12, 2017] The danger Turkey poses to Russia in Syria

Apr 12, 2017 | thesaker.is
Фланкербандит on April 11, 2017 · at 11:48 pm UTC
@ Simon Chow

I agree with you completely about the danger Turkey poses to Russia in Syria. You may even be right about this being a trap that Putin walked into by making a half-hearted military commitment to Syria and that now Drumpf decides to call the bluff by sicking Erdo on Russia exposed in Syria

This would surely be catastrophic for Russia and Putin himself he would have no chance to continue as leader of this great nation. However that is making a big leap of faith about Putin's basic math skills and resolve. What if VVP decides to pick up the glove that Drumpf appears to be throwing down ?

What then ?

Do you or anyone think that the Russian military is unprepared to put in place a very strong road block to any aggression on Syria ? As I mentioned elsewhere it would take only a couple of Iskander rocket brigades to cut Erdo's tank army to shreds if the move on Syria proceeds

I also believe that Russia is now moving in real time and is ready to spring its own trap as Professor Cohen noted on US TV today Russia is 'preparing for a hot war '. The rest of your comments about the Islamic threat to Russia's southern underbelly the first attempt with Chechnya in the '90s already failed badly

No doubt West still dreams of this but it would be a major project of 10 or 20 years at least would take a lot of ground laying

The idea that some kind of jihadist army is quickly going to march on Moscow is quite frankly silly

I would say that China's problem in Xinjiang is just as serious if not more how many Uighur takfiris have traveled from PRC to fight in Syria ?

Yet PRC does nothing At least Russia has Chechen military police in Syria and who knows what else that is operating in 'shadows'

Do you think those bearded Uighur fanatics are going to come back home and continue the fight in Xinjiang with support of US George Soros Amnesty International NED etc ? Also Tibet ? You seem to have some blind spots when it comes to assessing geopolitical strength

' Syria is not essential to Russia except for Russia's economically premature claim to super power status '

You sound like someone who needs a lesson in your own country's history

' In the 17th and 18th centuries, the demand for Chinese goods (particularly silk, porcelain, and tea) in the European market created a trade imbalance because the market for Western goods in China was virtually non-existent; China was largely self-sufficient and Europeans were not allowed access to China's interior. European silver flowed into China '

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Opium_War

Yes the Chinese were smart to conduct trade on their terms they told the English, French, Dutch and other colonial pirates [including America] that if they want Chinese tea then just bring silver and trade in one place where we allow it. Very good and wise policy .also incidentally followed at the time by Japan and Korea [another story]

Only problem was you see the mighty British Empire thought it had the god-given right to rule the world like another country today

They did not like the fact that they could not make anything off China and even had to buy silver from the Portuguese silver mines in Brazil for all the tea that Englishmen wanted to drink

So here is what happened the Brits decided to 'open up' the Chinese market [I love that phrase how do you do that like with a can opener ?]

You see the English had a nice little trade going in dope opium that they were growing in plantations in India which they ruled with an iron fist and they were making a nice business selling that to Chinese drug dealers under the table of course. And guess what the Chinese drug dealers were using to pay for that British dope if you guessed silver you would be right

' This reverse flow of silver and the increasing numbers of opium addicts alarmed Chinese officials '

Gee you think ?

' In 1839, the Daoguang Emperor, rejecting proposals to legalise and tax opium, appointed viceroy Lin Zexu to solve the problem by abolishing the trade. Lin confiscated around 20,000 chests of opium (approximately 1210 tons or 2.66 million pounds) without offering compensation, blockaded trade, and confined foreign merchants to their quarters.[6] The British government, although not officially denying China's right to control imports of the drug, objected to this unexpected seizure and used its naval and gunnery power to inflict a quick and decisive defeat,[5] a tactic later referred to as gunboat diplomacy "

Well gee that didn't turn out so well now did it ? China ended up having to 'open' its market to British dope while millions of Chines peasants destroyed themselves and their families as junkies

After that China was basically 'subdued' by the colonialists pirates until they managed to get Hong Kong back a few years ago and even now the pirates are stirring up trouble there

Sure the Imperial Russians jumped on China too after all Russian Czar and German Kaiser were first cousins colonialism was a great European gravy train for the elites of the day

Russia got China to give it the railroad concession in Manchuria [btw not Han ethnic at that time] and Russians built a railroad and a city [Harbin] now a city of over 5 million people

' Polish engineer Adam Szydłowski drew plans for the city [Harbin] following the construction of the Chinese Eastern Railway, which the Russian Empire had financed.[9] The Russians selected Harbin as the base of their administration over this railway and the Chinese Eastern Railway Zone. The Chinese Eastern Railway extended the Trans-Siberian Railway: substantially reducing the distance from Chita to Vladivostok and also linking the new port city of Dalny (Dalian) and the Russian Naval Base Port Arthur (Lüshun) '

So what was the lesson in 'trading' with British /

You can be very good and clever and not let foreigners get the better of you when selling them tea but unless you have guns that are bigger than theirs you may end up losing

What is going on today ? China makes and sells the 21'st century equivalent of tea and porcelain iphones and walmart stuff

Only now it is selling not for real money like silver but for IOUs printed by US banksters can be used to buy stuff in US not China maybe China wants to buy Disneyland ?

Try to buy Boeing or Lockheed Martin with Chinese big stack of dollars see what US say

Also can be used to buy US govt debt which allows US to print fake money to pay for its military industrial complex buy Russian rocket engines etc

Isn't it great when markets are 'opened up' ? everybody wins

My point is simply this please don't talk insultingly about Russian superpower 'pretensions'

How many nuclear submarines does China make ?

I hear recently China is making good progress on its first 'good' jet engine for its fighter aircraft

You may know that only a handful of nations produce 'good' turbojet and turbofan engines in the world today US Russia UK France

That China may soon join this exclusive club is something to be proud of

In 2003 China put its first man in space

' In 1994, Russia sold some of its advanced aviation and space technology to the Chinese. In 1995 a deal was signed between the two countries for the transfer of Russian Soyuz spacecraft technology to China. Included in the agreement was training, provision of Soyuz capsules, life support systems, docking systems, and space suits. In 1996 two Chinese astronauts, Wu Jie and Li Qinglong, began training at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia. After training, these men returned to China and proceeded to train other Chinese astronauts at sites near Beijing and Jiuquan. The hardware and information sold by the Russians led to modifications of the original Phase One spacecraft, eventually called Shenzhou, which loosely translated means "divine vessel." '

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenzhou_(spacecraft)#Design

Mother Russia is always willing to help her friends

I can also tell you about the Chinese army more than 60 years ago in Korea

' US Eighth Army was decisively defeated at the Battle of the Chongchon River and forced to retreat all the way back to South Korea The defeat of the U.S. Eighth Army resulted in the longest retreat of any American military unit in history The Chinese broke through the American defenses despite American air supremacy and the Eighth Army and U.N. forces retreated hastily to avoid encirclement. The Chinese offensive continued pressing American forces, which lost Seoul, the South Korean capital. Eighth Army's morale and esprit de corps hit rock bottom, to where it was widely regarded as a broken, defeated rabble

One more thing to be proud of. I'm sure if you decided to become a little more serious about your studies you could find many more instances in your nation's history to be proud of. Belittling another country in order to make yourself seem bigger is how shall I put rather un-Chinese

Actually very American

[Apr 09, 2017] Tucker Carlson Takes on Sen Graham After Syrian Strikes

Notable quotes:
"... So basically the Neoconservatives haven't learned a goddamn thing! ..."
www.youtube.com

Donal Lenehan

I don't trust that Lindsey Graham any more than Obama

Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Graham is a fucking asshole. The man is despicable FILTH.

Yanin Rodriguez

Disappointing questions Tucker with all due respect. Fact - Syrians support Assad up to 82%. Fact #2 - Rebels in Syria are by most accounts not even Syrian. Follow up on "liberating the Syrians" - with that mentality what about the Saudis?????

War is profits and comprises of the highest % of employment in the US - so until we transfer that sector of the economy to more peaceful endeavors - we will be permanently be in illegal wars. Lastly - where are any of these wars constitutional?

Why has congress relinquished this responsibility???

We know the answers but never hear the questions asked...

Josh Hempfleng

The strike in Syria really made the Military industrial complex show themselves. The media, Democrats and Rhino's all cheering on the attack now that they see a chance to make some money off war.

Rumi900

+Josh Hemplfeng - You say '... Democrats and Rhino's all cheering ...' Why Democrats and Rhino's?

I'd be okay with you saying Democrats and Republicans, but you seem to be letting the bulk of Republicans off the hook. Or, are you saying all the Republican elite are Rhinos? If so, I agree. The point is, surely, that much of Washington (on both sides) is bought and paid for by the wealthiest elites, through their lobbyists.

This isn't a partisan issue. I wish people would stop making it one! Republicans and Democrats are all equally culpable.

There are Democrats and Republicans who are not just shills for the elite. And those are the politicians we should be championing.

Trump talked about it during the election - 'draining the swamp'. The 'swamp' is not some secret power, some nefarious underground that is controlling things.

The 'swamp' is bought and paid for politicians - politicians bought and paid for by massive donations that can now hide behind the opaque screens of the SuperPACs. It's not just politicians on the 'other' side. Both sides are equally involved.

I don't believe Trump is serious about 'draining the swamp'. If he is, he should be going after things like the Citizen's United decision. The Supreme Court bounced that back to the House, because it's the House that makes the law. The Supreme Court is there to say whether the law is Constitutional. They don't make law. it's up to Congress to do that.

But politicians in the house, Republicans and Democrats alike, are happy with Citizen's United and SuperPACs and the opportunities for massive secret donations it has allowed. It's how they all get rich.

If Trump was serious about draining the swamp, he'd be tackling those issues. But he's not. Just look at his appointees! I didn't vote for Trump. Because I didn't believe his rhetoric. I still don't.

It's you guys, his ardent supporters, who should be holding his feet to the fire! And unfortunately, I see way too much adulation, mindless hero worship, and not enough demanding accountability.

Joanne K

They don't want us to know that ISIS is in Syria (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) and that is what Assad is fighting, along with other Islamic groups. The L in ISIL stands for Levant. Leave Syria out so that overthrowing Assad will only leave the amorphous oppressed rebels (really ISIS or Al Nusra or Al Qaeda).

They are deceivers.

Zack Edwards

So basically the Neoconservatives haven't learned a goddamn thing!

[Mar 11, 2017] Ukraine crisis: the neo-Nazi brigade fighting pro-Russian separatists

Notable quotes:
"... Kiev throws paramilitaries – some openly neo-Nazi - into the front of the battle with rebels ..."
"... But Kiev's use of volunteer paramilitaries to stamp out the Russian-backed Donetsk and Luhansk "people's republics", proclaimed in eastern Ukraine in March, should send a shiver down Europe's spine. Recently formed battalions such as Donbas, Dnipro and Azov, with several thousand men under their command, are officially under the control of the interior ministry but their financing is murky, their training inadequate and their ideology often alarming. ..."
"... The Azov men use the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel (Wolf's Hook) symbol on their banner and members of the battalion are openly white supremacists, or anti-Semites. ..."
"... The regiment's first commander was far-right nationalist Andriy Biletsky, who led the neo-Nazi Social-National Assembly and Patriot of Ukraine. ..."
"... Azov has gained notoriety among its detractors due to allegations of torture and war crimes, as well as the neo-Nazi sympathies of some of its members. ..."
Mar 11, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
RGC : March 11, 2017 at 07:47 AM
Ukraine crisis: the neo-Nazi brigade fighting pro-Russian separatists


Kiev throws paramilitaries – some openly neo-Nazi - into the front of the battle with rebels

By Tom Parfitt
9:00AM BST 11 Aug 2014

......................................

But Kiev's use of volunteer paramilitaries to stamp out the Russian-backed Donetsk and Luhansk "people's republics", proclaimed in eastern Ukraine in March, should send a shiver down Europe's spine. Recently formed battalions such as Donbas, Dnipro and Azov, with several thousand men under their command, are officially under the control of the interior ministry but their financing is murky, their training inadequate and their ideology often alarming.

The Azov men use the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel (Wolf's Hook) symbol on their banner and members of the battalion are openly white supremacists, or anti-Semites.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/11025137/Ukraine-crisis-the-neo-Nazi-brigade-fighting-pro-Russian-separatists.html

RGC -> RGC... , March 11, 2017 at 07:52 AM
The Azov Regiment (Ukrainian: Полк Азов) is a National Guard of Ukraine regiment.[1][2][3][4]

The unit is based in Mariupol in the Azov Sea coastal region.[5] It saw its first combat experience recapturing Mariupol from pro-Russian separatists forces in June 2014.[3]

Initially a volunteer militia, formed as the Azov Battalion on 5 May 2014 during the 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine, since 12 November 2014 Azov has been incorporated into the National Guard of Ukraine.[6] All members of the unit are under contract of and serve as part of the National Guard of Ukraine.[7]

More than half of the Battalion members are from eastern Ukraine and speak Russian,[8] and some of its recruits come from the eastern cities of Donetsk and Luhansk.[9] The regiment's first commander was far-right nationalist Andriy Biletsky, who led the neo-Nazi Social-National Assembly and Patriot of Ukraine.[10][11]

In its early days, Azov was the Ministry of Internal Affairs' special police company, led by Volodymyr Shpara, the leader of the Vasylkiv, Kiev, branch of Patriot of Ukraine and Right Sector.[12][13][14] Under the "Azov" umbrella were also created the non-governmental organization "Azov Civil Corps" and the political party National Corps.[15]

Azov has gained notoriety among its detractors due to allegations of torture and war crimes, as well as the neo-Nazi sympathies of some of its members.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azov_Battalion

[Mar 11, 2017] Whos Telling the Big Lie on Ukraine?

Notable quotes:
"... While I'm told that Russia did provide some light weapons to the rebels early in the struggle so they could defend themselves and their territory and a number of Russian nationalists have crossed the border to join the fight the claims of an overt "invasion" with tanks, artillery and truck convoys have been backed up by scant intelligence. ..."
"... One former U.S. intelligence official who has examined the evidence said the intelligence to support the claims of a significant Russian invasion amounted to "virtually nothing." ..."
"... Instead, it appears that the ethnic Russian rebels may have evolved into a more effective fighting force than many in the West thought. They are, after all, fighting on their home turf for their futures. ..."
"... "You need to know," the group wrote, "that accusations of a major Russian 'invasion' of Ukraine appear not to be supported by reliable intelligence. Rather, the 'intelligence' seems to be of the same dubious, politically 'fixed' kind used 12 years ago to 'justify' the U.S.-led attack on Iraq." ..."
"... Slavs are killing each other for the same reason Arabs are killing each other: to ensure the USA geopolitical and economic interests are served well. Divide and conquer was polished by British elite to perfection, and the USA elite adopted this policy like a very talented student. This is what neocolonialism is about. Disaster capitalism in action. ..."
Mar 11, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
RGC -> EMichael... March 11, 2017 at 09:10 AM , March 11, 2017 at 09:10 AM
Who's Telling the 'Big Lie' on Ukraine?

September 2, 2014

By Robert Parry


Official Washington draws the Ukraine crisis in black-and-white colors with Russian President Putin the bad guy and the U.S.-backed leaders in Kiev the good guys. But the reality is much more nuanced, with the American people consistently misled on key facts.
...............

A Mysterious 'Invasion'

And now there's the curious case of Russia's alleged "invasion" of Ukraine, another alarmist claim trumpeted by the Kiev regime and echoed by NATO hardliners and the MSM.

While I'm told that Russia did provide some light weapons to the rebels early in the struggle so they could defend themselves and their territory and a number of Russian nationalists have crossed the border to join the fight the claims of an overt "invasion" with tanks, artillery and truck convoys have been backed up by scant intelligence.

One former U.S. intelligence official who has examined the evidence said the intelligence to support the claims of a significant Russian invasion amounted to "virtually nothing."

Instead, it appears that the ethnic Russian rebels may have evolved into a more effective fighting force than many in the West thought. They are, after all, fighting on their home turf for their futures.

Concerned about the latest rush to judgment about the "invasion," the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, a group of former U.S. intelligence officials and analysts, took the unusual step of sending a memo to German Chancellor Angela Merkel warning her of a possible replay of the false claims that led to the Iraq War.

"You need to know," the group wrote, "that accusations of a major Russian 'invasion' of Ukraine appear not to be supported by reliable intelligence. Rather, the 'intelligence' seems to be of the same dubious, politically 'fixed' kind used 12 years ago to 'justify' the U.S.-led attack on Iraq."

But these doubts and concerns are not reflected in the Post's editorial or other MSM accounts of the dangerous Ukraine crisis. Indeed, Americans who rely on these powerful news outlets for their information are as sheltered from reality as anyone living in a totalitarian society.

https://consortiumnews.com/2014/09/02/whos-telling-the-big-lie-on-ukraine/

kthomas -> RGC... , March 11, 2017 at 08:27 AM
Poor Slavs. Always killing each other because the other is too Slav or not Slav enough.
libezkova -> kthomas... , March 11, 2017 at 10:21 AM
Slavs are killing each other for the same reason Arabs are killing each other: to ensure the USA geopolitical and economic interests are served well. Divide and conquer was polished by British elite to perfection, and the USA elite adopted this policy like a very talented student. This is what neocolonialism is about. Disaster capitalism in action.

[Feb 26, 2017] US Gov Vetting Next President for Ukraine

Notable quotes:
"... A Viktor Bout and Snowden Swap Imminent? ..."
www.moonofalabama.org

Oui | Feb 22, 2017 12:52:15 AM | 2

Posted earlier ...

US.Gov Vetting Next President for Ukraine, Tymoshenko?

Firtash can evade prison term if he "sells out" Russian leaders – Gerashchenko

Oui | Feb 22, 2017 12:56:33 AM | 3
More about Firtash in a post here ... Former Manafort UA Partner Facing Extradiction

A Viktor Bout and Snowden Swap Imminent?

Oui | Feb 22, 2017 1:07:23 AM | 5
Dutch fake referendum on Ukraine ...

Dutch Parliament secures required majority to support ratification of EU-Ukraine deal – outcome of debate

On last day before recess and the March general election!

[Feb 25, 2017] The Conflictual Relationship Between Donald Trump And The US Deep State

No real conflict emerged. The President proved to be a puppet of the Deep State.
Notable quotes:
"... Finally the most obvious attempt to sabotage the administration can be seen in the events in Ukraine. Unsurprisingly, Senators Graham and McCain, two of the deep state's top emissaries, visited Ukraine at the beginning of the year, prompting Ukrainian troops to resume their destructive offensive against the Donbass. ..."
"... "There are a lot of killers. We have a lot of killers", Trump said. "Well, you think our country is so innocent?" ..."
"... What the deep state refuses to accept is that they have lost the leading role in educating the rest of the world on humanitarian issues related to the concept of democracy. The main actors of the deep state clearly understand the negative implications for them personally in economic and financial terms associated with the abandonment of the pursuit of global hegemony. For over a hundred years, no US president has ever placed their country on a par with others, has ever abandoned the concept of a nation (the US) "chosen by God". ..."
"... "Donald Trump has emerged with in mind a precise foreign policy strategy, forged by various political thinkers of the realist world such as Waltz and Mearsheimer, trashing all recent neoconservative and neoliberal policies of foreign intervention (R2P - Right to Protect) and soft power campaigns in favor of human rights. No more UN resolutions, subtly used to bomb nations (Libya). Trump doesn't believe in the central role of the UN and reaffirmed this repeatedly. ..."
"... If one wants to place weight on his words during the election campaign, it should be taken into consideration that Trump won the election thanks to the clear objectives of wanting to avoid a further spending spree on destructive wars. This priority was made clear and expressed in every possible way with the adoption of an America First policy, especially regarding domestic policy. ..."
"... The bottom line is always that Trump has the ability and willingness to be resilient to the pressures of the deep state, focusing on the needs of the average American citizen, rather than caving in to the interests of the deep state such as intelligence agencies, neocons, Israel lobby, Saudi lobby, the military-industrial complex, and many more. ..."
Feb 25, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com
Submitted by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

... ... ...

The first two weeks of the new presidency have already provided a few significant events. The operation that took place in Yemen, conducted by the American special forces and directed against Al Qaeda, has reprised the previous administration. Being a complex operation that required thorough preparation, the new administration thereby had to necessarily represent a continuation of the old one. Details are still vague, but looking at the outcome, the mission failed as a result of incompetence. The American special forces were spotted before arriving at al Qaeda's supposed base. This resulted in the shooting of anything that moved, causing more than 25 civilian deaths.

The media that had been silent during the Obama administration was rightfully quick to condemn the killing of innocent people, and harsh criticism was directed at the administration for this operation. It is entirely possible that the operation was set up to fail, intended to delegitimize the operational capabilities of the new Trump team. Given the links between al Qaeda, the Saudis and the neoconservatives, something historically proven, it is not unthinkable that the failure of the operation was a consequence of an initial attempt at sabotaging Trump on a key aspect of his presidency, namely the successful execution of counter-terrorist efforts against Islamist terrorism.

Another structural component in the attempts to undermine the Trump administration concern the deployment of NATO and US troops on the western border of the Russian Federation. This attempt is obvious and is one of the strategies aimed at preventing a rapprochement between Washington and Moscow. The EU persists in its self-defeating policy, focusing its attention on foreign policy instead of gaining strategic independence thanks to the new presidency. It is now even more clear that European Union leaders, and in particular the current political representatives in Germany and France, have every intention of continuing in the direction set by the Obama presidency, seeking a futile confrontation with the Russian Federation instead of a sensible rapprochement.

Europe continues to insist on failed economic and social policies that will lead to bankruptcy, using foreign-policy issues as diversions and excuses. The consequences of these wrongheaded efforts will inevitably favor the election of nationalist and populist parties, as seen in the United States and other countries, which will end in the destruction of the EU. For the US deep state and their long-term objectives, this tactic has a dual effect: it prevents the proper functioning of the EU as well as significantly halts any rapprochement between the EU and the Russian Federation. The latter strategy looks more and more irreversible given the current European Union elites. In this sense, the UK, thanks to Brexit, seems to have broken free and started to slowly restructure its foreign- policy priorities, in close alignment to Trump's isolationism.

Finally the most obvious attempt to sabotage the administration can be seen in the events in Ukraine. Unsurprisingly, Senators Graham and McCain, two of the deep state's top emissaries, visited Ukraine at the beginning of the year, prompting Ukrainian troops to resume their destructive offensive against the Donbass. The intentions are clear and assorted. First is the constant attempt to sabotage any rapprochement between Moscow and Washington, hoping to engulf Trump in an American/NATO escalation of events in Ukraine. Second, given the critical situation in Europe, is the effort to push Berlin to assume the burden of economically supporting the failing administration in Kiev. Third is the increasing pressure applied to Russia and Putin, as was already seen in 2014, in an effort to actively involve the Russian Federation in the Ukrainian conflict so as to justify NATO's direct involvement or even that of the United States. The latter situation would be the dream of the neoconservatives, setting Trump and Putin on a direct collision course.

The new American administration has thus far suffered at least three sabotage attempts, and it is the attitude Trump intends to have with the rest of the world that has spurred them. In an interview with Bill O'Reilly on Fox News, Trump reiterated that his primary focus is not governed by the doctrine of American exceptionalism, a concept he does not subscribe to anyhow. The religion driving democratic evangelization looks more likely to be replaced with a pragmatic, realist geopolitical stance.

This is how one could sum up Trump's words to Bill O'Reilly:

"There are a lot of killers. We have a lot of killers", Trump said. "Well, you think our country is so innocent?"

What the deep state refuses to accept is that they have lost the leading role in educating the rest of the world on humanitarian issues related to the concept of democracy. The main actors of the deep state clearly understand the negative implications for them personally in economic and financial terms associated with the abandonment of the pursuit of global hegemony. For over a hundred years, no US president has ever placed their country on a par with others, has ever abandoned the concept of a nation (the US) "chosen by God".

In an article a few weeks ago, I tried to lay the foundations for a future US administration, placing a strong focus on foreign policy and revealing a possible shift in US historic foreign relations. In a passage I wrote:

"Donald Trump has emerged with in mind a precise foreign policy strategy, forged by various political thinkers of the realist world such as Waltz and Mearsheimer, trashing all recent neoconservative and neoliberal policies of foreign intervention (R2P - Right to Protect) and soft power campaigns in favor of human rights. No more UN resolutions, subtly used to bomb nations (Libya). Trump doesn't believe in the central role of the UN and reaffirmed this repeatedly.

In general, the Trump administration intends to end the policy of regime change, interference in foreign governments, Arab springs and color revolutions. They just don't work. They cost too much in terms of political credibility, in Ukraine the US are allied with supporters of Bandera (historical figure who collaborated with the Nazis) and in Middle East they finance or indirectly support al Qaeda and al Nusra front".

The recent meeting in Washington with Theresa May, the first official encounter with a prominent US ally, revealed, among other things, a possible dramatic change in US policy. The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom expressed her desire to follow a new policy of non-intervention, in line with the isolationist strategy Trump has spoken about since running for office. In a joint press conference with the American president, May said: "The era of military intervention is over. London and Washington will not return to the failed policy in the past that has led to intervention in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya".

During the election campaign, Trump made his intentions clear in different contexts, but always coming from the standpoint of non-interventionism inspired by the concept of isolationism. It is becoming apparent that these intentions are being put into action, though the rhetoric regarding Iran has become alarming. In typical Trump fashion (which contrasts with the Iran issue), the situation in Syria is normalizing and the initial threats directed at China appear to have been put aside. The case of Iran is a different and complex story, requiring a deeper analysis that deserves a separate article. What will gradually be important, as the Presidency progresses, is understanding the necessity to distinguish between words and actions, separating provocations from intentions.

Conclusions and future questions

There is a whole list of Trump statements that are seen as threats to other countries, primarily Iran. The next article will further explain the possible strategy to be employed by Donald Trump to fight these attempts to sabotage his administration, a strategy that seems to be based on silences, bluffs and admissions to counter the perpetual attempts to influence his presidency. If one wants to place weight on his words during the election campaign, it should be taken into consideration that Trump won the election thanks to the clear objectives of wanting to avoid a further spending spree on destructive wars. This priority was made clear and expressed in every possible way with the adoption of an America First policy, especially regarding domestic policy.

The bottom line is always that Trump has the ability and willingness to be resilient to the pressures of the deep state, focusing on the needs of the average American citizen, rather than caving in to the interests of the deep state such as intelligence agencies, neocons, Israel lobby, Saudi lobby, the military-industrial complex, and many more. It is only in the next few months that we will come to understand if Trump will be willing to continue the fight against war or bend the knee and pay the price.

Mustafa Kemal , Feb 21, 2017 11:21 PM

" What the deep state refuses to accept is that they have lost the leading role in educating the rest of the world on humanitarian issues related to the concept of democracy."

This was a strange article, but after reading the above quote I had to laugh and could not find the gumption to continue reading.

Who could write something like that?

BarnacleBill , Feb 21, 2017 11:29 PM

The Deep State ought to have beaten Trump already - one way or another...! But somebody with brains has realised that it's not just Trump. It's the political movement that he heads***. Even if they killed DT tomorrow (and it's certain to have been on their agenda), the Trumpista Party would survive: it's too active and too popular to disappear. So the establishment pretty much has to wrap up the entire movement. They have left things dangerously late, from their point of view.

*** I know he didn't start it; it's the old Pat Buchanan + Ron Paul gang, but Donald is twice as cunning as those chaps. I really don't think he'll win his war with the bad guys - the War Party - but his influence will be quite long-lasting. And of course he is our last hope to roll back the spectre of "1984".

[Feb 23, 2017] The Bow-Tied Bard of Populism by McKay Coppins

Notable quotes:
"... Politico Magazine ..."
"... Tucker Carlson Tonight ..."
Feb 23, 2017 | www.theatlantic.com

If this boosterism seems out of character for a primetime populist like Carlson, he doesn't seem to mind the dissonance. He speaks glowingly of his Northwest Washington neighborhood, a tony enclave of liberal affluence where, he tells me, he is surrounded by diplomats, lawyers, world bankers, and well-paid media types. They are reliably "wonderful"; unfailingly "nice"; "some of my favorite people in the world." If you've watched Carlson on TV lately, you know they are also wrong about virtually everything.

Indeed, throughout the 2016 election cycle Carlson routinely deployed his anonymous neighbors as a device in his political punditry -- pointing to them as emblems of the educated elite's insular thinking. He scoffed at their affection for Marco Rubio in the primaries, and he ridiculed their self-righteous reactions to the Republican nominee in the general. "On my street," he wrote in Politico Magazine , "there's never been anyone as unpopular as Trump."

This shtick worked brilliantly for Carlson, catapulting him from a weekend hosting gig to the coveted 9 p.m. slot in Fox's primetime lineup. He now regularly pulls in more than 3 million viewers a night -- a marked improvement on the program he replaced -- and he counts the commander in chief among his loyal fans. Just this past weekend, President Trump set off a minor international firestorm when he suggested Sweden was experiencing an immigrant-fueled spike in crime -- a ( dubious ) claim he picked up by watching Tucker Carlson Tonight .

In an era when TV talking heads are more influential than ever, Carlson has suddenly -- and rather improbably -- emerged as one of the most powerful people in media. The question now is what he wants to do with that perch.

To the extent that Carlson's on-air commentary these days is guided by any kind of animating idea, it is perhaps best summarized as a staunch aversion to whatever his right-minded neighbors believe. The country has reached a point, he tells me, where the elite consensus on any given issue should be "reflexively distrusted."

"Look, it's really simple," Carlson says. "The SAT 50 years ago pulled a lot of smart people out of every little town in America and funneled them into a small number of elite institutions, where they married each other, had kids, and moved to an even smaller number of elite neighborhoods. We created the most effective meritocracy ever."

"But the problem with the meritocracy," he continues, is that it "leeches all the empathy out of your society The second you think that all your good fortune is a product of your virtue, you become highly judgmental, lacking empathy, totally without self-awareness, arrogant, stupid -- I mean all the stuff that our ruling class is."

Carlson recounts, with some amusement, how he saw these attitudes surface in his neighbors' response to Trump's victory. He recalls receiving a text message on election night from a stunned Democratic friend declaring his intention to flee the country with his family. Carlson replied by asking if he could use their pool while they were gone.

"I mean people were, like, traumatized," he says. And yet, in the months since then, "no one I know has learned anything. There's been no moment of reflection It's just, 'This is what happens when you let dumb people vote.'" Carlson finds this brand of snobbery particularly offensive: "Intelligence is not a moral category. That's what I find a lot of people in my life assume. It's not. God doesn't care how smart you are, actually."

McKay Coppins is a staff writer at The Atlantic and the author of The Wilderness, a book about the battle over the future of the Republican Party.

[Feb 21, 2017] David Stockman provides one of the best commentaries on Flynn assassination by deep state and Trymp betrayal of Flynn

Feb 20, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
David Stockman provides one of the best commentaries on Flynn assassination by deep state and Obama neocon holdovers in the administration. This is a really powerful astute, first class analysis of the situation:

Flynn's Gone But They're Still Gunning For You, Donald

http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2017/february/17/flynns-gone-but-theyre-still-gunning-for-you-donald/

== quote ==
... ... ...
This is the real scandal as Trump himself has rightly asserted. The very idea that the already announced #1 national security advisor to a President-elect should be subject to old-fashion "bugging," albeit with modern day technology, overwhelmingly trumps the utterly specious Logan Act charge at the center of the case.

As one writer for LawNewz noted regarding acting Attorney General Sally Yates' voyeuristic pre-occupation with Flynn's intercepted conversations, Nixon should be rolling in his grave with envy:

Now, information leaks that Sally Yates knew about surveillance being conducted against potential members of the Trump administration, and disclosed that information to others. Even Richard Nixon didn't use the government agencies themselves to do his black bag surveillance operations. Sally Yates involvement with this surveillance on American political opponents, and possibly the leaking related thereto, smacks of a return to Hoover-style tactics. As writers at Bloomberg and The Week both noted, it wreaks of 'police-state' style tactics. But knowing dear Sally as I do, it comes as no surprise.

Yes, that's the same career apparatchik of the permanent government that Obama left behind to continue the 2016 election by other means. And it's working. The Donald is being rapidly emasculated by the powers that be in the Imperial City due to what can only be described as an audacious and self-evident attack on Trump's Presidency by the Deep State.

Indeed, it seems that the layers of intrigue have gotten so deep and convoluted that the nominal leadership of the permanent government machinery has lost track of who is spying on whom. Thus, we have the following curious utterance by none other than the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Devin Nunes:

'I expect for the FBI to tell me what is going on, and they better have a good answer,' he told The Washington Post. 'The big problem I see here is that you have an American citizen who had his phone calls recorded.'

Well, yes. That makes 324 million of us, Congressman.

But for crying out loud, surely the oh so self-important chairman of the House intelligence committee knows that everybody is bugged. But when it reaches the point that the spy state is essentially using its unconstitutional tools to engage in what amounts to "opposition research" with the aim of election nullification, then the Imperial City has become a clear and present danger to American democracy and the liberties of the American people.

As Robert Barnes of LawNewz further explained, Sally Yates, former CIA director John Brennan and a large slice of the Never Trumper intelligence community were systematically engaged in "opposition research" during the campaign and the transition:

According to published reports, someone was eavesdropping, and recording, the conversations of Michael Flynn, while Sally Yates was at the Department of Justice. Sally Yates knew about this eavesdropping, listened in herself (Pellicano-style for those who remember the infamous LA cases), and reported what she heard to others. For Yates to have such access means she herself must have been involved in authorizing its disclosure to political appointees, since she herself is such a political appointee. What justification was there for an Obama appointee to be spying on the conversations of a future Trump appointee?

Consider this little tidbit in The Washington Post . The paper, which once broke Watergate, is now propagating the benefits of Watergate-style surveillance in ways that do make Watergate look like a third-rate effort. (With the) FBI 'routinely' monitoring conversations of Americans...... Yates listened to 'the intercepted call,' even though Yates knew there was 'little chance' of any credible case being made for prosecution under a law 'that has never been used in a prosecution.'

And well it hasn't been. After all, the Logan Act was signed by President John Adams in 1799 in order to punish one of Thomas Jefferson's supporters for having peace discussions with the French government in Paris. That is, it amounted to pre-litigating the Presidential campaign of 1800 based on sheer political motivation.

According to the Washington Post itself, that is exactly what Yates and the Obama holdovers did day and night during the interregnum:
Indeed, the paper details an apparent effort by Yates to misuse her office to launch a full-scale secret investigation of her political opponents, including 'intercepting calls' of her political adversaries.

So all of the feigned outrage emanating from Democrats and the Washington establishment about Team Trump's trafficking with the Russians is a cover story. Surely anyone even vaguely familiar with recent history would have known there was absolutely nothing illegal or even untoward about Flynn's post-Christmas conversations with the Russian Ambassador.

Indeed, we recall from personal experience the thrilling moment on inauguration day in January 1981 when word came of the release of the American hostages in Tehran. Let us assure you, that did not happen by immaculate diplomatic conception -- nor was it a parting gift to the Gipper by the outgoing Carter Administration.

To the contrary, it was the fruit of secret negotiations with the Iranian government during the transition by private American citizens. As the history books would have it because it's true, the leader of that negotiation, in fact, was Ronald Reagan's national security council director-designate, Dick Allen.

As the real Washington Post later reported, under the by-line of a real reporter, Bob Woodward:

Reagan campaign aides met in a Washington DC hotel in early October, 1980, with a self-described 'Iranian exile' who offered, on behalf of the Iranian government, to release the hostages to Reagan, not Carter, in order to ensure Carter's defeat in the November 4, 1980 election.

The American participants were Richard Allen, subsequently Reagan's first national security adviser, Allen aide Laurence Silberman, and Robert McFarlane, another future national security adviser who in 1980 was on the staff of Senator John Tower (R-TX).

To this day we have not had occasion to visit our old friend Dick Allen in the US penitentiary because he's not there; the Logan Act was never invoked in what is surely the most blatant case ever of citizen diplomacy.

So let's get to the heart of the matter and be done with it. The Obama White House conducted a sour grapes campaign to delegitimize the election beginning November 9th and it was led by then CIA Director John Brennan.

That treacherous assault on the core constitutional matter of the election process culminated in the ridiculous Russian meddling report of the Obama White House in December. The latter, of course, was issued by serial liar James Clapper, as national intelligence director, and the clueless Democrat lawyer and bag-man, Jeh Johnson, who had been appointed head of the Homeland Security Department.

Yet on the basis of the report's absolutely zero evidence and endless surmise, innuendo and "assessments", the Obama White House imposed another round of its silly school-boy sanctions on a handful of Putin's cronies.

Of course, Flynn should have been telling the Russian Ambassador that this nonsense would be soon reversed!

But here is the ultimate folly. The mainstream media talking heads are harrumphing loudly about the fact that the very day following Flynn's call -- Vladimir Putin announced that he would not retaliate against the new Obama sanctions as expected; and shortly thereafter, the Donald tweeted that Putin had shown admirable wisdom.

That's right. Two reasonably adult statesman undertook what might be called the Christmas Truce of 2016. But like its namesake of 1914 on the bloody no man's land of the western front, the War Party has determined that the truce-makers shall not survive.

The Donald has been warned.

[Feb 19, 2017] The deep state is running scared!

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... ..."Multiple reports show that my former colleagues in the intelligence community have decided that they must leak or withhold classified information due to unsettling connections between President Trump and the Russian Government... ..."
"... The deep state is running scared! I never+ attribute to coincidence that which is the FBI trampling the bill of rights. It is coincidence the deep state (fbi, nsa, various CIA and DoD spooks) tapped Russia spies who talk to private citizens who have no opportunity at espionage. Then the innuendo is leaked to the Clinton media! ..."
"... Worse on Trump for calling them out for leaking rather than as a civil liberty trampling Gestapo. Ben Franklin was right, give the democrat run spooks the power to protect you and you lose liberty and protection! ..."
Feb 19, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
im1dc : February 18, 2017 at 05:32 PM
This is running now on FoxNews.com, total fabrication especially the last sentence but Trumpers believe this Fake News. I think this is where ilsm gets his intell insights from, phoney former intell officers, they sound exactly like him - check it out for yourself

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/02/18/im-democrat-and-ex-cia-but-spies-plotting-against-trump-are-out-control.html

"I'm a Democrat (and ex-CIA) but the spies plotting against Trump are out of control"

By Bryan Dean Wright...February 18, 2017...Foxnews.com

..."Multiple reports show that my former colleagues in the intelligence community have decided that they must leak or withhold classified information due to unsettling connections between President Trump and the Russian Government...

Days ago, they delivered their verdict. According to one intelligence official, the president "will die in jail."..."

ilsm -> im1dc... , February 18, 2017 at 06:08 PM
The deep state is running scared! I never+ attribute to coincidence that which is the FBI trampling the bill of rights. It is coincidence the deep state (fbi, nsa, various CIA and DoD spooks) tapped Russia spies who talk to private citizens who have no opportunity at espionage. Then the innuendo is leaked to the Clinton media!

Worse on Trump for calling them out for leaking rather than as a civil liberty trampling Gestapo. Ben Franklin was right, give the democrat run spooks the power to protect you and you lose liberty and protection!

+40 years around the puzzlers.

[Feb 19, 2017] The deep state is running scared!

Highly recommended!
Notable quotes:
"... ..."Multiple reports show that my former colleagues in the intelligence community have decided that they must leak or withhold classified information due to unsettling connections between President Trump and the Russian Government... ..."
"... The deep state is running scared! I never+ attribute to coincidence that which is the FBI trampling the bill of rights. It is coincidence the deep state (fbi, nsa, various CIA and DoD spooks) tapped Russia spies who talk to private citizens who have no opportunity at espionage. Then the innuendo is leaked to the Clinton media! ..."
"... Worse on Trump for calling them out for leaking rather than as a civil liberty trampling Gestapo. Ben Franklin was right, give the democrat run spooks the power to protect you and you lose liberty and protection! ..."
Feb 19, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
im1dc : February 18, 2017 at 05:32 PM
This is running now on FoxNews.com, total fabrication especially the last sentence but Trumpers believe this Fake News. I think this is where ilsm gets his intell insights from, phoney former intell officers, they sound exactly like him - check it out for yourself

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/02/18/im-democrat-and-ex-cia-but-spies-plotting-against-trump-are-out-control.html

"I'm a Democrat (and ex-CIA) but the spies plotting against Trump are out of control"

By Bryan Dean Wright...February 18, 2017...Foxnews.com

..."Multiple reports show that my former colleagues in the intelligence community have decided that they must leak or withhold classified information due to unsettling connections between President Trump and the Russian Government...

Days ago, they delivered their verdict. According to one intelligence official, the president "will die in jail."..."

ilsm -> im1dc... , February 18, 2017 at 06:08 PM
The deep state is running scared! I never+ attribute to coincidence that which is the FBI trampling the bill of rights. It is coincidence the deep state (fbi, nsa, various CIA and DoD spooks) tapped Russia spies who talk to private citizens who have no opportunity at espionage. Then the innuendo is leaked to the Clinton media!

Worse on Trump for calling them out for leaking rather than as a civil liberty trampling Gestapo. Ben Franklin was right, give the democrat run spooks the power to protect you and you lose liberty and protection!

+40 years around the puzzlers.

[Feb 19, 2017] Most people don't know that after the 134 men died on the Forrestal fire in 1967 McCain was the ONLY person helicoptered off the ship. It was done for his own safety as many on the ship blamed him for causing the fire by wet starting his jet causing a plume of fire to shoot out his plane's exhaust and into the plane behind

Pretty interesting video...
Notable quotes:
"... Pete Hegseth and Jesse Watters discuss the bitter establishment's desperation to manufacture a Trump scandal ..."
"... Most people don't know that after the 134 men died on the Forrestal fire in 1967 McCain was the ONLY person helicoptered off the ship. It was done for his own safety as many on the ship blamed him for causing the fire by "wet" starting his jet causing a plume of fire to shoot out his plane's exhaust and into the plane behind McCain causing the ordnance to cook off on that jet. McCain then panicked and dropped his own bombs onto the deck making matters much worse. McCain should have ended his career in jail. Oh, wait, he kinda did, maybe karma justice? ..."
"... FakeStream Media ..."
"... The very Fake Media has met their match ..."
Feb 18, 2017 | www.youtube.com
Pete Hegseth and Jesse Watters discuss the bitter establishment's desperation to manufacture a Trump scandal

TheBase1aransas 3 minutes ago

Alvina I think people that believe in freedom is not only the Best thing, but what built it. We finally have Trump to speak for us.

Christine Lesch 4 hours ago
McCains a shumuck
Herbert Stewart 11 minutes ago
@Christine Lesch

I feel sorry for Arizona they are stuck with this guy. he needs to change parties he had his turn and LOST1 america first!

Geoffry Allan

it appears quite apparent that you people are really sad. trump is above all else, a good american. so.... stop being a moron.

hexencoff 3 hours ago
no one gives a shit what John McCain says he's a scumbag!
hexencoff 3 hours ago
Jodi Boin i hope so too it's honestly very scary how far we have regressed as a country we are fighting about the same things from 50 years ago everyone has their own beliefs and opinions and some how adult conversation has been thrown away i mean we are still fighting over race relations for crying out loud
Louis John 2 hours ago
@hexencoff

McCain is a trouble maker. supporter of the terrorist and warmonger Iraq Libya Syria he is behind all the trouble scumbag

Gary M 3 hours ago
McCain is a globalist
belaghoulashi 2 hours ago
(edited) McCain has always been full of horseshit. And he has always relied on people calling him a hero to get away with it. That schtick is old, the man is a monumental failure for this country, and he needs to have his sorry butt kicked.

ryvr madduck 1 hour ago

+belaghoulashi

Most people don't know that after the 134 men died on the Forrestal fire in 1967 McCain was the ONLY person helicoptered off the ship. It was done for his own safety as many on the ship blamed him for causing the fire by "wet" starting his jet causing a plume of fire to shoot out his plane's exhaust and into the plane behind McCain causing the ordnance to cook off on that jet. McCain then panicked and dropped his own bombs onto the deck making matters much worse. McCain should have ended his career in jail. Oh, wait, he kinda did, maybe karma justice?

Michael Cambo 4 hours ago
When you start to drain the swamp, the swamp creatures start to show.
Alexus Highfield 3 hours ago
@Michael Cambo

don't they...they do say shit floats.

Geoffry Allan 41 minutes ago

@Michael Cambo - Trump has not drained the swamp he has surrounded himself with billionaires in his cabinet who don't give a damn about the working middle class who struggle e eryday to make a living - explain to me how he is draining the swamp

tim sparks 3 hours ago
Trump is trying so fucking hard to do a good job for us.
Integrity Truth-seeker 2 hours ago
@tim sparks

He is not trying... HE IS DOING IT... Like A Boss. Thank God Mark Taylor Prophecies 2017 the best is yet to come

Jodi Boin 3 hours ago
McCain is a traitor and is bought and paid for by Soros.
Grant Davidson 4 hours ago
Love him or hate him. The guy is a frikkin Genius...
Patrick Reagan 4 hours ago
FakeStream Media
Michael Cambo 4 hours ago
@Patrick Reagan

Very FakeStream Media

aspengold5 4 hours ago
I am so disappointed in McCain.
orlando pablo 4 hours ago
my 401k is keep on going up....thank u mr trump....
Dumbass Libtard 3 hours ago
McCain is not a Republican. He is a loser. Yuge difference.1
Mitchel Colvin 3 hours ago
Shut up McCain! I can't stand this clown anymore! Unfortunately, Arizona re-elected him for six more years!
robert barham 4 hours ago
The very Fake Media has met their match
H My ways of thinking! 3 hours ago
Why does everyone feel that if they don't kiss McCain's ass, they are being un American? Mccain has sold out to George Soros. He is a piece of shit who is guilty of no less than treason! Look up the definition for treason if you're in doubt!
Sam Nardo 3 hours ago
(edited) Mc Cain and Graham are two of the best democrats in the GOP. They are called RINOS
kazzicup 3 hours ago
We love and support our President Donald Trump. The media is so dishonest. CNN = Criminal News Network.

Geoffry Allan 34 minutes ago

@kazzicup - yeah if you get rid of the media Trump becomes a dictator - is that what you want he will censor everything and tell you what he wants - Trump is still president and he is doing his job and fulfilling his promises even though the media is there and reporting - so what's the problem - I don't want a got damn dictator running this country - if you don't like the media then just listen to Trump - 2nd amendment free speech and the right to bear arms we have to respect it even if we may disagree

[Feb 19, 2017] Oligarchs dreams about enslavement and complete control of all mankind

Notable quotes:
"... Senator John McCain (R- AZ) wants to go to war with Russia and he wants to reshape eastern Europe. McCain and Lindsey Graham were instrumental in the Obama-ordered and sanctioned coup d'état that brought down Ukraine's government and president and installed a U.S. puppet picked by Victoria Nuland. McCain hasn't stopped: he's just been "on hold" to see where he can take footing when the dust settles from the initial Trump shakeup. ..."
"... Not only democrats rigged Primary to elect Clinton as presidential candidate last year even though she has poor judgment (violating government cyber security policy) and is incompetent (her email server was not secured) when she was the Secretary of State, and was revealed to be corrupt by Bernie Sanders during the Primary, but also democrats encourage illegal immigration, discourage work, and "conned" young voters with free college/food/housing/health care/Obama phone. Democrat government employees/politicians also committed crimes leaking classified information which caused former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn losing his job. ..."
"... "Bill and I chose to Help early" My friends from Haiti tell me how grateful they are. They would like their gold back from your brother though. ..."
"... Star Trek...the Borg...Not a huge fan of star trek but the show does reveal interesting things...the borg, resistance is futile, etc, but it seems as tho resistance wws not futile, according the the show...the matrix is a good movie too...too many more to mention. I herd an interview with Robert Steele, very interesting...any thoughts? I also came across a christian leaning website who supports Trump, and they are quite smart..trunews.com......not your average piece of shit evangelist...anyway, thats all I got today... ..."
"... the thing you are missing is that the evil zio loves chaos... and Mericans are falling for it... how else will Soros make money without extreme movements.... when there is chaos they buy shit cheap.... Soros is reading these articles and laughing.... ..."
Feb 19, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com

In past articles the fact of a long struggle was mentioned and how it ties in with the current first year of the President's administration. The struggle is not merely to overcome the executive actions and orders of Obama. The true battle is to remove the Marxists from bureaucratic fiefs established by Obama for carryover into the current administration and to deflect and negate their attacks and the attacks of others.

The circuit court in San Francisco and the Department of Justice have been waging a seesaw-type of battle over the executive order signed by the President. The order's intent is to stem the illegal aliens and foreigners entering the U.S. from Middle Eastern nations either openly hostile to or providing the highest probability (intentionally or indirectly) for terrorists to enter the country. This makes perfect sense, and because it does, one can easily see that only those hell-bent on weakening the U.S. and fostering infiltration would be against the order: those Marxists of the Left labeled as "Democrats" and calling themselves "Progressives."

They are not alone: they are aided by the Left-Right, which is even worse. The Left-Right are those masquerading as Republican Conservatives, when they are Marxist-Leftists and proponents of Global Governance and the New World Order. They are the Paul Ryans, the Mitch McConnells, and the Newt Gingriches. They are the pseudo-Republican politico's in office presently and in the past who have those CFR slots and are working toward their fantasy: The Utopia of Oligarchs.

Even if they do not overtly act on behalf of the Marxists, they have been guilty numerous times of enabling the Marxists through the complacency of inactivity.

They do not simply wish to derail the actions of President Trump: it is a much larger concept than that. They see themselves as "partners" with the Left in the same game: to establish an elitist politico-oligarchic ruling class, broken down into divisions throughout the globe for ethno-cultural manipulation, yet with the same end-state. That goal is the enslavement and complete control of all of mankind with the elitists ensconced as the ruling moneyed class. They see themselves as the educated, sensible minority with tender sensibilities and true humanistic views who must must take a stand in the globalist crusade against the barbaric Neanderthals of the proletariat and populist serfs.

This new President has taken more action and more rapidly than even President Reagan did when he took office, and that is saying something. Even those globalists playing the part of conservatives are knuckling under in lock step, shivering internally: A President is in the White House that can turn these bedbugs out of the mattress and burn them. This new President quietly and without fanfare made it a point to be there for the SEAL who was killed in Yemen as his casket was brought back home.

That should speak volumes on the caliber of the man who is in the White House.

Everything that he does is attacked by the media and disparaged by the leftists. Even the removal of Dodd-Frank (let's remember that was Christopher Dodd and Barney Frank two troglodytes who came up with that one) is sneered at. The executive order to halt the illegals from potential hotbeds of Middle Eastern terrorism is challenged by states packed with liberals and also by the business and industry oligarchs who would rather the U.S. be vulnerable if they can continue to hire "tax-free" day-laborers for less than minimum wage with impunity.

Senator John McCain (R- AZ) wants to go to war with Russia and he wants to reshape eastern Europe. McCain and Lindsey Graham were instrumental in the Obama-ordered and sanctioned coup d'état that brought down Ukraine's government and president and installed a U.S. puppet picked by Victoria Nuland. McCain hasn't stopped: he's just been "on hold" to see where he can take footing when the dust settles from the initial Trump shakeup.

In previous articles, it was mentioned how critical this first 6 months to one year-period in office is for the President, namely because of the midterm elections. If the public does not see results, they could very well change the complexion and composition of Congress in 2018 and the Republicans could lose control of either one of or both houses of Congress. The President realizes this, and he is moving swiftly.

The public will also see that he is doing good things, and that it is the Democrats who are attempting to obstruct his efforts. This will carry the Republicans through in the midterm elections, and thus all legislative efforts by the President will be able to be enacted. It's a tough fight and at times it's uphill, but he started out well, and right and the Democrats won't be able to hold him off.

xythras -> Squid Viscous , Feb 18, 2017 10:30 PM

PATRIOTIC SPRING HAS STARTED --

GUS100CORRINA -> xythras , Feb 18, 2017 10:36 PM

DEEP STATE = Demonically Controlled Human Beings working together who have made a pact with the DEVIL for POWER, MONEY and INFLUENCE.

GEORGE SOROS is the POSTER CHILD for the typical DEEP STATE member.

WernerHeisenberg -> GUS100CORRINA , Feb 18, 2017 10:52 PM

Even worse than that, they hope they will be rewarded for their service with promotions to become immortal minions of Lucifer after their ancient human bodies finally expire.

Mustafa Kemal -> GUS100CORRINA , Feb 18, 2017 10:53 PM

CFR is the brain

Luc X. Ifer -> Mustafa Kemal , Feb 18, 2017 10:58 PM

This article practically describes the Communist Soviet bloc.

wanglee -> Luc X. Ifer , Feb 18, 2017 11:09 PM

Not only democrats rigged Primary to elect Clinton as presidential candidate last year even though she has poor judgment (violating government cyber security policy) and is incompetent (her email server was not secured) when she was the Secretary of State, and was revealed to be corrupt by Bernie Sanders during the Primary, but also democrats encourage illegal immigration, discourage work, and "conned" young voters with free college/food/housing/health care/Obama phone. Democrat government employees/politicians also committed crimes leaking classified information which caused former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn losing his job.

However middle/working class used their common senses voting against Clinton last November. Although I have not been a republican and didn't vote in primary but I voted for Trump and those Republicans who supported Trump in last November since I am not impressed with the "integrity" and "judgement" of democrats, Anti-Trump protesters, Anti-Trump republicans (such as McCain who is too old to make a sound judgement), and those media who donated/endorsed Clinton during presidential election and they'll work for globalist, the super rich, who moved jobs/investment overseas for cheap labor/tax and demanded middle/working class to pay tax to support welfare of illegal aliens and refugees who will be globalist's illegal voters and anti-Trump protesters.

Cashing in: Illegal immigrants get $1,261 more welfare than American families, $5,692 vs. $4,431 ( http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/cashing-in-illegal-immigrants-get-1261... ) DEA Report Shows Infiltration of Mexican Drug Cartels in Sanctuary Cities ( http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2015/09/08/dea-report-shows-infiltration-... ) Welfare Discourages Work( http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/04/27/the-science-is-settle... ) Hillary Clinton Says Bernie Sanders's "Free College" Tuition Plan Is All a Lie ( http://www.teenvogue.com/story/clinton-says-sanders-free-tuition-wont-wo... UC Berkeley Chancellor: Hillary Clinton 'Free' College Tuition Plan Won't Happen ( http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/09/30/uc-berkeley-chancello... ) Bill Clinton Impeachment Chief Investigator: I'm 'Terrified' of Hillary because we know that there were "People" who "Disappeared" ( http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/10/30/exclusive-bil... ) Former FBI Asst. Director Accuses Clintons Of Being A "Crime Family" ( http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-30/former-fbi-asst-director-accuse... ) FBI boss Comey's 7 most damning lines on Clinton ( http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/05/politics/fbi-clinton-email-server-comey-da... ). Aides claiming she "could not use a computer," and didn't know her email password– New FBI docs ( https://www.rt.com/usa/360528-obama-implicated-clinton-email/ ). 23 Shocking Revelations From The FBI's Clinton Email Report ( http://dailycaller.com/2016/09/02/23-shocking-revelations-from-the-fbis-... ) DOJ grants immunity to ex-Clinton staffer who set up her email server ( http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/02/politics/hillary-clinton-email-server-just... ) Former House Intelligence Chairman: I'm '100 Percent' Sure Hillary's Server Was Hacked ( http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/11/06/former-house-... ) Exclusive - Gen. Mike Flynn: Hillary Clinton's Email Setup Was 'Unbelievable Active Criminal Behavior' ( http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/11/06/exclusive-gen... ) Clinton directed her maid to print out classified materials ( http://nypost.com/2016/11/06/clinton-directed-her-maid-to-print-out-clas... ) Obama lied to the American people about his secret communications with Clinton( http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/president-barack-obama-hillary-email-... ) Former U.S. Attorney General, John Ashcroft: FBI didn't 'clear' Clinton ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFYQ3Cdp0zQ ) When the Clintons Loved Russia Enough to Sell Them Our Uranium ( http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/07/25/flashback-cli... ) Wikileaks: Clinton Foundation Chatter with State Dept on Uranium Deal with Russia ( http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/10/08/wikileaks-putting-on-... ) Russian officials donated $$$ to Clinton Foundation for Russian military research ( http://www.breitbart.com/radio/2016/12/16/schweizer-insecure-left-wants-... ) Cash Flowed to Clinton Foundation Amid Russian Uranium Deal ( https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/24/us/cash-flowed-to-clinton-foundation-... ) HILLARY CAMPAIGN CHIEF LINKED TO MONEY-LAUNDERING IN RUSSIA ( HTTP://WWW.WND.COM/2016/10/HILLARY-CAMPAIGN-CHIEF-LINKED-TO-MONEY-LAUNDE... ) The largest source of Trump campaign funds is small donors giving under $200 ( http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-self-fund_us_57fd4556e4... ) How mega-donors helped raise $1 billion for Hillary Clinton ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-mega-donors-helped-raise-1-b... ) Final newspaper endorsement count: Clinton 57, Trump 2 ( http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/304606-final-news... ) Journalists shower Hillary Clinton with campaign cash ( https://www.publicintegrity.org/2016/10/17/20330/journalists-shower-hill... ) Judicial Watch Planning to Sue FBI, NSA, CIA for Flynn Records ( http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/02/16/judicial-watch-planni... )

HRClinton -> Squid Viscous , Feb 18, 2017 10:43 PM

In that case, the choices are: Help, Fight or Stay out of the way.

Not being the fighting type, Bill and I chose to Help early, so that we're well positioned and so that we can also help like minded people that we bring in. Call it Amway with a twist.

Mustafa Kemal -> HRClinton , Feb 18, 2017 10:54 PM

"Bill and I chose to Help early" My friends from Haiti tell me how grateful they are. They would like their gold back from your brother though.

Normalcy Bias , Feb 18, 2017 10:30 PM

I don't even want to imagine what's being held over the heads of McCain and Graham.

deimos178 , Feb 18, 2017 10:35 PM

As long as he can drag the whiney little bitches McConnell and Ryan over the finish line.

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 10:37 PM

Zionists already run USA.. so what if they enslave you.... you are already enslaved.... fools... you cannot stop them.....

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 10:39 PM

the zio power brokers love what is going on ... they LOVE making CHAOS... it's working as planned... blow the whole thing up... you are doing exactly what they wanted

mvlazysusan , Feb 18, 2017 10:41 PM

Ending the ponzi money scheme and issuing non-debt based money will go the farthest in returning the power to the people to whom it belongs.

How about this: Take all that money lent to the big banks at a very low interest back from the banks and lend it to the American people at the same intrest rate.

coast1 , Feb 18, 2017 10:47 PM

Star Trek...the Borg...Not a huge fan of star trek but the show does reveal interesting things...the borg, resistance is futile, etc, but it seems as tho resistance wws not futile, according the the show...the matrix is a good movie too...too many more to mention. I herd an interview with Robert Steele, very interesting...any thoughts? I also came across a christian leaning website who supports Trump, and they are quite smart..trunews.com......not your average piece of shit evangelist...anyway, thats all I got today...

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 10:50 PM

the thing you are missing is that the evil zio loves chaos... and Mericans are falling for it... how else will Soros make money without extreme movements.... when there is chaos they buy shit cheap.... Soros is reading these articles and laughing....

the more chaos the better for them... when will you learn...

anticultist , Feb 18, 2017 10:51 PM

excellent presentation on globalist treason below from Jones. Their mind control technology of racebaiting and gender wars are expansions to their white guilt narrative, to maximize victimhood of ignorant slave zombies chanting for nanny state welfare.

To entrain them how they are not worthy is maximizing the self-sabotage instinct. This is triggered if the weak federali slave minds are at risk of achieving success they will instead self sabotage themselves with bad behavior and negative instincts, to take themselves out of the situation and out of the game. Because with success comes leadership, philanthropy, accountability, and responsibility, all antithetical to liberal cannibal slaves chanting for more.

How else would they be poor, ignorant, taxed, and property-less, like communism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PolyMD9lTVE

max_leering , Feb 18, 2017 10:55 PM

I think Trump gets it... the "trump" card is the minimal ties by him to special interests... notice I said minimal... that said, he's not as beholden as others before him... take the Boeing deal to provide a new AF1... he bluntly says it's overpriced, so Boeing reduces price... there is no president being owned by big biz in this scenario... and the new media fight is being likened to the media fight of Nixon... Idon't see itt that way... with the advent of numerous alternative news outlets (where I get mine), it's not the same CBS and Walter Cronkite or NBC and David Brinkley 6PM news show where most folks were almost programmed to get any news each day, so it could be tailored to fit a propaganda lean... the east European and Mideast wars are going to take the longest to root out the villians, as the MIC will do anything/everything to not lose one tiny fraction of their power, calling the shots with folks like McCain and Graham... it's going to take at least a year, possibly two, but I agree with the author in that if Trump shows his base he's working hard trying to get the things implemented that he stands for, the Demos are Dead, I tell you, DEAD

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 10:59 PM

the more the swamp is drained... the more Soros laughs... more chaos... more protests, more anarchy, then killings come, total fucking chaos is the goal... then the zios can come in and buy it for a song...

fall of USSR made how many zios billionaires?

Order out of chaos..... the more chaos - the more hand wringing....they are excited to get closer to their goal..

Soros would love to be injected with something to make him younger so he can live to see the collapse of USA, and then come in and snap up all the assets... it would be better than when snapped up property in hungary for a song...

Joebloinvestor , Feb 18, 2017 11:00 PM

Trump was never a member of Skull & Bones. That says a lot.

max_leering -> Joebloinvestor , Feb 18, 2017 11:02 PM

Odumbo was a member of Skullfucked and Boneheaded

Squid Viscous -> max_leering , Feb 18, 2017 11:18 PM

no at Columbia they had "get skulled & bone the jew sluts at Barnard" club...

obozo swings both ways, so he was an honorary member

anticultist -> Joebloinvestor , Feb 18, 2017 11:08 PM

Trump doesn't have a pedophile blackmail "control file" the globalist nightmare

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 11:03 PM

zios campaign the bring in immigrants and terrorists, then zios get you all worked up to hate them, and then fight them..

they sit back and laugh at the mess they made.... so much fun for them.... and great buying opportunity

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 11:09 PM

there is no goal of 'complete control' that's bullshit... coming from a mental midget..

the goal is CHAOS.... what ever comes after of course jews will control... naturally.... communism, capitalism... doesn't matter... it's all the same... but they shall be at the top

Omega_Man , Feb 18, 2017 11:15 PM

of course Soros and the lot wanted Hillary to win, so she could further erode USA, but really they must be pleased with Trump as President, as it appears they could not have dreamed how much choas a Trump Presidency can bring...

so things are turning out nicely for the zios... maybe even ahead of schedule with Trump...

now all they have to do is provoke Trump into doing things to stir things up... should be easy to provoke Trump as he is easily rattled

How can you possibly understand zios such as Soros if you don't think like him?

Father ¢hristmas , Feb 18, 2017 11:15 PM

Huxley was right.

[Feb 19, 2017] The swamp fights back

The "neoliberal establishment" (aka Washington Swamp) is deeply unpopular with American people. Trump is not that popular, but he definitely less unpopular. Such statements s of "the national media is the enemy" would be unthinkable a decade or two ago.
Notable quotes:
"... The National Media is the enemy. They are minor birds, repeaters of what the establishment wants parroted. They can no longer be considered American citizen friendly. They are indeed part of the Swamp to be drained. ..."
Feb 19, 2017 | www.youtube.com
Barbara waters 2 days ago (edited)

The National Media is the enemy. They are minor birds, repeaters of what the establishment wants parroted. They can no longer be considered American citizen friendly. They are indeed part of the Swamp to be drained.

Like former, despise current president matters not. We are still a nation of laws. The people have spoken. We want the laws followed period. CNN, MSNBC, and others who continue to go after our president will be met with an unbridled wave of conservative determination to restore law and order.

[Feb 15, 2017] He also said the media was the opposition party to the Trump administration. To the Washington media, those are truly fighting words.

Notable quotes:
"... New York Times ..."
"... Bannon's comments were outrageous, but they are hardly new. In 2009, President Obama's White House communications director, Anita Dunn, sought to restrict Fox News' access to the White House. She even said, "We're going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent." The media's outrage over that remark was restrained, to say the least. ..."
"... Brill then bluntly told the president that five of the highest-ranking Obama officials had told him that "as a practical matter . . . Jarrett was the real chief of staff on any issues that she wanted to weigh in on, and she jealously protected that position by making sure the president never gave anyone else too much power." When Brill asked the president about these aides' assessment of Jarrett, Obama "declined comment," Brill wrote in his book. That, in and of itself, was an answer. Would that Jarrett had received as much media scrutiny of her role in eight years under Obama as Bannon has in less than four weeks. ..."
Feb 15, 2017 | www.unz.com
Bannon is almost universally loathed by the Washington press corps, and not just for his politics. When he was the CEO of the pro-Trump Breitbart website, he competed with traditional media outlets, and he has often mercilessly attacked and ridiculed them.

The animosity towards Bannon reached new heights last month, when he incautiously told the New York Times that "the media should be embarrassed and humiliated and keep its mouth shut and just listen for a while." He also said the media was "the opposition party" to the Trump administration. To the Washington media, those are truly fighting words.

Joel Simon, of the Committee to Protect Journalists, told CNN that "this kind of speech not [only] undermines the work of the media in this country, it emboldens autocratic leaders around the world." Jacob Weisberg, the head of the Slate Group, tweeted that Bannon's comment was terrifying and "tyrannical."

Bannon's comments were outrageous, but they are hardly new. In 2009, President Obama's White House communications director, Anita Dunn, sought to restrict Fox News' access to the White House. She even said, "We're going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent." The media's outrage over that remark was restrained, to say the least.

Ever since Bannon's outburst, you can hear the media gears meshing in the effort to undermine him. In TV green rooms and at Washington parties, I've heard journalists say outright that it's time to get him. Time magazine put a sinister-looking Bannon on its cover, describing him as "The Great Manipulator." Walter Isaacson, a former managing editor of Time , boasted to MSNBC that the image was in keeping with a tradition of controversial covers that put leaders in their place. "Likewise, putting [former White House aide] Mike Deaver on the cover, the brains behind Ronald Reagan, that ended up bringing down Reagan," he told the hosts of Morning Joe . "So you've got to have these checks and balances, whether it's the judiciary or the press."

Reporters and pundits are also stepping up the effort to portray Bannon as the puppet master in the White House. Last week, MSNBC's Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski said, "Legitimate media are getting word that Steve Bannon is the last guy in the room, in the evening especially, and he's pulling the strings." Her co-host, Joe Scarborough, agreed that Bannon's role should be "investigated."

I'm all for figuring out who the powers behind the curtain are in the White House, but we saw precious little interest in that during the Obama administration.

It wasn't until four years after the passage of Obamacare that a journalist reported on just how powerful White House counselor Valerie Jarrett had been in its flawed implementation. Liberal writer Steven Brill wrote a 2015 book, America's Bitter Pill , in which he slammed "incompetence in the White House" for the catastrophic launch of Obamacare. "Never [has there] been a group of people who more incompetently launched something," he told NPR's Terry Gross, who interviewed him about the book. He laid much of the blame at Jarrett's doorstep. "The people in the administration who knew it was going wrong went to the president directly with memos, in person, to his chief of staff," he said. "The president was protected, mostly by Valerie Jarrett, from doing anything. . . . He didn't know what was going on in the single most important initiative of his administration." How important was Jarrett inside the Obama White House? Brill interviewed the president about the struggles of Obamacare and reported Obama's conclusion: "At this point, I am not so interested in Monday-morning quarterbacking the past."

Brill then bluntly told the president that five of the highest-ranking Obama officials had told him that "as a practical matter . . . Jarrett was the real chief of staff on any issues that she wanted to weigh in on, and she jealously protected that position by making sure the president never gave anyone else too much power." When Brill asked the president about these aides' assessment of Jarrett, Obama "declined comment," Brill wrote in his book. That, in and of itself, was an answer. Would that Jarrett had received as much media scrutiny of her role in eight years under Obama as Bannon has in less than four weeks.

I've had my disagreements with Bannon, whose apocalyptic views on some issues I don't share. Ronald Reagan once said that if someone in Washington agrees with you 80 percent of the time, he is an ally, not an enemy. I'd guess Bannon wouldn't agree with that sentiment.

But the media's effort to turn Bannon into an enemy of the people is veering into hysterical character assassination. The Sunday print edition of the New York Times ran an astonishing 1,500-word story headlined: "Fascists Too Lax for a Philosopher Cited by Bannon." (The online headline now reads, "Steve Bannon Cited Italian Thinker Who Inspired Fascists.") The Times based this headline on what it admits was "a passing reference" in a speech by Bannon at a Vatican conference in 2014 . In that speech, Bannon made a single mention of Julius Evola, an obscure Italian philosopher who opposed modernity and cozied up to Mussolini's Italian Fascists.

- John Fund is NRO's national-affairs correspondent . https://twitter.com/@JohnFund

[Jan 30, 2017] Former Obama adviser Rice calls Trump decision on Nat Sec panel stone cold crazy

Notable quotes:
"... There has been running tension between the Trump administration and the intelligence community ..."
"... the President had argued that intelligence services were politically partisan, he dismissed their findings that Russia hacked Democratic targets during the campaign and referred slightingly to the intelligence community by tweeting with the word intelligence in quotes. ..."
"... In setting out the reorganization, Trump said that "security threats facing the United States in the 21st century transcend international boundaries. Accordingly, the United States Government's decision-making structures and processes to address these challenges must remain equally adaptive and transformative." ..."
Jan 30, 2017 | www.cnn.com

Former Obama adviser calls Trump decision on Nat Sec panel 'stone cold crazy'

President Donald Trump's decision to reorganize the National Security Council in a way that removes the director of intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is "stone cold crazy," former National Security Adviser Susan Rice said Sunday.

Rice retweeted another Twitter user, P.E. Juan, who said: "Trump loves and trusts the military so much he just kicked them out of the National Security Council and put a Nazi in their place."

Rice, President Barack Obama's national security adviser, was reacting to an executive order signed by Trump that said that the head of DNI and the nation's most senior military officer would be invited to attend the security meetings "where issues pertaining to their responsibilities and expertise are to be discussed."

"This is stone cold crazy. After a week of crazy. Who needs military advice or intell to make policy on ISIL, Syria, Afghanistan, DPRK?" Rice tweeted, with DPRK referring to North Korea.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer told ABC News Rice's comments were "clearly inappropriate language from a former ambassador."

DNI James Clapper was always included in Obama administration's NSC principals' meetings, CNN confirmed.

In contrast, Trump's order makes his chief strategist, Stephen Bannon, a regular member of the Principals Committee. The committee is Cabinet-level group of agencies that deal with national security that was established by President George H. W. Bush in 1989. Every version of it has included the Joint Chiefs chairman and the director of the CIA or, once it was established, the head of the DNI. The President's chief of staff was typically included as well.

Bannon's presence reinforces the notion he is, in essence, a co-chief of staff alongside Reince Priebus, and demonstrates the breadth of influence the former head of Breitbart News has in the Trump administration.

Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, offered praise for the administration's national security team writ large, but expressed concerns about Bannon.

"I think the national security team around President Trump is very impressive. I don't think you could ask for a better one," he said on CBS' "Face the Nation."

"I am worried about the national security council who are the members of it and who are the permanent members of it. The appointment of Mr. Bannon is something which is a radical departure from any national security council in history," he said. "It's of concern this quote reorganization."

Rice continued her tweetstorm: "Chairman of Joint Chiefs and DNI treated as after thoughts in Cabinet level principals meetings. And where is CIA?? Cut out of everything?"

And she noted a provision that would allow Vice President Michael Pence to chair NSC meetings if Trump isn't available.

"Pence may chair NSC mtgs in lieu of POTUS," Rice tweeted. "Never happened w/Obama."

And she added the observation that Trump's UN ambassador Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, was "sidelined from Cabinet and Sub Cab mtgs."

The NSC is run by National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, a former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency until he was asked to step down in 2014 by senior intelligence leaders.

There has been running tension between the Trump administration and the intelligence community , though during a January 22 visit to the CIA Trump declared that "nobody feels stronger about the intelligence community than Donald Trump," adding that "I love you. I respect you."

Before then, the President had argued that intelligence services were politically partisan, he dismissed their findings that Russia hacked Democratic targets during the campaign and referred slightingly to the intelligence community by tweeting with the word intelligence in quotes.

In setting out the reorganization, Trump said that "security threats facing the United States in the 21st century transcend international boundaries. Accordingly, the United States Government's decision-making structures and processes to address these challenges must remain equally adaptive and transformative."

Regular members of the Principals Committee will include the secretary of state, the treasury secretary, the defense secretary, the attorney general, the secretary of Homeland Security, the assistant to the President and chief of staff, the assistant to the President and chief strategist, the national security adviser and the Homeland Security adviser.

[Jan 29, 2017] How Obama Framed Trump with Faux Mortgage Insurance Rate Decrease

Notable quotes:
"... By Naked Capitalism reader aliteralmind, aka Jeff Epstein. Jeff, a progressive activist and journalist, was one of only around forty candidates in the county to be personally endorsed by Bernie Sanders, and was a pledged delegate for him at the DNC. Jeff is also currently starring in Feel The Bern-The Musical , which will very soon be performed in New York. Originally posted on Citizens' Media TV ..."
"... "to be in the tank is to be "lovingly enthralled; foolishly enraptured; passionately bedazzled"" ..."
"... Today, the President announced a major new step that his Administration is taking to make mortgages more affordable and accessible for creditworthy families. ..."
Jan 29, 2017 | www.nakedcapitalism.com
Posted on January 28, 2017 by Yves Smith By Naked Capitalism reader aliteralmind, aka Jeff Epstein. Jeff, a progressive activist and journalist, was one of only around forty candidates in the county to be personally endorsed by Bernie Sanders, and was a pledged delegate for him at the DNC. Jeff is also currently starring in Feel The Bern-The Musical , which will very soon be performed in New York. Originally posted on Citizens' Media TV

(This is my first issue-opinion video. With thanks especially to Adryenn Ashley and Jimmy Dore for the inspiration. All sources and supporting evidence is below.) Within hours of becoming the 45th President of the United States , one of Donald Trump's first orders of business was to sign an executive order to " raise mortgage insurance rates " on millions of homeowners , by around $500 a year.

But while it is technically true that Trump did sign the order reversing the decrease, it is a misleading picture. This story is more a negative reflection on President Obama than it is on Trump.

A Brief Tutorial From Someone Who Is Learning the Subject Right Along With You

Generally speaking, if you are a first time homebuyer and purchase a house with a down payment of less than 20% of the home's worth, you are required to purchase mortgage insurance. This insurance is to protect the the lender in case you default on your payments.

Let's use the example of a $200,000 home with a $10,000 (5%) down payment. So you need to borrow $190,000.

$200,000 * .05 = $10,000
$200,000 - $10,000 = $190,000

Since January 2015 , the upfront MIP ( mortgage insurance premium ) has been 1.75%, with the annual premium at .8%. So when you sign the mortgage, you pay the upfront premium of $3,325.

$190,000 * .0175 = $3,325

And then every year, you pay the annual premium of $1,520.

$190,000 * .008 = $1,520

As you pay off your principal, this number goes down.

The Obama administration's reduction of the annual premium rate is .25 points (the upfront premium remains unchanged). So with the same loan above, your annual premium would instead be $1,045.

.008 - .0025 = .0055
$190,000 * .0055 = $1,045

That's a savings of $475 a year, or about $40 a month.

$1,520 - $1,045 = $475
$475 / 12 months = $39.59

Backlash Against Trump

The criticism of Trump for this move has been unrelenting and, at least in my internet bubble, unanimous. I have not seen any criticism of the Obama administration at all; including by, disappointingly, one of my primary sources of news, The Young Turks. (Can't find the video at the moment, but they briefly criticized Trump for the move, without looking further into the issue.)

As reported by USA Today :

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said Friday that Trump's words in his inaugural speech "ring hollow" following the mortgage premium action.

"In one of his first acts as president, President Trump made it harder for Americans to afford a mortgage," he said. "What a terrible thing to do to homeowners. Actions speak louder than words."

As reported by Bloomberg :

"This action is completely out of alignment with President Trump's words about having the government work for the people," said John Taylor, president of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, through a spokesman. "Exactly how does raising the cost of buying a home help average people?"

Sarah Edelman, director of housing policy for the left-leaning Center for American Progress, in an e-mail wrote, "On Day 1, the president has turned his back on middle-class families - this decision effectively takes $500 out of the pocketbooks of families that were planning to buy a home in 2017. This is not the way to build a strong economy."

And one of the many strong criticisms as documented by Common Dreams :

"Donald Trump's inaugural speech proclaimed he will govern for the people, instead of the political elite," [Liz Ryan Murray, policy director for national grassroots advocacy group People's Action] said. "But minutes after giving this speech, he gave Wall Street a big gift at the expense of everyday people. Trump may talk a populist game, but policies like this make life better for hedge fund managers and big bankers like his nominee for Treasury, Steven Mnuchin, not for everyday people."

The Full Picture

To say that Trump took savings away from the neediest of homebuyers is not true, because homebuyers never had the savings to begin with. The rate reduction was not announced until January 9 of this year–11 days before the end of Obama's eight year term–and was not set to take effect until January 27, a full week after Trump was sworn in.

(Here's the PDF from the FHA, of Trump's suspension announcement .)

In addition, Obama's reduction decision seems to have been made without any advance notice or even a projection document justifying the decrease. As I understand it , both of these things are unusual with a change of this magnitude.

Finally, with the announcement made little more than a week before the new administration was to be sworn in, and despite Trump being entirely responsible for implementing this change, the incoming administration was not consulted.

Now that the timing is clear, Time Magazine's coverage is particularly misleading:

Trump, who claimed a populist mantle in his first speech as a president, signed the executive order less than an hour after leaving the inaugural stage. It reverses an Obama-era policy.

"Obama-era policy" implies the reduction was made long ago, and has been in force for much of that time.


(Rates can't be raised if they were never lowered.)

Conclusion: It Was a Set Up

Finally. After eight years of hard work and multiple requests, your boss approaches you on a Monday morning and says, "Good news! Starting in two weeks, I'm giving you a raise. Congratulations."

Two days later, you find out that he decided to leave the company months ago, and his final day is Friday. Your raise doesn't start until a week after that.

You ask him about your new boss. "Well, he's a pretty strict guy." He leans in, puts the back of his hand to the side of his mouth, lowers his voice, and continues, "Honesty, I hear he is a bit difficult to work with. Real penny pincher." He sits up, his voice back to its normal cadence, "But don't worry. I'm leaving a note on his desk telling him just how important this raise is to you and your family." He stands up and slaps you on the back as he walks away. "I'm sure he'll keep my word."

If that were me, I would be upset at my new boss, but I would be furious at my old one. He had eight years to do something.

This was nothing more than an opportunistic political maneuver by the outgoing president, to set the incoming president up for failure. All while pretending to care about American homeowners. If the President Obama really wanted to help Americans, he would've considered this move–or something similar–long ago. Instead, he told them he was giving them a gift and promised that it would be delivered by Trump, knowing full well that he would never follow through. Lower-income Americans were used as pawns in a cheap political game.

Further confirming my theory, here is what was said when the reduction was originally announced :

"The Trump administration would be accused on day one of raising mortgage costs for average Americans if it reverses the FHA move," analyst Jaret Seiberg, managing director at Cowen Group Inc., wrote in a note to clients. "Trump's career has been real estate. It would seem out of character for him to be aggressively negative on real estate in his first week in office." [ ]

"I have no reason to believe this will be scaled back," [HUD Secretary Julian] Castro told reporters. The premium cut "offers a good benefit to hardworking American families out there at a time when interest rates might well continue to go up."

It is not Trump's responsibility to keep the promises that Obama makes on his way out the door. It is Obama's responsibility to not promise what is not promiseable.

There are so many things for progressives to criticize Trump about. This is not one of them.

So Who Are We Fighting Anyway?

To paraphrase Jimmy Dore , "The way to oppose Trump is to agree with him when he's right, and to fight him when he's wrong. Anything else delegitimizes you, especially in the eyes of his supporters."

And again in another of his videos : "We don't need to unite against Trump. We need to unite against corruption and corporatism."

If Democrats do something wrong, we need to fight them. If Trump does something wrong, we need to fight him. If Trump does something right, we need to stand with him.

If we can't win with the truth, we don't deserve to win.

39 0 10 0 1 This entry was posted in Banana republic , Banking industry , Credit markets , Dubious statistics , Guest Post , Media watch , Real estate , Regulations and regulators on January 28, 2017 by Yves Smith . Subscribe to Post Comments 93 comments Lambert Strether , January 28, 2017 at 6:06 am

"If we can't win with the truth, we don't deserve to win."

Let's get that tatooed on our foreheads.

UserFriendly , January 28, 2017 at 7:21 am

I agree with the sentiment but after watching the D party protest war under Bush, never talk about it under Obama, and then cheerlead for it with Hillary I don't think they actually stand for anything except identity politics.

jgordon , January 28, 2017 at 7:47 am

Right, they traded support for real issues for identity politics. Identity politics which is lovingly celebrated on TYT every day by the way. I'm not sure how or why anyone would go to that rancid cesspool of biased disinformation for news, but ok.

Here is a litmus test: anyone who gave a pro forma endorsement of Hillary OK, understandable, and I can kind of tolerate that. But for the others who were in the tank for Hillary like TYT–all except for Jimmy Dore–those people are persona non grata from here out.

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 8:35 am

Totally disagree that TYT was in the tank for Hillary. Have watched these guys every day since around May. They're all pro-Bernie. They clearly wanted Hillary over Trump during the general (and I did too, but that's waaaaaay not to say I'm pro-Hillary), but I don't think "in the tank for Hillary" is a fair characterization for any of them.

To me, the best evidence is that I have not witnessed Jimmy Dore being forced to tone his admittedly louder and more vehement anti-Hillary ranting down on any show, including the main show. They even gave him his own show around the end of the primaries where he gleefully goes off (Aggressive Progressives).

As an aside, The Jimmy Dore Show seems fresher than Aggressive Progressives, I believe because he rehearses the bits on own show first. On TJDS, he is frequently good, and consistently on fire.

Naked Cap, the entire TYT network, Glenn Greenwald, Le Show, and of course, Bernie Sanders, are among my most important truth tellers.

Jerry Denim , January 28, 2017 at 2:00 pm

Sorry for being so clueless, but "TYT", "TJDS" ?

Anyone care to fill me in on this nomenclature?

Thanks!

oh , January 28, 2017 at 2:26 pm

TYT – The Young Turks
TJDS – The Jimmy Dore Show

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 2:27 pm

The Young Turks and The Jimmy Dore Show. YouTube shows.

oh , January 28, 2017 at 2:27 pm

If you voted for Hillary then you were in the tank for her. There's no such thing as the lesser of the two evils. Sorry! Same goes for TYT.

dcrane , January 28, 2017 at 3:04 pm

A relevant definition of "in the tank" from this NY Times Magazine article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/magazine/20wwln-safire-t.html

"to be in the tank is to be "lovingly enthralled; foolishly enraptured; passionately bedazzled""

Yves Smith Post author , January 28, 2017 at 4:59 pm

It's not that clear cut. For instance, if you are a person of color, there was good reason to be plenty worried about Trump. Violence against immigrants picked up big time in the UK after Brexit, so there's a close parallel. And his appointment of Jeff Sessions as AG is hardly encouraging.

Brian Daly , January 28, 2017 at 7:43 pm

But if you're White, you have no good reason to be worried about Trump? That's a rather shabby way to think about folks of all colors.

Sorry to be snarky. It's just exasperating reading these attempts to define and claim moral purity. In a complex and compromised world.

integer , January 28, 2017 at 10:17 pm

Did you see their election day coverage? Here are the highlights: TYT meltdown .
My favorite part starts at 14m50s, when Kasparian rants about how she has no respect for women who didn't vote for Clinton and calls them "f@#king dumb". Solidarity!

skippy , January 28, 2017 at 3:30 pm

What the – ????? – like the right wing is not all about Identity Politics from an ethnic and religious foundations .. errrrrrr .

Now that the Democrats embraced free market neoliberalism and went off the reservation with non traditional views wrt whom could join the club, being the only thing separating the two, its a bit wobbly to make out like there is some massive schism between the two.

Disheveled . you can't have a "dominate" economic purview running the ship for 50ish years and then devolve into polemic political warfare ..

Teejay , January 28, 2017 at 4:42 pm

jgordon– Identity politics lovingly celebrated on that rancid cesspool of biased disinformation every day. Wow, takes my breath away. I've watched the TYT evening news for ~10 months virtually ever day and I'd guesstimate that I viewed 60 of their You Tube clips. Seems to me you're projecting. Given your strident certitude you should have no trouble provide any links that convinced you of your opinion, buttress your argument. The daily recurrences of "identity politics" put it out there. What convinced you they were "in the tank for Hillary"? It'd be hard to come up with a more inaccurate phrase. They full throatedly endorsed Sanders in the primaries. Cenk announced on the Monday (IIRC) before that he would be voting for HRC so how do you arrive at using "in the tank"? I found your remarks a "rancid cesspool of biased disinformation" long on emotion and very short on facts and evidence. That's why it seems like projection.

Donald , January 28, 2017 at 10:00 am

The US support for the Saudi war in Yemen is the most clearcut example of the moral worthlessness of many liberals. Actually, to their credit many Democrats and a few Republicans in Congress have opposed it, but it isn't a big cause because Obama was the one doing it. I imagine Trump will continue the policy, but don't expect anything to change– Trump can be opposed on other issues, so there will be no incentive to criticize him on an issue when the Trump people can say they are just continuing what Obama started.

It is infuriating to hear liberals mindlessly repeating how disgraceful it is to see Trump cozying up with a dictator who has blood on his hands. It is the eternal sunshine of the spotless mind with these people.

integer , January 28, 2017 at 10:33 pm

This tweet (which I found @ActualFlatticus ) sums up the dynamic you are referring to perfectly imo.

Jen , January 28, 2017 at 7:31 am

Hear, hear! Thanks to NC that Common Dreams piece set off my bs detector immediately. There's a larger framing question we can add as well: who benefits from PMI?

Using the example above, the home buyer pays an upfront premium of $3,300 which gives them no additional equity in their home, and somewhere between $1400 and $1500 a year for their premium, which also doesn't increase their equity. And, they continue to pay PMI until they achieve a loan to value ratio of 80%.

So you buy your 200K house and dutifully pay your mortgage and PMI, which, btw, is also not tax deductible. You finally get to the point where through a combination of paying down your mortgage and increasing home prices, you have 80% equity in your home. Then the housing market tanks, and your 200K home is worth 170K. Your house is worth less than you paid for it and you're stuck paying $1500 a year in fees that don't reduce the amount of your mortgage, that you can't deduct from your taxes, and that you can't get rid of until you have 80% equity in your house.

Sign me up!

So who benefits? Certainly not the middle class would be homeowner, who not only gets screwed on the finances, but thanks to inflation of home prices, is getting screwed on the finances so that they can spend 200K on a crappy little ranch that's a 40 minute commute to their job one way on a good day.

jgordon , January 28, 2017 at 7:56 am

I also read about this on the Neocon/Neolib pro-war propaganda and general disinformation site for women and manginas Huffington Post, and I have to say that they were spinning really hard to make this look like something horrible Trump had done. But even in the extremely biased article I read they surreptitiously had to admit that this was a rule the Obama regime had put in place the midnight before Obama departed and that Trump was just reversing it. I read this before I knew anything else about t he subject and already had a pretty good idea of what was going on. But the above post helped a lot.

Baby Gerald , January 28, 2017 at 8:45 am

'the Neocon/Neolib pro-war propaganda and general disinformation site for women and manginas '

Thank you, jgordon, for my first hearty laugh of the morning. I'm going to bookmark HuffPo just so I can re-title it this.

Thanks again to NC for giving me a good link to use against the uninformed masses with whom I frequently have to deal.

lyman alpha blob , January 28, 2017 at 1:12 pm

Finance benefits – they get to keep promoting unaffordable mortgages.

We refused to pay this BS insurance when purchasing our house, since it wan't insuring us against anything but rather we'd be paying for the bank's insurance against ourselves. Seems a lot more like a scam when you frame it that way, considering that the bank is lending you money they just created in the first place.

Instead we saved up for another year or two until we had the whole 20% down required to avoid the insurance. I do understand that not everyone can afford 20% down depending on their job and where they live however if enough people refused both PMI and to purchase because they couldn't afford 20% down on an overpriced house (and we are in another bubble already, at least in my area), prices would drop until people could really afford them.

Finance pretends they are just trying to make the American Dream available to everybody and too many have taken the bait to the point where finance as a percentage of GDP is near or at an all time high. The reality is that it's mostly just a scam to benefit finance and turn the population into debt slaves.

Marcer69 , January 28, 2017 at 2:03 pm

The home owner was able to purchase a home with less than 20% down. The PMI protects the lender during default, which is considerably higher when borrower has no skin in the game. Also, there are other options such as lender paid mi.

Marcer69 , January 28, 2017 at 2:11 pm

Additionally, most of you are confusing PMI – Private Mortgage Insurance- with FHA Upfront and MIP. With the latter being required regardless of the down payment. Secondly, the author was wrong on his facts. MIP is .85 @ 96.5% and .80 @ 30 years. 15 YR.terns offer reduced

koki , January 28, 2017 at 10:50 pm

PMI is another insurance company rip-off. Requiring people to escrow taxes with no interest paid to them by the banks using those funds is another rip-off.

Roger Smith , January 28, 2017 at 10:40 am

Agreed! Great article Jeff!

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 1:24 pm

Thank you, Roger.

nonsense factory , January 28, 2017 at 3:12 pm

Trying to condense this whole article into a tweet is a challenge. . .

"Obama cuts mortg. ins. rate for <20% down by 25 pts ($500 on $200k home) 11days prior to exit in con artist act sure to be dropped by Trump resulting in bogus media claims about Dem support for working class homeowners."

Sondra , January 28, 2017 at 4:35 pm

I agree. If we Progressives are to make any fwd movement, we can't beat up on DJT on any and everything. I am also cautioning friends & family to do so too. If cry "foul" everyou time he acts, that delegitimizes us.

One recent example is the Trumps' arrivall @ wh b4 the inauguration. A snapshot shows DJT entering WH before the Obamas and Mrs. DJT. Once posted, goes viral and the talk is how ill-mannered, selfish is and how gracious the Obamas are for escorting the Mrs. after her "oafish" husband

What is not shown is that DJT stops, comes back, and ushers the trio ahead of him. (which you can see on CSPAN ).
When I saw the truth of what happened, after reading the negative comments, that worried me.

We REALLY need to be more dis corning and employ critical thinking.

Have to be careful not to be swayed by bullshit, no matter where it comes from.

Quiet , January 28, 2017 at 7:01 am

This explanation, while nice, only serves to make Trump look dumb. He jumped into an obvious trap. Rather than focus on how Obama tricked him, I'm a bit more concerned with what this portends for the future. See, if the president is unable, either for political or personal reasons, to avoid easy pitfalls like this, the odds of his success aren't very high.

By the way, this reads like one more zing at Obama after he's already left the building. He earned most of the criticism he got, definitely from this site, but I feel like this is overdoing it. Criticizing him for not doing it sooner? Totally valid. Criticizing him for tripping up his successor? Petty.

Pointing out the hypocrisy of Schumer and Kaine isn't part of that pettiness, though. That will be useful to remember as they cozy up to the Don and claim they're doing it to "help working families."

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 8:13 am

I am admittedly a political newbie (Bernie woke me up never did anything before him but vote), and perhaps I am missing something, but I would be much less upset about it if he didn't screw middle class Americans in the process.

That this is considered petty, by which I believe you mean normal politics, is exactly the problem.

JTMcPhee , January 28, 2017 at 11:37 am

"Screw middle class Americans" exactly how?

The article makes it pretty clear, if I am reading it and the links and background right, that the screwing is principally in the form of requiring mortgage insurance to insure THE LENDER (or note holder or whoever MERS says gets paid on default). And that the "benefit" you may feel was (according to the spin) "taken away," was not even an "entitlement" because it would not have even been in effect until three weeks AFTER Obama (who has screwed the middle class and everyone else not in the Elite, nine ways from nowhere, for 8 years), and would not change the abuse that is PMI. And would not have "put dollars in the pockets of consumers" anyway for long after that. And how many homeowners are in the category?

And banksters and mortgage brokers and the rest, gee whiz, we mopes are supposed to be concerned about THEM? About people whose paydays come from commissions on the dollar amount of the loans they write? Where all the "incentives," backed by the Real Economy that undergirds the ability of the US Government to do its fiat money forkovers to lenders that connived to change the policies against prudential lending to inflate the bubble that crashed and burned so many, are all once again being pointed in the direction of making Realtors ™(c)(BS) and lenders even richer on flips and flops and dumb transactions and churning?

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 12:08 pm

He screwed the middle class by teasing them with a rate reduction, knowing that Trump was going to never let it happen.

JTMcPhee , January 28, 2017 at 3:39 pm

Just to clarify, and please anyone correct me, this was not any kind of "rate reduction." Rate reductions are what is supposed to happen under the various homeowner "they let you live in their house as long as you pay the rent mortgage" relief programs that never happened except to transfer more money to the Banksters. As in "reduce the unaffordable interest rate on oppressive mortgages." And "mark to market." And PRINCIPAL reductions as a result. And I do know the nominal difference between "title" states and "equitable interest" states - in either, the note holder effectively owns the house and property until the last nickel is paid, and as seen in the foreclosure racket, often not even the. And the "homeowner" gets to pay the taxes and maintain and maybe improve the place, to protect the note holder's equity "Fee simple absolute" is a comforting myth.

As the article points out, the only potential reduction in money from borrower to lender/loan servicer (since the PMI underwriters seem to have such close financial ties to the insured note holder, there's but slim difference between the parts of the racket) might have been that tiny reduction in the insurance PREMIUM.

Niggling over terms, maybe, but that's what "the law" is made up of.

And apologies if I mistook the referent of "he" to be "Trump" rather than Obama and his clan - but nonetheless

hemeantwell , January 28, 2017 at 8:54 am

This excellent analytic walkthrough is a model for what must be done to ward off any form of "Obama 2!" as a political battle cry. It must be done relentlessly and without any consideration of being fair to that neoliberal schemer. The Clintonites will claw their way back from the edge of their political grave if they can draw on such sentiments.

nonsense factory , January 28, 2017 at 3:20 pm

Exactly, what we need is an FDR approach, which Bernie Sanders Democrats are far more likely to deliver. Instead of bailing out AIG and Goldman Sachs, FDR would have set up a Homeonwers Loan Corporation to buy up all the adjustable rate mortgages and convert them to fixed-rate mortgages, and instead of the zero-interest loans going to Wall Street from the Fed, they'd have gone to homeowners facing foreclosure, who could then stay in their homes and pay them off over time.

But when Obama came in, he brought in Larry Summers and Tim Geithner, who preached about "not returning to the failed policied of FDR." What a pack of con artists. I prefer your honest hustlers to those guys (i.e. Team Trump, American Hustle 2.0 at least you know what to expect.)

a different chris , January 28, 2017 at 2:20 pm

>See, if the president is unable, either for political or personal reasons, to avoid easy pitfalls like this

How is this a pitfall? Trump puts a hold on a "last minute Obama change", lets it sit for awhile, and then reinstates it or maybe even makes it better. Then Trump owns the reduction, not Obama.

This isn't even one-dimensional chess.

Jim Haygood , January 28, 2017 at 7:59 am

This essay focuses on timing and tactics. Not analyzed is the essential question of What is the appropriate premium for mortgage insurance?

It's an actuarial question based on prior loss experience. Real estate moves in long cycles. Each trough is different in depth.

Such questions aside, HUD's annual mortgage insurance premium of 0.8% was in the middle of the typical range of 0.5% to 1.0% charged by private mortgage insurers. Obama's short-lived cut to 0.55% would have put HUD's premium at the low end, on what probably are higher-risk loans.

Obama's action mirrors what's seen in other gov-sponsored insurance programs, such as pension benefit guarantee schemes which are chronically under-reserved. Cheap premiums look like a free benefit, until the guarantee fund goes bust in a down cycle, and taxpayers get hit with a bailout.

What's so stupendously silly about Obama's diktat is that it was too late to provide any electoral benefit. Whereas if HUD's mortgage insurance pool later went bust, it could have been blamed on Obama for cutting premiums without any actuarial analysis.

Perhaps HUD secretary Ben Carson will ask a more fundamental question: what is HUD doing in the mortgage insurance business, anyway? Obama's ham-handed tampering with premiums for political purposes shows why government is not well placed to be in the insurance business - it has skewed incentives. Ditch it, Ben!

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 8:49 am

In researching this story (I have no financial background, and have never owned anything beyond a car), I had a theory that the reduction made no fiscal sense because the Feds raised rates for the first time in 2016, after hovering above near zero for eight years, to .5%. My thinking was that the move was to discourage new borrowers by making loans more expensive, therefore increasing the cost of mortgages and ultimately threatening the solvency of the FHA. I was wrong, which is disappointing because it would have made for a more dramatic ending, in that Trump's revoking the decrease would have been the "correct" thing to do.

Brian Lindholm , January 28, 2017 at 9:23 am

Jim,

Aye. You make an excellent point that essentially everybody in media has ignored. What should the mortgage insurance rate actually be? And the answer is simple: It should be high enough to cover losses incurred by mortgage defaults (plus operating expenses), but no higher.

I don't know what that rate should have actually been, but if it was 0.55%, then Obama and the FHA should have lowered the rate years ago to avoid overcharging people. And if 0.80% was the right rate, then Obama should never have lowered it at all, given that it would ultimately require a taxpayer bailout. Either way , Obama is incompetent.

If the only consideration is cost to customers, then the proper rate is 0%. Offer it for free!! But if you want to the program to actually be self-sustaining, so that it doesn't require continuous injection of taxpayer dollars and be a perpetual target for cancellation by Congress, then you have to charge enough to cover losses. Whether the average mortgage rate is 3.5% or 4.0% or 6.2% matters not a whit in this calculation.

Net conclusion: Obama is either a flaming incompetent who flat-out doesn't understand the concept of insurance, or this was a deliberate attempt to impose a political headache on Trump.

Jim Haygood , January 28, 2017 at 9:53 am

An analogy could be made to municipal bond insurance, which like mortgage insurance is intended to protect the lender against loss of principal:

Municipal bond insurance adds a layer of protection in the rare case of default. However, that protection is dependent on the insurance companies' credit quality.

Municipal bond insurance used to be commonplace; now it's quite rare. Why is that? As of 2008, nearly half of all newly issued municipal bonds carried some form of insurance. Today, the share is less than 7%.

The number of municipal bond insurers has also declined and their credit ratings have fallen.

A number of bond insurers went bust during the Great Recession. Plus, a large default by Puerto Rico has caused many municipal market participants to question the ability of insurance companies to pay on the bonds they insure.

http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/nn/articles/How-the-Municipal-Bond-Insurance-Market-Has-Changed-Since-the-Great-Recession

Muni bond insurers were publicly traded, profit seeking companies. But they underpriced their insurance, probably because no one expected a 1930s-style crisis like 2008.

Obama had no more concept about how to price mortgage insurance than I do about how to perform brain surgery. He was just mindlessly handing out bennies at public expense in the dark of night, before skulking away into well-deserved obscurity.

shinola , January 28, 2017 at 1:35 pm

I dunno Jim – perhaps Obama DID know (or was advised) that the rate cut was actuarially unsound thus setting up his successor for problems down the road or bad optics upfront if the cut was reversed.

Cleverly devious?

Brian Lindholm , January 28, 2017 at 2:01 pm

Yep. To quote the White House press release, " Today, the President announced a major new step that his Administration is taking to make mortgages more affordable and accessible for creditworthy families. "

That's not a valid reason to lower PMI rates. PMI rates must cover losses, and higher interest rates on mortgages may very well mean higher default rates. If so, PMI rates would need to go up as well.

Now if the press release had talked about PMI overcharges by the FHA, then I might have have bought it. But they didn't. There was no mention of actuarial soundness at all .

Jack , January 28, 2017 at 10:12 am

For a good explanation of how mortgage insurance works and the impact of the discussed premium increase/decrease, check out David Dayen's (a frequent contributor to NC) article on the Intercept here . David goes more in depth on the actual numbers and what they mean.

Optic7 , January 28, 2017 at 12:26 pm

I did briefly hear some discussion in the news about the FHA mortgage insurance program having been underfunded in the recent past. This could have given an additional reason for Trump to block the lower rate until the numbers could be analyzed. I did a search and found a couple of articles from before either of these decisions that illustrate different perspectives on this issue:

http://thehill.com/policy/finance/232492-castro-grilled-over-lowering-mortgage-insurance-premiums

http://www.fhaloanpros.com/2009/01/is-the-fha-under-funded/

The latter article is from 2009 but includes some interesting details about significant amounts of money being transferred from the fund to the treasury department.

Oregoncharles , January 28, 2017 at 2:13 pm

From the first link, as of 2015: " his recent decision to lower mortgage insurance premiums despite the FHA falling short of its capital reserve requirement." So the fund was out of compliance with the law, and this was a long-running point of contention between the administration and the Republicans in Congress.

What we don't know yet is whether the fund reached its goal, which would justify lowing the premium. The Congress members were complaining about being lied to.

DarkMatters , January 28, 2017 at 12:38 pm

"What is the appropriate premium for mortgage insurance?"

"Such questions aside, HUD's annual mortgage insurance premium of 0.8% was in the middle of the typical range of 0.5% to 1.0% charged by private mortgage insurers. Obama's short-lived cut to 0.55% would have put HUD's premium at the low end, on what probably are higher-risk loans."

The argument here seems to be that what is typical is appropriate. By that argument, 0.55% which falls in that range would be ok. The argument that it's too low assumes that the range as it stands is somehow rationally defined, which is another assumption that itself bears scrutiny. To say that 0.5-1.0% is ok is an assumption, and should be examined in detail right along with the 0.55 and 0.8 HUD figures before firmer conclusions could be drawn. The results would give an informed answer to the rhetorical question " what is HUD doing in the mortgage insurance business, anyway?" Absent that, we're reduced to arguments, tainted on both sides by political inclinations. Jeff Epstein's clarification is exemplary.

oh , January 28, 2017 at 2:51 pm

" Whereas if HUD's mortgage insurance pool later went bust, it could have been blamed on Obama for cutting premiums without any actuarial analysis."

Oh Boy! That would really hurt Obama, when he'd be long gone and dancing with the stars!

Remember, whatever he did during his term he weighed and measured a thousand times.

flora , January 28, 2017 at 3:33 pm

"Cheap premiums look like a free benefit, until the guarantee fund goes bust in a down cycle, and taxpayers get hit with a bailout."

+1.

Domofdoom , January 28, 2017 at 8:18 am

Well said. What do you think would be more effective: trying to change the dems or giving up on them and setting up another party?

WheresOurTeddy , January 28, 2017 at 3:33 pm

option 2

Vatch , January 28, 2017 at 4:37 pm

One may be more effective, but if it's not feasible, it doesn't matter how effective it would be in theory. See this comment by Martin from Canada a few days ago:

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/01/bernie-sanders-nails-trumps-pick-health-human-services-directly-wall.html#comment-2747290

Here's the link that Martin pointed to:

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/11/bernie-sanders-democratic-labor-party-ackerman/

Maybe a viable new progressive party can be created. But it sure won't be easy. If it weren't extremely difficult, don't you think that the Greens would have done it by now? For now, I think that people need to be actively looking for candidates to run in the 2018 Democratic primaries. In a few places, at the state level, this will be happening in 2017. See:

https://ballotpedia.org/State_legislative_elections,_2017

"Louisiana, Mississippi, New Jersey and Virginia hold elections in odd-numbered years."

rjs , January 28, 2017 at 8:36 am

Obama came in off the golf course after Trump was elected and issued dozens of similar diktats i recall wondering at the time that if all those moves were so important, why didn't he make them in the 8 years he had

oho , January 28, 2017 at 9:39 am

EZ real issue for Democrats to embrace. Stop the sales tax of food at the state/muni level. Shift that burden (or as much as reasonably possible) to the top income brackets.

Oh wait, the places where Democrats can do this, always solidly vote D and there's no incentive.

J.P. Steele , January 28, 2017 at 9:51 am

There is an art to politics. As anyone who studies the subject knows, one has to be both "Lion & Fox." Lion .for the strength to drive policies, but also a Fox in order to avoid "Snares and Traps." Bannon, who actually has been writing these executive orders, stepped right into this Trap. Rookie mistake. This is what happens when you have ideologues attempting to actually govern. They "step in it." I believe that Jeff is a bit naive and thin skinned here as to "The Game." Obama did indeed set a snare ..but I am a bit more concerned by Steve's arrogance for boldly stepping in it and allowing the opposition a fine platform to grandstand on the issue. Rookie mistake. Arrogance & Stupidity.

integer , January 28, 2017 at 11:13 pm

Afaics there are two ways in which this game can be played:

A)
1: 0bama sets the trap.
2: Trump nullifies the reduction in rates while simultaneously denouncing 0bama for setting the trap.
3: MSMedia circus.

B)
1: 0bama sets the trap.
2: Trump nullifies the reduction in rates.
3: D-party denounces Trump.
4: MSMedia circus.
5: Trump/Bannon denounces 0bama for setting the trap.
6: MSMedia once again loses credibility, at least in the eyes of Trump supporters.

Why is option A better than B? Am I missing something here?

Yves Smith Post author , January 29, 2017 at 12:02 am

Trump and Bannon will never do 5 and 6. They never fight on the level of detail and timetables.

Horatio Parker , January 28, 2017 at 10:14 am

Simple question: why did Trump reverse the cut?

Craig , January 28, 2017 at 10:53 am

Excellent question, it has not been answered yet:). Lotsa words tho.

cm , January 28, 2017 at 2:39 pm

1. It raised financial risk to the govt.
2. As the article pointed out many times, it was a sleazy move on Obama's part

WheresOurTeddy , January 28, 2017 at 3:41 pm

Same reason Bush 43 reversed the last-minute reductions to water regulations that Bill Clinton passed, and Obama had to deal with

Clinton to Bush : President Clinton Signs Midnight Regulations

Bush to Obama : Bush's Final FU: Last-Minute Regulations That Will Screw America for Years to Come

Obama to Trump: Mortgage rate (non-)"reduction", likely more to come

Wiki on "Midnight Regulations": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_regulations

WheresOurTeddy , January 28, 2017 at 4:07 pm

Not a lot of archived stuff from 2001 and before on the nets, oddly. I regret posting the CNN link up there.

I washed my hands twice afterward.

ScottW , January 28, 2017 at 10:17 am

If everyone with less than 20% equity has PMI, why didn't it pay off after the crash and lessen the need for a bailout? Logic would dictate most of the foreclosures were on homes people bought most recently with less than 20% down. Did PMI pay any money during the crash and to whom and for what?

If it didn't do any good during the last crash to lessen the public bailout, what's the point of requiring it?

lyman alpha blob , January 28, 2017 at 1:00 pm

That is a very good question and I don't remember hearing anything about PMI paying out during the crash (but that could just be my memory). In fact it never even crossed my mind but yeah you'd think that should have mitigated some of the losses. Maybe any payout would only benefit the mortgage holder directly and wouldn't carry through to the mortgage-based securities? That seems odd though and if true would be a strong case for severely curtailing if not eliminating at least the more exotic bets.

Anybody know anything about this?

oh , January 28, 2017 at 2:55 pm

I often wondered about the same thing/

WheresOurTeddy , January 28, 2017 at 4:01 pm

Because it's another BS fee they tack on for no good reason other than greed.

I was in the mortgage game in 2006-2008. Now matter how many showers I take I still don't feel clean.

bob , January 28, 2017 at 4:03 pm

"Logic would dictate most of the foreclosures were on homes people bought most recently with less than 20% down."

Not banker logic. They were foreclosing on houses with equity to steal. Those houses that were valued above what was mortgaged.

Jim F , January 28, 2017 at 10:29 am

What gets me is people who think "shame on Trump" for not recognizing and avoiding the trap. Every single one of those people I avoid like the plague.

Joel , January 28, 2017 at 10:42 am

Re: The Young Turks

I watched a few times until what's his name, the main turk, interrupted and talked over the female co-host too many times for my stomach. There are too many good choices to give clicks to that type of behavior. Hey this is the 21st century.

Oregoncharles , January 28, 2017 at 2:03 pm

Cenk Uygur – the only actual Turk on the show. It IS his show and network, but I see your point.

jake , January 28, 2017 at 10:42 am

I don't know . Obama made many policy changes after the election results came.

It's not as if government is a fast moving engine. This could have been in the works for years and got expedited for obvious reasons. It took years for Obama to start commuting drug sentences, also Chelsea Manning, and there was no political gain in it for him.

Unless the policy was itself a fraud, it's impossible to know whether it was implemented cynically.

Oregoncharles , January 28, 2017 at 2:01 pm

I made this point below, once it escapes moderation, but basically: 1) the article fails to tell us whether the new rate made sense; and 2) Clinton did the same thing – a bunch of last-minute progressive moves, designed to stroke his legacy and punk his Republican successor. Let's hope the clemency actions are less reversible than the policy moves.

WheresOurTeddy , January 28, 2017 at 4:04 pm

"It took years for Obama to start commuting drug sentences, also Chelsea Manning, and there was no political gain in it for him."

It took years for Obama to start commuting drug sentences, also Chelsea Manning,*** BECAUSE*** there was no political gain in it for him.

There, I fixed it for you.

John , January 28, 2017 at 11:00 am

So Trump/Bannon got punked by Obama the first week in office. Looks like to me th e Repubs are realizing Obamacare may be a similar punkjob.

JamesG , January 28, 2017 at 11:02 am

"Simple question: why did Trump reverse the cut?"

To gain time.

To evaluate the numbers and come up with an accurate rate?

My simple question: Why did the Ds presume it was simply "to hurt the middle class?"

Horatio Parker , January 28, 2017 at 12:06 pm

Because it makes buying a house more expensive.

It seems that Obama's motives may safely assumed to be deceitful and petty, but we can conclude nothing at all about Trump or his motives.

I don't see how this "truth" advances any agenda.

DarkMatters , January 28, 2017 at 12:41 pm

Maybe Mnuchin protecting his faction? Just another hypothesis.

NotClairVoyant , January 28, 2017 at 12:12 pm

The MIP rate reduction was either an ill-advised reaction to the recent spike in mortgage rates or a simple set-up for the incoming administration. I suspect is was a combination of both, and likely designed more for political gain than anything.

It's hard to take a guy seriously when he professes to be concerned about home affordability when he spent the last 8 years "foaming the runway" for banks as millions of people were foreclosed on their homes, only to watch many of those same homes get gobbled up by Wall Street and rented back out to them.

Fewer underwater borrowers will at least curtail the path to feudalism in this new echo housing bubble.

winstonsmith , January 28, 2017 at 12:21 pm

Another issue is who would have actually benefited from the Obama rate cut. We are supposed to believe it would have been home buyers, but a uniform increase in the spending power of home buyers as a group is to a large extent offset by a corresponding increase in home prices. To that extent it would be sellers (including private equity) and not low income buyers who would benefit.

yan , January 28, 2017 at 1:14 pm

Also, as far as I'm concerned, if Obamamometer was serious about helping homeowners there are many more better ways to do it than "foaming the runway" for banks, or preempting any meaningful action through his statewide get out of jail free card settlement, or actually trying to stop his buddies from blowing asset bubble after asset bubble.
Moreover, if you can´t put up more than 20% up front to buy a house maybe the problem is that wages are shit compared to property prices and people can´t afford anything more than cheap meth or oxycontin to cope with their sorry lives.

WheresOurTeddy , January 28, 2017 at 4:06 pm

+1

Oregoncharles , January 28, 2017 at 1:55 pm

Pardon if this is a duplication, but: Isn't there a very large omission here? Was the premium decrease justified, or not? It's supposed to be government insurance, so the premium should cover the costs. Did it? Would the proposed lower premium cover them? (Yeah, I know, MMT. But apparently the idea here was to have a self-supporting program, so it should be self-supporting unless you announce otherwise.)

That said: this is part of a pattern. Obama made a number of progressive policy moves at the very last minute, most of them reversible. This is nothing but legacy-stroking, as well as setting a trap for the next Pres. Clinton did the same thing, along with some questionable pardons.

"So why'd you wait so long?"

Oregoncharles , January 28, 2017 at 2:30 pm

Well, Haygood was the only one to beat me to it.

oh , January 28, 2017 at 2:21 pm

I noticed the false headlines on yahoo news (the bastion of fake and worthless news) and I immediately checked it to find that O'Liar had planted this landmine so that it could blow up in Trump's face. Sure enough, when Trump canceled it, he was the bad guy (even though it had never had gone into effect as this article points out). What a cynical move by O'Liar and how cynical can his sycophants be?

flora , January 28, 2017 at 3:11 pm

Great post! I saw the headlines when the story came out and instantly thought there was something "off", something a little too pat about the stories. But I wasn't sure what was wrong with the stories, and was left confused. This post of investigative reporting and facts informs me what was actually happening. Thank you.

aliteralmind , January 28, 2017 at 4:48 pm

Nice to hear this. Thanks.

jake , January 28, 2017 at 4:29 pm

The reaction here puzzles me to the point of confusion. Absent any argument that the policy didn't offer it's claimed benefits (cost savings for the middle-class), is the left so virtuous that it will reject and refuse to fight for any advance which isn't selflessly arrived at?

Compare this to "conservatives" who successfully campaigned in 2010 against supposed Medicare cuts related to Obamacare implementation, when they'd love nothing more than to kill the program outright.

We, by contrast, we won't even fight for what we claim to believe in, if it isn't wrapped in virtue.

Yves Smith Post author , January 28, 2017 at 5:06 pm

You are missing that this is insurance, and the cost of losses must be paid for somehow. From Bruce's comment above:

What should the mortgage insurance rate actually be? And the answer is simple: It should be high enough to cover losses incurred by mortgage defaults (plus operating expenses), but no higher.

I don't know what that rate should have actually been, but if it was 0.55%, then Obama and the FHA should have lowered the rate years ago to avoid overcharging people. And if 0.80% was the right rate, then Obama should never have lowered it at all, given that it would ultimately require a taxpayer bailout. Either way, Obama is incompetent.

If the only consideration is cost to customers, then the proper rate is 0%. Offer it for free!! But if you want to the program to actually be self-sustaining, so that it doesn't require continuous injection of taxpayer dollars and be a perpetual target for cancellation by Congress, then you have to charge enough to cover losses. Whether the average mortgage rate is 3.5% or 4.0% or 6.2% matters not a whit in this calculation.

Net conclusion: Obama is either a flaming incompetent who flat-out doesn't understand the concept of insurance, or this was a deliberate attempt to impose a political headache on Trump.

jake , January 28, 2017 at 6:56 pm

Granted, but nobody knows the facts. Bruce wants to damn Obama for not doing it before, or damn him now for doing it. But nothing he either did or didn't do will be deemed acceptable at this point, even if the reduction is fully warranted.

Have we never heard politics? Process? Delay? Your net conclusion may still prove to be the correct one, though I'm not sure that failure to implement change earlier, assuming it was warranted, could be justly laid at the feet of Obama. But we do know?

flora , January 28, 2017 at 7:55 pm

I'm not sure that failure to implement change earlier, assuming it was warranted, could be justly laid at the feet of Obama. But we do know?"

A Presidential Directive, aka an executive order or executive action, can be laid at the feet of the President. So, yes, we do know. He could have taken the action anytime in the past 8 years. Note the date on this action – Jan 7th, 2017.
http://www.housingwire.com/articles/32533-its-official-obama-to-direct-fha-to-cut-mortgage-insurance-premiums

centaur , January 28, 2017 at 5:03 pm

+1000, jake

witters , January 28, 2017 at 6:10 pm

So Obama almost nearly did something that might, maybe, have been a tiny bit useful, but then the US Constitution

[Jan 24, 2017] Precedents for Pizzagate>

Jan 24, 2017 | www.unz.com

In 2006, the DHS's Department of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) ran an internationally cooperative investigation into the purchase of subscriptions of child pornography online. Code-named Project Flicker, the investigation uncovered the identities of 30,000 child porn subscribers in 132 different nations. Some 250 of these identities belonged to civilian and military employees of the U.S. Defense Department, who gave their real names and purchased the porn with government .mil email addresses-some with the highest security clearances available. In response, the Pentagon's Department of Criminal Investigative Services (DCIS) cross-referenced ICE's list with current employment roles and began a series of prosecutions.

A DCIS report from July 2010 shows that 30 of these individuals were investigated, despite uncovering a new total of 264 Defense employees and contractors who had purchased child pornography online. 13 had Top Secret security clearance. 8 had NATO Secret security clearance. 42 had Secret security clearance. 4 had Interim Secret security clearance. A total of 76 individuals had Secret security clearance or higher.

Yet, the investigations were halted entirely after only some 50 total names were investigated at all, and just 10 were prosecuted . A full 212 of the individuals on ICE's list were never even given the most cursory investigation at all. (Note: The number 5200 keeps popping up in sources covering this-for instance, see here -and I'm not sure what that number is for: American subscribers? Pentagon email addresses that weren't confirmed to have actually been used by Pentagon employees, but still may have been? I'll leave it to anyone interested enough to pursue these individual leads to see if they can figure that out and get back to us.)

In 2011, the story resurfaced when Anderson Cooper covered it with (again) Senator Chuck Grassley on CNN. After this, the story appears to have sunk straight back down into the memory hole yet again. Neither Anderson Cooper nor CNN appear to have given a follow–up in the five years since the story of the failed investigation first aired-why not? And why wasn't the first airing enough to lead to mass outrage and calls for action anyway? See here for another summary of the squashed investigation from 2014.

[Jan 24, 2017] Pizzagate by Aedon Cassiel

Notable quotes:
"... Mehrdad Amanpour ..."
"... The Sunday Times ..."
"... The Rotherham child sexual exploitation scandal first "broke" in the far-right blogosphere. The accusation they made was that these gangs were being allowed to operate undisturbed because everyone was too afraid of "appearing racist" to properly investigate them . . . and nobody listened to the far-right bloggers who were breaking this story because they were afraid of "appearing racist" if they gave any credibility to those far-right sources, too. Never mind that it seemed paranoid to rely on bloggers ..."
"... the far-right blogosphere turned out to be right. ..."
"... those people ..."
"... The Podesta Emails ..."
"... The evidence is of wildly varying levels of quality, ranging from the pareidolia of "Jesus is appearing to me in my toast" to "wait, that's actually pretty damn creepy." The mountain of claims and observations and speculations being compiled in places like Voat and Steemit are too overwhelming for any one person to hope to wade through sorting wheat from chaff, and while I don't intend to try, I will summarize some just a little bit of it here. ..."
"... While many of these claims are wild speculation over coincidences (though by no means all of them are), at some point I think a bunch of weird coincidences involving pedophilia and kids becomes sort of damning in and of itself. In one email , Podesta is among those being invited to a farm and the host says, "Bonnie will be Uber Service to transport Ruby, Emerson, and Maeve Luzzatto (11, 9, and almost 7) so you'll have some further entertainment, and they will be in [the] pool for sure ." ..."
"... Could that have an innocent explanation? Sure, maybe. But inviting a group of adult men to a gathering and calling young children "further entertainment" while listing their ages is ..."
"... All the Children ..."
"... Here are just a few of the more "institutional" coincidences involved in the story: one of the men on the small list of people found "liking" photos like this one on these individuals' Instagram accounts is Arun Rao , the U.S. Attorney Chief, charged with prosecuting cases of child pornography. ..."
"... Besta Pizza, the business whose logo so closely resembled the "little boy lover" logo, is owned by Andrew Kline , who was one of four attorneys in the Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit of the Department of Justice. Isn't it just a little ..."
"... The disturbing bit is that the photo uses the tag "#chickenlovers," and "chicken lover" is in fact ..."
"... Chicken Hawk ..."
"... Furthermore, Tony Podesta's favorite ..."
"... In addition to Jeffrey Epstein, the Podesta brothers are also friends with convicted sex offender Clement Freud as well as convicted serial child molester Dennis Hastert . ..."
"... New York Times ..."
"... And we do know that this has happened before. ..."
"... The Franklin Scandal: A Story of Powerbrokers, Child Abuse & Betrayal ..."
"... how we should respond to the possibility. ..."
Dec 02, 2016 | www.unz.com

Man Motivated by 'Pizzagate' Conspiracy Theory Arrested in Washington Gunfire
Eric Lipton, The New York Times, December 5th, 2016

Beginning in 1997, in an English town of more than 100,000 people, eight Pakistani men stood at the core of a group involving as many as three hundred suspects who abused, gang-raped, pimped and trafficked, by the most conservative estimate, well over a thousand of the town's young girls for years.

The police were eventually accused of not just turning a blind eye, but of participating in the abuse - even supplying the Pakistani gangs with drugs and tipping them off when they heard of colleagues searching for children they knew to be in the gangs' possession.

Others were afraid of investigating the gangs or calling attention to their behavior because it would have been politically incorrect to accuse the town's ethnic community of such a rampant and heinous crime - in the words of one English writer, " Fears of appearing racist trumped fears of more children being abused ."

But when this story first broke, guess where it appeared?

Here's how a blogger writing under the name Mehrdad Amanpour tells the story of how the story first started reaching people:

Some years ago, a friend sent me a shocking article. It said hundreds of British girls were being systematically gang-raped by Muslim gangs. It claimed this was being covered-up.

I've never had time for conspiracy theories, especially when they look as hateful as those in the article. So I checked the links and sources in the piece. I found an American racist-far-right website and from there, saw the original source was a similarly unpleasant website in the UK.

I did a brief search for corroboration from reputable mainstream sources. I found none. So I wrote a curt reply to my friend: "I'd appreciate it if you didn't send me made-up crap from neo–Nazi websites."

Some months later, I read the seminal exposé of the (mainly) ethnic-Pakistani grooming gang phenomenon by Andrew Norfolk in The Sunday Times .

I was stunned and horrified - not just that these vile crimes were indeed happening and endemic, but that they really were being ignored and "covered-up" by public authorities and the mainstream media.

The Rotherham child sexual exploitation scandal first "broke" in the far-right blogosphere. The accusation they made was that these gangs were being allowed to operate undisturbed because everyone was too afraid of "appearing racist" to properly investigate them . . . and nobody listened to the far-right bloggers who were breaking this story because they were afraid of "appearing racist" if they gave any credibility to those far-right sources, too. Never mind that it seemed paranoid to rely on bloggers to report truths like these when the allegations were so wide-reaching, involving a literal conspiracy within the police force.

And yet, years after no one was willing to take them seriously, the far-right blogosphere turned out to be right.

Well over a thousand (mostly) white young girls were being abused by (mostly) Pakistani gangs.

And the authorities were covering it up.

We are now, once again, in the stage of an evolving scandal that Mehrdad Amanpour described his experience with above. Just to be clear, I'm not going to commit myself to the idea that this is going to be as huge as Rotherham was. We should be careful: we don't know what would or wouldn't be confirmed with a proper investigation. The question here is not whether we've gotten to the bottom of this online. The question is whether there is enough here to justify thinking there should be a proper investigation.

And the parallel with Rotherham is that the relatively small number of people asking for that are mostly the loathsome kinds of people who run "racist far-right websites." So, since the claims are inherently conspiratorial, and the mainstream doesn't want to be associated with those people who are talking about it, it is once again all too easy to just dismiss the claims out of hand as paranoia run wild.

Again, the evolution of the Rotherham child sexual exploitation scandal was an extremely painful lesson that the mainstream can be wrong and the "paranoid racist far-right" can be right. And that lesson was far too expensive to simply let go to waste.

The name of this scandal is Pizzagate.

It gets the name for two reasons: first, because at the center of the scandal are high-level Washington insiders who own a handful of businesses in the DC area, including a couple pizzerias (Comet Ping Pong and Besta Pizza), who have fallen under suspicion for involvement in a child sex abuse ring. Second, because the first questions arose in peoples' minds as a result of some very bizarre emails revealed by Wikileaks in The Podesta Emails that, quite simply, just sound strange (and usually involve weird references to pizza). One of the strangest emails involves Joe Podesta being asked this question: "The realtor found a handkerchief (I think it has a map that seems pizza-related). Is it yours?"

The evidence is of wildly varying levels of quality, ranging from the pareidolia of "Jesus is appearing to me in my toast" to "wait, that's actually pretty damn creepy." The mountain of claims and observations and speculations being compiled in places like Voat and Steemit are too overwhelming for any one person to hope to wade through sorting wheat from chaff, and while I don't intend to try, I will summarize some just a little bit of it here.

While many of these claims are wild speculation over coincidences (though by no means all of them are), at some point I think a bunch of weird coincidences involving pedophilia and kids becomes sort of damning in and of itself. In one email , Podesta is among those being invited to a farm and the host says, "Bonnie will be Uber Service to transport Ruby, Emerson, and Maeve Luzzatto (11, 9, and almost 7) so you'll have some further entertainment, and they will be in [the] pool for sure ."

Could that have an innocent explanation? Sure, maybe. But inviting a group of adult men to a gathering and calling young children "further entertainment" while listing their ages is weird , whether it ends up having an explanation or not.

If I was getting messages that listed the ages of young children that would be in a pool

And it turned out that the logo for my business contained a symbol strikingly close to the "little boy lover" logo used by pedophiles to signify that their interest is in young boys rather than girls . . .

And the bands that showed up at my restaurant had albums called All the Children with images on the cover of a child putting phallic-shaped objects into his mouth . . .

. . . and were found making creepy jokes about pedophilia (in reference to Jared Fogle: " we all have our preferences . . . ") . . . and there were instagram photos coming out of kids ("jokingly?") taped to the tables in my restaurant . . .

. . . frankly, I would start asking questions about myself.

Here are just a few of the more "institutional" coincidences involved in the story: one of the men on the small list of people found "liking" photos like this one on these individuals' Instagram accounts is Arun Rao , the U.S. Attorney Chief, charged with prosecuting cases of child pornography.

Besta Pizza, the business whose logo so closely resembled the "little boy lover" logo, is owned by Andrew Kline , who was one of four attorneys in the Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit of the Department of Justice. Isn't it just a little unusual that someone that high up in a human trafficking division would fail to notice the symbolism?

For yet another coincidence, Lauren Silsby-Gayler is the former director of The New Life Children's Refuge in Haiti. It is a matter of public record that she was caught, prosecuted, and sent to jail while in that role for trying to abduct dozens of children, most of whom had homes and families. The main lawyer paid to represent Silsby-Gayler, "President of the Sephardic Jewish community in the Dominican Republic," was himself suspected of involvement in human trafficking.

When the Clintons gained influence in the region, one of their first acts was to work to get Silsby-Gayler off the hook . Among the Podesta Wikileaks are State Department emails discussing their case. Meanwhile, she now works on the executive board of AlertSense . . . which collaborates with IPAWS to send out nation-wide Amber Alerts.

While some of the supposed "codewords" people have claimed to have identified in Pizzagate appear to be made up, there is at least one unambiguous instance: here is an Instagrammed photo posted by James Alefantis, the owner of Comet Ping Pong that appears innocent enough: a man carrying a young child with a beaded necklace draped around both of their necks.

The disturbing bit is that the photo uses the tag "#chickenlovers," and "chicken lover" is in fact an established term to refer to a pedophile - someone who loves "chicken," which is also unambiguously an established term to refer to underage children (you can see this in the gay slang dictionary subset of the Online Dictionary of Playground Slang ).

Complain all you want about the "speculative" and "paranoid" online discussions of Pizzagate, but when you have clearer-cut cases like this one where James Alefantis absolutely, unquestionably did in fact post a photo of a man holding an infant and the one and only hashtag he used for the photo involved a term that unquestionably is a reference to pedophilia, in a context where it is clear that there is nothing else here that "chicken" could possibly have been referring to, the likelihood that more speculative claims might have truth to them is increased.

There is a 1994 documentary expose on NAMBLA (the North American Man/Boy Love Association) called Chicken Hawk . Here is yet another reference from a watchdog group from 2006, proving that this one existed well before Pizzagate surfaced. Another confirmed fact dug up by the paranoid right-wing conspiracy nuts on the Internet?

So here are a few more things we do know. We know that Bill Clinton has taken dozens of international flights on a plane colloquially known as the " Lolita Express " with Jeffrey Epstein, a man who spent 13 months in jail after being convicted of soliciting a 13-year-old prostitute . We know that Hillary Clinton's staff knew that Anthony Weiner was sexting underage girls all the way back in 2011 - and covered it up. Guess whose laptop revealed evidence that Hillary Clinton went on flights on Jeffrey Epstein's " Lolita Express " along with Bill? That's right: Anthony Weiner's.

Now do you understand why the mainstream media was so eager to spin these emails as just a "distraction" during the election?

The staff that ignored Weiner's sexting of young children included John Podesta himself, whose brother Tony is one of the very men at the center of Pizzagate. Tony Podesta has rather warped tastes in art. For instance, he owns a bronze statue of a decapitated man in a contorted position identical to a well-known photograph of one of serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer's victims:

(See here for the disturbing photo of the real victim.)

The same news story that features the image above also mentions the fact that John Podesta's bedroom contains multiple images from a photographer "known for documentary-style pictures of naked teenagers in their parents' suburban homes.")

Furthermore, Tony Podesta's favorite artist is Biljana Djurdjevic, whose art heavily features images of children in BDSM-esque positions in large showers. Here's one with a row of young girls in a shower with their hands behind their backs in a position that suggests bondage:

Here's one with a young boy in a shower tied up in the air with his hands over his head:

In addition to Jeffrey Epstein, the Podesta brothers are also friends with convicted sex offender Clement Freud as well as convicted serial child molester Dennis Hastert .

We do know that the New York Times , which is now dismissing Pizzagate in its entirety as a hoax, is run by Mark Thompson - who was credibly accused a few years back of lying to help cover up a scandal involving another high-profile public figure involved in child sex abuse, Jimmy Savile , during his time as head of the BBC .

And we do know that this has happened before.

Lawrence King , the leader of the Black Republican Caucus, who sang the national anthem at the Republican convention in 1984, was accused by multiple claimed victims of trafficking and abusing boys out of the Boys Town charity for years. You can hear the chilling testimony from three people who claim to have been victimized by King in a documentary produced shortly after the events transpired.

You can hear the FBI, even after they received extensive testimony from victims, explain in their own words that they weren't going to prosecute King because if anything were wrong with him, he would have been prosecuted by a lower authority already. Eventually, King was found "O. J. guilty" of abusing Paul Bonacci - convicted in civil court, acquitted in criminal court.

The best written source for information about the depths of corruption and cover-up involved in this scandal is Nick Bryant's The Franklin Scandal: A Story of Powerbrokers, Child Abuse & Betrayal (if you can't find a free copy on your own, contact me through my website, www.zombiemeditations.com and I tell you where to find it).

Could all of this turn out to be nothing?

Of course it could.

But that's not the question here. The question is how we should respond to the possibility.

Do we take the possibility seriously? History clearly indicates that we should. Even if it did turn out to be nothing at all, I would still be more proud to belong to a community willing to take the possibility seriously and call for investigation than I would to belong to a community that dismissed the possibility far too hastily and luckily turned out to be right - even as it did this and turned out to be wrong in so many cases like Rotherham before.

The real horror here would be to live in a society that responded as Reddit has - by shutting down the whole conversation entirely, banning r/pizzagate even while keeping subreddits like r/pedofriends, "a place for (non-offending) pedophiles and allies to make friends with each other!" alive.

Over on his blog, Scott Adams asks us to keep in mind cases where confirmation bias did lead to false allegations of institutional pedophilia, to caution against excessive confidence. (He hastens to add: "I want to be totally clear here that I'm not saying Pizzagate is false. I see the mountain of evidence too. And collectively it feels totally persuasive to me. It might even be true. I'm not debating the underlying truth of it. That part I don't know.")

But which is worse? If all the evidence coming out of Pizzagate is entirely false, what have we lost by spending time on it? On the other hand, if even five percent of the allegations that have been made surrounding the topic are true, what have we lost by ignoring them? Which is worse: spending too much time pursuing and thoroughly vetting false leads, or looking the other way while any amount of child abuse goes on?

According to the FBI's National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database, nearly 470,000 children disappear in the United States alone each year. This number is dubious for a number of reasons. It looks like some number of runaways end up in the NCIC count, and to make matters worse, repeat offenders can make it into the data multiple times. So that would suggest that the real number must be lower than this tally; but on the other hand, we also know that many missing children are never reported in the first place, so it's possible that that could boost the number back up. The bottom line, however, seems to be that there is no reliable way to determine how many total children are actually missing in the U.S.

Either way, though, even if correcting for these errors took out 90% of the disappearances in the NCIC database, and there were no unreported disappearances to account for at all, I think even the resulting 50,000 per year would still be enough to call the problem systematic and justify suspicion that these disappearances could well involve organized efforts-given that we already know of so many pedophile rings in so many powerful institutions.

In 2013, Canada busted a ring involving more than 300 adults , who had teachers, doctors, and nurses heavily represented among them. A pedophile ring has just been identified in the highest levels of UK football (Americans know the sport as soccer). Norwegian police also just uncovered a ring of 50 organized pedophiles mostly working in the tech sector , once again including elected officials, teachers, and lawyers. The Vatican scandals can practically go without mention - institutional involvement in child sex exploitation is nearly an a priori given.

And the children that are being raped and murdered in the photos passed around by these child porn rings are coming from somewhere . And when figures like politicians, teachers, and lawyers are involved in the rings, it's hardly inconceivable that they could be involved in disappearances.

Have we identified one here?

Only time will tell. But we deserve to be paid attention. We deserve to have the matter taken (Reprinted from Counter-Currents Publishing by permission of author or representative)

[Jan 21, 2017] Departing Obama Tearfully Shoos Away Loyal Drone Following Him Out Of White House

Jan 21, 2017 | www.theonion.com

WASHINGTON-Stopping and turning around as he made his way across the South Lawn after hearing the unmanned aerial vehicle hovering just feet behind him, outgoing President Barack Obama tearfully shooed away a loyal MQ-9 Reaper drone attempting to follow him out of the White House, sources confirmed Friday.

"Go on now-get out of here!" said the former commander-in-chief, his lower lip trembling and his eyes welling with tears as he affected a stern tone of voice in an attempt to scare off the faithful hunter-killer drone that had spent the past eight years obediently at his side.

"You can't come with me anymore, you got that? Can't you see this is for your own good? Now scram. What are you waiting for? Go!" At press time, a heartbroken Obama had thrown a rock in the drone's direction, causing the unmanned aerial vehicle to flee into the sky, where it paused to look back one last time at its old master before flying off toward a Yemeni tribal wedding.

[Jan 18, 2017] Better dead than bad: Status competition among German fighter pilots during World War II

Jan 18, 2017 | voxeu.org

January 14, 2017

Better dead than bad: Status competition among German fighter pilots during World War II
By Philipp Ager, Leonardo Bursztyn, and Joachim Voth

During World War II, the German military publicly celebrated the performance of its flying aces to incentivise their peers. This column uses newly collected data to show that, when a former colleague got recognition, flying aces performed much better without taking more risks, while average pilots did only slightly better but got themselves killed much more often. Overall the incentives may have been detrimental, which serves as a caution to those offering incentives to today's financial risk-takers. Reply Sunday, January 15, 2017 at 12:16 PM

anne said in reply to anne... Conceptually alone, this essay on the effects of competition is intriguing and possibly quite important and surely worth following up. Reply Sunday, January 15, 2017 at 01:48 PM ilsm said in reply to anne... A lot of externalities in the WW II air war! Reply Sunday, January 15, 2017 at 04:13 PM

anne said in reply to ilsm... A lot of externalities in the WW II air war!

[ I am reminded of the World War II air war as depicted in "Catch-22" by the essay. Of course I took Joseph Heller as knowing that air war, however maddening the depiction. ] Reply Sunday, January 15, 2017 at 04:38 PM anne said in reply to anne... http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Catch-22

1961

Yossarian came to him one mission later and pleaded again, without any real expectation of success, to be grounded. Doc Daneeka snickered once and was soon immersed in problems of his own, which included Chief White Halfoat, who had been challenging him all that morning to Indian wrestle, and Yossarian, who decided right then and there to go crazy.

'You're wasting your time,' Doc Daneeka was forced to tell him.

'Can't you ground someone who's crazy?'

'Oh, sure. I have to. There's a rule saying I have to ground anyone who's crazy.'

'Then why don't you ground me? I'm crazy. Ask Clevinger.'

'Clevinger? Where is Clevinger? You find Clevinger and I'll ask him.'

'Then ask any of the others. They'll tell you how crazy I am.'

'They're crazy.'

'Then why don't you ground them?'

'Why don't they ask me to ground them?'

'Because they're crazy, that's why.'

'Of course they're crazy,' Doc Daneeka replied. 'I just told you they're crazy, didn't I? And you can't let crazy people decide whether you're crazy or not, can you?'

Yossarian looked at him soberly and tried another approach. 'Is Orr crazy?'

'He sure is,' Doc Daneeka said.

'Can you ground him?'

'I sure can. But first he has to ask me to. That's part of the rule.'

'Then why doesn't he ask you to?'

'Because he's crazy,' Doc Daneeka said. 'He has to be crazy to keep flying combat missions after all the close calls he's had. Sure, I can ground Orr. But first he has to ask me to.'

'That's all he has to do to be grounded?'

'That's all. Let him ask me.'

'And then you can ground him?' Yossarian asked.

'No. Then I can't ground him.'

'You mean there's a catch?'

'Sure there's a catch,' Doc Daneeka replied. 'Catch-22. Anyone who wants to get out of combat duty isn't really crazy.'

There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane, he had to fly them. If he flew them, he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to, he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.

'That's some catch, that Catch-22,' he observed.

'It's the best there is,' Doc Daneeka agreed.

-- Joseph Heller Reply Sunday, January 15, 2017 at 04:39 PM anne said in reply to anne... http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/02/15/home/heller-cadets.html

October 6, 1986

'Catch-22': Cadets Hail a Chronicler of the Absurd
By ANDREW H. MALCOLM

COLORADO SPRINGS

It was love at first sight.

The first time the cadets at the Air Force Academy saw Joseph Heller walk into the cavernous auditorium. they fell madly in love with him. Nearly 900 future officers stood as one to applaud the white-haired author as he arrived to begin a weekend-long celebration.

The occasion was the 25th anniversary of the publication of ''Catch-22,'' the novel that captured the insanity of war and the human condition while adding a phrase to the English language.... Reply Sunday, January 15, 2017 at 05:39 PM

[Jan 18, 2017] 25th anniversary of the publication of ''Catch-22,'' the novel that captured the insanity of war and the human condition while adding a phrase to the English language

Oct 06, 1986 | www.nytimes.com

'CATCH-22': CADETS HAIL A CHRONICLER OF THE ABSURD

Section B; Page 10, Column 3; National Desk
Byline: By ANDREW H. MALCOLM, Special to the New York Times COLORADO SPRINGS, Oct. 4 Lead:

It was love at first sight.

The first time the cadets at the Air Force Academy saw Joseph Heller walk into the cavernous auditorium. they fell madly in love with him. Nearly 900 future officers stood as one to applaud the white-haired author as he arrived to begin a weekend-long celebration.

The occasion was the 25th anniversary of the publication of ''Catch-22,'' the novel that captured the insanity of war and the human condition while adding a phrase to the English language.

Text:

The audience in blue uniforms rose again to applaud and cheer when the author introduced the movie based on his book. The cadets applauded during the movie credits, after the movie and after he thought he was finished answering questions.

Then they mobbed him down front with more questions, asked for autographs and followed him out to a waiting car for more talk about the evil Colonel Cathcart, who kept raising the number of bombing missions necessary for rotation home, Major Major, who would only see people in his office when he wasn't in, and Milo Minderbinder, the mess officer who could see a profit in almost anything. 'An Intoxicating Experience'

''For me,' said the 63-year-old author, ''this is an intoxicating experience unlike any other I've ever had. I don't want to take it in stride. I want to revel in it.''

As part of the celebration, there was a 25th birthday cake for Yossarian, the book's puzzled protagonist. There were academic papers presented on the theological, cultural and social significance of ''Catch-22.'' And there were big smiles on the faces of the Air Force Academy's English department, which sought to introduce the man who made fun of an insane military bureaucracy to future members of a military bureaucracy.

''We want these men and women to be a thinking part of a large military bureaucracy,'' said Col. Jack Shuttleworth, head of the English department, ''We don't want them to be victims of the Colonel Cathcarts of the world. To put it bluntly, you don't want dumb officers out there protecting your country.''

Since its publication, ''Catch-22'' has been an informal part of the military education of many soldiers. And it was occasionally used in some senior classes here. But in recent years it has become a staple taught by a self-confident staff of teachers whose military experiences included tours in Vietnam, where the historical distinctions between good guy and bad guy were fuzzed and, as Colonel Shuttleworth put it, ''The enemy was everywhere and nowhere.'' Mutual Admiration Builds

''We oversimplify our military,'' said Mr. Heller, who as a World War II bombardier lieutenant flew 60 missions in the Army Air Corps. ''We think they have one mind. But they are very educated today and they want their families and students to be well educated. The degree of acceptance here, maybe even love, for the book is very surprising, and gratifying.''

Likewise, the cadets learned that an Olympian author can also be accessible. ''He seems like a nice guy,'' said Corey Keppler, a sophomore from Smithtown, L.I., ''I read parts of the book in high school. Now I'm going to finish it.''

Mr. Heller also shared several confidences with his young admirers, none of whom was born when he wrote the book. They learned that the book was originally titled ''Catch-18,'' but the imminent publication of Leon Uris's ''Mila 18'' and the repetition of the number two in Mr. Heller's book suggested the change.

The cadets also discovered that Milo's car in the movie really did belong to Mussolini. They laughed when the author told why he sold the movie rights: ''I wanted the money.'' A Catch That Defies Explanation

And the author tried once again to explain why he can never define catch-22. ''It doesn't exist,'' he said, ''That's the catch. If it existed in writing or something, we could change it.''

Then he sought to give an example. ''I understand the Air Force Academy has a catch-22,'' he said, ''To repair a uniform it must be freshly cleaned. But the cleaning staff has orders not to clean any uniform needing repairs.''

''That's some catch,'' says Yossarian in the movie.

''It's the best there is,'' replies the doctor.

There were, of course, serious moments in the celebration, which the academy advertised with a sketch of a naked Yossarian in a tree looking out over the Air Force school. In one paper presented, Stuart James of Denver University praised the book's ''narrative knots and sheer fantasy'' as ''a mirror image of the madhouse world of lonely psyches that we all inhabit.'' Joan Robertson of the academy's faculty analyzed the author's depiction of women in ''Catch-22'' as undemanding, compliant, often not even worthy of a proper name, and thus adding a needed gritty edge to his portrayal of men.

Frederick Kiley of the National Defense University even wrote another chapter to ''Catch-22'' in Mr. Heller's style about the brave young men who went off on the dangerous missions they did not have to fly but could not get out of. 'I'm Sure Milo Would'

The author himself said he was surprised by the lasting impact of Milo Minderbinder, a product of the capitalist system. ''I don't understand the merger mania sweeping American business,'' said Mr. Heller. ''But I'm sure Milo would.''

The author said he was not surprised, however, when catch-22's kept popping up in real life. In a speech tonight he quoted one United States Army briefing officer in Vietnam telling reporters, ''I'm happy to announce our casualties have increased greatly and are now on a level with those of our Marines.''

Mr. Heller said he was stunned with the strength of continuing interest in his book. He confided plans to cancel the Friday evening showing of the movie if only a few teachers attended. Instead, it was the largest crowd he has ever addressed.

All of which put the author in his own catch-22 - the more he enjoyed the weekend, the faster it went, and the less he could enjoy it.

''I'm as happy as a lark,'' said Mr. Heller, who expects to complete his next novel, ''Poetics,'' this winter. ''All my fantasies have been fulfilled. The sad part to me is that now I'll have to wait another 25 years to come back.''

[Jan 18, 2017] War is a ... destructive suction tube.

Jan 18, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
It is MLK weekend....

A Boy Named Sue, January 15, 2017 at 12:22 AM

It is MLK weekend....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rynxqdNMry4
ilsm -> A Boy Named Sue... , January 15, 2017 at 05:12 AM
Freedom is in the soul.

Let us 'ally' with all the world, let us protect civilians, let us impose 'just peace', let us squander the environment. No plan is too bloody, no price too steep to prevent another 9/11. The evening news still needs bodies of "those people". Non violence is un American.

I am not surprised the neoliberals do not post Dr King's Vietnam Speech:

Here it is:

http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/pacificaviet/riversidetranscript.html

War is a ... "destructive suction tube. And you may not know it, my friends, but it is estimated that we spend $500,000 to kill each enemy soldier, while we spend only fifty-three dollars for each person classified as poor, and much of that fifty-three dollars goes for salaries to people that are not poor."

Ike said the same thing in 1953 and 1961.

Poverty is violence.

RC AKA Darryl, Ron -> ilsm... , January 15, 2017 at 05:17 AM
I was informed by MLK's awareness of the truth on the ground in 1967. That is why I protested the war in Viet Nam when protests began early in 1968 in Richmond VA, but not the draft. In April 1969 I had to decide whether to go to Canada and maybe never see my family again and take my wife far from her family as well, go to prison, or go to Viet Nam. MLK had already been murdered and I had already lost hope in the truth and social justice. So, I went to Viet Nam. I figured Doctor King would understand.
ilsm -> RC AKA Darryl, Ron... , January 15, 2017 at 05:34 AM
I have a buddy who refused to take the step. Repeatedly until the SS board sent him to the 'judge'.

He got 3 years in Public Health Service...... it was late '70 maybe they got kinder or maybe it was his area of NYS.

I took the ROTC route, became a cold warrior by accident.

Thank God! I never had to do any of my jobs!

Humans rarely see.

RC AKA Darryl, Ron -> ilsm... , January 15, 2017 at 06:08 AM
"...maybe it was his area of NYS..."

[I'd go with probably.]

RC AKA Darryl, Ron -> ilsm... , January 15, 2017 at 05:19 AM
BTW, that is an awesome great MLK speech. THANKS for dragging it out.

[Jan 18, 2017] War is a ... destructive suction tube.

Jan 18, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
It is MLK weekend....

A Boy Named Sue, January 15, 2017 at 12:22 AM

It is MLK weekend....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rynxqdNMry4
ilsm -> A Boy Named Sue... , January 15, 2017 at 05:12 AM
Freedom is in the soul.

Let us 'ally' with all the world, let us protect civilians, let us impose 'just peace', let us squander the environment. No plan is too bloody, no price too steep to prevent another 9/11. The evening news still needs bodies of "those people". Non violence is un American.

I am not surprised the neoliberals do not post Dr King's Vietnam Speech:

Here it is:

http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/pacificaviet/riversidetranscript.html

War is a ... "destructive suction tube. And you may not know it, my friends, but it is estimated that we spend $500,000 to kill each enemy soldier, while we spend only fifty-three dollars for each person classified as poor, and much of that fifty-three dollars goes for salaries to people that are not poor."

Ike said the same thing in 1953 and 1961.

Poverty is violence.

RC AKA Darryl, Ron -> ilsm... , January 15, 2017 at 05:17 AM
I was informed by MLK's awareness of the truth on the ground in 1967. That is why I protested the war in Viet Nam when protests began early in 1968 in Richmond VA, but not the draft. In April 1969 I had to decide whether to go to Canada and maybe never see my family again and take my wife far from her family as well, go to prison, or go to Viet Nam. MLK had already been murdered and I had already lost hope in the truth and social justice. So, I went to Viet Nam. I figured Doctor King would understand.
ilsm -> RC AKA Darryl, Ron... , January 15, 2017 at 05:34 AM
I have a buddy who refused to take the step. Repeatedly until the SS board sent him to the 'judge'.

He got 3 years in Public Health Service...... it was late '70 maybe they got kinder or maybe it was his area of NYS.

I took the ROTC route, became a cold warrior by accident.

Thank God! I never had to do any of my jobs!

Humans rarely see.

RC AKA Darryl, Ron -> ilsm... , January 15, 2017 at 06:08 AM
"...maybe it was his area of NYS..."

[I'd go with probably.]

RC AKA Darryl, Ron -> ilsm... , January 15, 2017 at 05:19 AM
BTW, that is an awesome great MLK speech. THANKS for dragging it out.

[Jan 17, 2017] I'll sell myself out in a lot of different ways, but I will never sell myself out for a check from BuzzFeed

Jan 17, 2017 | washingtonbabylon.com

See, I'm not surprised that BuzzFeed would do something as shady and unethical as exposing this Trump dossier that alleges he paid Russian sex workers for a golden shower show. Nope, literally nothing this loathsome, pathetic excuse for a "news" site does could ever surprise me. I can't understand why anyone would take a site seriously that posts things they admit cannot be verified.

[Jan 16, 2017] Who is blackmailing the president ? by Eric Zuesse

Notable quotes:
"... "Democrats can only turn this decade-long collapse around by not being who they appeared to be in the last three election cycles." He yet again is a Democratic-Party sucker by his bald assumption that it wasn't "who they appeared to be," it's instead what they were and still are, which is disgusting and which was overwhelmingly supported by Democrats supporting Obama -- they even voted for his war against Russia, and backed almost 100% his bloody coup which overthrew the democratically elected President of Ukraine -- right next door to Russia. ..."
"... What would we Americans think if Russia had perpetrated a coup in Mexico? ..."
Jan 16, 2017 | www.washingtonsblog.com
Eric Zuesse 2 days ago

This article caused me to lose respect for 'Gaius Publius', because of his statements so prejudicial and presumption-laden, so trusting in what liars (including especially Trump) have said, as, "As horrible and as monstrous as this incoming administration is - and it will prove to be the worst in American history" -- which presumes that Trump will certainly turn out to have been even worse than George W. Bush and Barack Obama, which means that 'Gaius Publius' doesn't understand what the competition for that title, "the worst in American history," really is and how vile and evil and harmful they were, such as Obama's having tried to push Russia to the very brink of war (and Hillary Clinton would have pushed it beyond the brink, by her insisting upon establishing a "no-fly zone" in Syria, shooting down Russian planes and forcing Russia to shoot down American planes there). 'Gaius Publius' is a Democratic Party sucker there, blind to Obama's (and especially Clinton's) evil. Then he says:

"Democrats can only turn this decade-long collapse around by not being who they appeared to be in the last three election cycles." He yet again is a Democratic-Party sucker by his bald assumption that it wasn't "who they appeared to be," it's instead what they were and still are, which is disgusting and which was overwhelmingly supported by Democrats supporting Obama -- they even voted for his war against Russia, and backed almost 100% his bloody coup which overthrew the democratically elected President of Ukraine -- right next door to Russia.

What would we Americans think if Russia had perpetrated a coup in Mexico? Would we feel safe from their missiles? How blind can Democrats be? It's why I quit the Party.

'Gaius Publius' is just a fool, someone who can't get rid of his assumptions once they've become false. How is he any smarter than Republicans, who are long-infamous for being precisely such fools?

This article has some true parts, but the person who wrote it is a fool. Lots of fools mix falsehoods in with truths, instead of believe only falsehoods. Those fools are harder to detect, but that also makes even more important the reader's being on guard against believing what such 'over-educated' fools say or write. 'Gaius Publius' hasn't absorbed the reality of the Clinton-Obama-led Democratic Party. It's disgusting.

[Jan 14, 2017] Reflections on a Post Election Soft Coup: Fake News , CIA Intervention, US-NATO Militarization on Russia s Doorstep

Jan 13, 2017 | www.globalresearch.ca
All this brings to mind the report that Trump is considering a realignment of the intel agencies including staff reductions and reassignments as it compares with JFK's experience when he fired CIA Director Allen Dulles. Kennedy replaced Dulles for lying to him about the Bay of Pigs debacle with an inept outsider named John McCone who was easily snookered by CIA staff. Kennedy did not fully realize the depth of Dulles' betrayal as he continued to meet with senior CIA staff at his home on a regular basis where they discussed, debated and decided CIA policy.

What Trump needs to understand is that certain cats, especially the neo-con variety, have more than nine lives and will hang on to their power base with every fiber of their being - and we know how that worked out for JFK.

Enrique Ferro's insight: Observing the President since the November 8th election, his reactions reveal an aggressiveness rarely, if ever seen in an outgoing President's closing days, and has become a fascinating study in human dynamics.

Obama is clearly experiencing more than a normal reluctance to hand over his @POTUS twitter account as perhaps the reality has only just hit home that it is far too late to create a new, improved legacy.

One explanation may be that the President's carefully constructed veneer of personality, never convincing for those who have long sought the 'real' Barak Obama, has cracked under the pressure of the 2016 losses.

[Jan 12, 2017] Chuck Todd Excoriates Buzzfeed s Editor in Chief YOU PUBLISHED FAKE NEWS

Jan 12, 2017 | www.zerohedge.com
Chuck Todd Excoriates Buzzfeed's Editor in Chief: 'YOU PUBLISHED FAKE NEWS'

Rudolph Steiner Jan 12, 2017 3:17 PM

You cannot make this up! As a NEWS purveyor today you say anything you like, from any credible or not credible person or organization on the planet, and then claim it is up to your readers to decide if it is true or not. Yikes. The American Fourth Estate is beginning to look like a one flight up gentleman's parlor on old Times Square.

inosent Jan 12, 2017 12:17 PM

a lot of homosexual practitioners like ben smith produce this kind of garbage. the aggressive promotion of homosexualized America, and Europe as well, has been very bad news indeed. That is a political agenda that needs to meet some serious resistance.

dizzyfingers Jan 12, 2017 12:07 PM

Isn't 99.99% of tv "news" fake? That's if you add in commercials... :-)

worbsid Karl Marxist Jan 12, 2017 1:06 PM

Chuck Todd is doing exactly was he is being paid to do. Just like you, me, and every one else. Not that he is especially good at what he is supposed to be doing though. Tucker is much better.

chunga Jan 12, 2017 10:56 AM

Carlson blowing up Mark Ingram last night was pretty funny too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7FZ6dJGoJ4

[Jan 12, 2017] The Neocons declaration of war against Trump

Notable quotes:
"... The allegation that " The dossier is controlled by Kremlin spokesman, PESKOV, directly on PUTIN'S orders " is beyond laughable. Clearly the author of this fake has no idea how the Russian intelligence and security services work (hint: the Presidential spokesman has no involvement in that whatsoever) On page 2 there is this other hilarious sentence " exploit TRUMP's personal obsession and sexual perversion in order to obtain suitable 'kompromat' (compromising material) on him ." ..."
"... this is an attempt at removing Donald Trump from the White House. This is a political coup d'etat. ..."
"... Third, within one short week we went from allegations of "Russian hacking" to "having a traitor sitting in the White House". We can only expect a further Tsunami of such allegations to continue and get worse and worse every day. It is interesting that Buzzfeed has already preempted the accusation of this being a smear and demonization campaign against Trump by writing that " Now BuzzFeed News is publishing the full document so that Americans can make up their own minds about allegations about the president-elect that have circulated at the highest levels of the US government. " as if most Americans had the expertise to immediately detect that this document is a crude forgery! ..."
"... Fourth, unless all the officials who briefed Trump come out and deny that this fake was part of their briefing with Trump, it will appear that this document has the official imprimatur of the senior US intelligence officials and that would give them a legal, probatory, authority. This de-facto means that the "experts" have evaluated that document and have certified it as "credible" even before any legal proceedings in court or, worse, in Congress. I sure hope that Trump had the foresight to audio and video record his meeting with the intelligence chiefs and that he is now able to threaten them with legal action if they now act in a way contradicting their behavior before him. ..."
"... Fifth, the fact that CNN got involved in all this is a critical factor. Some of us, including yours truly, were shocked and disgusted when the WaPo posted a list of 200 websites denounced as "fake news" and "Russian propaganda", but what CNN did by posting this article is infinitely worse: it is a direct smear and political attack on the President Elect on a worldwide level (the BBC and others are already posting the same crap). This again confirms to be that the gloves are off and that the Ziomedia is in full state of war against Donald Trump. ..."
"... In spite of the image which Hollywood likes to give of them, most Americans are peaceful and non-violent people, but if they are pushed too far they will not hesitate and grab their guns to defend themselves, especially if they lose all hopes in their democracy. ..."
"... just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that they are not after you ..."
"... I watched the press-conference just now, and I get the impression that this latest episode is the best thing (for Trump) recently. ..."
"... Apparently it was so inane that it was immediately refuted, and it's now accepted in all quarters that it was a fake accusation. Which gives Trump an opportunity to 1. claim victimhood, 2. attack the media and US 'intelligence' services, and 3. talk about it every time he's asked any question about his mythical 'Russian connections'. It's a huge win for him. In fact, it wouldn't have surprised me if this whole thing was his own design (well, of his operatives). ..."
"... There needs to be a mass housecleaning at the CIA and other intelligence agencies, and, in a serious country, ..."
"... His enemies are like a pack, in both parties, in both chambers, in the economic and financial establishment, the media, Hollywood. He'll have to trad carefully. And yet, he is courageous and outspoken, as he has shown right away, by strongly denouncing the media and "intelligence community" for their forgeries. ..."
"... I'm afraid the conspiracy will get nastier and nastier, and sooner or later, they will remove him, even violently, very violently. I fear the Inauguration ceremony will be historic, and not for the best. Cross your fingers. The humanity's fate is at the stake. ..."
"... To finish the power of the oligarchs, Trump must separate the politics from the business and start a serious reform of CIA. If he will be able to do it, we all may enjoy much safer World. ..."
"... The document reads like "the gang that couldn't shoot straight." It's a joke. And such hyper-overreaction as this post represents suggests an instability of mind. That anyone took the document seriously per se speaks of utter unseriousness. ..."
"... despite the fact that Trump has lately wrapped himself in a prodigious portion of Establishment Mantle, the Powers That Be are terrified, and the brick bats have just begun. ..."
"... Additionally: the accuracy, legitimacy, and/or professionalism of their attacks may prove irrelevant. Facts aren't really what it's about when you control the Narrative...When you control the Production of Truth. It's no accident that the stranglehold on the MSM is guarded so viciously. Control of the Media is Control of Everything. ..."
"... The point is not that these allegations can be used as direct grounds for impeachment, but that they create a climate in which Congressmen and Senators, especially Republicans, can block Trump's personnel and policies, especially on Russia, and if and when the opportunity arises, justify voting against party lines on an impeachment motion. ..."
"... There are plenty of establishment Republican who would vote to impeach in a heartbeat, regardless of the merits of the case, if they thought their careers would survive it, This kind of furore is designed to create political circumstances in which they might hope for their careers to survive such a betrayal. ..."
"... It's useful to understand who the Neocons are. They're mostly the Zionist section of US Jewry, but even this isn't so clear since US Jews have a problem defining themselves racially. They are ethnically more European than Semitic, and their cultural affinity is wholly European rather than Semitic Middle Eastern. Also, they are not so religious, with the decline in practicing Judaism mirroring the decline in Christian Church attendance among Europeans and Americans in general. ..."
"... So it could be more informative to see US Jewry as something more like a private corporation. ..."
"... Like any other large corporation, it's transnational, sets up lobbying organizations to help client Congressmen get elected, guides their research, helps with their expenses and gets favourable legislation in return. This reality seems to build naturally out of the Jewish European background in international commerce (rather than national government administration) so a Neoliberal economic environment is much more congenial with very little input from a nominal national identity. The key is the corporate identity. ..."
"... "Trumps problem (if it is a problem for him) is that he is dealing with a ...corporate "deep state" that sees the US mostly in economic terms, as a market to be exploited for maximum profit" ..."
"... I tell you – you are right. The stakes are very high indeed. If the establishment will lose political power, many of them may finish their lives in prison. ..."
"... It was a hoax. It also allowed Trump to find out where leaks are coming from. Anyone who understands the type of man Trump is would have placed such a report in the hoax category straightaway. That the "intelligence community" did not, says a lot about them. Under Obama, they have simply become a partisan tool. ..."
"... The McCains and Wilsons and the responsible editors at Buzzfeed and CNN all wanted to believe it to be true so they posted it as true. Collaborator McCain is a despicable creature. ..."
"... McCain of "Tokyo rose" fame. The older McCain of the USSLiberty scandalous coverup and insult to the USSLiberty victims and veterans fame. Seems that there something that runs in the McCain family. ..."
"... I am amazed by the brazen nature of the attacks. The most interesting part is that at least the most lurid claims seem to have been spoonfed to the earlier idiot in the US as part of the flow by 4chan trolls, and this continued through the former MI6 loon, both the UK and US mnrons shopped the lies around for months. ..."
"... The CNN man at the press-conference was really arrogant and aggressive. I think, if Trump will exclude CNN from his future press-conferences, people would accept it with understanding. Anyway we will have interesting times. ..."
Jan 12, 2017 | www.unz.com

After several rather lame false starts, the Neocons have now taken a step which can only be called a declaration of war against Donald Trump.

It all began with CNN published an article entitled " Intel chiefs presented Trump with claims of Russian efforts to compromise him " which claimed that:

Classified documents presented last week to President Obama and President-elect Trump included allegations that Russian operatives claim to have compromising personal and financial information about Mr. Trump, multiple US officials with direct knowledge of the briefings tell CNN. The allegations were presented in a two-page synopsis that was appended to a report on Russian interference in the 2016 election. The allegations came, in part, from memos compiled by a former British intelligence operative, whose past work US intelligence officials consider credible ( ) The two-page synopsis also included allegations that there was a continuing exchange of information during the campaign between Trump surrogates and intermediaries for the Russian government, according to two national security officials.

The website Buzzfeed then published the full document . Here it is in full.

When I first read the document my intention was to debunk it sentence by sentence. However, I don't have the time for that and, frankly, there is no need for it. I will just provide you here with enough simple straightforward evidence that this is a fake. Here are just a few elements of proof: The document has no letterhead, no identification, no date, no nothing. For many good technical and even legal reasons, sensitive intelligence documents are created with plenty of tracking and identification information. For example, such a document would typically have a reference to the unit which produced it or an number-letter combination indicating the reliability of the source and of the information it contains. The classification CONFIDENTIAL/SENSITIVE SOURCE is a joke. If this was a true document its level of classification would be much, much higher than "confidential" and since most intelligence documents come from sensitive sources there is no need to specify that.

The allegation that " The dossier is controlled by Kremlin spokesman, PESKOV, directly on PUTIN'S orders " is beyond laughable. Clearly the author of this fake has no idea how the Russian intelligence and security services work (hint: the Presidential spokesman has no involvement in that whatsoever) On page 2 there is this other hilarious sentence " exploit TRUMP's personal obsession and sexual perversion in order to obtain suitable 'kompromat' (compromising material) on him ."

Nobody in a real intelligence document would bother to clarify what the word "kompromat" means since both in Russian and in English it is obviously the combination of the words "compromising" and "materials". Any western intelligence officer, even a very junior one, would know that word, if only because of the many Cold War era espionage books written about the KGB entrapment techniques. The document speaks of "source A", "source B" and further down the alphabet. Now ask yourself a simple question: what happens after "source Z" is used? Can any intelligence agency work with a potential pool of sources limited to 26? Obviously, this is not how intelligence agencies classify their sources.

I will stop here and submit that there is ample evidence that this is a crude fake produced by amateurs who have no idea of what they are talking about.

This does not make this document any less dangerous, however.

First, and this is the really crucial part, there is more than enough here to impeach Trump on numerous grounds both political and legal . Let me repeat again – this is an attempt at removing Donald Trump from the White House. This is a political coup d'etat.

Second, this documents smears everybody involved: Trump himself, of course, but also the evil Russians and their ugly Machiavellian techniques. Trump is thereby "confirmed" as a sexual pervert who likes to hire prostitutes to urinate on him. As for the Russians, they are basically accused of trying to recruit the President of the United States as an agent of their security services. That would make Trump a traitor, by the way.

Third, within one short week we went from allegations of "Russian hacking" to "having a traitor sitting in the White House". We can only expect a further Tsunami of such allegations to continue and get worse and worse every day. It is interesting that Buzzfeed has already preempted the accusation of this being a smear and demonization campaign against Trump by writing that " Now BuzzFeed News is publishing the full document so that Americans can make up their own minds about allegations about the president-elect that have circulated at the highest levels of the US government. " as if most Americans had the expertise to immediately detect that this document is a crude forgery!

Fourth, unless all the officials who briefed Trump come out and deny that this fake was part of their briefing with Trump, it will appear that this document has the official imprimatur of the senior US intelligence officials and that would give them a legal, probatory, authority. This de-facto means that the "experts" have evaluated that document and have certified it as "credible" even before any legal proceedings in court or, worse, in Congress. I sure hope that Trump had the foresight to audio and video record his meeting with the intelligence chiefs and that he is now able to threaten them with legal action if they now act in a way contradicting their behavior before him.

Fifth, the fact that CNN got involved in all this is a critical factor. Some of us, including yours truly, were shocked and disgusted when the WaPo posted a list of 200 websites denounced as "fake news" and "Russian propaganda", but what CNN did by posting this article is infinitely worse: it is a direct smear and political attack on the President Elect on a worldwide level (the BBC and others are already posting the same crap). This again confirms to be that the gloves are off and that the Ziomedia is in full state of war against Donald Trump.

All of the above further confirms to me what I have been saying over the past weeks: if Trump ever makes it into the White House (I write 'if' because I think that the Neocons are perfectly capable of assassinating him), his first priority should be to ruthlessly crack down as hard as he legally can against those in the US "deep state" (which very much includes the media) who have now declared war on him. I am sorry to say that, but it will be either him or them – one of the parties here will be crushed.

[Sidebar: to those who wonder what I mean by "crackdown" I will summarize here what I wrote elsewhere: the best way to do that is to nominate a hyper-loyal and determined FBI director and instruct him to go after all the enemies of Trump by investigating them on charge of corruption, abuse of power, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and all the other types of behavior which have gone on forever in Congress, the intelligence community, the banking world and the media. Deal with the Neocons like Putin did with the Russian oligarchs or how the USA dealt with Al Capone – get them on tax evasion. There is no need to open Gulags or shoot people when you can get them all on what is their normal daily behavior :-)]

I sincerely hope that I am wrong, and I admit that I might be, but I don't have the gut feeling that Trump has what it takes to hit hard enough at those who are using any and every ugly method imaginable to prevent him from ever making it into the White House or to have him impeached if he tries to deliver on his campaign promises. I cannot blame him for that either: the enemy has infiltrated all the level of power in the US polity and there are strong sign that they are even represented in Trump's immediate entourage. Putin could do what he did because he was an iron-willed and highly trained intelligence officer. Trump is just a businessman whose best "training" to deal with such people would probably be his exposure to the mob in New York. Will that be enough to allow him to prevail against the Neocons? I doubt it, but I sure hope so.

As I predicted it before the election , the USA are about to enter the worst crisis in their history. We are entering extraordinarily dangerous times. If the danger of a thermonuclear war between Russia and the USA had dramatically receded with the election of Trump, the Neocon total war on Trump put the United States at very grave risk, including civil war (should the Neocon controlled Congress impeach Trump I believe that uprisings will spontaneously happen, especially in the South, and especially in Florida and Texas). At the risk of sounding over the top, I will say that what is happening now is putting the very existence of the United States in danger almost regardless of what Trump will personally do. Whatever we may think of Trump as a person and about his potential as a President, what is certain is that millions of American patriots have voted for him to "clear the swamp", give the boot to the Washington-based plutocracy and restore what they see as fundamental American values. If the Neocons now manage to stage a coup d'etat against Trump, I predict that these millions of American will turn to violence to protect what they see as their way of life, their values and their country.

In spite of the image which Hollywood likes to give of them, most Americans are peaceful and non-violent people, but if they are pushed too far they will not hesitate and grab their guns to defend themselves, especially if they lose all hopes in their democracy. And I am not talking only about gun-toting hillbillies here, I am talking about the local, state and county authorities, who often care much more about what their local constituents think and say than what the are up to in DC. If a coup is staged against Trump and some wannabe President à la Hillary or McCain gives the order to the National Guard or even the US Army to put down a local insurrection, we could see what we saw in Russia in 1991: a categorical refusal of the security services to shoot at their own people. That is the biggest and ultimate danger for the Neocons: the risk that if they give the order to crack down on the population the police, security and military services might simply refuse to take action. If that could happen in the "KGB-controlled country" (to use a Cold War cliché) this can also happen in the USA.

I sure hope that I am wrong and that this latest attack against Trump is the Neocon's last "hurray" before they finally give up and leave. I hope that all of the above is my paranoia speaking. But, as they say, " just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that they are not after you ".

So please tell me I am wrong!

(Reprinted from The Vineyard of the Saker by permission of author or representative)

Mao Cheng Ji , January 11, 2017 at 7:34 pm GMT • 100 Words

I watched the press-conference just now, and I get the impression that this latest episode is the best thing (for Trump) recently.

Apparently it was so inane that it was immediately refuted, and it's now accepted in all quarters that it was a fake accusation. Which gives Trump an opportunity to 1. claim victimhood, 2. attack the media and US 'intelligence' services, and 3. talk about it every time he's asked any question about his mythical 'Russian connections'. It's a huge win for him. In fact, it wouldn't have surprised me if this whole thing was his own design (well, of his operatives).

@Mikhailovich
"this whole thing was his own design" - you mean it is possible that Trump somehow has control over CNN, BBC etc. In such case - why he would attack them? And other question - why they worked so hard against him in time of the election campaign?
Seamus Padraig , January 11, 2017 at 9:05 pm GMT

Looks like CNN and Buzzfeed got trolled hard by 4Chan: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-11/archived-posts-prove-4chan-trolled-cia-trump-golden-shower-story-entire-russian-hack

dearieme ,January 11, 2017 at 9:44 pm GMT

If the pis-en-lit putsch fails, there will be another along in a minute. "Lock 'em up" is going to have to be applied by the thousands.

@pyrrhus
Indeed. There needs to be a mass housecleaning at the CIA and other intelligence agencies, and, in a serious country, a number of people at the CIA would be shot for treason.
Enrique Ferro , January 11, 2017 at 10:16 pm GMT • 200 Words

Saker, Putin's crack down the oligarchs took him some years, the time to gather forces and get them in disarray. He was very clever and cautious, he didn't go after them overnight. And Putin had decisive connections. Besides it was never so dramatic, and his succession was smooth The problem with Trump, as you say, is that he is quite new in town, and a forlorn fighter.

His enemies are like a pack, in both parties, in both chambers, in the economic and financial establishment, the media, Hollywood. He'll have to trad carefully. And yet, he is courageous and outspoken, as he has shown right away, by strongly denouncing the media and "intelligence community" for their forgeries.

I'm afraid the conspiracy will get nastier and nastier, and sooner or later, they will remove him, even violently, very violently. I fear the Inauguration ceremony will be historic, and not for the best. Cross your fingers. The humanity's fate is at the stake.

@Mikhailovich
Russian oligarchs had about 5% support of Russian people. They needed Putin themselves. Alternative was the communists and the nationalisation of everything.

Putin gave them choice: carry on with your business, but not interfere in the politics or leave the country. Khodorkovsky tried to resist and failed miserably. The regime change from the oligarchs to Putin took about four years.

After election 2004, it was clear who control the country. In US, the establishment, in their struggle against Trump, has support of almost half of US people, including all minorities (Jews too). To finish the power of the oligarchs, Trump must separate the politics from the business and start a serious reform of CIA. If he will be able to do it, we all may enjoy much safer World.

Robert Magill , January 11, 2017 at 10:59 pm GMT • 200 Words

This is excerpted from a futurist short story that was never published and hopefully would never be acted upon. Today's madness make it almost a possibility.

Rescuing the Republic From Itself /or How 50 Men, Women and Children Could Save our Bacon.

One thing still trumps all others in America. It isn't wealth, nor power, it's not the myth of our uniqueness under Heaven no. It's a lot more basic and powerful than those. It even trumps celebrity which is a close second. No, fundamental as those are in the national psyche they pale in comparison to Number One racism. Added to this ancient plague is a relative newcomer. Only about a century old; it is a formidable competitor and looks like it's here to stay. (If the money holds out.) Big drum roll ..ForeverWar!

Secret Plan: Your Eyes Only. Need-To-Know Established. Emergency use only! Not to be attempted until things are so bad nothing else is feasible.The basis of the Secret Plan is to use racism against racism. more https://robertmagill.wordpress.com/2014/01/30/how-our-republic-was-finally-rescued-from-itself-or/

http://robertmagill.wordpress.com

@Lemurmaniac
Racism is in group preference based upon common descent. It's how you create a stable polity as De Tocqueville elaborated - one people and one culture settled the United States. Ethnic solidarity allows us to cooperate to produce public goods in the common interest.
Forbes , January 12, 2017 at 2:54 am GMT • 100 Words

The document reads like "the gang that couldn't shoot straight." It's a joke. And such hyper-overreaction as this post represents suggests an instability of mind. That anyone took the document seriously per se speaks of utter unseriousness.

What's been referred to as the mainstream media has effectively lost all credibility, as they play the role of the partisan opposition. There's no reason to believe their reporting beyond yesterday's high and low temperature.

@Kyle McKenna
It's tempting to treat this analysis as paranoid and even a tad hysterical, but I fear it's nothing more than the unvarnished truth. Trump is a wrench in the works of the Establishment, and a bit of a loose cannon besides.

However, despite the fact that Trump has lately wrapped himself in a prodigious portion of Establishment Mantle, the Powers That Be are terrified, and the brick bats have just begun. While it's a pleasure to see them on the run for once, it'd be a fatal error to underestimate them.

Additionally: the accuracy, legitimacy, and/or professionalism of their attacks may prove irrelevant. Facts aren't really what it's about when you control the Narrative...When you control the Production of Truth. It's no accident that the stranglehold on the MSM is guarded so viciously. Control of the Media is Control of Everything.

Anon , January 12, 2017 at 5:35 am GMT • 100 Words

Does blackmail work?

Didn't J. Edgar Hoover have all sorts of tapes of MLK acting like Fartin Poother Bling? Drunkeness, orgies, blasphemy, hitting women around, and acting like some rapper thug?

Well, it didn't do any good, and MLK is now revered as some kind of god.

And Monica's dress failed to topple Billy Boy Clinton.

BBC reports that it was some British Intelligence that got this news. But I don't know if we should trust that stuff. Didn't British intelligence spread false rumors to drag the US into both WWI and WWII?

Well, if Russia does have the incriminating tape and had planned to blackmail Trump, that possibility is gone since the beans have been spilled.

PS. Was there any truth to the rumor that Obama had 'gay' affairs with rich powerful men? Now, that would explain a lot.

@Eagle Eye
Was there any truth to the rumor that Obama had 'gay' affairs with rich powerful men?
Senator Frist was mentioned as a Barry worshiper. Barry loves humiliating and lying to white men, probably still acting out early childhood trauma over having been ditched by 3 parents (father - whoever he was, mother, and stepfather), perhaps a lot of other unpleasantness that tends to befall unprotected boys. ,
@Dr. X
Well, it didn't do any good, and MLK is now revered as some kind of god.
Yeah, because a Federal judge sealed his FBI records from being FOILed for fifty years, so that TPTB could create a Magic Negro myth about him and make him more important than George Washington.
The Alarmist , January 12, 2017 at 6:27 am GMT

"There is no need to open Gulags ."

There's still plenty of room at Gitmo, and it would only be fitting to bring the neocons face to face with their old friends and henchmen.

Kyle McKenna , January 12, 2017 at 7:00 am GMT • 100 Words
@Forbes
The document reads like "the gang that couldn't shoot straight." It's a joke. And such hyper-overreaction as this post represents suggests an instability of mind. That anyone took the document seriously per se speaks of utter unseriousness.

What's been referred to as the mainstream media has effectively lost all credibility, as they play the role of the partisan opposition. There's no reason to believe their reporting beyond yesterday's high and low temperature.

It's tempting to treat this analysis as paranoid and even a tad hysterical, but I fear it's nothing more than the unvarnished truth. Trump is a wrench in the works of the Establishment, and a bit of a loose cannon besides.

However, despite the fact that Trump has lately wrapped himself in a prodigious portion of Establishment Mantle, the Powers That Be are terrified, and the brick bats have just begun. While it's a pleasure to see them on the run for once, it'd be a fatal error to underestimate them.

Additionally: the accuracy, legitimacy, and/or professionalism of their attacks may prove irrelevant. Facts aren't really what it's about when you control the Narrative When you control the Production of Truth. It's no accident that the stranglehold on the MSM is guarded so viciously. Control of the Media is Control of Everything.

@Anonymous
"even a tad hysterical"

it's anutha showa --

Ned Resnikoff

Nov 12 2016 -- 4 days after the election of Donald Trump

Wanted to share an experience from earlier today. This afternoon, I had a plumber over to my apartment to fix a clogged drain. He was a perfectly nice guy and a consummate professional. But he was also a middle aged white man with a southern accent who seemed unperturbed by this week's news. And while I had him in the apartment, I couldn't stop thinking about whether he had voted for Trump, whether he knew my last name is Jewish, and how that knowledge might change the interaction we were having inside my own home. I have no real reason to believe he was a Trump support or an anti-Semite, but in my uncertainty I couldn't shake the sense of potential danger. I was rattled for some time after he left.

I'm very privileged insofar as this sense of range is unfamiliar to me. And I know I feel it much less acutely than a lot of other people right now. I'm still a straight, white guy who can phenotypically pass for gentile. Plus my first name is pretty WASP-y.

But today was a reminder that ambiguous social interactions now feel unsafe and unpredictable in a way that they never did before. And even if Trump is gone in four years, I don't expect to ever reclaim that feeling of security. That's just one more thing you voted for, if you voted for him."

https://twitter.com/Thomasismyuncle/status/818117574466699264

anon , January 12, 2017 at 7:18 am GMT • 100 Words

I am of the opinion that the dossier, even if true, is at most embarrassing but not an impeachable offense. Impeachment is for offenses committed while in office, not for alleged misdeeds before the office starts when the person was a private citizen. The process of election, is a judgement on fitness to hold office. He can be impeached only for things he will do after Jan. 20.

All voters who voted for him knew he is not strong on personal or business morality or ethics. He was elected in spite of that. That should take away all the sting out of the dossier allegations.

Impeachment and Removal by CRS

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44260.pdf

@Randal
The point is not that these allegations can be used as direct grounds for impeachment, but that they create a climate in which Congressmen and Senators, especially Republicans, can block Trump's personnel and policies, especially on Russia, and if and when the opportunity arises, justify voting against party lines on an impeachment motion.

There are plenty of establishment Republican who would vote to impeach in a heartbeat, regardless of the merits of the case, if they thought their careers would survive it, This kind of furore is designed to create political circumstances in which they might hope for their careers to survive such a betrayal.

Miro23 , January 12, 2017 at 7:34 am GMT • 500 Words

The Neocons' Declaration of War Against Trump,

It's useful to understand who the Neocons are. They're mostly the Zionist section of US Jewry, but even this isn't so clear since US Jews have a problem defining themselves racially. They are ethnically more European than Semitic, and their cultural affinity is wholly European rather than Semitic Middle Eastern. Also, they are not so religious, with the decline in practicing Judaism mirroring the decline in Christian Church attendance among Europeans and Americans in general.

So it could be more informative to see US Jewry as something more like a private corporation.

You either belong to the corporation or you don't, and it's not essential to have a Jewish connection either (e.g. top executives Hillary Clinton and John McCain) with the general idea being to run the enterprise for the mutual benefit of its members.

Like any other large corporation, it's transnational, sets up lobbying organizations to help client Congressmen get elected, guides their research, helps with their expenses and gets favourable legislation in return. This reality seems to build naturally out of the Jewish European background in international commerce (rather than national government administration) so a Neoliberal economic environment is much more congenial with very little input from a nominal national identity. The key is the corporate identity.

Corporations are not too concerned if their competitors go bankrupt, it's just part of the business, and in fact it's positive, since it shows that your corporation can capture a market and exploit it more profitably. If your competitors are Gentile businesses then there are various ways to remove them, the most popular being to gain leadership positions in Gentile Corporation "G" while still holding loyalty to Jewish Corporation "J". Corporation "G" can them be incorporated in Corporation " J" and the top executives replaced.

Trump's problem (if it is a problem for him) is that he is dealing with a Corporate "J" run "deep state", that sees the US in mostly economic terms, as a market to be exploited for maximum profit. Putin faced a similar problem when he came to power in Russia (also Corporation "J" ), and slowly resolved it by blocking their attempts to gain political power (arrest on tax charges of Khodorkovsky) and emphasizing national interests and identity over corporate interests.

Trump could follow a similar line by blocking all special interest access to Congress, or more aggressively suspend all CIA and FBI non-disclosure agreements, giving past and present agents immunity to prosecution and inviting them to present documentation in confidence to a Presidential Commission regarding any activities that in their opinion were conducted against the interests of the United States.

Alternatively he could accept the presidency of Corporation "J", take the tremendous benefits, and be hailed by the MSM as America's Greatest Leader, but as the article says, face a backlash from his base who will see that he has sold them out.

@alexander
"Trumps problem (if it is a problem for him) is that he is dealing with a ...corporate "deep state" that sees the US mostly in economic terms, as a market to be exploited for maximum profit"


"Exploited" Miro23 ?

This has got to be the "understatement" of the decade.... Lets just take a look at the numbers, shall we?..

Let us say for a moment that I placed you (or myself ) on a street corner in New York City with the specific intention of handing out a $1,000,000 cashiers check to each and every person who walks by ........ Do you know how many people you would have to hand the check to...in order to EQUAL the amount of tax dollars this "deep state" VACUUM has "sucked" from the taxpayers pockets, in a mere decade and a half ?......

14,300,000 people.!

That's right !... the entire Population of Manhattan.. TIMES TWO.

This is not the total in "spending" , mind you..No, No....this is the total in... "overspending".

Our national debt has BALLOONED from 5.7 trillion in 2000 to a whopping 20 trillion in just sixteen years...

A "bone crunching" $14.3 million, million dollars --

This level of "assault" on our nations balance sheet is wholly unprecedented in history.

Its absolutely "mind -numbing"

Its obscene.

And what can nearly all of this humongous debt, foisted on the backs of 320 million Americans, be attributed to ....

BANKING FRAUD as in....triple A rating worthless subprime junk
TERROR FRAUD as in ....it was "Saddam's Anthrax" in Senators Leahy's office
WAR FRAUD as in.....imminent threat of "mushroom clouds" ,WMD's, and "Yellow Cake from Niger".

This kind of behavior is simply unacceptable.

Yet for some reason, there has been ZERO accountability......ZERO.

This cannot continue.

The people voted in the Donald to "Drain the Swamp"....because if he doesn't do something..we are all SUNK.

And if the "swamp doesn't want to be drained"...well.... too bad......Because the American people have put their foot down on this....and they ain't gonna budge --

Throw the whole lot in Guantanamo Bay, Mr. President, if need be.....Just get it done --

Enough is enough.

Mikhailovich , January 12, 2017 at 7:40 am GMT

I tell you – you are right. The stakes are very high indeed. If the establishment will lose political power, many of them may finish their lives in prison.

@annamaria
Agree. The establishment's hysterics and histrionics betray the fear of loosing money and power. But what a pitiful imagination, what a consistent incompetence the "deciders" have been showing: Nothing but banality and half-wit... clear signs of degradation.
@Mao Cheng Ji
I watched the press-conference just now, and I get the impression that this latest episode is the best thing (for Trump) recently.

Apparently it was so inane that it was immediately refuted, and it's now accepted in all quarters that it was a fake accusation. Which gives Trump an opportunity to 1. claim victimhood, 2. attack the media and US 'intelligence' services, and 3. talk about it every time he's asked any question about his mythical 'Russian connections'. It's a huge win for him. In fact, it wouldn't have surprised me if this whole thing was his own design (well, of his operatives).

"this whole thing was his own design" – you mean it is possible that Trump somehow has control over CNN, BBC etc. In such case – why he would attack them? And other question – why they worked so hard against him in time of the election campaign?

@Mao Cheng Ji
No. What I meant is that, seeing how insane the MSM are these days, perhaps it would makes sense for the Trump team to secretly manufacture some juicy red-meat fake scandal for them -- in hope that they mindlessly grab it and run with it -- and then get burned when it's proven a ludicrous fake. But maybe it's just my devious mind... ,
@squf
No, "by design" would refer to the original document being hoaxed, not that Trump has complete control over the Cathedral's media wing.
n230099 , January 12, 2017 at 12:20 pm GMT • 100 Words

"And I am not talking only about gun-toting hillbillies here, I am talking about the local, state and county authorities, who often care much more about what their local constituents think and say than what the are up to in DC"

One of the oft heard cliches of the gun control crowd is that the armed among the unwashed are silly to think they could stand against the might of the government. But as the writer here implies, this notion relies on the authorities staying with the program. But these folks are still family people for which their service is just a job. The notion that they're all part of a unified goon squad may be in error.

Ram , January 12, 2017 at 12:29 pm GMT • 100 Words

" one of the parties here will be crushed."

I sure hope it won't be Trump. However, his promise to drain the swamp has NOT happened, and the State Department is still completely controlled by the ZioCons and the foreign policy is controlled from Tel Aviv. The recent attempt to further subvert British politics by the Israeli embassy in London was exposed but what will the consequence be.? Not very much I guess.

War for Blair Mountain , January 12, 2017 at 12:29 pm GMT • 100 Words

The Civil War will be in fact an all-out-race-war. They didn't take this into account when the 1965 Immigration Reform Act was passed. We are already in a low-level .maybe not so low-level race war. Barack Obama will spend his time in retirement with very aggressive racial grievance agitation.

The basement of the US has been filled to the brim with gasoline ..we are one match away .one match

@george strong
I hope you are correct. All decent white men have many scores to settle.
Quartermaster , January 12, 2017 at 12:40 pm GMT • 100 Words

It was a hoax. It also allowed Trump to find out where leaks are coming from. Anyone who understands the type of man Trump is would have placed such a report in the hoax category straightaway. That the "intelligence community" did not, says a lot about them. Under Obama, they have simply become a partisan tool.

@annamaria
Agree. The "intelligent" community's big shots showed themselves to be intellectual whimpers. ,
@Eagle Eye
Yep, the more lurid parts are definitely a hoax, with some other parts cobbled together from open sources to lend volume and credibility to this threadbare effort.

The weird fascination with the person of Obama is a dead giveaway. Only an Obama worshiper would feel that the highest/lowest form of sexual perversion is to commit sacrilege against a BED that the Holy One and his consort had slept in.

Whatever Trump's personal predilections, they are most unlikely to revolve around the person of Barry Obama.

On the other hand, anyone with eyes to see will have encountered the type of fervid, manic, glassy-eyed Barry worshiper (mostly gay or female) with the characteristic combination of sexual arousal and religious fervor, leavened with vicious bitchiness during depressive phases.

War for Blair Mountain , January 12, 2017 at 12:58 pm GMT • 100 Words

Dear Saker

The term "hillbillies" is a slur against the People of Appalachia. It is a slur that is used in comedy skits on SNL written by the East Coast Rootless Cosmopolitan SNL Comedy Writers. For the record Tina Fey is not Jewish niether is Samantha Bee -- but they are Rootless Cosmopolitan Filth.

CK , January 12, 2017 at 1:05 pm GMT • 100 Words

The McCains and Wilsons and the responsible editors at Buzzfeed and CNN all wanted to believe it to be true so they posted it as true.
Collaborator McCain is a despicable creature.

Rick Wilson is a moral degenerate as is his son whose web site is a storehouse of perversity.

Imagine what kind of mental aberration you have to hold to believe that hiring prostitutes and having them urinate on new linen somehow invalidated or harms someone who might have slept in that room months previously.

That is the level of aberration that runs from Pizzagate to the highest levels of American Journalism and the American Democratic party ( but I repeat myself). Sympathetic magic maybe?

@annamaria
McCain of "Tokyo rose" fame. The older McCain of the USSLiberty scandalous coverup and insult to the USSLiberty victims and veterans fame. Seems that there something that runs in the McCain family.
Che Guava , January 12, 2017 at 1:08 pm GMT • 200 Words

I am amazed by the brazen nature of the attacks. The most interesting part is that at least the most lurid claims seem to have been spoonfed to the earlier idiot in the US as part of the flow by 4chan trolls, and this continued through the former MI6 loon, both the UK and US mnrons shopped the lies around for months.

Hanoi Hilton collaborator and Lord Haw Haw of the US in Vietnam, John McCain decided to dash it out again. Having never logged on to 4chan, but been an admin on a site they invaded, I know and at times enjoy their troll style. That supposedly serious 'intelligence' agencies push that entertaining crap, as disinfo without a second thought is mystifying

It also raises my estimation of the Donald, never heard his speaking voice before, but it is quite good,
.
Trump needs to clean their Augean stables.

They are cleary sn.

If the disinfo against hm iis so bad, he must be doing many things right.
. . .

Anonymous , January 12, 2017 at 2:36 pm GMT • 100 Words

I'm amazed at how incompetent the CIA is in its war against Trump but, then, I look at its historical track record since its founding and note this has always been the case. Like petulant children, the CIA tends to be present oriented in extremis . It discounts the future and is therefore constitutively unprepared for exposure, consequences, and blowback. The CIA knows how to make a mess of things but not much else.

I would not trust any intelligence coming from the CIA It doesn't appear to be staffed with very intelligent people. The KGB (now the SFB/SVR) is running circles around them.

@annamaria
"...incompetent CIA.."
Decades of selection in favor of opportunists and sycophants, while, at the same time, weeding out the principled and competent professionals.
Is not the result grand? - CIA as a senescent, gossiping madame. ,
@Realist
"I'm amazed at how incompetent the CIA is in its war against Trump but, then, I look at its historical track record since its founding and note this has always been the case."

Exactly right. The CIA has never done anything to better the US for the common man. From it's inception it was the muscle for the power elite. It's purpose was to manipulate foreign governments to provide wealth and power to the power elite/deep state, which ever you prefer. And occasionally to eliminate threats to it'self.

DaveE , January 12, 2017 at 3:06 pm GMT • 100 Words

The zionists have lost and they know it. BUT, they still have their"trump-card" (sorry!) left to play: a nuclear false flag attack on America, to be blamed on Russia.

No-one could stop war at that point, regardless of belief of culpability. Although Saker is right, such a stunt would involve some SERIOUS repercussions for the Israelites.

Are they crazy enough to risk self-annihilation to prove their superiority, once and for all?

Trump certainly doesn't have the guts to say, "Hey folks, the zionists did it .." Hell, he won't even publicly admit they did 9/11, although there's plenty of evidence he knows they did. But Obama on the other hand would help them plant the nukes and take a train outa town.

If I were a zionist contemplating such a stunt, I'd get it over with before next Friday.

@CanSpeccy
War between Russia and NATO would be the ultimate civil conflict among the European people, leading to the elimination of the white race as a significant component of the future world population and the end of Christendom.

That, apparently, is what the NeoCons, President Obama, and their Treason Party allies, the likes of Senator McCain at home, and Canada's witless Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau abroad, want.

alexander , January 12, 2017 at 3:37 pm GMT • 400 Words
Agent76 , January 12, 2017 at 4:16 pm GMT • 100 Words

They are the cancer that needs to be radiated and removed in both wings of the War party!

Mar 2, 2014 Jeremy Scahill: The One Party State, The War Party

Is the United States of America an Oligarchy? During the 2014 ISFLC, Jeremy Scahill speaks on the fact that in today's world behemoth corporations are able to buy off politicians and pull the strings to impact legislature. Washington, D.C. is a town that operates by campaign contributions and legal bribery in the form of campaign finance. What can the American people do to get their political representatives to represent them as opposed to the mega corporations. When will the people's voice be heard?

@Realist
Jeremy is wrong at least one thing. McCain is a member in good standing with the deep state. Just too stupid to be elected.
Mao Cheng Ji , January 12, 2017 at 4:27 pm GMT • 100 Words
@Mikhailovich
"this whole thing was his own design" - you mean it is possible that Trump somehow has control over CNN, BBC etc. In such case - why he would attack them? And other question - why they worked so hard against him in time of the election campaign?

No. What I meant is that, seeing how insane the MSM are these days, perhaps it would makes sense for the Trump team to secretly manufacture some juicy red-meat fake scandal for them - in hope that they mindlessly grab it and run with it - and then get burned when it's proven a ludicrous fake. But maybe it's just my devious mind

@Mikhailovich
The CNN man at the press-conference was really arrogant and aggressive. I think, if Trump will exclude CNN from his future press-conferences, people would accept it with understanding. Anyway we will have interesting times.
@anonymous
They'd probably bite on anything.

I look at the CNN webpage once in a while, and I get the distinct impression that the people staffing the place are simply not very bright.

There may be too many diversity hires? It seems like a group of actors and SJWs pretending to be journalists. They aren't serious people, and you'd like to not have to take them seriously but since they control the information flow of the nation you kind of have to.

CanSpeccy , • Website January 12, 2017 at 4:31 pm GMT • 100 Words
@DaveE
The zionists have lost and they know it. BUT, they still have their"trump-card" (sorry!) left to play: a nuclear false flag attack on America, to be blamed on Russia.

No-one could stop war at that point, regardless of belief of culpability. Although Saker is right, such a stunt would involve some SERIOUS repercussions for the Israelites.

Are they crazy enough to risk self-annihilation to prove their superiority, once and for all?

Trump certainly doesn't have the guts to say, "Hey folks, the zionists did it....." Hell, he won't even publicly admit they did 9/11, although there's plenty of evidence he knows they did. But Obama on the other hand would help them plant the nukes and take a train outa town.

If I were a zionist contemplating such a stunt, I'd get it over with before next Friday.

War between Russia and NATO would be the ultimate civil conflict among the European people, leading to the elimination of the white race as a significant component of the future world population and the end of Christendom.

That, apparently, is what the NeoCons, President Obama, and their Treason Party allies, the likes of Senator McCain at home, and Canada's witless Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau abroad, want.

Abelard Lindsey , January 12, 2017 at 4:35 pm GMT

I can assure you that, if Trump is prevented from taking office, or is removed from office after being sworn in, millions of us WILL treat it as a coup d'etat and will respond appropriately, and this does not necessarily involve violence.

I can also tell you our feelings are not limited to the South and Texas. Many of us in the Western U.S. feel the same way.

@anonymous
So many options. Take a page from the leftists and block highways and ports -- but on a grand scale.

Simply stop paying taxes. Stop funding the entire machine -- the sports, shops, colleges. Just stop it all.

If there is a coup, it'll more than past time for it all to be stopped. It will be time to implode the whole thing and hit the reset button.

Thales the Milesian , January 12, 2017 at 5:08 pm GMT

USA: numero uno!

Every patriotic American should support president Trump, all the way.

Long live President Trump!

annamaria , January 12, 2017 at 5:12 pm GMT
@Mikhailovich
I tell you - you are right. The stakes are very high indeed. If the establishment will lose political power, many of them may finish their lives in prison.

Agree. The establishment's hysterics and histrionics betray the fear of loosing money and power. But what a pitiful imagination, what a consistent incompetence the "deciders" have been showing: Nothing but banality and half-wit clear signs of degradation.

@Mikhailovich
The difference between the corporate interests of the financial-political elite and the interests of the nation became too obvious. So they are failing to persuade American Nation that they are acting in the national interest.

[Jan 11, 2017] Remarks of Stephen Bannon at a Conference at the Vatican

See http://the-american-catholic.com/2016/11/18/remarks-of-stephen-bannon-at-a-conference-at-the-vatican
Notable quotes:
"... Dugin is positively millenarian: "We must create strategic alliances to overthrow the present order of things, of which the core could be described as human rights, anti-hierarchy, and political correctness – everything that is the face of the Beast, the anti-Christ." ..."
Jan 11, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
anne -> Julio ... , January 10, 2017 at 10:20 AM
Again, I know nothing about Steve Bannon but the column of David Brooks does not seem to be connected to the Vatican speech referred to:

http://the-american-catholic.com/2016/11/18/remarks-of-stephen-bannon-at-a-conference-at-the-vatican/

Fred C. Dobbs -> anne... , January 10, 2017 at 10:53 AM
Putin and Trump could be on the same side in this troubling new world order https://www.theguardian.com/world/commentisfree/2016/dec/19/trump-putin-same-side-new-world-order
The Guardian - Matthew d'Ancona - Dec 19

Russian hacking, White House warnings, angry denials by Vladimir Putin's officials: we are edging towards a digital Cuban crisis. So it is as well to ask what is truly at stake in this e-conflict, and what underpins it.

To which end, meet the most important intellectual you have (probably) never heard of. Alexander Dugin, the Russian political scientist and polemicist, may resemble Santa's evil younger brother and talk like a villain from an Austin Powers movie. But it is no accident that he has earned the nickname Putin's Rasputin. ...

The purpose of operations like the hacking of the US election has been to destabilize the Atlantic order generally, and America specifically. And on this great struggle, Dugin is positively millenarian: "We must create strategic alliances to overthrow the present order of things, of which the core could be described as human rights, anti-hierarchy, and political correctness – everything that is the face of the Beast, the anti-Christ."

anne -> Fred C. Dobbs... , January 10, 2017 at 12:03 PM
I do appreciate the reference, but the language of the column portion is too much for me. I stopped reading a few words after "Santa's."
Julio -> anne... , January 10, 2017 at 11:27 AM
At the end of your linked article there is a link to the full speech, including the Q&A. It takes you here:
https://www.buzzfeed.com/lesterfeder/this-is-how-steve-bannon-sees-the-entire-world?utm_term=.wn06r4OX5#.eqzLQEa5M

In the Q&A he discusses Russia and Putin; his comments include this: "I'm not justifying Vladimir Putin and the kleptocracy that he represents, because he eventually is the state capitalist of kleptocracy. "

John San Vant -> Julio ... , January 10, 2017 at 11:26 AM
Bannon is a zionist shill and always will be. He has tried to blur that point away. But that kind of crap is pure zionism. Putin's ties with Ashkenazi jews is well well known. He has had much support from the extreme wings of the Lukud for years, yet the idiots don't pay attention. Putin sold himself and they bought it up. The myth he purged the Oligarchs from Russia cracks me up. He made sure the winners power was firmly planted.

From a "conservative revolutionary" (Renee Guenon aka real traditionalism) pov, this is pure bunk. Nationalism is semitic by its very nature and collectivist. What they want is a global plutocracy with the bible as its whip. Now, not everybody agrees with that version of "plutocracy". Thus comes the adversaries, the Jesuits.

anne -> Fred C. Dobbs... , January 10, 2017 at 09:58 AM
http://the-american-catholic.com/2016/11/18/remarks-of-stephen-bannon-at-a-conference-at-the-vatican/

2014

Remarks of Stephen Bannon at a Conference at the Vatican

[Jan 06, 2017] Trump and Hegel concept of the Irony of History.

Notable quotes:
"... It was possible to say, before Warren G. Harding was elected, that he wasn't particularly well-qualified to be president. And he did turn out as president to have, as we say nowadays, some issues. But his administration was stocked with (mostly) well-qualified men who served with considerable distinction. ..."
"... But how Hegelian it would be if the thesis of the Bush and Clinton dynasties, followed by the antithesis of a Trump victory over first a Bush and then a Clinton in 2016, were to produce an unanticipated synthesis: a Trump administration marked by the reconstruction of republican normalcy in America. In its own way, that would be a genuine contribution to making America great again. ..."
"... Kristol is mad Trump lambasted the Iraq war. Was Putin against the Iraq war? I think the whole world was except for the "Coalition of the Willing." You'll never see the UK back another war like that. ..."
"... "Socialist feminist Liza Featherstone and others have denounced Clinton's uncritical praise of the "opportunity" and "freedom" of American capitalism vis-à-vis other developed nations. "With this bit of frankness," Featherstone explains, referring to the former Secretary of State's "Denmark" comments, "Clinton helpfully explained why no socialist-indeed, no non-millionaire-should support her. She is smart enough to know that women in the United States endure far more poverty, unemployment, and food insecurity than women in Denmark-yet she shamelessly made clear that she was happy to keep it that way." Indeed, Clinton's denunciation of the idea that the United States should look more like Denmark betrayed one of the glaring the fault lines within the Democratic Party, and between Clintonian liberalism and Sandersite leftism." ..."
"... Of course the progressive neoliberals in this forum regularly resort to ad hominem to any ideas or facts that don't line up with the agreed-upon party line. ..."
Jan 06, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com
Fred C. Dobbs : January 05, 2017 at 07:40 AM , 2017 at 07:40 AM
(Harding redux?)

The Trump Administration
http://tws.io/2iFd3rC
via @WeeklyStandard
Nov 28, 2016 - William Kristol

Who now gives much thought to the presidency of Warren G. Harding? Who ever did? Not us.

But let us briefly turn our thoughts to our 29th president (while stipulating that we're certainly no experts on his life or times). Here's our summary notion: Warren G. Harding may have been a problematic president. But the Harding administration was in some ways an impressive one, which served the country reasonably well.

It was possible to say, before Warren G. Harding was elected, that he wasn't particularly well-qualified to be president. And he did turn out as president to have, as we say nowadays, some issues. But his administration was stocked with (mostly) well-qualified men who served with considerable distinction.

Andrew Mellon was a successful Treasury secretary whose tax reforms and deregulatory efforts spurred years of economic growth. Charles Dawes, the first director of the Bureau of the Budget, reduced government expenditures and, helped by Mellon's economic policies, brought the budget into balance. Charles Evans Hughes as secretary of state dealt responsibly with a very difficult world situation his administration had inherited-though in light of what followed in the next decade, one wishes in retrospect for bolder assertions of American leadership, though in those years just after World War I, they would have been contrary to the national mood.

In addition, President Harding's first two Supreme Court appointments -- William Howard Taft and George Sutherland -- were distinguished ones. And Harding personally did some admirable things: He made pronouncements, impressive in the context of that era, in favor of racial equality; he commuted the wartime prison sentence of the Socialist leader, Eugene V. Debs. In these ways, he contributed to an atmosphere of national healing and civility.

The brief Harding administration-and for that matter the eight years constituting his administration and that of his vice president and successor, Calvin Coolidge-may not have been times of surpassing national greatness. But there were real achievements, especially in the economic sphere; those years were not disastrous; they were not dark times.

President-elect Donald J. Trump probably doesn't intend to model his administration on that of President Warren G. Harding. But he could do worse than reflect on that administration's successes-and also on its failures, particularly the scandals that exploded into public view after Harding's sudden death. These were produced by cronies appointed by Harding to important positions, where they betrayed his trust and tarnished his historical reputation.

Donald Trump manifestly cares about his reputation. He surely knows that reputation ultimately depends on performance. If a Trump hotel and casino is successful, it's not because of the Trump brand-that may get people through the door the first time-but because it provides a worthwhile experience thanks to a good management team, fine restaurants, deft croupiers, and fun shows. If a Trump golf course succeeds, it's because it has been built and is run by people who know something about golf. The failed Trump efforts-from the university to the steaks-seem to have in common the assumption that the Trump name by itself would be enough to carry mediocre or worse enterprises across the finish line.

To succeed in business, the brand only gets you so far. Quality matters. To succeed in the presidency, getting elected only gets you so far. Governing matters.

It would be ironic if Trump's very personal electoral achievement were followed by a mode of governance that restored greater responsibility to the cabinet agencies formally entrusted with the duties of governance. It would be ironic if a Trump presidency also featured a return of authority to Congress, the states, and to other civic institutions. It would be ironic if Trump's victory led not to a kind of American Caesarism but to a strengthening of republican institutions and forms. It would be ironic if the election of Donald J. Trump heralded a return to a kind of constitutional normalcy.

If we are not mistaken, it was Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (though sadly unaware of the phenomena of either Warren G. Harding or Donald J. Trump) who made much of the Irony of History.

But how Hegelian it would be if the thesis of the Bush and Clinton dynasties, followed by the antithesis of a Trump victory over first a Bush and then a Clinton in 2016, were to produce an unanticipated synthesis: a Trump administration marked by the reconstruction of republican normalcy in America. In its own way, that would be a genuine contribution to making America great again.

(Harding-Coolidge-Hoover were a disastrous triumvirate that ascended to power after the Taft & Wilson administrations, as the GOP - then the embodiment of progressivism - split apart due to the efforts of Teddy Roosevelt.)

Peter K. -> Fred C. Dobbs... , -1
Kristol is mad Trump lambasted the Iraq war. Was Putin against the Iraq war? I think the whole world was except for the "Coalition of the Willing." You'll never see the UK back another war like that.
ilsm -> Peter K.... , January 05, 2017 at 03:35 PM
It is the neocon's taking a back seat!

Kristol is co-founder of PNAC along with a Clinton mob long time foggy bottom associate's husband..

Trump is somewhat less thrilled with tilting with Russia for the American empire which is as moral as Nero's Rome.

ilsm -> Fred C. Dobbs... , -1
Prescient: dumping Kristol's PNAC will strengthen the republic.
Peter K. -> Peter K.... , January 05, 2017 at 07:52 AM
"Socialist feminist Liza Featherstone and others have denounced Clinton's uncritical praise of the "opportunity" and "freedom" of American capitalism vis-à-vis other developed nations. "With this bit of frankness," Featherstone explains, referring to the former Secretary of State's "Denmark" comments, "Clinton helpfully explained why no socialist-indeed, no non-millionaire-should support her. She is smart enough to know that women in the United States endure far more poverty, unemployment, and food insecurity than women in Denmark-yet she shamelessly made clear that she was happy to keep it that way." Indeed, Clinton's denunciation of the idea that the United States should look more like Denmark betrayed one of the glaring the fault lines within the Democratic Party, and between Clintonian liberalism and Sandersite leftism."

Is it better to ignore this fault line and try to paper it over or is it better to debate the issues in a polite and congenial manner?

Of course the progressive neoliberals in this forum regularly resort to ad hominem to any ideas or facts that don't line up with the agreed-upon party line.

[Dec 20, 2016] ClubOrlov Brain Parasite Gonna Eatcha!

Dec 16, 2016 | cluborlov.blogspot.com
Brain Parasite Gonna Eatcha! I've been experiencing some difficulties with commenting on the current political situation in the US, because it's been a little too funny, whereas this is a very serious blog. But I have decided that I must try my best. Now, these are serious matters, so as you read this, please refrain from any and all levity and mirth.

You may have heard by now that the Russians stole the US presidential election; if it wasn't for them, Hillary Clinton would have been president-elect, but because of their meddling we are now stuck with Donald Trump and his 1001 oligarchs running the federal government for the next four years.

There are two ways to approach this question. One is to take the accusation of Russian hacking of the US elections at face value, and we will certainly do that. But first let's try another way, because it's quicker. Let's consider the accusation itself as a symptom of some unrelated disorder. This is often the best way forward. Suppose a person walks into a doctor's office, and says, "Doctor, I believe I have schizophrenium poisoning." Should the doctor summon the hazmat team, or check for schizophrenia first?

And so let's first consider that this "Russians did it" refrain we keep hearing is a symptom of something else, of which Russians are not the cause. My working hypothesis is that this behavior is being caused by a brain parasite. Yes, this may seem outlandish at first, but as we'll see later the theory that the Russians stole the election is no less outlandish.

Brain parasites are known to alter the behavior of the organisms they infest in a variety of subtle ways. For instance, Toxicoplasma gondii alters the behavior of rodents, causing them to lose fear of cats and to become attracted to the smell of cat urine, making it easy for the cats to catch them. It also alters the behavior of humans, causing them to lavish excessive affection on cats and to compulsively download photographs of cute kittens playing with yarn.

My hypothesis is that this particular brain parasite was specifically bioengineered by the US to make those it infects hate Russia. I suspect that the neurological trigger it uses is Putin's face, which the parasite somehow wires into the visual cortex. This virus was first unleashed on the unsuspecting Ukrainians, where its effect was plain to see. This historically Russian, majority Russian-speaking, culturally Russian and religiously Russian Orthodox region suddenly erupted in an epidemic of Russophobia. The Ukraine cut economic ties with Russia, sending its economy into a tailspin, and started a war with its eastern regions, which were quite recently part of Russia and wish to become part of Russia again.

So far so good: the American bioengineers who created this virus achieved the effect they wanted, turning a Russian region into an anti-Russian region. But as happens so often with biological agents, it turned out to be hard to keep under control. Its next victims turned out to be NATO and the Pentagon, whose leadership started compulsively uttering the phrase "Russian aggression" in a manner suggestive of Tourette's Syndrome, entirely undeterred by the complete absence of evidence of any such aggression that they could present for objective analysis. They, along with the by now fit-to-be-tied Ukrainians, kept prattling on about "Russian invasion," waving about decades-old pictures of Russian tanks they downloaded from their friends on Facebook.

From there the brain parasite spread to the White House, the Clinton presidential campaign, the Democratic National Committee, and its attendant press corps, who are now all chattering away about "Russian hacking." The few knowledgeable voices who point out that there is absolutely no hard evidence of any such "Russian hacking" are being drowned out by the Bedlam din of the rest.

This, to me, seems like the simplest explanation that fits the facts. But to be fair and balanced, let us also examine the other perspective: that claims of "Russian hacking" should be taken at face value. The first difficulty we encounter is that what is being termed "Russian hacking" is not hacks but leaks. Hacks occur where some unauthorized party breaks into a server and steals data. Leaks occur where an insider-a "whistleblower"-violates rules of secrecy and/or confidentiality in order to release into the public domain evidence of wrongdoing. In this case, evidence of leaking is prima facie: Was the data in question evidence of wrongdoing? Yes. Was it released into the public domain? Yes. Has the identity of said leaker or leakers remained secret? Yes, with good reason.

But this does not rule out hacking, because what a leaker can do, a hacker can also do, although with difficulty. Leakers have it easy: you see evidence of wrongdoing, take umbrage at it, copy it onto a thumb drive, smuggle it off premises, and upload it to Wikileaks through a public wifi hotspot from an old laptop you bought off Craislist and then smashed. But what's a poor hacker to do? You hack into server after server, running the risk of getting caught each time, only to find that the servers contain minutes of public meetings, old press releases, backups of public web sites and-incriminating evidence!-a mother lode of pictures of fluffy kittens playing with yarn downloaded by a secretary afflicted with Toxicoplasma gondii .

The solution, of course, is to create something that's worth hacking, or leaking, but this is a much harder problem. What the Russians had to do, then, was take the incorruptible, squeaky-clean goody-two-shoes faithful public servant Hillary Clinton, infiltrate the Clinton Foundation, Hillary's presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee, and somehow manipulate them all into doing things that, when leaked (or hacked) would reliably turn the electorate against Clinton. Yes Sir, Tovarishch Putin!

Those Russians sure are clever! They managed to turn the DNC into an anti-Bernie Sanders operation, depriving him of electoral votes through a variety of underhanded practices while appealing to anti-Semitic sentiments in certain parts of the country. They managed to manipulate Donna Brazile into handing presidential debate questions to the Clinton campaign. They even managed to convince certain Ukrainian oligarchs and Saudi princes to bestow millions upon the Clinton foundation in exchange for certain future foreign policy concessions. The list of these leak-worthy Russian subterfuges goes on and on But who can stop them?

And so clearly the Russians had to first corrupt the Clinton Foundation, the Clinton Presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee, just in order to render them hackworthy. But here we have a problem. You see, if you can hack into a server, so can everyone else. Suppose you leave your front door unlocked and swinging in the breeze, and long thereafter stuff goes missing. Of course you can blame the neighbor you happen to like least, but then why would anyone believe you? Anybody could have walked through that door and taken your shit. And so it is hard to do anything beyond lobbing empty accusations at Russia as far as hacking is concerned; but the charge of corrupting the incorruptible Hillary Clinton is another matter entirely.

Because here the ultimate Russian achievement was in getting Hillary Clinton to refer to over half of her electorate as "a basket of deplorables," and this was no mean feat. It takes a superpower to orchestrate a political blunder of this magnitude. This she did in front of an LGBT audience in New York. Now, Hillary is no spring chicken when it comes to national politics: she's been through quite a few federal elections, and she has enough experience to know that pissing off over half of your electorate in one fell swoop is not a particularly smart thing to do. Obviously, she was somehow hypnotized into uttering these words no doubt by a hyperintelligent space-based Russian operative.

The Russian covert operation into subverting American democracy started with the Russians sending an agent into the hitherto unexplored hinter regions of America, to see what they are like. Hunched over his desk, Putin whipped out a map of the US and a crayon, and lightly shaded in an area south of the Mason-Dixon line, west of New York and Pennsylvania, and east of the Rockies.

Let me come clean. I have split loyalties. I have spent most of my life hobnobbing with transnational elites on the East Coast, but I have also spent quite a few years working for a very large midwestern agricultural equipment company, and a very large midwestern printing company, so I know the culture of the land quite well. I am sure that what this Russian agent reported back is that the land is thickly settled with white people of Anglo-Irish, Scottish, German and Slavic extraction, that they are macho, that their women (for it is quite a male-centric culture) tend to vote same way as the men for the sake of domestic tranquility, that they don't much like dark-skinned people or gays, and that plenty of them view the East Coast and California as dens of iniquity and corruption, if not modern-day Sodoms and Gomorras.

And what if Vladimir Putin read this report, and issued this order: "Get Clinton to piss them all off." And so it was done: unbeknownst to her, using nefarious means, Hillary was programmed, under hypnosis, to utter the phrase "a basket of deplorables." A Russian operative hiding in the audience of LGBT activists flashed a sign triggering the program in Hillary's overworked brain, and the rest is history. If that's what actually happened, then Putin should be pronounced Special Ops Officer of the Year, while all the other "world leaders" should quietly sneak out the back entrance, sit down on the ground in the garden and eat some dirt, then puke it up into their hands and rub it into their eyes while wailing, because how on earth can they possibly ever hope to beat that?

Or we can just go back to my brain parasite theory. Doesn't it seem a whole lot more sane now? Not only is it much simpler and more believable, but it also has certain predictive merits that the "Russian hacking" theory lacks. You see, when there is parasitism involved, there is rarely just one symptom. Usually, there is a whole cluster of symptoms. And so, just for the sake of comparison, let's look at what has happened to the Ukraine since it was infected with the Ukrainian Brain Parasite, and compare that to what is happening to the US now that the parasite has spread here too.

1. The Ukraine is ruled by an oligarch-Petro Poroshenko, the "candy king"-along with a clique of other oligarchs who have been handed regional governorships and government ministries. And now the US is about to be ruled by an oligarch-Trump, the "casino king"-along with a clique of other oligarchs, from ExxonMobile to Goldman Sachs.

2. The Ukraine has repudiated its trade agreements with Russia, sending its economy into free-fall. And now Trump is promising to repudiate, and perhaps renegotiate, a variety of trade agreements. For a country that has run huge structural trade deficits for decades and pays for them by constantly issuing debt this is not going to be easy or safe.

3. The Ukraine has been subjected to not one but two Color Revolutions, promoted by none other than that odious oligarch George Soros. The US is now facing its own Color Revolution-the Purple Revolution-paid for by that same Soros, with the goal of overturning the results of the presidential election and derailing the inauguration of Donald Trump through a variety of increasingly desperate ploys including paid-for demonstrations, vote recounts and attempts to manipulate the Electoral College.

4. For a couple of years now the Ukraine has been mired in a bloody and futile civil war. To this day the Ukrainian troops (with NATO support) are lobbing missiles into civilian districts in the east of the country, and getting decimated in return. So far, Trump's victory seems to have appeased the "deplorables," but should the Purple Revolution succeed, the US may also see major social unrest, possibly escalating into a civil war.

The Ukrainian Brain Parasite has devastated the Ukraine. It is by now too far gone for much of anything to be done about it. All of the best people have left, mostly for Russia, and all that's left is a rotten, hollow shell. But does it have to end this way for the US? I hope not!

There are, as I see it, two possibilities. One is to view those who are pushing the "Russian hacking" or "Russian aggression" story as political adversaries. Another is to view them as temporarily mentally ill. Yes, their brains are infected with the Ukrainian Brain Parasite, but that just means that their opinions are to be disregarded-until they feel better. And since this particular brain parasite specifically influences social behavior, if we refuse to reward that behavior with positive reinforcement-by acknowledging it-we will suppress its most debilitating symptoms, eventually forcing the parasite to evolve toward a more benign form. As with many infectious diseases, the fight against them starts with improved hygiene-in this case, mental hygiene. And so that is my prescription: when you see someone going on about "Russian hacking" or "Russian aggression" be merciful and charitable toward them as individuals, because they are temporarily incapacitated, but do not acknowledge their mad ranting, and instead try to coax them into learning to control it.

[Dec 07, 2016] In view of listing on PropOrNot should

Notable quotes:
"... I was thinking Natasha Fatale .. ..."
"... it's truly amazing. many of these people have denounced joe mccarthy all their lives. ..."
"... I was thinking Katyusha. Besides being a very pretty diminutive name for Katherine, the sound of the Katyusha rockets made the forces of evil's collective sphincter tighten up. ..."
"... Just like the sound of the truth spoken to power here at NC is apparently tightening up some establishment sphincters :) ..."
"... Oh OIFVet, do you know where this line of snark is leading? Next, the NC will be "mischaracterized" as Stalin's News Organ! ..."
Dec 07, 2016 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

charles leseau November 26, 2016 at 5:36 am

So are you changing your name to Eva Smithova any time soon? Or maybe change the page header to Голый Капитализм for a bit?

a different chris November 26, 2016 at 10:37 am

Oh, I don't ask for much but please, please consider that! :) :) :)

fresno dan November 26, 2016 at 11:22 am

Re: charles leseau, November 26, 2016 at 5:36 am

I was thinking Natasha Fatale ..

petal November 26, 2016 at 1:02 pm

... Anyway, concerned by number of supposedly educated friends(Clinton supporters) being taken in by this fake news/Russian ties thing. They've lost their heads and there's no discussing it with them, they are convinced. Where does it end? Na zdorovie!

pretzelattack November 26, 2016 at 1:29 pm

it's truly amazing. many of these people have denounced joe mccarthy all their lives. somebody referred to invasion of the body snatchers on nc the other day, that's the only logical explanation.

OIFVet November 26, 2016 at 1:31 pm

I was thinking Katyusha. Besides being a very pretty diminutive name for Katherine, the sound of the Katyusha rockets made the forces of evil's collective sphincter tighten up.

Just like the sound of the truth spoken to power here at NC is apparently tightening up some establishment sphincters :)

ambrit November 26, 2016 at 4:05 pm

Oh OIFVet, do you know where this line of snark is leading? Next, the NC will be "mischaracterized" as Stalin's News Organ!

[Oct 28, 2016] Americas Vichy Regime

Notable quotes:
"... A few comparisons are in order. In their fine review of French history since 1870, Alice L. Conklin, Sarah Fishman, and Robert Zaretsky point out that French leaders at Vichy had several bargaining chips they could use against Hitler, but decided not to play them "because they had other priorities on their mind, including a 'National Revolution' to remake France, politically, socially, and economically." ..."
"... Petain was accompanied by legions of experts, administrators, and technocrats, who shared Petain's disdain for ordinary people and democratic processes, and by strident French fascists who even welcomed their country's defeat. Indeed, although fascists hated democracy, they also believed that Petain's measures did not go far enough to remake the country's institutions. The main thing this menagerie of "minorities" -- to use Stanley Hoffmann's phrase -- had in common was the loathing they shared of their own country. ..."
"... France was saved from its Vichy insanities by a country that was proclaimed, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, as the "last best hope on earth" -- that is, by the United States. The question is: Who will save America from its own Vichy regime? ..."
Apr 21, 2011 | www.americanthinker.com
For the French, revisiting the time period when the Vichy Regime ruled what was left of the country after its humiliating defeat by the Germans in 1940 involves trauma. But the lessons imparted by those dark years of Nazi occupation transcend historical era and nationality, touching upon equivalent circumstances in the United States for the past few years. Equivalent, not identical: clearly, phalanxes of Nazi troops aren't goose-stepping down Pennsylvania Avenue....

A few comparisons are in order. In their fine review of French history since 1870, Alice L. Conklin, Sarah Fishman, and Robert Zaretsky point out that French leaders at Vichy had several bargaining chips they could use against Hitler, but decided not to play them "because they had other priorities on their mind, including a 'National Revolution' to remake France, politically, socially, and economically."

France's new leader, the 84-year-old Marshall Petain, was a deeply reactionary veteran who loathed the Third Republic crushed by the Germans and vowed to take advantage of France's crisis to obliterate the past and install a centralized, authoritarian government. His rejection of liberalism, egalitarianism, and democracy prompted measures designed to return France to its pre-revolutionary roots: cities, industrial plants, and factories were rejected in favor of a return to nature, to villages and small shops. On top of this heap of nouveau-peasantry loomed the Marshall himself, whose grandfatherly physiognomy was plastered on buildings in public arenas all over the country to remind French subjects of who was in charge.

Petain was accompanied by legions of experts, administrators, and technocrats, who shared Petain's disdain for ordinary people and democratic processes, and by strident French fascists who even welcomed their country's defeat. Indeed, although fascists hated democracy, they also believed that Petain's measures did not go far enough to remake the country's institutions. The main thing this menagerie of "minorities" -- to use Stanley Hoffmann's phrase -- had in common was the loathing they shared of their own country.

... .. ..

Further, like his aged counterpart before him, President Obama took advantage of a crisis to "transform" American institutions instead of grappling with the country's main problems -- national debt, unemployment, recession, and burgeoning entitlement costs, to name a few. He made matters worse by augmenting entitlements, exploding federal deficits, exacerbating unemployment, and blaming others for the inevitable mess that ensued...

... ... ...

France was saved from its Vichy insanities by a country that was proclaimed, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, as the "last best hope on earth" -- that is, by the United States. The question is: Who will save America from its own Vichy regime?

Dr. Marvin Folkertsma is a professor of political science and Fellow for American Studies with The Center for Vision & Values at Grove City College. The author of several books, his latest release is a high-energy novel titled "The Thirteenth Commandment."

[Sep 09, 2016] Imagine the SNL parody of Bubba meeting Lynch

Jul 01, 2016 | www.nakedcapitalism.com

Michael Hudson July 1, 2016 at 3:52 pm

Imagine the SNL parody of Bubba meeting Lynch.

Lynch: How is your granddaughter Chelsea?
Bubba: She's fine. How are your grandkids?
Lynch: They're doing great too.
Bubba: Too bad if anything were to happen to them

[Jul 28, 2016] Russians take performance enhancing drugs: Americans dont!!!

marknesop.wordpress.com
Moscow Exile , July 26, 2016 at 9:17 am

Russians take performance enhancing drugs: Americans don't!!!

Continued

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[Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary Published on Jul 12, 2017 | russia-insider.com

[Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce Published on Jun 24, 2017 | original.antiwar.com

[May 23, 2017] CIA, the cornerstone of the deep state has agenda that is different from the US national interest and reflect agenda of the special interest groups such as Wall Street bankers and MIC Published on May 23, 2017 | nakedcapitalism.com

[Feb 19, 2017] The deep state is running scared! Published on Feb 19, 2017 | economistsview.typepad.com

[Feb 29, 2020] A very interesting and though provoking presentation by Ambassador Chas Freeman "America in Distress: The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change" Published on Feb 29, 2020 | angrybearblog.com

Oldies But Goodies

  • [Mar 24, 2019] One thing left out is the ability of readers to call BS on a story i.e. a robust comment section for debates.
  • [Mar 23, 2019] Brennan pipe dream obliterated. The color revolution against Trump failed
  • [Sep 26, 2016] War as a Business Opportunity
  • [Sep 26, 2016] War as a Business Opportunity
  • [Mar 24, 2019] One could wish that DOJ IG Horowitz could investigate and sanction British Intelligence for its use of official and non-official officials in starting this debacle.
  • [Mar 24, 2019] The manner in which Guccifer 2.0's English was broken, did not follow the typical errors one would expect if Guccifer 2.0's first language was Russian.
  • [Dec 28, 2017] How CrowdStrike placed malware in DNC hacked servers by Alex Christoforou
  • [Dec 22, 2017] When Sanity Fails - The Mindset of the Ideological Drone by The Saker
  • [Aug 30, 2017] The President of Belgian Magistrates - Neoliberalism is a form of Fascism by Manuela Cadelli
  • [Dec 22, 2017] When Sanity Fails - The Mindset of the Ideological Drone by The Saker
  • [Jul 17, 2017] Tucker Carlson Goes to War Against the Neocons by Curt Mills
  • [Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary
  • [Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce
  • [May 23, 2017] CIA, the cornerstone of the deep state has agenda that is different from the US national interest and reflect agenda of the special interest groups such as Wall Street bankers and MIC
  • [Feb 19, 2017] The deep state is running scared!
  • [Sep 17, 2017] The So-called Russian Hack of the DNC Does Not Make Sense by Publius Tacitus
  • [Sep 19, 2017] The Glaring Omissions in Trumps U.N. Speech by Daniel Larison
  • [Dec 21, 2019] The Pentagon s New Map War and Peace in the Twenty-First Century
  • [Dec 21, 2019] We are all Palestinians: possible connection between neocons and Pentagon
  • [Jul 17, 2017] Tucker Carlson Goes to War Against the Neocons by Curt Mills
  • [Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary
  • [Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce
  • [May 23, 2017] CIA, the cornerstone of the deep state has agenda that is different from the US national interest and reflect agenda of the special interest groups such as Wall Street bankers and MIC
  • [Feb 19, 2017] The deep state is running scared!
  • [Feb 29, 2020] A very interesting and though provoking presentation by Ambassador Chas Freeman "America in Distress: The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change"
  • [Feb 15, 2018] Trump's War on the Deep State by Conrad Black
  • [Mar 12, 2018] Obama's has continued his neoliberal ways after leaving office. Obama was NOT forced into neoliberal positions by terrible Repugs like his Obamabot apologists claimed repeatedly
  • [Mar 12, 2018] Colonizing the Western Mind using think tanks
  • [Mar 12, 2018] State Department's War on Political Dissent
  • [Dec 30, 2018] RussiaGate In Review with Aaron Mate - Unreasoned Fear is Neoliberalism's Response to the Credibility Gap
  • [Dec 21, 2019] Trump comes clean from world s policeman to thug running a global protection racket by Finian Cunningham
  • [Dec 29, 2018] NATO Partisans Started a New Cold War With Russia -
  • [Dec 24, 2018] Jewish neocons and the romance of nationalist armageddon
  • [Dec 22, 2018] British Security Service Infiltration, the Integrity Initiative and the Institute for Statecraft by Craig Murray
  • [Dec 22, 2018] If Truth Cannot Prevail Over Material Agendas We Are Doomed by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Dec 21, 2018] Virtually no one in neoliberal MSM is paying attention to the fact that a group of Pakistani muslims, working for a Jewish Congresswoman from Florida, had full computer access to a large number of Democrat Representatives. Most of the press is disinterested in pursuing this matter
  • [Dec 10, 2018] One thing that has puzzled me about Trump methods is his constant tweeting of witch hunt with respect to Mueller but his unwillingness to actually disclose what Brennan, Clapper, Comey, et al actually did
  • [Dec 09, 2018] Die Weltwoche Weltwoche Online – www.weltwoche.ch Tucker Carlson Trump is not capable Die Weltwoche, Ausgabe 49-2018
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Neocons Sabotage Trump s Trade Talks - Huawei CFO Taken Hostage To Blackmail China
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Internet as a perfect tool of inverted totalitarism: it stimulates atomizatin of individuals, creates authomatic 24x7 surveillance over population, suppresses solidarity by exceggerating non-essential differences and allow more insidious brainwashing of the population
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Postmodern Imperialism: Geopolitics and the Great Games
  • [Dec 07, 2018] Brexit Theresa May Goes Greek! by Brett Redmayne
  • [Dec 05, 2018] Who are the Neocons by Guyenot
  • [Dec 02, 2018] Muller investigation has all the appearance of an investigation looking for a crime
  • [Dec 01, 2018] Congress' Screwed-Up Foreign Policy Priorities by Daniel Larison
  • [Nov 30, 2018] US Warlords now and at the tome Miill's Poer Elite was published
  • [Nov 27, 2018] 'Highly likely' that Magnitsky was poisoned by toxic chemicals on Bill Browder's orders
  • [Nov 27, 2018] US Foreign Policy Has No Policy by Philip Giraldi
  • [Nov 25, 2018] Let s recap what Obama s coup in Ukraine has led to shall we?
  • [Nov 24, 2018] Anonymous Exposes UK-Led Psyop To Battle Russian Propaganda
  • [Nov 24, 2018] British Government Runs Secret Anti-Russian Smear Campaigns
  • [Nov 24, 2018] Now we know created MH17 smear campaign, who financial Steele dossier and created Skripal affair ;-)
  • [Nov 24, 2018] When you are paid a lot of money to come up with plots psyops, you tend to come up with plots for psyops . The word entrapment comes to mind. Probably self-serving also.
  • [Nov 22, 2018] Facing Up to the Gradual Demise of Jewish Political Power
  • [Nov 22, 2018] Facing Up to the Gradual Demise of Zionist Political Power
  • [Nov 14, 2018] Nationalism vs partiotism
  • [Nov 13, 2018] The US's trajectory as it is, clearly parallel's the Soviet Union and Russia's situation during the mid-80's
  • [Nov 12, 2018] The Best Way To Honor War Veterans Is To Stop Creating Them by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Nov 12, 2018] Obama s CIA Secretly Intercepted Congressional Communications About Whistleblowers
  • [Nov 12, 2018] Protecting Americans from foreign influence, smells with COINTELPRO. Structural witch-hunt effect like during the McCarthy era is designed to supress decent to neoliberal oligarcy by Andre Damon and Joseph Kishore
  • [Nov 11, 2018] Trump's Iran Policy Cannot Succeed Without Allies The National Interest by James Clapper & Thomas Pickering
  • [Nov 10, 2018] US Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan Killed 500,000 by Jason Ditz
  • [Nov 09, 2018] Globalism Vs Nationalism in Trump's America by Joe Quinn
  • [Nov 07, 2018] There is only the Deep Purple Mil.Gov UniParty. The Titanic is dead in the water, lights out, bow down hard.
  • [Nov 05, 2018] Bertram Gross (1912-1997) in "Friendly Fascism: The New Face of American Power" warned us that fascism always has two looks. One is paternal, benevolent, entertaining and kind. The other is embodied in the executioner's sadistic leer
  • [Nov 03, 2018] Kunstler The Midterm Endgame Democrats' Perpetual Hysteria
  • [Oct 25, 2018] DNC Emails--A Seth Attack Not a Russian Hack by Publius Tacitus
  • [Oct 25, 2018] Putin jokes with Bolton: Did the eagle eaten all the olives
  • [Oct 20, 2018] I am most encouraged by the apparent Putin's realisation that the First Strike is possible now if not even likely. If the Russians expect an attack they are much less likely to be totally surprised, as usual. In fact, never in history was such attack by the West more likely than now, for various reasons which would take a while to explain.
  • [Oct 20, 2018] Cloak and Dagger by Israel Shamir
  • [Oct 10, 2018] A Decalogue of American Empire-Building A Dialogue by James Petras
  • [Oct 09, 2018] NYT Claims Trump Campaign (Almost) Colluded With Israeli Spies
  • [Oct 04, 2018] Brett Kavanaugh's 'revenge' theory spotlights past with Clintons by Lisa Mascaro
  • [Oct 02, 2018] I m puzzled why CIA is so against Kavanaugh?
  • [Sep 29, 2018] The Schizophrenic Deep State is a Symptom, Not the Disease by Charles Hugh Smith
  • [Sep 29, 2018] Trump Surrenders to the Iron Law of Oligarchy by Dan Sanchez
  • [Sep 27, 2018] Hiding in Plain Sight Why We Cannot See the System Destroying Us
  • [Sep 27, 2018] The power elites goal is to change its appearance to look like something new and innovative to stay ahead of an electorate who are increasingly skeptical of the neoliberalism and globalism that enrich the elite at their expense.
  • [Sep 21, 2018] One party state: Trump's 'Opposition' Supports All His Evil Agendas While Attacking Fake Nonsence by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Sep 16, 2018] Looks like the key players in Steele dossier were CIA assets
  • [Sep 16, 2018] Perils of Ineptitude by Andrew Levin
  • [Sep 16, 2018] I m delighted we can see the true face of American exceptionalism on display everyday. The last thing I want to see is back to normal.
  • [Sep 15, 2018] Why the US Seeks to Hem in Russia, China and Iran by Patrick Lawrence
  • [Sep 07, 2018] New York Times Undermining Peace Efforts by Sowing Suspicion by Diana Johnstone
  • [Dec 24, 2018] Jewish neocons and the romance of nationalist armageddon
  • [Dec 22, 2018] British Security Service Infiltration, the Integrity Initiative and the Institute for Statecraft by Craig Murray
  • [Dec 22, 2018] If Truth Cannot Prevail Over Material Agendas We Are Doomed by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Dec 21, 2018] Virtually no one in neoliberal MSM is paying attention to the fact that a group of Pakistani muslims, working for a Jewish Congresswoman from Florida, had full computer access to a large number of Democrat Representatives. Most of the press is disinterested in pursuing this matter
  • [Dec 21, 2018] Trump End the Syria War Now by Eric Margolis
  • [Dec 10, 2018] One thing that has puzzled me about Trump methods is his constant tweeting of witch hunt with respect to Mueller but his unwillingness to actually disclose what Brennan, Clapper, Comey, et al actually did
  • [Dec 09, 2018] Die Weltwoche Weltwoche Online – www.weltwoche.ch Tucker Carlson Trump is not capable Die Weltwoche, Ausgabe 49-2018
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Neocons Sabotage Trump s Trade Talks - Huawei CFO Taken Hostage To Blackmail China
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Internet as a perfect tool of inverted totalitarism: it stimulates atomizatin of individuals, creates authomatic 24x7 surveillance over population, suppresses solidarity by exceggerating non-essential differences and allow more insidious brainwashing of the population
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Postmodern Imperialism: Geopolitics and the Great Games
  • [Dec 07, 2018] Brexit Theresa May Goes Greek! by Brett Redmayne
  • [Dec 05, 2018] Who are the Neocons by Guyenot
  • [Dec 02, 2018] Muller investigation has all the appearance of an investigation looking for a crime
  • [Dec 01, 2018] Congress' Screwed-Up Foreign Policy Priorities by Daniel Larison
  • [Nov 30, 2018] US Warlords now and at the tome Miill's Poer Elite was published
  • [Nov 27, 2018] 'Highly likely' that Magnitsky was poisoned by toxic chemicals on Bill Browder's orders
  • [Nov 27, 2018] US Foreign Policy Has No Policy by Philip Giraldi
  • [Dec 16, 2018] The 'Integrity Initiative' - A Military Intelligence Operation, Disguised As Charity, To Create The Russian Threat
  • [Dec 05, 2018] Beleaguered British Prime Minister Theresa May is wailing loudly against a Trump threat to reveal classified documents relating to Russiagate by Philip Giraldi
  • [Nov 25, 2018] Let s recap what Obama s coup in Ukraine has led to shall we?
  • [Nov 24, 2018] Anonymous Exposes UK-Led Psyop To Battle Russian Propaganda
  • [Nov 24, 2018] British Government Runs Secret Anti-Russian Smear Campaigns
  • [Nov 24, 2018] Now we know created MH17 smear campaign, who financial Steele dossier and created Skripal affair ;-)
  • [Nov 24, 2018] When you are paid a lot of money to come up with plots psyops, you tend to come up with plots for psyops . The word entrapment comes to mind. Probably self-serving also.
  • [Nov 22, 2018] Facing Up to the Gradual Demise of Jewish Political Power
  • [Nov 22, 2018] Facing Up to the Gradual Demise of Zionist Political Power
  • [Nov 14, 2018] Nationalism vs partiotism
  • [Nov 13, 2018] The US's trajectory as it is, clearly parallel's the Soviet Union and Russia's situation during the mid-80's
  • [Nov 12, 2018] The Best Way To Honor War Veterans Is To Stop Creating Them by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Nov 12, 2018] Obama s CIA Secretly Intercepted Congressional Communications About Whistleblowers
  • [Nov 12, 2018] Protecting Americans from foreign influence, smells with COINTELPRO. Structural witch-hunt effect like during the McCarthy era is designed to supress decent to neoliberal oligarcy by Andre Damon and Joseph Kishore
  • [Nov 11, 2018] Trump's Iran Policy Cannot Succeed Without Allies The National Interest by James Clapper & Thomas Pickering
  • [Nov 10, 2018] US Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan Killed 500,000 by Jason Ditz
  • [Nov 09, 2018] Globalism Vs Nationalism in Trump's America by Joe Quinn
  • [Nov 24, 2018] MI6 Scrambling To Stop Trump From Releasing Classified Docs In Russia Probe
  • [Nov 10, 2018] The Reasons for Netanyahu's Panic by Alastair Crooke
  • [Nov 07, 2018] There is only the Deep Purple Mil.Gov UniParty. The Titanic is dead in the water, lights out, bow down hard.
  • [Nov 05, 2018] Bertram Gross (1912-1997) in "Friendly Fascism: The New Face of American Power" warned us that fascism always has two looks. One is paternal, benevolent, entertaining and kind. The other is embodied in the executioner's sadistic leer
  • [Nov 03, 2018] Kunstler The Midterm Endgame Democrats' Perpetual Hysteria
  • [Oct 25, 2018] DNC Emails--A Seth Attack Not a Russian Hack by Publius Tacitus
  • [Oct 25, 2018] Putin jokes with Bolton: Did the eagle eaten all the olives
  • [Oct 20, 2018] I am most encouraged by the apparent Putin's realisation that the First Strike is possible now if not even likely. If the Russians expect an attack they are much less likely to be totally surprised, as usual. In fact, never in history was such attack by the West more likely than now, for various reasons which would take a while to explain.
  • [Oct 20, 2018] Cloak and Dagger by Israel Shamir
  • [Oct 10, 2018] A Decalogue of American Empire-Building A Dialogue by James Petras
  • [Oct 09, 2018] NYT Claims Trump Campaign (Almost) Colluded With Israeli Spies
  • [Oct 04, 2018] Brett Kavanaugh's 'revenge' theory spotlights past with Clintons by Lisa Mascaro
  • [Oct 02, 2018] I m puzzled why CIA is so against Kavanaugh?
  • [Sep 29, 2018] The Schizophrenic Deep State is a Symptom, Not the Disease by Charles Hugh Smith
  • [Sep 29, 2018] Trump Surrenders to the Iron Law of Oligarchy by Dan Sanchez
  • [Sep 27, 2018] Hiding in Plain Sight Why We Cannot See the System Destroying Us
  • [Sep 27, 2018] The power elites goal is to change its appearance to look like something new and innovative to stay ahead of an electorate who are increasingly skeptical of the neoliberalism and globalism that enrich the elite at their expense.
  • [Sep 21, 2018] One party state: Trump's 'Opposition' Supports All His Evil Agendas While Attacking Fake Nonsence by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Sep 16, 2018] Looks like the key players in Steele dossier were CIA assets
  • [Sep 16, 2018] Perils of Ineptitude by Andrew Levin
  • [Sep 16, 2018] I m delighted we can see the true face of American exceptionalism on display everyday. The last thing I want to see is back to normal.
  • [Sep 15, 2018] Why the US Seeks to Hem in Russia, China and Iran by Patrick Lawrence
  • [Sep 07, 2018] New York Times Undermining Peace Efforts by Sowing Suspicion by Diana Johnstone
  • [Sep 03, 2018] www.informationclearinghouse.info/50168.htm In Memoriam by Paul Edwards
  • [Sep 02, 2018] Open letter to President Trump concerning the consequences of 11 September 2001 by Thierry Meyssan
  • [Aug 28, 2018] A Colony in a Nation by Chris Hayes
  • [Aug 24, 2018] The priorities of the deep state and its public face the MSM
  • [Aug 22, 2018] The CIA Owns the US and European Media by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Aug 19, 2018] End of "classic neoliberalism": to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare.
  • [Aug 18, 2018] Corporate Media the Enemy of the People by Paul Street
  • [Aug 14, 2018] I think one of Mueller s deeply embedded character flaw is that once he decides on burying someone he becomes possessed
  • [Aug 14, 2018] US Intelligence Community is Tearing the Country Apart from the Inside by Dmitry Orlov
  • [Aug 13, 2018] Imperialism Is Alive and Kicking A Marxist Analysis of Neoliberal Capitalism by C.J. Polychroniou
  • [Aug 08, 2018] Ten Bombshell Revelations From Seymour Hersh's New Autobiography
  • [Aug 05, 2018] Cooper was equally as unhinged as Boot: Neoliberal MSM is a real 1984 remake.
  • [Jul 31, 2018] Is not the Awan affair a grave insult to the US "Intelligence Community?
  • [Jul 28, 2018] American Society Would Collapse If It Were not For These 8 Myths by Lee Camp
  • [Jul 23, 2018] Chickens with Their Heads Cut Off, Coming Home to Roost. The "Treason Narrative" by Helen Buyniski
  • [Jul 22, 2018] Tucker Carlson SLAMS Intelligence Community On Russia
  • [Jul 20, 2018] So many (ex-) MI6 operators (Steele, Tait, etc) involved in the story. It is interesting that the media don t question the intense involvement of the British in all this. And of course, the British haven t been laggards in adding fuel to the fire by the whole novichok hoax
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Doubting The Intelligence Of The Intelligence Community by Ilana Mercer
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Is President Trump A Traitor Because He Wants Peace With Russia by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Jul 15, 2018] What Mueller won t find by Bob In Portland
  • [Jul 13, 2018] False flag operation covering DNC leaks now involves Mueller and his team
  • [Jul 03, 2018] When you see some really successful financial speculator like Soros or (or much smaller scale) Browder, search for links with intelligence services to explain the success or at least a part of it related to xUSSR space , LA and similar regions
  • [Jun 09, 2018] Spooks Spooking Themselves by Daniel Lazare
  • [Jun 09, 2018] Still Waiting for Evidence of a Russian Hack by Ray McGovern
  • [May 09, 2018] Trotskyist Delusions, by Diana Johnstone
  • [Apr 24, 2018] The Democratic Party has embraced the agenda of the military-intelligence apparatus and sought to become its main political voice
  • [Apr 21, 2018] Amazingly BBC newsnight just started preparing viewers for the possibility that there was no sarin attack, and the missile strikes might just have been for show
  • [Apr 21, 2018] It s a tough old world and we are certainly capable of a Salisbury set-up and god knows what else in Syria.
  • [Apr 15, 2018] The Trump Regime Is Insane by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Mar 27, 2018] The Stormy Daniels scandal Political warfare in Washington hits a new low by Patrick Martin
  • [Mar 13, 2018] The CIA takeover of the Democratic Party by Patrick Martin
  • [Mar 10, 2018] Meier might have discovered that his subject had been, as it were, 'top supporting actor' in the first fumbling attempt by Christopher Steele et al to produce a plausible-sounding scenario as to the background to Litvinenko s death.
  • [Mar 10, 2018] There is reason to suspect that some former and very likely current employees of the FBI have been colluding with elements in other American and British intelligence agencies, in particular the CIA and MI6, in support of an extremely ambitious foreign policy agenda for a very long time. It also seems clear that influential journalists, such as Glenn Simpson was before founding Fusion GPS, along with his wife Mary Jacoby, have been strongly involved in this
  • [Mar 08, 2018] Mueller determines the US foreign policy toward Russia; The Intel Community Lies About Russian Meddling by Publius Tacitus
  • [Feb 08, 2018] Try Googling Riggs Bank – a lot of interesting information emerges, on matters such as their involvement with Prince Bandar. So, what we are dealing with is a joint Anglo-American attempt to create a comprador oligarchy who could loot Russia s raw materials resources
  • [Feb 04, 2018] DNC collusion with Ukrainian IT Security company Crowdstrike tied to the Atlantic Council to push false narrative of DNC hack and malware to influence US election
  • [Dec 31, 2017] How America Spreads Global Chaos by Nicolas J.S. Davies
  • [Dec 31, 2017] Is [neo]Liberalism a Dying Faith by Pat Buchanan
  • [Dec 31, 2017] What Happens When A Russiagate Skeptic Debates A Professional Russiagater
  • [Dec 28, 2017] How CrowdStrike placed malware in DNC hacked servers by Alex Christoforou
  • [Dec 22, 2017] When Sanity Fails - The Mindset of the Ideological Drone by The Saker
  • [Sep 17, 2017] The So-called Russian Hack of the DNC Does Not Make Sense by Publius Tacitus
  • [Oct 25, 2018] Putin jokes with Bolton: Did the eagle eaten all the olives
  • [Oct 18, 2018] Donald Trump's Foreign Policy Goes Neocon by Robert W. Merry
  • [Oct 16, 2018] Donald Trump's Foreign Policy Goes Neocon
  • [Oct 08, 2018] Hacking and Propaganda by Marcus Ranum
  • [Sep 11, 2018] Is Donald Trump Going to Do the Syria Backflip by Publius Tacitus
  • [Sep 11, 2018] If you believe Trump is trying to remove neocons(Deep State) from the government, explain Bolton and many other Deep State denizens Trump has appointed
  • [Sep 02, 2018] Open letter to President Trump concerning the consequences of 11 September 2001 by Thierry Meyssan
  • [Aug 28, 2018] A Colony in a Nation by Chris Hayes
  • [Aug 24, 2018] The priorities of the deep state and its public face the MSM
  • [Aug 22, 2018] The CIA Owns the US and European Media by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Aug 19, 2018] End of "classic neoliberalism": to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare.
  • [Aug 18, 2018] Corporate Media the Enemy of the People by Paul Street
  • [Aug 14, 2018] I think one of Mueller s deeply embedded character flaw is that once he decides on burying someone he becomes possessed
  • [Aug 14, 2018] US Intelligence Community is Tearing the Country Apart from the Inside by Dmitry Orlov
  • [Aug 13, 2018] Imperialism Is Alive and Kicking A Marxist Analysis of Neoliberal Capitalism by C.J. Polychroniou
  • [Aug 08, 2018] Ten Bombshell Revelations From Seymour Hersh's New Autobiography
  • [Aug 05, 2018] Cooper was equally as unhinged as Boot: Neoliberal MSM is a real 1984 remake.
  • [Aug 17, 2018] What if Russiagate is the New WMDs
  • [Aug 11, 2018] President Trump the most important achivement
  • [May 11, 2019] Christopher Steele, FBI s Confidential Human Source by Publius Tacitus
  • [Aug 05, 2018] How identity politics makes the Left lose its collective identity by Tomasz Pierscionek
  • [Jul 31, 2018] Is not the Awan affair a grave insult to the US "Intelligence Community?
  • [Jul 28, 2018] American Society Would Collapse If It Were not For These 8 Myths by Lee Camp
  • [Jul 23, 2018] Chickens with Their Heads Cut Off, Coming Home to Roost. The "Treason Narrative" by Helen Buyniski
  • [Jul 22, 2018] Tucker Carlson SLAMS Intelligence Community On Russia
  • [Jul 20, 2018] What exactly is fake news caucus99percent
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Doubting The Intelligence Of The Intelligence Community by Ilana Mercer
  • [Jul 20, 2018] So many (ex-) MI6 operators (Steele, Tait, etc) involved in the story. It is interesting that the media don t question the intense involvement of the British in all this. And of course, the British haven t been laggards in adding fuel to the fire by the whole novichok hoax
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Doubting The Intelligence Of The Intelligence Community by Ilana Mercer
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Is President Trump A Traitor Because He Wants Peace With Russia by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Jul 15, 2018] What Mueller won t find by Bob In Portland
  • [Jul 13, 2018] False flag operation covering DNC leaks now involves Mueller and his team
  • [Jul 03, 2018] When you see some really successful financial speculator like Soros or (or much smaller scale) Browder, search for links with intelligence services to explain the success or at least a part of it related to xUSSR space , LA and similar regions
  • [Jun 09, 2018] Spooks Spooking Themselves by Daniel Lazare
  • [Jun 09, 2018] Still Waiting for Evidence of a Russian Hack by Ray McGovern
  • [May 09, 2018] Trotskyist Delusions, by Diana Johnstone
  • [Apr 24, 2018] The Democratic Party has embraced the agenda of the military-intelligence apparatus and sought to become its main political voice
  • [Apr 21, 2018] Amazingly BBC newsnight just started preparing viewers for the possibility that there was no sarin attack, and the missile strikes might just have been for show
  • [Apr 21, 2018] It s a tough old world and we are certainly capable of a Salisbury set-up and god knows what else in Syria.
  • [Apr 15, 2018] The Trump Regime Is Insane by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Mar 27, 2018] The Stormy Daniels scandal Political warfare in Washington hits a new low by Patrick Martin
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Tucker Carlson The Cold War Is Over. The World Has Changed. Time To Rethink America's Alliances
  • [Jul 17, 2018] I think there is much more to the comment made by Putin regarding Bill Browder and his money flows into the DNC and Clinton campaign. That would explain why the DNC didn t hand the servers over to the FBI after being hacked.
  • [Jul 16, 2018] Putin Claims U.S. Intelligence Agents Funneled $400K To Clinton Campaign Zero Hedge
  • [Jul 16, 2018] Five Things That Would Make The CIA-CNN Russia Narrative More Believable
  • [Jul 15, 2018] As if the Donald did not sanctioned to death the Russians on every possible level. How is this different from Mueller's and comp witch hunt against the Russians?
  • [Jul 15, 2018] Sic Semper Tyrannis HILLARY CLINTON S COMPROMISED EMAILS WERE GOING TO A FOREIGN ENTITY – NOT RUSSIA! FBI Agent Ignored Evide
  • [Jul 15, 2018] Peter Strzok Ignored Evidence Of Clinton Server Breach
  • [Jul 15, 2018] Something Rotten About the DOJ Indictment of the GRU by Publius Tacitus
  • [Jul 15, 2018] As if the Donald did not sanctioned to death the Russians on every possible level. How is this different from Mueller's and comp witch hunt against the Russians?
  • [Jul 03, 2018] Russia has a lot of information about Lybia that could dig a political grave for Hillary. They did not release it
  • [Jul 03, 2018] Corruption Allegations are one of the classic tools in the color revolution toolbox
  • [Jul 03, 2018] When you see some really successful financial speculator like Soros or (or much smaller scale) Browder, search for links with intelligence services to explain the success or at least a part of it related to xUSSR space , LA and similar regions
  • [Jun 21, 2018] The neoliberal agenda is agreed and enacted by BOTH parties:
  • [Jun 19, 2018] How The Last Superpower Was Unchained by Tom Engelhardt
  • [Jun 17, 2018] Mattis Putin Is Trying To Undermine America s Moral Authority by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Jun 13, 2018] Sanction Trump not Bourbon
  • [Jun 13, 2018] How False Flag Operations Are Carried Out Today by Philip M. GIRALDI
  • [Jun 10, 2018] Trump and National Neoliberalism by Sasha Breger Bush
  • [Jun 10, 2018] Trump and National Neoliberalism, Revisited by Sasha Breger Bush
  • [Jun 06, 2018] Why Foreign Policy Realism Isn't Enough by William S. Smith
  • [May 27, 2018] America's Fifth Column Will Destroy Russia by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [May 27, 2018] Northwestern University roundtable discusses regime change in Russia Defend Democracy Press
  • [May 24, 2018] The diversion of Russia Gate is a continuation of former diversions such as the Tea Party which was invented by the banksters to turn public anger over the big banking collapse and the resulting recession into a movement to gain more deregulation for tax breaks for the wealthy
  • [May 23, 2018] If the Trump-Russia set up began in spring 2016 or earlier, presumably it was undertaken on the assumption that HRC would win the election. (I say "presumably" because you never can tell..) If so, then the operation would have been an MI6 / Ukrainian / CIA coordinated op intended to frame Putin, not Trump
  • [May 22, 2018] Cat fight within the US elite getting more intense
  • [May 04, 2018] Media Use Disinformation To Accuse Russia Of Spreading Such by b
  • [May 03, 2018] Mueller's questions to Trump more those of a prosecuting attorney than of an impartial investigator by Alexander Mercouris
  • [May 03, 2018] Skripal case British confirm they have no suspect; Yulia Skripal vanishes, no word of Sergey Skripal by Alexander Mercouris
  • [Apr 30, 2018] Neoliberalization of the US Democratic Party is irreversible: It is still controlled by Clinton gang even after Hillary debacle
  • [Apr 27, 2018] A Most Sordid Profession by Fred Reed
  • [Apr 24, 2018] America's Men Without Chests by Paul Grenier
  • [Apr 22, 2018] The Crisis Is Only In Its Beginning Stages by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Apr 21, 2018] On the Criminal Referral of Comey, Clinton et al by Ray McGovern
  • [Apr 20, 2018] Stench of hypocrisy British 'war on terror' strategic ties with radical Islam by John Wight
  • [Apr 17, 2018] Poor Alex
  • [Apr 11, 2018] Female neocon warmongers from Fox look like plastered brick walls – heartless and brainless.
  • [Apr 11, 2018] It is long passed the time when any thinking person took Trump tweets seriously
  • [Apr 10, 2018] The Ghouta Massacre near Damascus on Aug 21, 2013 was not a sarin rocket attack carried out by Assad or his supporters. It was a false-flag stunt carried out by the insurgents using carbon monoxide or cyanide to murder children and use their corpses as bait to lure the Americans into attacking Assad.
  • [Apr 09, 2018] When Military Leaders Have Reckless Disregard for the Truth by Bruce Fein
  • [Apr 02, 2018] Russophobia Anti-Russian Lobby and American Foreign Policy by A. Tsygankov
  • [Apr 01, 2018] Big American Money, Not Russia, Put Trump in the White House: Reflections on a Recent Report by Paul Street
  • [Mar 29, 2018] Giving Up the Ghost of Objective Journalism by Telly Davidson
  • [Mar 28, 2018] Deep State and False Flag Attacks
  • [Mar 27, 2018] Indian Punchline - Reflections on foreign affairs by M K Bhadrakumar
  • [Mar 25, 2018] A truly historical month for the future of our planet by The Saker
  • [Mar 24, 2018] Why the UK, the EU and the US Gang-Up on Russia by James Petras
  • [Mar 22, 2018] If it's correct, the Brits made a very nasty error that shows the true nature of their establishment.
  • [Mar 22, 2018] Vladimir Putin: nonsense to think Russia would poison spy in UK
  • [Mar 21, 2018] Former CIA Chief Brennan Running Scared by Ray McGovern
  • [Mar 21, 2018] Washington's Invasion of Iraq at Fifteen
  • [Feb 07, 2020] How They Sold the Iraq War by Jeffrey St. Clair
  • [Mar 18, 2018] Powerful intelligence agencies are incompatible with any forms of democracy including the democracy for top one precent. The only possible form of government in this situation is inverted totalitarism
  • [Mar 16, 2018] Will the State Department Become a Subsidiary of the CIA
  • [Mar 16, 2018] Corbyn Calls for Evidence in Escalating Poison Row
  • [Mar 16, 2018] Are We Living Under a Military Coup ?
  • [Mar 13, 2018] The CIA takeover of the Democratic Party by Patrick Martin
  • [Mar 10, 2018] Meier might have discovered that his subject had been, as it were, 'top supporting actor' in the first fumbling attempt by Christopher Steele et al to produce a plausible-sounding scenario as to the background to Litvinenko s death.
  • [Mar 10, 2018] There is reason to suspect that some former and very likely current employees of the FBI have been colluding with elements in other American and British intelligence agencies, in particular the CIA and MI6, in support of an extremely ambitious foreign policy agenda for a very long time. It also seems clear that influential journalists, such as Glenn Simpson was before founding Fusion GPS, along with his wife Mary Jacoby, have been strongly involved in this
  • [Mar 08, 2018] Mueller determines the US foreign policy toward Russia; The Intel Community Lies About Russian Meddling by Publius Tacitus
  • [Feb 08, 2018] Try Googling Riggs Bank – a lot of interesting information emerges, on matters such as their involvement with Prince Bandar. So, what we are dealing with is a joint Anglo-American attempt to create a comprador oligarchy who could loot Russia s raw materials resources
  • [Feb 04, 2018] DNC collusion with Ukrainian IT Security company Crowdstrike tied to the Atlantic Council to push false narrative of DNC hack and malware to influence US election
  • [Dec 31, 2017] How America Spreads Global Chaos by Nicolas J.S. Davies
  • [Dec 31, 2017] Is [neo]Liberalism a Dying Faith by Pat Buchanan
  • [Dec 31, 2017] What Happens When A Russiagate Skeptic Debates A Professional Russiagater
  • [Dec 28, 2017] How CrowdStrike placed malware in DNC hacked servers by Alex Christoforou
  • [Mar 14, 2018] Jefferson Morley on the CIA and Mossad Tradeoffs in the Formation of the US-Israel Strategic Relationship
  • [Mar 11, 2018] Washington s Century-long War on Russia by Mike Whitney
  • [Mar 11, 2018] Reality Check: The Guardian Restarts Push for Regime Change in Russia by Kit
  • [Mar 11, 2018] I often think that, a the machinery of surveillance and repression becomes so well oiled and refined, the ruling oligarchs will soon stop even paying lip service to 'American workers', or the "American middle class" and go full authoritarian
  • [Mar 10, 2018] Visceral Russo-phobia became a feature in Obama policy and HRC campaign long before any Steele s Dossier. This was a program ofunleashing cold War II
  • [Mar 10, 2018] There is reason to suspect that some former and very likely current employees of the FBI have been colluding with elements in other American and British intelligence agencies, in particular the CIA and MI6, in support of an extremely ambitious foreign policy agenda for a very long time. It also seems clear that influential journalists, such as Glenn Simpson was before founding Fusion GPS, along with his wife Mary Jacoby, have been strongly involved in this
  • [Mar 08, 2018] Cue bono question in Scripal case?
  • [Mar 08, 2018] In recent years, there has been ample evidence that US policy-makers and, equally important, mainstream media commentators do not bother to read what Putin says, or at least not more than snatches from click-bait wire-service reports.
  • [Mar 08, 2018] A key piece of evidence pointing to 'Guccifer 2.0' being a fake personality created by the conspirators in their attempt to disguise the fact that the materials from the DNC published by 'WikiLeaks' were obtained by a leak rather than a hack had to do with the involvement of the former GCHQ person Matt Tait.
  • [Mar 08, 2018] Mueller determines the US foreign policy toward Russia; The Intel Community Lies About Russian Meddling by Publius Tacitus
  • [Mar 06, 2018] Is MSNBC Now the Most Dangerous Warmonger Network by Norman Solomon
  • [Mar 06, 2018] The U.S. Returns to 'Great Power Competition,' With a Dangerous New Edge
  • [Mar 06, 2018] The current anti-Russian sentiment in the West as hysterical. But this hysteria is concentrated at the top level of media elite and neocons. Behind it is no deep sense of unity or national resolve. In fact we see the reverse - most Western countries are deeply divided within themselves due to the crisis of neolineralism.
  • [Mar 04, 2018] Generals who now are running the USA foreign policy represents a great danger. These men seem incapable of rising above the Russophobia that grew in the atmosphere of the Cold War. They yearn for world hegemony for the US and to see Russia and to a lesser extent China and Iran as obstacles to that dominion for the "city on a hill
  • [Mar 02, 2018] The main reason much of the highest echelons of American power are united against Trump might be that they're terrified that -- unlike Obama -- he's a really bad salesman for the US led neoliberal empire. This threatens the continuance of their well oiled and exceedingly corrupt gravy train
  • [Mar 02, 2018] Fatal Delusions of Western Man by Pat Buchanan
  • [Mar 02, 2018] Contradictions In Seth Rich Murder Continue To Challenge Hacking Narrative
  • [Feb 28, 2018] Perjury traps to manufacture indictments to pressure people to testify against others is a new tool of justice in a surveillance state
  • [Feb 27, 2018] Alfred McCoy The Rise and Decline of US Global Power
  • [Feb 27, 2018] On Contact Decline of the American empire with Alfred McCoy
  • [Feb 26, 2018] Why one war when we can heve two! by Eric Margolis
  • [Feb 25, 2018] Russia would not do anything nearing the level of self-harm inflicted by the US elites.
  • [Apr 17, 2019] Deep State and the FBI Federal Blackmail Investigation
  • [Feb 23, 2018] NSA Genius Debunks Russiagate Once For All
  • [Feb 22, 2018] Bill Binney explodes the rile of 17 agances security assessment memo in launching the Russia witch-hunt
  • [Feb 20, 2018] Russophobia is a futile bid to conceal US, European demise by Finian Cunningham
  • [Feb 19, 2018] The Russiagate Intelligence Wars What We Do and Don't Know
  • [Feb 19, 2018] Russian Meddling Was a Drop in an Ocean of American-made Discord by AMANDA TAUB and MAX FISHER
  • [Feb 18, 2018] Had Hillary Won What Now by Andrew Levine
  • [Feb 16, 2018] A Dangerous Turn in U.S. Foreign Policy
  • [Feb 16, 2018] The Deep Staters care first and foremost about themselves.
  • [Feb 14, 2018] The Anti-Trump Coup by Michael S. Rozeff
  • [Feb 14, 2018] The FBI and the President – Mutual Manipulation by James Petras
  • [Feb 12, 2018] The Age of Lunacy: The Doomsday Machine
  • [Feb 12, 2018] Ike's Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex Is Alive and Very Well by William J. Astore
  • [Feb 11, 2018] How Russiagate fiasco destroys Kremlin moderates, accelerating danger for a hot war
  • [Feb 10, 2018] The generals are not Borgists. They are something worse ...
  • [Feb 10, 2018] More on neoliberal newspeak of US propaganda machine
  • [Feb 09, 2018] Professor Stephen F. Cohen Rethinking Putin – A critical reading, by The Saker - The Unz Review
  • [Jan 30, 2018] Washington Reaches New Heights of Insanity with the "Kremlin Report" by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Jan 30, 2018] The Unseen Wars of America the Empire The American Conservative
  • [Jan 29, 2018] It is OK for an empire to be hated and feared, it doesn t work so good when Glory slowly fades and he empire instead becomes hated and despised
  • [Jan 28, 2018] Russiagate Isn t About Trump, And It Isn t Even Ultimately About Russia by Caitlyn Johnstone
  • [Jan 27, 2018] The Rich Also Cry by Israel Shamir
  • [Jan 27, 2018] As of January 2018 Trump's firing of FBI Director James Comey, is starting to look like something Trump should have done sooner.
  • [Jan 27, 2018] Mainstream Media and Imperial Power
  • [Jan 26, 2018] Warns The Russiagate Stakes Are Extreme by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Jan 25, 2018] Russiagate as Kafka 2.0
  • [Jan 24, 2018] Whistleblower Confirms Secret Society Meetings Between FBI And DOJ To Undermine Trump
  • [Jan 22, 2018] Pentagon Unveils Strategy for Military Confrontation With Russia and China by Bill Van Auken
  • [Jan 22, 2018] The Associated Press is reporting that the Department of Justice has given congressional investigators additional text messages between FBI investigator Peter Strzok and his girlfriend Lisa Page. The FBI also told investigators that five months worth of text messages, between December 2016 and May 2017, are unavailable because of a technical glitch
  • [Jan 20, 2018] What Is The Democratic Party ? by Lambert Strether
  • [Jan 19, 2018] #ReleaseTheMemo Extensive FISA abuse memo could destroy the entire Mueller Russia investigation by Alex Christoforou
  • [Jan 19, 2018] No Foreign Bases Challenging the Footprint of US Empire by Kevin B. Zeese and Margaret Flowers
  • [Jan 17, 2018] Neoconning the Trump White House by Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
  • [Jan 16, 2018] The Russia Explainer
  • [Jan 14, 2018] Sic Semper Tyrannis The Trump Dossier Timeline, A Democrat Disaster Looming by Publius Tacitus
  • [May 11, 2019] Why Crowdstrike's Russian Hacking Story Fell Apart -- Say Hello to Fancy Bear
  • [Jan 13, 2018] The FBI Hand Behind Russia-gate by Ray McGovern
  • [Jan 12, 2018] The DOJ and FBI Worked With Fusion GPS on Operation Trump
  • [Jan 08, 2018] Someone Spoofed Michael Wolff s Book About Trump And It s Comedy Gold
  • [Jan 06, 2018] Russia-gate Breeds Establishment McCarthyism by Robert Parry
  • [Jan 06, 2018] Trump's triumph revealed the breadth of popular anger at politics as usual the blend of neoliberal domestic policy and interventionist foreign policy that constitutes consensus in Washington
  • [Jan 02, 2018] Neocon warmongers should be treated as rapists by Andrew J. Bacevich
  • [Jan 02, 2018] What We Don t Talk about When We Talk about Russian Hacking by Jackson Lears
  • [Jan 02, 2018] Jill Stein in the Cross-hairs by Mike Whitney
  • [Jan 02, 2018] Who Is the Real Enemy by Philip Giraldi
  • [Jan 02, 2018] American exceptionalism extracts a price from common citizens
  • [Jan 02, 2018] The Idolatry of the Donald
  • [Dec 31, 2017] Maybe Trump was the deep state candidate of choice? Maybe that s why they ran Clinton against him rather than the more electable Sanders? Maybe that s why Obama started ramping up tensions with Russia in the early fall of 2016 – to swing the election to Trump (by giving the disgruntled anti-war Sanders voters a false choice between Trump or war with Russia?
  • [Jul 17, 2017] Tucker Carlson Goes to War Against the Neocons by Curt Mills
  • [Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary
  • [Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce
  • [Dec 21, 2019] Trump administration sanction companies involved in laying the remaining pipe, and also companies involved in the infrastructure around the arrival point.
  • [Dec 21, 2019] If the plan was to sabotage Trump's second-term campaign, it seems to have backfired spectacularly
  • [Dec 21, 2019] Lessons of the past: all changed in 1999 with the war in Kosovo. For the first time I witnessed shocking images of civilian targets being bombed, TV stations, trains, bridges. The NATO spokesman boasted of hundreds of Serbian tanks being destroyed. There was something new and disturbing about his manner, language and tone, something I'd not encountered from coverage of previous conflicts. For the first time I found myself not believing one word of the narrative
  • [Dec 21, 2019] Trump comes clean from world s policeman to thug running a global protection racket by Finian Cunningham
  • [Dec 21, 2019] Time to Terminate Washington's Defense Welfare
  • [Dec 21, 2019] The Pentagon s New Map War and Peace in the Twenty-First Century
  • [Dec 21, 2019] We are all Palestinians: possible connection between neocons and Pentagon
  • [Dec 21, 2019] The ruthless neo-colonialists of 21st century
  • [Dec 21, 2019] The goal of any war is the redistribution of taxpayer money into the bank accounts of MIC shareholders and executives
  • [Dec 20, 2019] Did John Brennan's CIA Create Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks by Larry C Johnson
  • [Dec 20, 2019] Singer became notorious for what he did to Argentina after he bought their debt, and he is pretty upfront about not caring who objects by Andrew Joyce
  • [Dec 18, 2019] Rudy Giuliani Yovanovitch Was Part Of The Cover-Up, She Had To Be Ousted
  • [Dec 17, 2019] Neocons like car salespeople have a stereotypical reputation for lacking credibility because ther profession is to lie in order to sell weapons to the publin, much like used car saleme lie to sell cars
  • [Dec 19, 2019] MIC lobbyism (which often is presented as patriotism) is the last refuge of scoundrels
  • [Dec 19, 2019] A the core of color revolution against Trump is Full Spectrum Dominance doctrine
  • [Dec 19, 2019] Historically the ability of unelected, unaccountable, secretive bureaucracies (aka the "Deep State") to exercise their own policy without regard for the public or elected officials, often in defiance of these, has always been the hallmark of the destruction of democracy and incipient tyranny.
  • [Dec 17, 2019] Judge Denies Flynn's Requests For Exculpatory Information, Case Dismissal by Peter Svab
  • [Dec 17, 2019] History Doesn t Repeat, But It Often Rhymes: Wilson in UK was subjected to the similar attack by rogue elements in MI5 as Trump in the USA
  • [Dec 15, 2019] The infinity war - The Washington Post by Samuel Moyn, Stephen Wertheim
  • [Dec 14, 2019] Full Interview: Barr Criticizes Inspector General Report On The Russia Investigation
  • [Dec 14, 2019] A Determined Effort to Undermine Russia
  • [Dec 12, 2019] Threat Inflation Poisons Our Foreign Policy by Daniel Larison
  • [Dec 10, 2019] The level of Neo-McCarthyism and the number of lunitics this NYT forums is just astonishing: When it comes to Donald Trump and Russia, everything is connected.
  • [Dec 07, 2019] Why the foreign policy establishment consensus is neocon by default.
  • [Dec 06, 2019] The USA is an occupied by neocon country
  • [Dec 07, 2019] Impeachment does not require a crime.
  • [Dec 06, 2019] Who Is Making US Foreign Policy by Stephen F. Cohen
  • [Dec 06, 2019] The USA is an occupied by neocon country
  • [Dec 04, 2019] The central question of Ukrainegate is whether CrowdStrike actions on DNC leak were a false flag operation designed to open Russiagate and what was the level of participation of Poroshenko government and Ukrainian Security services in this false flag operation by Factotum
  • [Dec 04, 2019] Responding to Lt. Col. Vindman about my Ukraine columns with the facts John Solomon Reports
  • [Dec 04, 2019] Ukrainegaters claim that Trump Reduced the USA empire 'Global Commitments' was fraudulent from the very beginning. Trump is yet another imperial president who favours the "Full spectrum Dominance; The problem is that the time when the USA can have it are in the past. Europe finally recovered from WWII losses and that alone dooms the idea
  • [Dec 04, 2019] Common Funding Themes Link 'Whistleblower' Complaint and CrowdStrike Firm Certifying DNC Russia 'Hack' by Aaron Klein
  • [Dec 04, 2019] DNC Russian Hackers Found! You Won't Believe Who They Really Work For by the Anonymous Patriots
  • [Dec 04, 2019] June 4th, 2017 Crowdstrike Was at the DNC Six Weeks by George Webb
  • [Dec 04, 2019] Cyberanalyst George Eliason Claims that the "Fancy Bear" Who Hacked the DNC Server is Ukrainian Intelligence – In League with the Atlantic Council and Crowdstrike
  • [Dec 04, 2019] Fancy Bear - Conservapedia
  • [Dec 04, 2019] June 2nd, 2018 Alperovich's DNC Cover Stories Soon To Match With His Hacking Teams by George Webb
  • [Dec 04, 2019] America's War Exceptionalism Is Killing the Planet by William Astore
  • [Dec 02, 2019] The cost of militarism cannot be measured only in lost opportunities, lives and money. There will be a long hangover of shame
  • [Oct 20, 2019] Putin sarcastic remark on Western neoliberal multiculturalism
  • [Oct 20, 2019] How did the United States become so involved in Ukraine's torturous and famously corrupt politics? The short answer is NATO expansion
  • [Sep 10, 2019] Being called a narcissist by Jim Comey is akin to being accused of having sex with underage girls by the late Jeffrey Epstein by Larry C Johnsons
  • [Dec 02, 2019] A Think Tank Dedicated to Peace and Restraint
  • [Nov 30, 2019] CrowdStrike: a Conspiracy Wrapped in a Conspiracy Inside a Conspiracy by Oleg Atbashian
  • [Nov 29, 2019] Where s the Collusion
  • [Nov 28, 2019] WSJ story reopens the claim Comey had a report there was an email exchange between Loretta Lynch and Clinton claiming Lynch promised her the DOJ would go easy on Clinton.
  • [Nov 27, 2019] Obama Admits He Would Speak Up Only To Stop Bernie Sanders Nomination
  • [Nov 27, 2019] Could your county use some extra money?
  • [Nov 26, 2019] John Solomon Everything Changes In The Ukraine Scandal If Trump Releases These Documents
  • [Nov 24, 2019] Mark Blyth - Global Trumpism and the Future of the Global Economy
  • [Nov 24, 2019] Despair is a very powerful factor in the resurgence of far right forces. Far right populism probably will be the decisive factor in 2020 elections.
  • [Nov 23, 2019] Is Fiona Hill a Sleeper Agent
  • [Nov 21, 2019] The deep state is individuals INSIDE the government that do the bidding of the banksters, the military-industrial complex, the globalists and other nefarious interests
  • [Nov 15, 2019] Letter to Congressman Adam Schiff from Krishen Mehta - American Committee for East-West Accord
  • [Nov 13, 2019] Understanding What Sidney Powell is Doing to Kill the Case Against Michael Flynn by Larry C Johnson
  • [Nov 08, 2019] Charlie Kirk and Kochsucker Conservatism E. Michael Jones
  • [Nov 03, 2019] How Controlling Syria s Oil Serves Washington s Strategic Objectives by Nauman Sadiq
  • [Nov 01, 2019] Viable Opposition The Legal Connection Between Washington and Kiev
  • [Nov 01, 2019] Color revolution is a method of using a minority to render the country ungovernble, waving a simplistic banner against corruption and for (undefined) democracy, which leaves the masses unorganized and eschews even a platform, in favor of a secret coterie run by intelligence againces
  • [Oct 28, 2019] National Neolibralism destroyed the World Trade Organisation by John Quiggin
  • [Oct 25, 2019] Trump-Haters, Not Trump, Are The Ones Wrecking America s Institutions, WSJ s Strassel Says
  • [Oct 24, 2019] Empire Interventionism Versus Republic Noninterventionism by Jacob Hornberger
  • [Oct 24, 2019] Joltin' Jack Keane wants your kids to fight Russia and Syria over Syrian oil by Colonel Patrick Lang
  • [Oct 23, 2019] The treason of the intellectuals The Undoing of Thought by Roger Kimball
  • [Oct 23, 2019] Neoconservatism Is An Omnicidal Death Cult, And It Must Be Stopped by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Oct 20, 2019] Putin sarcastic remark on Western neoliberal multiculturalism
  • [Oct 19, 2019] Kunstler One Big Reason Why America Is Driving Itself Bat$hit Crazy
  • [Oct 10, 2019] There is no reason that anyone should treat George Bush with respect: he is a war criminal, who escaped justice
  • [Oct 02, 2019] The Self-Set Impeachment Trap naked capitalism
  • [Sep 30, 2019] Stephen Miller calls whistleblower a 'partisan hit job' in fiery interview
  • [Sep 22, 2019] More Americans Questioning Official 9-11 Story As New Evidence Contradicts Official Narrative by Whitney Webb
  • [Sep 22, 2019] US reconnaissance plane operated drones that attacked Hmeymim
  • [Sep 22, 2019] Shoigu calls US belief in its superiority the major threat to Russia and other states
  • [Sep 22, 2019] It was neoliberalism that won the cold war
  • [Sep 19, 2019] The progressive movement, in its political manifestations, was essentially a revolt of the middle classes
  • [Sep 18, 2019] To End Endless Wars, We Must Give Up Hegemony by Daniel Larison
  • [Sep 17, 2019] The Devolution of US-Russia Relations by Tony Kevin
  • [Sep 15, 2019] How the UK Security Services neutralised the country s leading liberal newspaper by Matt Kennard and Mark Curtis
  • [Sep 15, 2019] Demythologizing the Roots of the New Cold War by Ted Snider
  • [Sep 12, 2019] The Brain-Dead Maximalism of [neocon] Hard-liners by Daniel Larison
  • [Sep 11, 2019] John Brennan's and Jim Clappers' Last Gasp by Larry C Johnson
  • [Sep 11, 2019] Video Collapse of World Trade Center Building 7 The Bamboozle Has Captured Us
  • [Sep 10, 2019] Being called a narcissist by Jim Comey is akin to being accused of having sex with underage girls by the late Jeffrey Epstein by Larry C Johnsons
  • [Sep 10, 2019] The idea tha the USA won the Cold War is questionable
  • [Sep 10, 2019] How Deep Is the Rot in America s Institutions by Charles Hugh Smith
  • [Sep 10, 2019] It s all about Gene Sharp and seeping neoliberal regime change using Western logistical support, money, NGO and intelligence agencies and MSM as the leverage
  • [Sep 02, 2019] Questions Nobody Is Asking About Jeffrey Epstein by Eric Rasmusen
  • [Sep 02, 2019] Is it Cynical to Believe the System is Corrupt by Bill Black
  • [Aug 27, 2019] House Niggers Mutiny by Israel Shamir
  • [Aug 26, 2019] US Backs Xenophobia Mob Violence in Hong Kong
  • [Aug 25, 2019] What Is the US Role in the Hong Kong Protests> by Reese Erlich
  • [Aug 23, 2019] Spygate The Inside Story Behind the Alleged Plot to Take Down Trump by Jeff Carlson
  • [Aug 21, 2019] Solomon If Trump Declassifies These 10 Documents, Democrats Are Doomed
  • [Aug 20, 2019] Trump is about the agony. The agony of the US centered global neoliberal empire.
  • [Aug 17, 2019] The Unraveling of the Failed Trump Coup by Larry C Johnson
  • [Aug 17, 2019] Debunking the Putin Panic by Stephen F. Cohen
  • [Aug 17, 2019] Putin-Trump Derangement Syndrome (PTDS)
  • [Aug 13, 2019] "Much that passes as idealism is disguised hatred or disguised love of power."
  • [Aug 12, 2019] New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has called Epstein's death "way too convenient."
  • [Aug 12, 2019] Bruce Ohr 302s by Larry C Johnson - Sic Semper Tyrannis
  • [Aug 12, 2019] Russiagate is the idea around which varied interests can be organized
  • [Jul 30, 2019] The main task of Democratic Party is preventing social movements from undertaking independent political activity to their left and killing such social movements
  • [Jul 29, 2019] Looks like Epstein turned informant for Mueller s FBI in 2008. Likely earlier
  • [Jul 29, 2019] Michael Hudson Trump s Brilliant Strategy to Dismember US Dollar Hegemony by Michael Hudson
  • [Jul 29, 2019] American Ron Unz on Pizzagate
  • [Jul 29, 2019] The hidden control mechanism of what the late Paul A. Samuelson called our "democratic oligarchy".
  • [Jul 29, 2019] The Real Reason The Propagandists Have Been Promoting Russia Hysteria by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Jul 28, 2019] Antisemitism prejudices projection on Russians
  • [Jul 27, 2019] Understanding the Roots of the Obama Coup Against Trump by Larry C Johnson
  • [Jul 26, 2019] Tucker What should happen to those who lied about Russian collusion
  • [Jul 26, 2019] Tucker: Democrats believed Mueller would save America. But he is A daft old man blinking in the sunlight once the curtain has been opened
  • [Jul 23, 2019] John Helmer MH17 Evidence Tampering Revealed by Malaysia – FBI Attempt To Seize Black Boxes; Dutch Cover-Up of Forged Telephon
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Not The Onion: NY Times Urges Trump To Establish Closer Ties With Moscow
  • [Jul 23, 2019] Ukraine Election - Voters Defeat Second Color Revolution
  • [Jul 20, 2019] New US Pentagon Chief Vested Interest in War Conflict
  • [Jul 17, 2019] Oil Is Driving the Iran Crisis by Michael T. Klare
  • [Jul 13, 2019] Mueller Does Not Have Evidence That The IRA Was Part of Russian Government Meddling by Larry C Johnson
  • [Jul 09, 2019] Epstein and the conversion of politicians into "corrupt and vulnerable" brand
  • [Jul 09, 2019] Spying for Israel is Consequence Free by Philip Giraldi
  • [Jul 09, 2019] Ex-FBI, CIA Officials Draw Withering Fire on Russiagate by Ray McGovern
  • [Jul 06, 2019] Why is Iran such a high priority for US elite? Because Iran successfully booted out the CIA and CIA-imposed regime out of their country and successfully remained independent since then
  • [Jul 06, 2019] In practice, the USSR behaved exactly like a brutal totalitarian theocracy
  • [Jul 05, 2019] Who Won the Debate? Tulsi Gabbard let the anti-war genie out of the bottle by Philip Giraldi
  • [Jul 05, 2019] Globalisation- the rise and fall of an idea that swept the world - World news by Nikil Saval
  • [Jul 05, 2019] The UK public finally realized that the Globalist/Open Frontiers/ Neoliberal crowd are not their friends
  • [Jul 05, 2019] The World Bank and IMF 2019 by Michael Hudson and Bonnie Faulkner
  • [Aug 24, 2019] Peace plan for eastern Ukraine As divisive as the causes of the war by Fred Weir
  • [Aug 17, 2019] Putin-Trump Derangement Syndrome (PTDS)
  • [Jul 26, 2019] Tucker: Democrats believed Mueller would save America. But he is A daft old man blinking in the sunlight once the curtain has been opened
  • [Jun 30, 2019] USG's Bizarre Change of Position in the Roger Stone Case by Larry C Johnson
  • [Jun 29, 2019] Latest Weapon Of US Imperialism Liquified Natural Gas
  • [Jun 28, 2019] The Donald's Latest Iranian Caper Sh*t-Faced Stupidity by David Stockman
  • [Jun 27, 2019] 'The Ugly Americans' From Kermit Roosevelt to John Bolton Iran Al Jazeera
  • [Jun 27, 2019] The Ongoing Restructuring of the Greater Middle East by C.J. Hopkins
  • [Jun 26, 2019] Pompeo is a MIC lobbyist, not a diplomat
  • [Jun 26, 2019] Opinion - NY Times admits it sends stories to US government for approval before publication
  • [Jun 25, 2019] Tucker US came within minutes of war with Iran
  • [Jun 23, 2019] The return of fundamentalist nationalism is arguably a radicalized form of neoliberalism
  • [May 02, 2019] Neoliberalism and the Globalization of War. America s Hegemonic Project by Prof Michel Chossudovsky
  • [Apr 15, 2019] War is the force that gives America its meaning.
  • [Apr 15, 2019] I wonder if the Middle East is nothing more than a live-fire laboratory for the military
  • [Jun 28, 2019] Tulsi Gabbard vs Bolton
  • [Jun 27, 2019] 'The Ugly Americans' From Kermit Roosevelt to John Bolton Iran Al Jazeera
  • [Jun 22, 2019] Bolton Calls For Forceful Iranian Response To Continuing US Aggression
  • [Jun 20, 2019] Chuck Schumer 'The American People Deserve A President Who Can More Credibly Justify War With Iran'
  • [May 12, 2019] Is rabid warmonger, neocon chickenhawk Bolton a swinger? That is a mental picture that s deeply disturbing yet funny at the same time
  • [May 07, 2019] Look! A whale!
  • [Jun 26, 2019] Pompeo is a MIC lobbyist, not a diplomat
  • [Jun 22, 2019] Why The Empire Is Failing The Horrid Hubris Of The Albright Doctrine by Doug Bandow
  • [Jun 20, 2019] Chuck Schumer 'The American People Deserve A President Who Can More Credibly Justify War With Iran'
  • [Jun 22, 2019] Bolton Calls For Forceful Iranian Response To Continuing US Aggression
  • [Jun 22, 2019] Why a U.S.-Iran War Could End Up Being a Historic Disaster by Doug Bandow
  • [Jun 22, 2019] Why The Empire Is Failing The Horrid Hubris Of The Albright Doctrine by Doug Bandow
  • [Jun 21, 2019] America's Confrontation With Iran Goes Deeper Than Trump by Trita Parsi
  • [Jun 21, 2019] Russia accuses U.S. of pushing Iran situation to brink of war RIA - Reuters
  • [Jun 20, 2019] The Trump-Bolton Duo Is Just Like the Bush-Cheney Duo Warmongers Using Lies to Start Illegal Wars by Prof Rodrigue Tremblay
  • [Jun 19, 2019] Investigation Nation Mueller, Russiagate, and Fake Politics by Jim Kavanagh
  • [Jun 19, 2019] Bias bias the inclination to accuse people of bias by James Thompson
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Rule of law in Murrika is kaput
  • [Jun 11, 2019] A Word From Joe the Angry Hawaiian
  • [Jun 09, 2019] The looming 100-year US-China conflict by Martin Wolf
  • [Jun 05, 2019] Due to the nature of intelligence agencies work and the aura of secrecy control of intelligence agencies in democratic societies is a difficult undertaking as the entity you want to control is in many ways more politically powerful and more ruthless in keeping its privileges then controllers.
  • [Jun 05, 2019] Do Spies Run the World by Israel Shamir
  • [Jun 02, 2019] Somer highlights of Snowden spreach at Dalhousie University
  • [May 30, 2019] Whatever you may think of Trump, the people who set out to 'get him' are the scum of the Earth
  • [May 28, 2019] Any time you read an article (or a comment) on Russia, substitute the word Jew for Russian and International Jewry for Russia and re-read.
  • [May 25, 2019] The Belligerence Of Empire by Kenn Orphan
  • [May 22, 2019] On War With Iran, It's Trump Versus the Founding Fathers
  • [May 22, 2019] NATO has pushed eastward right up to its borders and threatened to incorporate regions that have been part of Russia's sphere of influence -- and its defense perimeter -- for centuries
  • [May 20, 2019] "Us" Versus "Them"
  • [May 19, 2019] How Russiagate replaced Analysis of the 2016 Election by Rick Sterling
  • [May 19, 2019] Intel agencies of the UK and US are guilty of fabricating evidence, breaking the laws (certainly of the targeted countries, but also of the UK and US), providing fake analysis and operating as evil actors on the dark side of humanity
  • [May 16, 2019] The Disinformationists by C.J. Hopkins
  • [May 14, 2019] iJews and the Left-i by Philip Mendes A Review, by Brenton Sanderson - The Unz Review
  • [May 14, 2019] Despite a $ 22 Trillion National Debt, America Is on a Military Spending Spree. 800 Overseas US Military Bases by Masud Wadan
  • [May 13, 2019] Not Just Ukraine; Biden May Have A Serious China Problem As Schweizer Exposes Hunter s $1bn Deal
  • [May 13, 2019] Angry Bear Senate Democratic Jackasses and Elmer Fudd
  • [May 13, 2019] US Foreign Policy as Bellicose as Ever by Serge Halimi
  • [May 12, 2019] Is rabid warmonger, neocon chickenhawk Bolton a swinger? That is a mental picture that s deeply disturbing yet funny at the same time
  • [May 12, 2019] Charting a Progressive Foreign Policy for the Trump Era and Beyond
  • [May 11, 2019] Whitney Judgment Day Looms For John Brennan
  • [May 11, 2019] Crowdstrike planted the malware on DNC systems, which they discovered later discovered and attributed to Russians later
  • [May 11, 2019] Why Crowdstrike's Russian Hacking Story Fell Apart -- Say Hello to Fancy Bear
  • [May 11, 2019] Intel and Law Enforcement Tried to Entrap Trump by Larry C Johnson
  • [May 11, 2019] Just worth noting that in the hand-written notes taken by Bruce Ohr after meetings with Chris Steele, there is the comment that the majority of the Steele Dossier was obtained from an expat Russian living in the US, and not from actual Russian sources in Russia
  • [May 11, 2019] Doug Ross @ Journal A TIMELINE OF TREASON How the DNC and FBI Leadership Tried to Fix a Presidential Election [Updated]
  • [May 11, 2019] Christopher Steele, FBI s Confidential Human Source by Publius Tacitus
  • [May 11, 2019] Nunes Memo Details Weaponization of FISA Court for Political Advantage by Elizabeth Lea Vos
  • [May 11, 2019] CIA Paid $100,000 To Shadowy Russian For Dirt on Trump, Including Sex Video by Chuck Ross
  • [May 10, 2019] Biden is up to neck in Spygate dirt by Jeff Carlson
  • [May 10, 2019] Mueller Report - Expensive Estimations And Elusive Evidence by Adam Carter
  • [May 10, 2019] Obama administration raced to obtain FICA warrant on Carter Page before Rogers investigation closes on them and that was definitely an obstruction of justice and interference with the ongoing investigation
  • [May 10, 2019] What was the meaning of the term "insurance policy" in Stzok messages to Lisa Page
  • [May 10, 2019] The Battle Between Rosenstein and McCabe
  • [May 08, 2019] Obama Spied on Other Republicans and Democrats As Well by Larry C Johnson
  • [May 07, 2019] Look! A whale!
  • [May 07, 2019] Chris Hedges: The Demonization of Russia is Driven by Defense Contractors
  • [May 05, 2019] The Left Needs to Stop Crushing on the Generals by Danny Sjursen
  • [May 03, 2019] Former high-ranking FBI officials on Andrew McCabe's alarming admissions
  • [May 03, 2019] Andrew McCabe played the key role in the appointment of the special prosecutor
  • [May 03, 2019] The Wheels Of Real Justice Are In Motion Now Kunstler Fears The Desperate Resistance Next Move...
  • [Apr 29, 2019] The Mueller Report Indicts the Trump-Russia Conspiracy Theory by Aaron Maté
  • [Apr 28, 2019] The British Role in Russiagate Is About to Be Fully Exposed
  • [Apr 28, 2019] Breath of fresh air--real journalism again! Have so much respect for Chris Hedges and Aaron Mate, great work!
  • [Apr 28, 2019] On Contact Russiagate Mueller Report w- Aaron Mate
  • [Apr 26, 2019] Jared Kushner, Not Maria Butina, Is America's Real Foreign Agent by Philip Giraldi
  • [Apr 26, 2019] Intelligence agencies meddling in elections
  • [Apr 22, 2019] FBI top brass have been colluding with top brass of CIA and MI6 to pursue ambitious anti-Russian agenda
  • [Apr 22, 2019] Current Neo-McCarthyism hysteria as a smoke screen of the UK and the USA intent to dominate European geopolitics and weaken Russia and Germany
  • [Apr 21, 2019] Makes me wonder if this started out as a standard operation by the FBI to gain leverage over a presidential contender
  • [Apr 21, 2019] Even if we got a candidate against the War Party the Party of Davos, would it matter? Trump betayal his voters, surrounded himself with neocons, continues to do Bibi's bidding, and ratcheting up tensions in Latin America, Middle East and with Russia. What's changed even with a candidate that the Swamp disliked and attempted to take down?
  • [Apr 21, 2019] Muller report implicates Obama administration in total and utter incompetence, if not pandering to the foreign intervention into the USA elections. The latter is called criminal negligence in legal speak.
  • [Apr 21, 2019] Psywar: Propaganda during Iraq war and beyond
  • [Apr 21, 2019] John Brennan's Police State USA
  • [Apr 21, 2019] Deciphering Trumps Foreign Policy by Oscar Silva-Valladares
  • [Apr 21, 2019] Whenever someone inconveniences the neoliberal oligarchy, the entire neoliberal MSM mafia tells us 24 x7 how evil and disgusting that person is. It's true of the leader of every nation which rejects neoliberal globalization as well as for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange
  • [Apr 20, 2019] Trump has certainly made the world safer
  • [Apr 20, 2019] Sure, blame those guys over there for Hillary fiasco and hire Mueller to get the goods . That s the ultimate the dog ate my homework excuse.
  • [Apr 19, 2019] Tulsi Gabbard: People get into a lot of conversations about political strategies I might get in trouble for saying this, but what does it matter if we beat Donald Trump, if we end up with someone who will perpetuate the very same crony capitalist policies, corporate policies, and waging more of these costly wars?
  • [Apr 17, 2019] Haspel is not the "underling". Trump is the underling. Sure, being that he is also an oligarch makes Trump's role in the show complicated, but Presidents are installed in order to serve the oligarchy, and the CIA are top level strategists/enforcers for the oligarchy.
  • [Apr 17, 2019] Deep State and the FBI Federal Blackmail Investigation
  • [Apr 17, 2019] Did CIA Director William Casey really say, We ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false
  • [Apr 16, 2019] The incompetent, the corrupt, the treacherous -- not just walking free, but with reputations intact, fat bank balances, and flourishing careers. Now they re angling for war with Iran.
  • [Apr 16, 2019] CIA Director Used Fake Skripal Incident Photos To Manipulate Trump
  • [Apr 15, 2019] Do you need to be stupid to support Trump in 2020, even if you voted for him as lesser evil in 2016
  • [Apr 13, 2019] America as a Myth of good life is a powerful tool of color revolutions
  • [Apr 12, 2019] Putin was KGB agent crowd forgets that Bush Sr was long time senior CIA operative and the director of CIA
  • [Apr 10, 2019] Habakkuk on cockroaches and the New York Times
  • [Apr 09, 2019] NYT: It Is, in Fact, All About the Benjamins by Philip Weiss
  • [Dec 21, 2019] The ruthless neo-colonialists of 21st century
  • [Apr 08, 2019] Aaron Maté Was Also Right About Russiagate
  • [Apr 07, 2019] Nunes The Russian Collusion Hoax Meets An Unbelievbable End
  • [Apr 06, 2019] The Magnitsky Act-Behind the Scenes ASEEES
  • [Apr 06, 2019] Trump is for socialism but only when it comes to funding US military industry Tulsi Gabbard
  • [Apr 04, 2019] How Brzezinski's Chessboard degenerated into Brennan's Russophobia by Mike Whitney
  • [Apr 04, 2019] Was John Brennan The Russia Lie Ringleader
  • [Apr 03, 2019] Jewish Power Rolls Over Washington by Philip Giraldi
  • [Apr 03, 2019] What We Can Learn From 1920s Germany by Brian E. Fogarty
  • [Apr 03, 2019] Suspected of Corruption at Home, Powerful Foreigners Find Refuge in the US
  • [Apr 02, 2019] 'Yats' Is No Longer the Guy by Robert Parry
  • [Apr 01, 2019] Amazon.com War with Russia From Putin Ukraine to Trump Russiagate (9781510745810) Stephen F. Cohen Books
  • [Mar 31, 2019] A Reprise of the Iraq-WMD Fiasco by James W Carden
  • [Mar 31, 2019] Guaido Set To Enact Uprising Rooted In US Regime-Change Operations Manual
  • [Mar 31, 2019] What is the purpose of Russiagate hysteria?
  • [Mar 30, 2019] The US desperately needs Venezuelan oil
  • [Mar 30, 2019] The Real Costs of Russiagate
  • [Mar 30, 2019] You don't like Trump? Bolton? Clinton? All of these people who are in or have passed through leadership positions in America are entirely valid representatives of Americans in general. You may imagine they are faking cluelessness to avoid acknowledging responsibility for their crimes, but the cluelessness is quite real and extends to the entire population.
  • [Mar 30, 2019] My suggestion is that Cambridge Analytica and others backing Trump and the Yankee imperial machine have been taking measurements of USA citizens opinions and are staggered by the results. They are panicked!
  • [Mar 25, 2019] Russiagate was never about substance, it was about who gets to image-manage the decline of a turbo-charged, self-harming neoliberal capitalism by Jonathan Cook
  • [Mar 25, 2019] Meet The Kushners First Couple In-Waiting by Ilana Mercer
  • [Mar 25, 2019] Spygate The True Story of Collusion (plus Infographic) by Jeff Carlson
  • [Mar 25, 2019] Nuland role in Russiagate
  • [Mar 25, 2019] Another SIGINT compromise ...
  • [Mar 24, 2019] Top Democrat is right: there was a collition, but not with Russians, but Zionist billionaires and Isreal lobby
  • [Mar 24, 2019] The accountability that must follow Mueller's report
  • [Mar 24, 2019] "Russia Gate" investigation was a color revolution agaist Trump. But a strnge side effect was that Clintons have managed to raise a vicious, loud mouthed thug to the status of some kind of martyr.
  • [Mar 24, 2019] With RussiaGate Over Where's Hillary
  • [Mar 24, 2019] One could wish that DOJ IG Horowitz could investigate and sanction British Intelligence for its use of official and non-official officials in starting this debacle.
  • [Mar 24, 2019] The manner in which Guccifer 2.0's English was broken, did not follow the typical errors one would expect if Guccifer 2.0's first language was Russian.
  • [Mar 24, 2019] One thing left out is the ability of readers to call BS on a story i.e. a robust comment section for debates.
  • [Mar 23, 2019] Brennan pipe dream obliterated. The color revolution against Trump failed
  • [Mar 22, 2019] Glenn Greenwald on Twitter The Mueller investigation is complete and this is a simple fact that will never go away
  • [Mar 20, 2019] In a remarkable report by British Channel 4, former CIA officials and a Reuters correspondent spoke candidly about the systematic dissemination of propaganda and misinformation in reporting on geopolitical conflicts
  • [Mar 18, 2019] Journalists who are spies
  • [Mar 18, 2019] FULL CNN TOWN HALL WITH TULSI GABBARD 3-10-19
  • [Mar 18, 2019] The Why are the media playing lapdog and not watchdog – again – on war in Iraq?
  • [Mar 17, 2019] Mueller uses the same old false flag scams, just different packaging of his forensics-free findings
  • [Mar 17, 2019] VIPS- Mueller's Forensics-Free Findings
  • [Mar 11, 2019] Bruce Ohr, Liar or Moron by Larry C Johnson
  • [Mar 05, 2019] The Shadow Governments Destruction Of Democracy
  • [Feb 27, 2019] Their votes mean absolutely nothing, and that the entire American electoral system is just a simulation of democracy
  • [Feb 22, 2019] Neo-McCarthyism is used to defend the US imperial policies. Branding dissidents as Russian stooges is a loophole that allow to suppress dissident opinions
  • [Feb 21, 2019] The Empire Now or Never by Fred Reed
  • [Feb 19, 2019] Tulsi Gabbard kills New World Order bloodbath in thirty seconds
  • [Feb 19, 2019] Warmongers in their ivory towers - YouTube
  • [Feb 18, 2019] Do You Believe in the Deep State Now by Robert W. Merry
  • [Feb 17, 2019] Was Trump was a deep state man from day one, just like Obama, Bush, Clinton and all the rest?
  • [Feb 17, 2019] Trump is Russian asset memo is really neocon propaganda overkill
  • [Feb 17, 2019] The goal of any war is the redistribution of taxpayer money into the bank accounts of MIC shareholders and executives
  • [Feb 16, 2019] MSM Begs For Trust After Buzzfeed Debacle by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Feb 13, 2019] MoA - Russiagate Is Finished
  • [Feb 13, 2019] Making Globalism Great Again by C.J. Hopkins
  • [Feb 13, 2019] Stephen Cohen on War with Russia and Soviet-style Censorship in the US by Russell Mokhiber
  • [Feb 10, 2019] Pussy John Bolton and His Codpiece Mustache by Fred Reed
  • [Feb 10, 2019] Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Exposes the Problem of Dark Money in Politics NowThis - YouTube
  • [Feb 05, 2019] The neocon s strategy
  • [Feb 04, 2019] Trump s Revised and Rereleased Foreign Policy: The World Policeman is Back
  • [Feb 02, 2019] According to the recipes devised by Reagan: why the methods which successfully destroyed the USSR do not work with modern Russia? by Alexey Makurin
  • [Jan 30, 2019] The ruling class of the US imperium will simply not tolerate any government that opposes its financial and geopolitical dominance
  • [Jan 29, 2019] Guardian became Deep State Guardian
  • [Jan 29, 2019] The Religious Fanaticism of Silicon Valley Elites by Paul Ingrassia
  • [Jan 26, 2019] Can the current US neoliberal/neoconservative elite be considered suicidal?
  • [Jan 24, 2019] No One Said Rich People Were Very Sharp Davos Tries to Combat Populism by Dean Baker
  • [Jan 22, 2019] War with Russia From Putin Ukraine to Trump Russiagate
  • [Jan 22, 2019] The French Anti-Neoliberal Revolution. On the conditions for its success by Dimitris Konstantakopoulos
  • [Jan 21, 2019] Beyond BuzzFeed The 10 Worst, Most Embarrassing US Media Failures On The Trump-Russia Story by Glenn Greenwald
  • [Jan 20, 2019] Doctor, nurse, Chief Nursing Officer of the Army, whatever.
  • [Jan 19, 2019] According to Wolin, domestic and foreign affairs goals are each important and on parallel tracks
  • [Jan 14, 2019] Nanci Pelosi and company at the helm of the the ship the Imperial USA: Most terrifying of all, the crew has become incompetent. They have no idea how to sail.
  • [Jan 13, 2019] As FBI Ramped Up Witch Hunt When Trump Fired Comey, Strzok Admitted Collusion Investigation A Joke
  • [Jan 13, 2019] Tucker Carlson Routs Conservatism Inc. On Unrestrained Capitalism -- And Immigration by Washington Watcher
  • [Jan 12, 2019] Tucker Carlson Mitt Romney supports the status quo. But for everyone else, it's infuriating Fox News
  • [Jan 12, 2019] Tucker Carlson has sparked the most interesting debate in conservative politics by Jane Coaston
  • [Jan 11, 2019] How President Trump Normalized Neoconservatism by Ilana Mercer
  • [Jan 11, 2019] Facts does not matter in the current propoganda environment, the narrative is everything
  • [Jan 02, 2019] The Only Meddling "Russian Bots" Were Actually Democrat-Led "Experts" by Mac Slavo
  • [Jan 02, 2019] That madness of the US neocons comes from having no behavioural limits, no references outside of groupthink, and manipulating the language. Simply put, you don't know anymore what's what outside of the narrative your group pushes. The manipulators ends up caught in their lies.
  • [Dec 30, 2018] RussiaGate In Review with Aaron Mate - Unreasoned Fear is Neoliberalism's Response to the Credibility Gap
  • [Dec 29, 2018] NATO Partisans Started a New Cold War With Russia -
  • [Dec 24, 2018] Jewish neocons and the romance of nationalist armageddon
  • [Dec 22, 2018] British Security Service Infiltration, the Integrity Initiative and the Institute for Statecraft by Craig Murray
  • [Dec 22, 2018] If Truth Cannot Prevail Over Material Agendas We Are Doomed by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Dec 21, 2018] Virtually no one in neoliberal MSM is paying attention to the fact that a group of Pakistani muslims, working for a Jewish Congresswoman from Florida, had full computer access to a large number of Democrat Representatives. Most of the press is disinterested in pursuing this matter
  • [Dec 10, 2018] One thing that has puzzled me about Trump methods is his constant tweeting of witch hunt with respect to Mueller but his unwillingness to actually disclose what Brennan, Clapper, Comey, et al actually did
  • [Dec 09, 2018] Die Weltwoche Weltwoche Online – www.weltwoche.ch Tucker Carlson Trump is not capable Die Weltwoche, Ausgabe 49-2018
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Neocons Sabotage Trump s Trade Talks - Huawei CFO Taken Hostage To Blackmail China
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Internet as a perfect tool of inverted totalitarism: it stimulates atomizatin of individuals, creates authomatic 24x7 surveillance over population, suppresses solidarity by exceggerating non-essential differences and allow more insidious brainwashing of the population
  • [Dec 08, 2018] Postmodern Imperialism: Geopolitics and the Great Games
  • [Dec 07, 2018] Brexit Theresa May Goes Greek! by Brett Redmayne
  • [Dec 05, 2018] Who are the Neocons by Guyenot
  • [Dec 02, 2018] Muller investigation has all the appearance of an investigation looking for a crime
  • [Dec 01, 2018] Congress' Screwed-Up Foreign Policy Priorities by Daniel Larison
  • [Nov 30, 2018] US Warlords now and at the tome Miill's Poer Elite was published
  • [Nov 27, 2018] 'Highly likely' that Magnitsky was poisoned by toxic chemicals on Bill Browder's orders
  • [Nov 27, 2018] US Foreign Policy Has No Policy by Philip Giraldi
  • [Nov 25, 2018] Let s recap what Obama s coup in Ukraine has led to shall we?
  • [Nov 24, 2018] Anonymous Exposes UK-Led Psyop To Battle Russian Propaganda
  • [Nov 24, 2018] British Government Runs Secret Anti-Russian Smear Campaigns
  • [Nov 24, 2018] Now we know created MH17 smear campaign, who financial Steele dossier and created Skripal affair ;-)
  • [Nov 24, 2018] When you are paid a lot of money to come up with plots psyops, you tend to come up with plots for psyops . The word entrapment comes to mind. Probably self-serving also.
  • [Nov 22, 2018] Facing Up to the Gradual Demise of Jewish Political Power
  • [Nov 22, 2018] Facing Up to the Gradual Demise of Zionist Political Power
  • [Nov 14, 2018] Nationalism vs partiotism
  • [Nov 13, 2018] The US's trajectory as it is, clearly parallel's the Soviet Union and Russia's situation during the mid-80's
  • [Nov 12, 2018] The Best Way To Honor War Veterans Is To Stop Creating Them by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Nov 12, 2018] Obama s CIA Secretly Intercepted Congressional Communications About Whistleblowers
  • [Nov 12, 2018] Protecting Americans from foreign influence, smells with COINTELPRO. Structural witch-hunt effect like during the McCarthy era is designed to supress decent to neoliberal oligarcy by Andre Damon and Joseph Kishore
  • [Nov 11, 2018] Trump's Iran Policy Cannot Succeed Without Allies The National Interest by James Clapper & Thomas Pickering
  • [Nov 10, 2018] US Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan Killed 500,000 by Jason Ditz
  • [Nov 09, 2018] Globalism Vs Nationalism in Trump's America by Joe Quinn
  • [Nov 07, 2018] There is only the Deep Purple Mil.Gov UniParty. The Titanic is dead in the water, lights out, bow down hard.
  • [Nov 05, 2018] Bertram Gross (1912-1997) in "Friendly Fascism: The New Face of American Power" warned us that fascism always has two looks. One is paternal, benevolent, entertaining and kind. The other is embodied in the executioner's sadistic leer
  • [Nov 03, 2018] Kunstler The Midterm Endgame Democrats' Perpetual Hysteria
  • [Oct 25, 2018] DNC Emails--A Seth Attack Not a Russian Hack by Publius Tacitus
  • [Oct 25, 2018] Putin jokes with Bolton: Did the eagle eaten all the olives
  • [Oct 20, 2018] I am most encouraged by the apparent Putin's realisation that the First Strike is possible now if not even likely. If the Russians expect an attack they are much less likely to be totally surprised, as usual. In fact, never in history was such attack by the West more likely than now, for various reasons which would take a while to explain.
  • [Oct 20, 2018] Cloak and Dagger by Israel Shamir
  • [Oct 10, 2018] A Decalogue of American Empire-Building A Dialogue by James Petras
  • [Oct 09, 2018] NYT Claims Trump Campaign (Almost) Colluded With Israeli Spies
  • [Oct 04, 2018] Brett Kavanaugh's 'revenge' theory spotlights past with Clintons by Lisa Mascaro
  • [Oct 02, 2018] I m puzzled why CIA is so against Kavanaugh?
  • [Sep 29, 2018] The Schizophrenic Deep State is a Symptom, Not the Disease by Charles Hugh Smith
  • [Sep 29, 2018] Trump Surrenders to the Iron Law of Oligarchy by Dan Sanchez
  • [Sep 27, 2018] Hiding in Plain Sight Why We Cannot See the System Destroying Us
  • [Sep 27, 2018] The power elites goal is to change its appearance to look like something new and innovative to stay ahead of an electorate who are increasingly skeptical of the neoliberalism and globalism that enrich the elite at their expense.
  • [Sep 21, 2018] One party state: Trump's 'Opposition' Supports All His Evil Agendas While Attacking Fake Nonsence by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Sep 16, 2018] Looks like the key players in Steele dossier were CIA assets
  • [Sep 16, 2018] Perils of Ineptitude by Andrew Levin
  • [Sep 16, 2018] I m delighted we can see the true face of American exceptionalism on display everyday. The last thing I want to see is back to normal.
  • [Sep 15, 2018] Why the US Seeks to Hem in Russia, China and Iran by Patrick Lawrence
  • [Sep 07, 2018] New York Times Undermining Peace Efforts by Sowing Suspicion by Diana Johnstone
  • [Sep 03, 2018] www.informationclearinghouse.info/50168.htm In Memoriam by Paul Edwards
  • [Sep 02, 2018] Open letter to President Trump concerning the consequences of 11 September 2001 by Thierry Meyssan
  • [Aug 28, 2018] A Colony in a Nation by Chris Hayes
  • [Aug 24, 2018] The priorities of the deep state and its public face the MSM
  • [Aug 22, 2018] The CIA Owns the US and European Media by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Aug 19, 2018] End of "classic neoliberalism": to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare.
  • [Aug 18, 2018] Corporate Media the Enemy of the People by Paul Street
  • [Aug 14, 2018] I think one of Mueller s deeply embedded character flaw is that once he decides on burying someone he becomes possessed
  • [Aug 14, 2018] US Intelligence Community is Tearing the Country Apart from the Inside by Dmitry Orlov
  • [Aug 13, 2018] Imperialism Is Alive and Kicking A Marxist Analysis of Neoliberal Capitalism by C.J. Polychroniou
  • [Aug 08, 2018] Ten Bombshell Revelations From Seymour Hersh's New Autobiography
  • [Aug 05, 2018] Cooper was equally as unhinged as Boot: Neoliberal MSM is a real 1984 remake.
  • [Jul 31, 2018] Is not the Awan affair a grave insult to the US "Intelligence Community?
  • [Jul 28, 2018] American Society Would Collapse If It Were not For These 8 Myths by Lee Camp
  • [Jul 23, 2018] Chickens with Their Heads Cut Off, Coming Home to Roost. The "Treason Narrative" by Helen Buyniski
  • [Jul 22, 2018] Tucker Carlson SLAMS Intelligence Community On Russia
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Doubting The Intelligence Of The Intelligence Community by Ilana Mercer
  • [Jul 20, 2018] So many (ex-) MI6 operators (Steele, Tait, etc) involved in the story. It is interesting that the media don t question the intense involvement of the British in all this. And of course, the British haven t been laggards in adding fuel to the fire by the whole novichok hoax
  • [Jul 20, 2018] Is President Trump A Traitor Because He Wants Peace With Russia by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Jul 15, 2018] What Mueller won t find by Bob In Portland
  • [Jul 13, 2018] False flag operation covering DNC leaks now involves Mueller and his team
  • [Jul 03, 2018] When you see some really successful financial speculator like Soros or (or much smaller scale) Browder, search for links with intelligence services to explain the success or at least a part of it related to xUSSR space , LA and similar regions
  • [Jun 09, 2018] Spooks Spooking Themselves by Daniel Lazare
  • [Jun 09, 2018] Still Waiting for Evidence of a Russian Hack by Ray McGovern
  • [May 09, 2018] Trotskyist Delusions, by Diana Johnstone
  • [Apr 24, 2018] The Democratic Party has embraced the agenda of the military-intelligence apparatus and sought to become its main political voice
  • [Apr 21, 2018] Amazingly BBC newsnight just started preparing viewers for the possibility that there was no sarin attack, and the missile strikes might just have been for show
  • [Apr 21, 2018] It s a tough old world and we are certainly capable of a Salisbury set-up and god knows what else in Syria.
  • [Apr 15, 2018] The Trump Regime Is Insane by Paul Craig Roberts
  • [Mar 27, 2018] The Stormy Daniels scandal Political warfare in Washington hits a new low by Patrick Martin
  • [Mar 13, 2018] The CIA takeover of the Democratic Party by Patrick Martin
  • [Mar 10, 2018] Meier might have discovered that his subject had been, as it were, 'top supporting actor' in the first fumbling attempt by Christopher Steele et al to produce a plausible-sounding scenario as to the background to Litvinenko s death.
  • [Mar 10, 2018] There is reason to suspect that some former and very likely current employees of the FBI have been colluding with elements in other American and British intelligence agencies, in particular the CIA and MI6, in support of an extremely ambitious foreign policy agenda for a very long time. It also seems clear that influential journalists, such as Glenn Simpson was before founding Fusion GPS, along with his wife Mary Jacoby, have been strongly involved in this
  • [Mar 08, 2018] Mueller determines the US foreign policy toward Russia; The Intel Community Lies About Russian Meddling by Publius Tacitus
  • [Feb 08, 2018] Try Googling Riggs Bank – a lot of interesting information emerges, on matters such as their involvement with Prince Bandar. So, what we are dealing with is a joint Anglo-American attempt to create a comprador oligarchy who could loot Russia s raw materials resources
  • [Feb 04, 2018] DNC collusion with Ukrainian IT Security company Crowdstrike tied to the Atlantic Council to push false narrative of DNC hack and malware to influence US election
  • [Dec 31, 2017] How America Spreads Global Chaos by Nicolas J.S. Davies
  • [Dec 31, 2017] Is [neo]Liberalism a Dying Faith by Pat Buchanan
  • [Dec 31, 2017] What Happens When A Russiagate Skeptic Debates A Professional Russiagater
  • [Dec 28, 2017] How CrowdStrike placed malware in DNC hacked servers by Alex Christoforou
  • [Dec 22, 2017] When Sanity Fails - The Mindset of the Ideological Drone by The Saker
  • [Jul 17, 2017] Tucker Carlson Goes to War Against the Neocons by Curt Mills
  • [Jul 12, 2017] Stephen Cohens Remarks on Tucker Carlson Last Night Were Extraordinary
  • [Jun 24, 2017] The Criminal Laws of Counterinsurgency by Todd E. Pierce
  • [May 23, 2017] CIA, the cornerstone of the deep state has agenda that is different from the US national interest and reflect agenda of the special interest groups such as Wall Street bankers and MIC
  • [Feb 19, 2017] The deep state is running scared!
  • [May 02, 2019] Neoliberalism and the Globalization of War. America s Hegemonic Project by Prof Michel Chossudovsky
  • [Jul 29, 2019] Michael Hudson Trump s Brilliant Strategy to Dismember US Dollar Hegemony by Michael Hudson
  • [Jan 14, 2019] Nanci Pelosi and company at the helm of the the ship the Imperial USA: Most terrifying of all, the crew has become incompetent. They have no idea how to sail.
  • [Nov 14, 2018] Nationalism vs partiotism
  • [Oct 25, 2018] Putin jokes with Bolton: Did the eagle eaten all the olives
  • [Aug 30, 2017] The President of Belgian Magistrates - Neoliberalism is a form of Fascism by Manuela Cadelli
  • [Nov 12, 2020] Initiators or Russiagate panicking about the possibility of additional disclosure
  • [Nov 12, 2020] Caitlin Johnstone- Americans didn't vote against Trump, they voted against more media psychological abuse by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Nov 09, 2020] Biden victory in some ways looks like Catch 22 for neoliberal Dems
  • [Nov 09, 2020] Tucker: GOP Establishment Happy to Sell Out their Voters with Amnesty
  • [Nov 07, 2020] The result of this election can be summarized with one phase "Strange non-death of neoliberalism."
  • [Nov 07, 2020] Trump as fake populist
  • [Nov 06, 2020] Did the Iraq War Cause the Great Recession?'
  • [Nov 05, 2020] The Last White Man by Eric Striker
  • [Oct 28, 2020] Wall Street Banks, And Their Employees, Now Officially Lean Democrat
  • [Oct 26, 2020] Politicians books as a subtle form of corruption
  • [Oct 21, 2020] How Trump Got Played By The Military-Industrial Complex by Akbar Shahid Ahmed
  • [Oct 21, 2020] This Is Not A Russian Hoax 'Nonpublic Information' Debunks Letter From '50 Former Intel Officials'
  • [Oct 20, 2020] Tucker Carlson- The American Media Will Never Be The Same After Hunter Biden Story - Video - RealClearPolitics
  • [Oct 20, 2020] Glenn Greenwald- Media and Intel Community Working Together To Manipulate The American People - Video - RealClearPolitics
  • [Oct 19, 2020] The Emails Are Russian- Will Be The Narrative, Regardless Of Facts Or Evidence by Caitlin Johnstone
  • [Oct 19, 2020] The neocon/NATO aggressive expansionism and anti-Russian hysteria has many purposes, but one is surely domestic repression: to gaslight and cause fear-the-foreign-bogeyman trauma among the American and British people
  • [Oct 19, 2020] New report shows more than $1B from war industry and govt. going to top 50 think tanks
  • [Oct 11, 2020] Putin on the US Presidential race and the myth that Trump, one of the most hostile to Russia presidents in history, is somehow a "Putin puppet"
  • [Oct 01, 2020] 'Clueless' former FBI Director James Comey admits the agency's Trump-Russia probe was a ball of bungled confusion by David Haggith
  • [Sep 30, 2020] Opinion - I Ran the C.I.A. Now I m Endorsing Hillary Clinton by Michael J. Morell
  • [Sep 30, 2020] DNI Letter Supports Allegation That Hillary Clinton Created 'Russiagate' by b
  • [Sep 28, 2020] No wonder Pompey and his friend Jeffries won't give up on Syria! No wonder
  • [Sep 28, 2020] Truth be told: political operatives own and run our MSM. This is why the press is called the 'Fourth Estate'
  • [Sep 26, 2020] What is predatory capitalism
  • [Sep 25, 2020] US standard "negotiating" techniques
  • [Sep 23, 2020] How fake media actually works: reporter are given the narrative and they should rehash their stories to fit it
  • [Sep 23, 2020] Another sign of the crisis of legitimacy of neoliberal elite: FBI Agent Who Discovered Hillary's Emails On Weiner Laptop Claims He Was Told To Erase Computer
  • [Sep 21, 2020] How the west lost by Anatol Lieven
  • [Sep 21, 2020] Stephen F. Cohen- The Ukrainian Crisis - It s not All Putin s Fault
  • [Sep 21, 2020] Stephen Cohen at the AJC 2017 Forum, about Russia and Terrorism
  • [Sep 21, 2020] Tucker: Democrats, fires and the climate misinformation campaign
  • [Sep 20, 2020] CJ Hopkins Exposes The Final Act In 'The War On Populism'
  • [Sep 20, 2020] Darren Beattie Tucker Carlson Discuss Color Revolutions The Plot To Oust President Trump
  • [Sep 20, 2020] Norm Eisen And The Colour Revolution Playbook!
  • [Sep 20, 2020] THE TAKE-DOWN OF TRUMP ALA THE "COLOR REVOLUTION"- NORM EISEN'S REVOLUTIONARY PLAYBOOK A Deeply Embedded (Demster) Lawfare Operative; Regime Change Professionals More. What's Going On- Conservative Firing Line
  • [Sep 17, 2020] Why the Blob Needs an Enemy by ARTA MOEINI
  • [Sep 10, 2020] Is BLM the Mask behind which the Oligarchs Operate, by Mike Whitney
  • [Sep 09, 2020] Proof of collusion at last! - IRRUSSIANALITY
  • [Sep 02, 2020] 400,000+ Americans sick of political duopoly turn out for virtual 'People's Convention' vote to launch new anti-corporate party
  • [Sep 01, 2020] Are We Deliberately Trying to Provoke a Military Crisis With Russia by Ted Galen Carpenter
  • [Sep 01, 2020] How Democrats and Republicans made deals to pass Magnitsky Act by Lucy Komisar
  • [Aug 24, 2020] Is the goal to take Belarus and destabilize Russia (prepare the terrain) or was it to take both at the same time?
  • [Aug 23, 2020] Catapulting Russian-Meddling Propaganda by Ray McGovern
  • [Aug 22, 2020] Kamala is a MIC marionette
  • [Aug 21, 2020] What Belarus Stands to Lose by Vadim Nikitin
  • [Aug 19, 2020] Is Belarus a color revolution- The real problem is that ANY protest these days may be by Nebojsa Malic
  • [Aug 19, 2020] The Republican led Senate Select Committee on Intelligence repeats the lies about Guccifer 2.0
  • [Aug 19, 2020] American imperialism vs. EU imperialism: Pushed into the Ukrainian adventure by the US? Rubbish. The EU and its constituent members were attempting to play their own hand and were not merely following the US lead submissively.
  • [Aug 16, 2020] 'You're being used as cannon fodder'- Lukashenko urges people to STAY HOME, blames protests on foreign meddling
  • [Aug 16, 2020] CIA Behind Guccifer Russiagate A Plausible Scenario
  • [Aug 08, 2020] Russia Hoax- Are We All Being Played- Put Up Or Shut Up! - Zero Hedge
  • [Aug 03, 2020] Trump DID commit obstruction of justice... he refused to force HIS Dept of Justice to indict Hillary, Comey, Brennan and Clapper
  • [Aug 01, 2020] Executed Turkish general exposed misuse of Qatari funds for Syria extremists- Report - Al Arabiya English
  • [Jul 31, 2020] Tucker Carlson calls Obama 'one of the sleaziest and most dishonest figures' in US political history
  • [Jul 29, 2020] America's Own Color Revolution by F. William Engdahl
  • [Jul 23, 2020] Demorats defeat amedment ot cut Defence by 10%
  • [Jul 23, 2020] This is a biggie: Egypt's parliament approves troop deployment to Libya
  • [Jul 21, 2020] This Skripal thing smelled to high heaven from day 1. My opinion is that Sergei Skripal was involved (to what degree is open to speculation) with the Steele dossier.
  • [Jul 20, 2020] The Real 'Russian Playbook' Is Written in English -- Strategic Culture
  • [Jul 13, 2020] George Washington Tried To Warn Americans About Foreign Policy Today by Doug Bandow
  • [Jul 06, 2020] US claim of 'Russian Bounty' plot in Afghanistan is dubious and dangerous - The Grayzone
  • [Jul 04, 2020] The Return of the Neoliberal Interventionists and their alliance with Bush republicans by James W. Carden
  • [Jul 03, 2020] I don't think we can assume that even now Trump actually has control of the FBI; it is still in hands of Obama faction
  • [Jul 03, 2020] The world s economy is in contraction. Although capital, what actual capital exists, will have to try and do something productive, it is confronted by this fact, that everything is facing contraction.
  • [Jul 01, 2020] Putin s economic and social policies have a neoliberal bent but Putin is far from a classic neoliberal
  • [Jul 01, 2020] Russiagate's Last Gasp by Ray McGovern
  • [Jul 01, 2020] Three Glaring Problems with the Russian Taliban Bounty Story by Barbara Boland
  • [Jul 01, 2020] Control freaks that cannot even control their own criminal impulses!
  • [Jun 28, 2020] Russian position for Start talks: "We don't believe the US in its current shape is a counterpart that is reliable, so we have no confidence, no trust whatsoever".
  • [Jun 23, 2020] Surely 'legitimacy' goes to the victor. Once you've won you can build a sort of legitimacy that the majority will agree with (whether its real or not)
  • [Jun 23, 2020] It is shocking to see such a disgusting piece of human garbage like Joe Biden get so many working class voters to vote for him. Biden has never missed a chance to stab the working class in the back in service to his wealthy patrons.
  • [Jun 23, 2020] Putin Tries To Set Record Straight by
  • [Jun 21, 2020] Paul R. Pillar who pointed out that U.S. sanctions are frequently peddled as a peaceful alternative to war fit the definition of 'crimes against peace'.
  • [Jun 19, 2020] The Police Weren t Created to Protect and Serve. They Were Created to Maintain Order. A Brief Look at the History of Police
  • [Jun 19, 2020] The USG' s definition of Dictator
  • [Jun 18, 2020] Populism vs. inverted totalitarism and the illusion of choice in the US elections
  • [Jun 15, 2020] Do Deep State Elements Operate within the Protest Movement? by Mike Whitney
  • [Jun 15, 2020] Full Special Investigation - Donald Trump vs The Deep State
  • [Jun 14, 2020] Jeane J. Kirkpatrick 30 Years Unheeded
  • [Jun 14, 2020] Anonymous Berkeley Professor Shreds BLM Injustice Narrative With Damning Facts And Logic
  • [Jun 13, 2020] How False Flag Operations are Carried Out Today by Philip M. Giraldi
  • [Jun 13, 2020] Korea is just another distraction: false conflicts with China, North Korea, Russia and Iran are needed to keep support for MIC and Security State which cost 1.2 trillion a year
  • [Jun 12, 2020] Flynn Case 85 Lies, Contradictions, Oddities, Unusual Occurrences by Petr Svab
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Mueller investigation was never about Trump colluding with Russia. It was always about Trump obstructing the investigation of the collusion with Russia that the investigation was not about
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Not The Onion: NY Times Urges Trump To Establish Closer Ties With Moscow
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Internet Users Who Call For Attacking Other Countries Will Now Be Enlisted In The Military Automatically
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Rule of law in Murrika is kaput
  • [Jun 03, 2020] Requiem to Russiagate: this was the largest and the most successful attempt to gaslight the whole US population ever attempted by CIA and Clinton wing of Dems by CJ Hopkins
  • [Jun 03, 2020] RussiaGate for neoliberal Dems and MSM honchos is the way to avoid the necessity to look into the camera and say, I guess people hated us so much they were even willing to vote for Donald Trump
  • [Jun 02, 2020] Sheldon Wolin and Inverted Totalitarianism
  • [Jun 01, 2020] This is one war party -- war party, imperial party of militarism, conquest and killing of civilians
  • [May 31, 2020] We Are Combat Vets, and We Want America to Reboot Memorial Day by Matthew Hoh and Danny Sjursen
  • [May 30, 2020] More On "Obamagate!"
  • [May 29, 2020] You can;t have a Democracy at home and an empire aboard, the violence of empire will always turn against the very idea of democracy
  • [May 26, 2020] News Stories Avoid Naming Israel by Philip Giraldi
  • [May 24, 2020] FBI Document Reveals That Without Direct Israeli 'Intervention' Trump Would Have Lost 2016 Election
  • [May 24, 2020] Obamagate as the reaction of managerial class neoliberals on the crisis of neoliberalism
  • [May 24, 2020] Unable to communicate in Arabic and with no relevant experience or appropriate educational training
  • [May 23, 2020] China is still in great danger. Of the existing 30 or so high-tech productive chains, China only enjoys superiority at 2 or 3
  • [May 22, 2020] No US president who can withdraw the USA from the Forever Wars
  • [May 22, 2020] Time to Break up the FBI by William S. Smith
  • [May 21, 2020] The 'Clean Break' Doctrine OffGuardian
  • [May 20, 2020] The American Mission and the Evil Empire The Crusade for a Free Russia Since 1881 by Foglesong
  • [May 20, 2020] Newly Revealed Texts Show Strzok, Page Altered Flynn Interview Notes
  • [May 20, 2020] McGovern Turn Out The Lights, Russiagate Is Over by Ray McGovern
  • [May 19, 2020] America: "We demand an coronavirus origin investigation, but the investigators must agree on the outcome that we specify before they begin investigating!"
  • [May 19, 2020] Russophobia in the Age of Donald Trump
  • [May 18, 2020] FBI under Comey as an uncontrolled political police operating without any oversight from Justice Department
  • [May 17, 2020] General Flynn investigation 'has tarnished Obama's legacy' - YouTube
  • [May 17, 2020] Apparently, the FBI, and not the CIA, are the real government.
  • [May 16, 2020] A model democrat
  • [May 16, 2020] Bought MSM experts typically are just MIC prostitutes: most are neocons and "Russiagaters"
  • [May 16, 2020] Putin's Call For A New System and the 1944 Battle Of Bretton Woods
  • [May 16, 2020] Tucker Adam Schiff should resign
  • [May 15, 2020] The Complete Collusion Against Trump Timeline
  • [May 13, 2020] Dramatic change of direction for Syrian envoy
  • [May 13, 2020] From RussiaGate To ObamaGate The End Of Boomerville by Tom Luongo
  • [May 11, 2020] Lee Zeldin Adam Schiff 'should resign today' for role in Russia investigation by Dominick Mastrangelo
  • [May 11, 2020] McCarthy: It would be 'profoundly crazy if Obama wasn't in on Flynn case'
  • [May 11, 2020] Twin Pillars of Russiagate Crumble by Ray McGovern
  • [May 10, 2020] Did the FBI target Michael Flynn to protect Obama's policies, not national security by Kevin R. Brock
  • [May 10, 2020] Does Obama now feels his potential liability for staging coup d' tat and gaslighting the whole nation?
  • [May 07, 2020] Media Malpractice Is Criminalizing Better Relations With Russia by Stephen F. Cohen
  • [May 07, 2020] There's No Question It's A Fraud Fmr Trump Attorney Says Mueller Badly Misled White House, Schiff Is Nancy's Liar Zero
  • [May 07, 2020] Angry Bear " "cannot remember a single International Crisis in which the United States had no global presence at all"
  • [May 05, 2020] Newly released FBI documents show Israel intervened in 2016 election to help Trump
  • [May 05, 2020] Is there a "6th column" trying to subvert Russia, by The Saker
  • [May 03, 2020] Flynn told the investigators that he knew that the call was inevitably monitored and that a transcript existed. However, he did not recall discussing sanctions with Kislyak. There was no reason to hide such a discussion
  • [Apr 29, 2020] Trump, despite pretty slick deception during his election campaign, is an typical imperialist and rabid militarist. His administration continuredand in some areas exceeded the hostility of Obama couse against Russia
  • [Apr 24, 2020] Please Tell the Establishment That U.S. Hegemony is Over by Daniel Larison
  • [Apr 17, 2020] The word socialism became just a neoliberal smear. We should talk about public sector vs private sector, not about socialism
  • [Apr 17, 2020] Declassified Horowitz Footnotes Show Obama Officials Knew Steele Dossier Was Russian Disinfo Designed To Target Trump Zero He
  • [Apr 17, 2020] Barr just said the Russia collusion probe was a travesty, had no basis and was intended to sabotage Trump.
  • [Apr 11, 2020] The country that glorifies profit at any cost and ruthless unethical competition will fare bad in case of any virus epidemic. That includes "Typhoid Mary" cases of selfish anti-social behaviour
  • [Apr 11, 2020] 'Never in my country': COVID-19 and American exceptionalism by Jeanne Morefield
  • [Apr 10, 2020] Tucker: In crisis, nothing is more important than staying connected to reality
  • [Apr 08, 2020] Feudal Japan Edo and the US Empire by Hiroyuki Hamada
  • [Apr 05, 2020] Esper tone deafness: a sad illustration of wildly misplaced priorities of military industrial complex
  • [Apr 02, 2020] Bloomberg spent north of $500 millions to become president with zero results, and you want me to believe that Russians spent 1% of that and got better results
  • [Mar 24, 2020] This weaponizing of random indignation is a classic tool of the Western propaganda
  • [Mar 22, 2020] Intelligence agencies and the virus
  • [Mar 21, 2020] Tulsi Gabbard says insider traders should be 'investigated prosecuted,' as Left and Right team up on profiteering senator
  • [Mar 21, 2020] When reading any article concerning current events (ie. Ukraine, Syria, Iran, Venezuela, or Coronavirus) consider how the The Seven Principles of Propaganda may apply
  • [Mar 21, 2020] Tucker Senator Burr sold shares after virus briefing
  • [Mar 13, 2020] Daffy Duck. cartoon was made in 1953 and like many Looney Tune cartoon's, they are an extreme parody of life. It dawned on me that this cartoon is an almost perfect description of US Military policy and action.
  • [Mar 04, 2020] Russiagate should be viewed as classic, textbook case of gaslighting and projecting election interference
  • [Mar 04, 2020] Why Are We Being Charged? Surprise Bills From Coronavirus Testing Spark Calls for Government to Cover All Costs by Jake Johnson
  • [Mar 03, 2020] Let s Talk About Your Alleged #Resistance by Joe Giambrone
  • [Mar 03, 2020] "Predatory capitalism", which clearly describes what neoliberalism is.
  • [Mar 03, 2020] Whacking Rich is a reminder to Sanders what the party establishmen is capable of
  • [Mar 01, 2020] Countering Nationalist Oligarchy by Ganesh Sitaraman
  • [Feb 29, 2020] A very interesting and though provoking presentation by Ambassador Chas Freeman "America in Distress: The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change"
  • [Feb 29, 2020] Secret Wars, Forgotten Betrayals, Global Tyranny. Who s Really In Charge Of The US Military by Cynthia Chung
  • [Feb 28, 2020] Chas Freeman America in Distress The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change
  • [Feb 27, 2020] An interesting view on Russian "intelligencia" by the scientist and writer Zinoviev expressed during "perestroika" in 1991
  • [Feb 26, 2020] A serious US politician has to demonstrate a large capacity for betrayal.
  • [Feb 26, 2020] Elections as a form of class war
  • [Feb 25, 2020] The Democrats' Quandary In a Struggle Between Oligarchy and Democracy, Something Must Give by Michael Hudson
  • [Feb 23, 2020] Previously oppressed group, given a lucky chance, most often strive for dominance and oppression of other groups including and especially former dominant group. This is an eternal damnation of ethno/cultural nationalism
  • [Feb 23, 2020] Welcome to the American Regime
  • [Feb 23, 2020] Where Have You Gone, Smedley Butler The Last General To Criticize US Imperialism by Danny Sjursen
  • [Feb 22, 2020] The Red Thread A Search for Ideological Drivers Inside the Anti-Trump Conspiracy by Diana West
  • [Feb 21, 2020] Why Both Republicans And Democrats Want Russia To Become The Enemy Of Choice by Philip Giraldi
  • [Feb 28, 2020] Chas Freeman America in Distress The Challenges of Disadvantageous Change
  • [Feb 28, 2020] Russia s Relationship With China Is Growing Despite Setbacks by Lyle J. Goldstein ,
  • [Feb 16, 2020] Understanding the Ukraine Story by Joe Lauria
  • [Feb 14, 2020] Is Apartheid the Inevitable Outcome of Zionism? by Henry Siegman
  • [Feb 09, 2020] Trump demand for 50% of Iraq oil revenue sound exactly like a criminal mob boss
  • [Feb 09, 2020] The Deeper Story Behind The Assassination Of Soleimani
  • [Feb 09, 2020] World Conquest The United States' Global Military Crusade (1945-2020) By Eric Waddell
  • [Feb 08, 2020] Is Iraq About To Switch From US to Russia
  • [Feb 07, 2020] How They Sold the Iraq War by Jeffrey St. Clair
  • [Feb 07, 2020] Sanders Called JPMorgan's CEO America's 'Biggest Corporate Socialist' Here's Why He Has a Point
  • [Feb 04, 2020] The FBI is the secret police force of the authoritarian (aching to be totalitarian) govt hidden behind "Truth, Justice the American Way"
  • [Feb 03, 2020] White House Warriors: How the National Security Council Transformed the American Way of War
  • [Feb 02, 2020] The most interesting issue is the role of NSC in this impeachment story
  • [Jan 31, 2020] Trump excoriates Bolton in tweets this morning
  • [Jan 31, 2020] What's going on right now with Elizabeth Warren and Hillary Clinton is the beginning of sticking the knife back into Bernie's back by Bill Martin What follows originates in some notes I made in response to one such woman who supports Bernie. There are two main points.
  • [Jan 27, 2020] The end of Trump? Trump betrayed all major promises of his 2016 election campaign. Trump needs to go...
  • [Jan 25, 2020] Rabobank What If... The Protectionists Are Right And The Free Traders Are Wrong by Michael Every
  • [Jan 24, 2020] How Are Iran and the "Axis of the Resistance" Affected by the US Assassination of Soleimani by Elijah J. Magnier
  • [Jan 24, 2020] Lawrence Wilkerson Lambasts 'the Beast of the National Security State' by Adam Dick
  • [Jan 23, 2020] An incredible level of naivety of people who still think that a single individual, or even two, can change the direction of murderous US policies that are widely supported throughout the bureaucracy?
  • [Jan 20, 2020] Fake Investigations... Designed To Fool by Bryce Buchanan
  • [Jan 19, 2020] Anyone who has studied the history of the Third Reich would note a curious similarity between Germany s behaviour under Hitler and the current behaviour of the US both internally and externally
  • [Jan 19, 2020] The frantic attempt to deflect attention from US foreign wars and mainly derisive media coverage of Tulsi Gabbard is a case in point. Is she the harbinger of a growing political movement aiming to dismantle the military empire project?
  • [Jan 18, 2020] The joke is on us: Without the USSR the USA oligarchy resorted to cannibalism and devour the American people
  • [Jan 18, 2020] Putin plants to prohibit dual citizens to serve in government
  • [Jan 18, 2020] Super Imperialism: The Economic Strategy of American Empire is available for free download
  • [Jan 17, 2020] Ukraine is a deeply sick patient. The destiny of ordinary Ukrainians is deeply tragic. Diaspora is greedy and want a piece of cake immediately
  • [Jan 14, 2020] Impeachment Of President Trump An Imperial War Game by By Barbara Boyd
  • [Jan 12, 2020] MIC along with Wall Street controls the government and the country
  • [Jan 12, 2020] US has been preaching human rights while mounting wars and lying.
  • [Jan 12, 2020] Luongo Fears "An Abyss Of Losses" As Iraq Becomes MidEast Battleground
  • [Jan 10, 2020] The Saker interviews Michael Hudson
  • [Jan 09, 2020] Come Home, America Stop Policing The Globe And Put An End To Wars-Without-End by John Whitehead
  • [Jan 09, 2020] Opposing War With Iran: Three Reasons by Anthony DiMaggio
  • [Jan 08, 2020] I can't quite understand how gratuitous US piracy and adventurism in places on the globe beyond the knowledge and reach of most Americans could possibly be compared to Iranian actions securing their immediate regional borders and interests.
  • [Jan 08, 2020] Iraqi Journalist: Killing Soleimani "Ended An Era In Which Iran And The United States Coexisted In Iraq" by Tim Hains
  • [Jan 08, 2020] Do you really want to be a one term president? Pompeo can talk big now and then go back to Kansas to run for senator. Where will you be able to take refuge?
  • [Jan 08, 2020] If we assume that Pompeo persuaded Trump to order to kill a diplomatic envoy, Trump is now a dead man walking as after Iran responce Pelosi impeachment gambit now have legs
  • [Jan 06, 2020] Diplomacy Trump-style. Al Capone probably would be allow himself to fall that low
  • [Jan 06, 2020] I am tired of giving Trump a free pass, just because Hillary would have been worse. Trump needs to go.
  • [Jan 06, 2020] How To Avoid Swallowing War Propaganda by Nathan J. Robinson
  • [Jan 06, 2020] Neocon Pompeo pushed Trump to kill Soleimani; Looks like West Point educated military contactor mafia to which Pompeo and Esper belongs controls the President, although Trump malleability and recklessness are inexcusable
  • [Jan 06, 2020] The Soleimani Assassination by Philip Giraldi
  • [Jan 06, 2020] The threat of General Soleimani - TTG
  • [Jan 05, 2020] The USA is now at war, de-facto and de-jure, with BOTH Iraq and Iran (UPDATED 6X) The Vineyard of the Saker
  • [Jan 05, 2020] Trump is wholly responsible for his own actions, but he -- just like the Ayatollah -- is being pushed in a direction where it's impossible to back down and still "save face". Neither men can afford to do so by Andrew Korybko
  • [Jan 04, 2020] The role of Germany in the Ukrainian disaster
  • [Jan 04, 2020] American Meddling in the Ukraine by Publius Tacitus
  • [Jan 04, 2020] Trump Is Doing the Bidding of Washington's Most Vile Cabal
  • [Jan 04, 2020] Will Trump welcome the ejection of the US from Iraq - He should by Colonel Lang
  • [Jan 04, 2020] Talking about revenge is stupid and juvenile: Iran needs to pull back and focus on making themselves stronger in economy and technology and for strong ties with other responsible players
  • [Dec 17, 2019] Neocons like car salespeople have a stereotypical reputation for lacking credibility because ther profession is to lie in order to sell weapons to the publin, much like used car saleme lie to sell cars
  • [Dec 12, 2019] Threat Inflation Poisons Our Foreign Policy by Daniel Larison
  • [Dec 07, 2019] Why the foreign policy establishment consensus is neocon by default.
  • [Dec 06, 2019] The USA is an occupied by neocon country
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