The Trump Presidency: RIP

May 19th, 2023 by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

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This article was originally published in February 2017.

Has Donald Trump overestimated his presidential power? The answer is yes.

Is Steve Bannon, Trump’s main advisor, politically inexperienced? The answer is yes.

We can conclude from the answers to these two questions that Trump is in over his head and will pay a big price.

How large will the price be?

The New York Times reports that US “intelligence agencies…sought to learn whether the Trump campaign was colluding with the Russians on the hacking or other efforts to influence the election.”

Former National Security Agency (NSA) spy John Schindler tweeted on Twitter that a senior intelligence community colleague sent him an email stating that the deep state had declared nuclear war on Trump and that “He will die in jail.” See this.

At the end of World War II, the military/security complex decided that the flow of profits and power from war and threats of war were too great to be relinquished to an era of peace. This complex manipulated a weak and inexperienced President Truman into a gratuitous Cold War with the Soviet Union. The lie was created, and accepted by the gullible American people, that International Communism intended world conquest.

This lie was transparent, because Stalin had purged and murdered Leon Trotsky and all communists who believed in world revolution. “Socialism in one country,” declared Stalin.

Academic experts, knowing where their bread was buttered, went along with and contributed to the deceit. By 1961 the overarching power of the military/security complex was apparent to President Eisenhower, a five star general in charge of the US invasion of German occupied Western Europe during the Second World War. The private power that the military/security complex (Eisenhower called it the military-industrial complex) exercised disturbed Ike so much that in his last address to the American people he said we must guard against its subversion of democracy:

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence — economic, political, even spiritual — is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Eisenhower’s warning was to the point. However, it relied on “an alert and knowledgeable citizenry,” which the US does not have. The American population is largely insoucient, and is heading, across the ideological spectrum from left to right, to self-destruction.

The print and TV media, which serve as propagandists for the ruling military/security complex and Wall Street elites, make certain that Americans have nothing but bogus orchestrated information. Every household and person who turns on TV or reads a newspaper is programed to live in a false orchestrated reality that serves the tiny few who comprise the ruling Establishment.

Trump challenged this Establishment without realizing that it is more powerful than a mere President of the United States.

This is what has happened: During Obama’s second term, Russia and its president were demonized by the military/security complex and the neoconservatives using the presstitute media. The demonization has facilitated the ability of the controlled presstitute media, such as the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, MSNBC, and the rest, to associate contact with Russia and articles questioning the orchestrated tensions between the US and Russia with suspicious activity, possibly even treason. Trump and his advisors were too inexperienced to realize that the consequence of Flynn’s dismissal was to validate this orchestrated association of the Trump presidency with Russian intelligence.

Now we have the media whores and the political whores asking the question used to blacken President Nixon and to force his resignation: “What did the President know and when did he know it?” Did Trump know that Gen. Flynn spoke to the Russian ambassador weeks before Trump said he did? Did Flynn do the unspeakable—speak to a Russian—because Trump told him to do so?

The purveyors of fake news—the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, MSNBC, and the rest of the despicable liars are using irresponsible innuendo to entangle President Trump in a web of treason. Here is the New York Times headline: “Trump Campaign Aides Had Repeated Contacts With Russian Intelligence.” What we are witnessing is a campaign by the deep state using their media whores to set up Trump for impeachment.

Those at work overturning the 2016 presidential election are so confident of their success that they publicly declare their preference for coup over democracy. The zionist neoconservative warmonger Bill Kristol has expressed his preference for a deep state coup over democratically elected President Trump. See this.

The liberal/progressive/left has aligned with the One Percent against the “racist, misogynist, homophobic” working class—the “Trump deplorables”—who elected Trump. Even the uninformed muscian, Moby, felt compelled to post ignorant nonsense on Facebook:

“1-the russian dossier on trump is real. 100% real. he’s being blackmailed by the russian government, not just for being peed on by russian hookers, but for much more nefarious things. 2-the trump administration is in collusion with the russian government, and has been since day one.” See this.

Now that Trump has been tainted with “associations with Russian intelligence,” the idiot Republicans, according to Bloomberg, have “joined calls by Democrats for a deeper look at contacts between President Donald Trump’s team and Russian intelligence agents Wednesday [Feb. 15], indicating a growing sense of political peril within the party as new reports surfaced of extensive contacts between the two.” See this.

Of course, there is no evidence of such contacts, but facts are not part of the campaign to depose Trump.

Trump’s sacking of Flynn is being used as vindication by his opponents of their false charges that the President of the United States is compromised by Russian intelligence. Realizing the mistake, the White House has tried to counter its blunder by saying that Flynn was dismissed because Trump lost confidence in him, not because he did anything illegal or had connections to Russian intelligence. But none of Trump’s opponents are listening. And the CIA keeps feeding fake news to the presstitutes.

From the very beginning I warned that Trump lacked the experience and the knowledge to pick a government that would stand by him and serve his agenda. Trump has now fired the one person on whom he could have counted. The most obvious conclusion is that Trump is dead meat.

The effort of the American people to bring government back under their control via Trump has been defeated by the deep state.

Chris Hedges argument that revolution is the only way that Americans can reclaim their country continues to gain credibility.

The words that doomed Trump when he declared war before he had his army assembled:

There is nothing the political establishment will not do, and no lie they will not tell, to hold on to their prestige and power at your expense. The Washington establishment, and the financial and media corporations that fund it, exists for only one reason: to protect and enrich itself. This is a crossroads in the history of our civilization that will determine whether or not We The People reclaim control over our government. The political establishment that is trying everything to stop us, is the same group responsible for our disastrous trade deals, massive illegal immigration, and economic and foreign policies that have bled this country dry.

The political establishment has brought about the destruction of our factories and our jobs, as they flee to Mexico, China and other countries throughout the world. It’s a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth, and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities.

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Dr. Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have attracted a worldwide following. Roberts’ latest books are The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the WestHow America Was Lost, and The Neoconservative Threat to World Order.  

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A New Trajectory for the Region

May 19th, 2023 by Michael Jansen

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Palestinian Nakba Day commemorations at the UN and the lifting of Syria’s suspension from the Arab League have altered the trajectory of events in this region.

The May 15th first-ever Nakba Day events at UN headquarters have, at long last, acknowledged that the UN treated the Palestinian people unjustly when the General Assembly voted in November 1947 — under strong US pressure — to partition their country into two states. The “Arab State” was allocated 45 per cent of Palestine, the “Jewish state” 55 per cent. At that time, Palestinians were 1.3 million strong, two-thirds of the population of their country, while the 630,000 European Jewish immigrants amounted to one-third and owned only 7 per cent of the land. The proposed “Arab State” would have had a Palestinian population of 725,000 (99 per cent) and 10,000 Jews (1 per cent); the “Jewish State” would have had 498,000 Jews (55 per cent) and 407,000 Palestinians (45 per cent). This was, from the start, an unworkable plan which was designed to enable Britain to desert the land for which it secured a mandate in 1920, having trained and armed Jewish paramilitaries to both defend their communities and take whatever land they wanted. Minus Palestinians, of course.

The division of the land and disposition of the two major populations was unacceptable to the Zionists who used their underground army (Hagenah) to systematically seize land intended for the Palestinian state and expel its population. Israel’s war of establishment which began before May 15th, 1948, ended in 1949 with the conquest of 78 per cent of Palestine while Jordan came to administer East Jerusalem and the West Bank (21 per cent) and Egypt Gaza (1 per cent). In 1967, Israel completed the conquest of Palestine and extended to these areas the a augmented version of the apartheid system already imposed on Palestinian citizens of Israel.

The harsh facts of the Palestinian case have been largely suppressed or dismissed since the Nakba but brave politicians, officials, journalists and activists from many countries, including Israel, have become acquainted with the Palestinians’ cause had have done their utmost — often at considerable personal expense — to tell their story. Unfortunately, it has taken people across the globe decades to listen.

On Monday evening, supporters of the Palestinian cause gathered in the UN General Assembly’s grand hall to listen to music and testimonies and view photos and videos conveying the Palestinian experience during these 75 deadly, destructive, trying, and tragic years. This was a key event in the long campaign to overcome hostility to Palestinians generated by the Zionists, Israelis and their uncritical supporters who want to erase the Nakba and deny the Palestinians their identity and right to self-determination. Israel and its chums know that even the mention of Palestine and Palestinians has the effect of undermining Israel’s legitimacy.

Earlier in the day, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas — a refugee from Safad in Palestine — called on the UN to revoke Israel’s membership due to its treatment of the Palestinians. He did not, however, say that Israel is the only UN member admitted on condition that it would abide by General Assembly resolutions 181 — the partition plan restricting the “Jewish state” to 55 per cent of Palestine — and 194 — which called on Israel to repatriate Palestinian refugees and compensate them for their losses.

UN agencies, relief organisations, investigators, journalists, and others are now ready to speak openly about the Palestinians and their terrible fate. Thanks to Israel’s B’Tselem rights organisation which first demonstrated that Israel has adopted the illegal practice of apartheid for dealing with the Palestinians, this has been picked up by Human Rights Watch the Amnesty International and other rights organisations.

The vote on May 8th by Arab League foreign ministers to rehabilitate Syria has taken early effect. Syrian ministers of the economy and foreign trade have attended the May 15th Jeddah meeting of the League’s Economic and Social Council which is making preparations for the Arab Summit tomorrow. The invitation issued by Saudi Arabia to Syrian President Bashar Assad to attend the Summit has given a major boost to the Emirati-Saudi effort to return Syria to the Arab fold and bring Assad in from the cold. The Emirates, which reopened its Damascus embassy in 2018, has followed up the Saudi invitation with an invitation to Assad to attend the climate summit (COP28) to be held in Dubai from November 30 to December 12. If he attends, Assad will be in the company of Western leaders who continue to call for his ouster and impose sanctions on Syria although such measures are illegal as they constitute collective punishment under international law.

These two developments herald the re-establishment of Palestine as an international cause and issue to be resolved and the rehabilitation of Syria in the Arab region, which must initiate the process of Syria’s normalisation with ostracising and sanctioning Western powers.

They cannot continue to ignore either Palestine or Syria. Individual Palestinians have mounted their personal intifadas against Israeli rule and are dying while fighting Israeli troops and colonists at an average rate of a Palestinian a day. Post-war Syria’s absence at the centre of the Eastern Arab World weakens and destabilises the entire region and undermines Arab efforts to end regional rivalries and conflicts in order to focus on economic development and social advancement.

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The Feds and Their Copycats

May 19th, 2023 by Judge Andrew P. Napolitano

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The federal government recently revealed that at least 50 U.S. government personnel working in 10 foreign countries have had their mobile devices hacked by unknown persons who employed software known as “zero-click.” The zero-click product, called Pegasus, is manufactured by an Israeli high-tech company, called NSO Group.

Pegasus enables the user to download the contents of the target’s mobile device or desktop without having to trick the target into clicking onto a link. It also enables the user to follow the person in possession of the device, capturing all texts and emails, as well as listening to conversations on the device or that take place in near proximity to it.

Pegasus is so sophisticated that its victims are largely unaware of the digital attack on their devices. The feds learned that they have been victimized by this software when Apple informed them. Apple told the feds to expect much more of this. The feds are deeply troubled by this warning, as they don’t know who the victims are. The president himself was recently in Ireland, where his personal phone may have been targeted.

But don’t feel sorry for the feds. They have been using this software and similar products on unsuspecting Americans since the Trump administration.

Here is the backstory.

In reply to a routine Freedom of Information Act request made in 2020, the FBI acknowledged spending $5 million to license Pegasus from NSO Group. When FBI director Christopher Wray was asked about this, he reluctantly told Congress that his agents bought zero-click, but he denied its use in law enforcement. What does that mean? Isn’t the essence of the FBI’s work law enforcement?

Wray claimed that the FBI only purchased zero-click in order to reverse engineer it — basically to see how it worked. But that’s not truly why the FBI wanted Pegasus. It hoped to use the software to spy on Americans without first obtaining search warrants.

The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, written in the aftermath of British searches of colonial homes not based on evidence of crimes, requires judicially issued search warrants based on probable cause of crime for all searches and seizures.

Thus, the owners and users of mobile devices and desktops — that’s nearly every American — have a privacy right in the use of their devices and in the data they have stored in them. Even a narrow interpretation of the amendment that guarantees privacy in “persons, houses, papers, and effects” must acknowledge that a computer chip — the heart of every computer — is an “effect,” and thus its owner or user enjoys privacy protection.

Protection from whom? Let’s see.

When President Joe Biden learned of the FBI’s use of Pegasus — the FBI secretly bought it during the Trump years — and the FBI’s shady explanation for its use of it, the White House announced an executive order that it claimed would prevent future use of zero-click. The Biden executive order stops the sales of Pegasus to Americans and to the government, but it does not stop the sales of all zero-clicks.

Rather than simply banning zero-click, rather than banning all warrantless searches, Biden banned only the use of one brand of zero-click software and only when it has also been used by foreign governments to target the U.S. government, when it is under the control of a foreign government, when it has been used to target the freedom of expression of foreign human rights activists or when it has been used by foreign authoritarians.

What about stopping the use of zero-click by federal authoritarians? Biden banned it because of how others use it, not because, in its essence, it violates the Fourth Amendment. Quick to pick up on this, the feds quickly purchased Predator — a twin of Pegasus, made by another foreign high-tech firm, with a more benign track record of sales and use.

What good does Biden’s executive order do? Whom does it protect? The Biden executive order is Joe Biden at his worst. Claiming to deny commercial benefit to a foreign company because it also sells to bad guys but permitting another foreign company to sell functionally the same product to the feds protects no one’s Fourth Amendment rights.

When Thomas Jefferson predicted shortly before he died in 1826 that, in the long run, personal liberty would shrink and government power would grow, he could not have imagined any of this. It seems that, no matter who is in the White House and which political party controls either house of Congress, the tentacles of government reach deeper into our lives with every tick of the clock.

Is there any area of private or harmless behavior that the government leaves alone?

The government that Jefferson left us has been inverted. That government needed the permission of the voters to do nearly anything. Today, we need the permission of the government to do nearly everything. And folks under observation change on account of the observation.

Two of my closest friends — husband and wife — told me they were discussing diamond earrings on their cellphones with each other last week. Soon, ads for diamond earrings began popping up on their desktops.

This was obviously not the government, yet, government sets the tone and the standard. Federal agents use zero-click to hack into our computers because that’s a lot easier than developing probable cause of crime and presenting it to a judge. Big tech uses hacking because that’s more effective than advertising.

Now big tech targeting consumers can mimic the feds — and, like the feds, get away with it because when the government breaks its own laws, it sets a precedent for others to follow. Is this the government the Framers left us? Is it the government we voted for? What awaits us on the other side of this Orwellian landscape?

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Senior Turkish officials have criticised French magazine Charlie Hebdo for a cover cartoon depicting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan following elections over the weekend. 

The drawing shows Erdogan in a bathtub, in reference to French singer Claude Francois (Cloclo), who was electrocuted to death while in the bath in 1978. “Like Cloclo, only fate will save us from him,” the cover states. 

Screenshot from Charlie Hebdo

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said: 

“Shameless Charlie Hebdo has yet to possess an ounce of humanity [and] continues to insult the Turkish people.”

Meanwhile, Fahrettin Altun, Erdogan’s communications director, described the publication as “disgusting”.  

“One of the biggest centres of provocation, insults and blasphemy in world media, the ugly publication Charlie Hebdo, has again proved how disgusting it is with its latest inhumane caricature of our president,” he tweeted. 

“No matter what you do, you cannot intimidate Recep Tayyip Erdogan. You cannot turn us away from our path.”

Presidential spokesperson Ibrahim Kalin labelled the magazine a “rag” and “evil”. 

“Don’t worry CH. Our nation will give you the best answer, with a louder voice, on May 28,” he added, referencing the upcoming presidential runoff election.

Erdogan received 49.5 percent of the votes in Sunday’s presidential election, just short of an outright victory, while his main competitor, Kemal Kilicdaroglu of the centre-left Republican People’s Party (CHP), got 44.9 percent.  

In February, Charlie Hebdo came in for criticism for publishing cartoons that mocked the devastating earthquake which hit Turkey and Syria. 

A cartoon showed a damaged building, a toppled car and a heap of rubble with the caption: “No need to send tanks.”

Turkish political commentators pointed out at the time that Turks were quick to support freedom of speech marches in January 2015, after gunmen claiming to represent al-Qaeda forced their way into Charlie Hebdo’s offices and opened fire, killing 12 people and wounding 11 others. 

The magazine has previously published offensive cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, and Alan Kurdi, a three-year-old Syrian toddler who drowned off Turkey’s coast in 2015. 

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Nuclear Bombs and Drones Over the Kremlin

May 19th, 2023 by Ted Snider

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History may one day show that two important events did not receive the attention they deserved. One may have led to the horrible way the war in Ukraine started; one may lead to the horrible way it ends.

Putin’s decision to illegally invade Ukraine seems to have been the result of the confluence of two factors. The Ukrainian rejection of the Minsk agreement left it committed to a military solution in the Donbas. The decree to reintegrate Crimea by military force if necessary, the massing of elite Ukrainian troops and drones on the eastern border of Donbas and the dramatically increased Ukrainian shelling into the Donbas created genuine alarm in Russia that Ukraine was about to escalate the civil war. That threat of war with Ukraine combined with the simultaneous US refusal of Russia’s request for a guarantee that Ukraine would not become a member of NATO, left Russia facing the possibility of being drawn into a war with NATO.

What has received very little attention is that that concern was in no way eased by Zelensky’s speech, made at the same time on February 19 at the Munich Security Conference, five days before the invasion, threatening Ukraine’s reacquisition of nuclear weapons.

When the Soviet Union broke up, Ukraine broke away with the third largest nuclear arsenal in the world. In 1994, under the Budapest Memorandum, Ukraine agreed to give their nuclear weapons up and join the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as a non-nuclear weapons state. They, of course, maintain the knowledge, the equipment and the technology.

In his speech to the Munich Security Conference, Zelensky said,

“I am initiating consultations in the framework of the Budapest Memorandum. The Minister of Foreign Affairs was commissioned to convene them. If they do not happen again or their results do not guarantee security for our country, Ukraine will have every right to believe that the Budapest Memorandum is not working and all the package decisions of 1994 are in doubt.”

Richard Sakwa, Professor of Russian and European Politics at Kent, pointed out to me that the wording is ambiguous and open to interpretation. But he stressed that the threat to reacquire nuclear weapons was “the natural conclusion of his statement.”

Russia was now threatened not just with a conventional war with NATO but a nuclear war. Geoffrey Roberts, Professor of History at University College Cork, has argued in his essay “‘Now or Never’: The Immediate Origins of Putin’s Preventative War on Ukraine’ that “The final trigger for war might have been President Zelensky’s defiant speech to the Munich Security Conference on 19 February, in which he threatened Ukrainian re-acquisition of nuclear weapons.”

In a recent interview, Roberts said that it is his “impression . . . that the nuclear factor was the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

Sakwa told me that he agrees that the Ukrainian threat to reacquire nuclear weapons was an important motivation for Putin. He added that “Putin certainly has said as much.”

The day after Zelensky’s speech, a Russian journalist asked Putin how seriously he took the threat. He answered that “We take it that these words were primarily addressed to us. I want to say that we have heard them.” He then stressed Ukraine’s “nuclear competencies” and how quickly they could reacquire the weapons. He closed with the words, “What is the threat to us? The appearance of tactical weapons in Ukraine is a strategic threat to us.”

On another occasion, Putin worried that “If Ukraine acquires weapons of mass destruction, the situation in the world and in Europe will drastically change, especially for us in Russia. We cannot but react to this real danger. . . .”

Zelensky’s words may be ambiguous, and Putin’s fear may be exaggerated, but Ukraine’s threat to reacquire nuclear weapons, when combined with its commitment to a military solution to the crisis in the Donbas and the West’s refusal to close the door to NATO to Ukraine, may have played a motivational role in beginning the war that deserves more attention than it has gotten.

A second event may play a larger role in ending the war than it has gotten. On May 3, Russia said that the two drones that it was forced to explode over the Kremlin were a Ukrainian attempt to assassinate President Vladimir Putin. “Last night,” the message from the Russian Presidential Press Service read, “the Kiev regime attempted a drone strike against the residence of the President of the Russian Federation at the Kremlin. . . . We view these actions as a planned terrorist attack and an assassination attempt targeting the President.” It then added that “Russia reserves the right to take countermeasures wherever and whenever it deems appropriate.”

It is not just the importance of a possible Ukrainian attack deep inside Russian territory and its threat of provoking Russia to escalate the war that is of concern. It is also the meaning of the closing promise of “countermeasures.”

The video showing two slow moving drones over the Kremlin bursting into flames fifteen minutes apart in the early hours of the morning has been verified by The New York Times and by Reuters. The event really happened, but there is no certainty about exactly what happened. Russia says Ukraine attacked the Kremlin in an attempt to assassinate Putin. They cast the net wider than Ukraine. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said “We know very well that the decisions to carry out such actions, such terrorist attacks, are made not in Kiev. Rather, it is precisely in Washington [where the decision-making is done]. And, Kiev is already left to do what it is told to do.” Kiev and Washington have denied involvement – though Washington didn’t criticize it, saying “These are decisions for Ukraine to make about how it’s going to defend itself” – and suggested that the drone attack was a Russian false flag operation.

It is natural that the US should consider the possibility of a false flag operation in which Russia targets its own assets because the US has often considered false flag operations in which they target their own assets. And one does not have to go all the way back to remember the Maine. One can go back to Operation Northwoods in the 1960’s that considered blowing up a US ship in Guantanamo Bay and blaming Cuba. It also proposed the developing of a Cuban terror campaign in Miami and Washington, staging a false flag attack on the US military base in Guantanamo Bay and shooting down a US reconnaissance plane. Half a century later, the US would consider a similar false flag operation in Iran in which American soldiers in Iranian uniforms would attack a US ship.

Whatever happened, the significance of the event goes back to a promise made by Putin early in the war. Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett says that, while attempting to mediate between Russia and Ukraine, he received a promise from Putin that “I won’t kill Zelensky.”

The attempted assassination of Putin seems to have canceled that promise. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov says that Russia will consider a “wide variety” of “well-thought-out steps that meet the interests of our country” when deciding how to respond. Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov also stressed that the response would be calm and thought out: “We will answer when we consider it necessary. We will answer in accordance with the assessments of the threat that Kiev posed to the leadership of our country.” But he also asked, “How would Americans react if a drone hit the White House, the Capitol or the Pentagon? The answer is obvious for any politician as well as for the average citizen: the punishment would be harsh and inevitable.”

Former Russian President and current Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev was more succinct: “After today’s terrorist attack, there are no options left except for the physical elimination of Zelensky and his clique.” The drone attack seems to have canceled the Putin promise: Russia could attempt to cut the war short and include killing Zelensky in its goals. The Speaker of the Russian parliament, Vyacheslav Volodin, seemed to agree: “An attack on the president is an attack on Russia. There can be no negotiations. We will demand the use of weapons that are capable of stopping and destroying the Kyiv terrorist regime.”

These two events may deserve more attention than they have received. The first, Ukraine’s threat to reacquire nuclear weapons, was ignored; the second, the alleged assassination attempt on Putin, was dismissed. But one may have helped start this horrible war, and the other may horribly help to end it.

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Ted Snider is a regular columnist on US foreign policy and history at Antiwar.com and The Libertarian Institute. He is also a frequent contributor to Responsible Statecraft and The American Conservative as well as other outlets.

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Londres: Municiones con uranio empobrecido para Ucrania

May 19th, 2023 by Pablo Jofré Leal

The COVID “Killer Vaccine”. People Are Dying All Over the World. It’s a Criminal Undertaking

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, May 18, 2023

Peer reviewed reports confirm the causes  of vaccine related deaths and “adverse events” (injuries) including among others blood clots, thrombosis, myocarditis, cardiac arrests.

Kiev’s Air Defense Capability Threatened

By Lucas Leiroz de Almeida, May 18, 2023

The recent successful Russian attacks against strategic Ukrainian targets made clear the reality that was already reported by many military experts: the Ukrainian air defense is  vulnerable. Despite all the Western aid and the incessant delivery of weapons, Kiev seems unable to improve its defense system, continuing to be an easy target for Russia’s incisive combat actions.

The United States Has Been Destroyed by Its Ruling Elites

By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts and GEOFOR, May 18, 2023

The Special Counsel’s vindication of Donald Trump and denunciation of the FBI for conducting a politically motivated investigation devoid of any evidence should collapse the equally fraudulent Biden regime investigation of Trump on fake documents charges and the New York state prosecution of Trump on alleged expense misreporting charges.

Taiwan War Becomes Real Threat and It Scares the G7

By Karsten Riise, May 18, 2023

One big issue is absorbing G7 these days. Possible war on Taiwan. Chief among the points of tension is how far to go in trying to stop a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, which could trigger world war and wreck the global economy. The self-governing island, which Beijing claims as its own, provides most of the world’s advanced computer chips that are vital to the tech and defense industries.

The Occupation Is Destroying Israel’s Democracy Regardless of What Kind of Spin Is Put on It

By Prof. Alon Ben-Meir, May 18, 2023

It is sad and bewildering, albeit not surprising, how many Israelis completely distort the nature and the ultimate objective of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. The reactions to my article from April 30, “An Occupying Power Cannot Be a Beacon of Democracy,” by many well-versed individuals, reveal how misguided they are and how comfortable they feel about their distorted views about the occupation, which they have embraced for more than five decades.

Turkey Elections: West Failed to Depose Erdogan Despite Openly Backing Opposition

By Ahmed Adel, May 18, 2023

Although Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s victory in the second round of the presidential election in Turkey is almost assured ahead of the second round of votes, opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, in case of victory, would alter the country’s foreign policy and put the relationship with Russia into a framework that is acceptable to the US.

Durham Report Indicts FBI for Role in Russiagate Scam But Is Silent About the CIA

By Jeremy Kuzmarov, May 18, 2023

May 15 saw the release of the much-awaited Durham report, which detailed how the FBI initiated what was essentially a phony and heavily politicized investigation into Donald Trump’s Russia ties based on “raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence.”

Bombshell Report: Two 9/11 Hijackers Were Recruited by CIA

By Ben Bartee, May 18, 2023

Building 7, also known as the Salomon Brothers building, was not struck by an airplane or any such projectile that day. Nonetheless, it collapsed at free-fall speed neatly into its own footprint. Anyone who’s ever seen a controlled demolition will recognize the kinetic pattern.

The US Should be a Force for Peace in the World

By Eisenhower Media Network, May 18, 2023

The Russia-Ukraine War has been an unmitigated disaster. Hundreds of thousands have been killed or wounded. Millions have been displaced. Environmental and economic destruction have been incalculable. Future devastation could be exponentially greater as nuclear powers creep ever closer toward open war.

See 867 US Military Bases on New Online Tool. Interactive Map

By World Beyond War, May 18, 2023

World BEYOND War has launched a new online tool at worldbeyondwar.org/no-bases that allows the user to view a globe pock-marked with 867 U.S. military bases in countries other than the United States, and to zoom in for a satellite view of and detailed information on each base. The tool also allows filtering the map or list of bases by country, government type, opening date, number of personnel, or acres of land occupied.

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This Week’s Most Popular Articles

May 19th, 2023 by Global Research News

Small Percent of Vaccine Batches Responsible for Large Number of Adverse Reactions, Analysts Claim

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Eat Your Vaccines: mRNA Gene Therapy Is Coming to the Food Supply This Month

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This War Is the Big One: “The Objective Is to Destroy Russia and the Russian Empire”

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Limits to Growth, Climate Change, Digitization of Everything and Worldwide Censorship — All Leading to WEF and the Behemoth Cult Commanding It

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The Party’s Over, the Gloves Are Off

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The Great FREESET Versus The Great Reset. URGENT Message from Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

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Moving Toward a Global Empire: Humanity Sentenced to a Unipolar Prison and a Digital Gulag

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Drugged-Up and Ready to Kill

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Pilot Died: Air Transat and Former Air Canada Pilot Eddy Vorperian, Age 48, from Montreal, Canada, Died Suddenly on May 3, 2023

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National Citizens Inquiry: Canada’s Response to COVID-19

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The United States Has Been Destroyed by Its Ruling Elites

May 18th, 2023 by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts

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*** 

Against the backdrop of the United States’ recognition of the investigation against Donald Trump as politically motivated, structural and ideological controversies, and concerns that the American economy will enter a recession, the GEOFOR editorial board asked Paul Craig Roberts, Chairman of the Institute for Political Economy (USA), a PhD in Economics and US Undersecretary of Treasury in the Reagan administration, to share his views on America’s future.

GEOFOR: Special Counsel John Durham “acquitted” Donald Trump on the so-called “Russiagate”, writing in his report that the FBI investigation was politically motivated. How will this news affect the Democrats’ fight against Trump?

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts: The Special Counsel’s vindication of Donald Trump and denunciation of the FBI for conducting a politically motivated investigation devoid of any evidence should collapse the equally fraudulent Biden regime investigation of Trump on fake documents charges and the New York state prosecution of Trump on alleged expense misreporting charges. It has been clear for a long time that the list of fake charges against Trump, supported by the media, are propaganda to prevent Trump again running for President and to teach all future potential presidential candidates that they will be destroyed if they attempt to represent the people instead of the unelected ruling oligarchy.

However, the Democrat Party and the presstitutes that service them have no respect whatsoever for truth. Facts simply do not matter to them. This is true also of American Universities, law associations, medical associations, the CIA, FBI, NSA, the State Department, the regulatory agencies such as NIH, CDC, FDA, the large corporations, and many establishment Republican members of the House and Senate who serve the economic interests that pay them, not truth. It is also the case with a high percentage of Democrat voters who have been conditioned by propaganda to hate Trump. To Democrats what matters is not facts, but getting Trump. Truth is not permitted to prevent the destruction of Trump.

Consequently, the US is moving toward a fatal split in the society from which recovery is impossible. Trump represents ordinary Americans who prefer peace to the neoconservatives’ wars, who want their jobs back that the greed-driven capitalist global corporations sent to China and Asia, who want their children properly educated instead of indoctrinated with sexual perversion, Satanism, and told that they are racists. In contrast, the Democrats are increasingly Woke–people who believe that truth is an oppressive tool of white supremacy, that Christian morality is tyrannical and discriminatory against pedophiles and other sexual perverts, and that, as “President” Biden himself has said, white people are the greatest threat to America. See this.

Now that official investigations by the House Republicans have brought the utter corruption of Biden and his son to light (see this), the Democrats, the dangerous and corrupt military/security complex, and the complicit whore American media, are desperate. They all stand as being exposed. So, rather than apologize for their mistreatment of Trump and his supporters–1,000 of whom the Democrats have illegally imprisoned–they will likely strike out while they still control the Executive Branch, the US Senate, the CIA, FBI, NSA, and federal agencies such as the IRS that have been armed and militarized.

Alternatively, the corrupt and threatened Democrats might cause war between the US and Russia, or Iran, or China in the hopes that a war will unify even Trump supporters, especially the super-patriots among them, around the “President” against “foreign enemies.”

GEOFOR: Recently there were reports that former Vice President Mike Pence seriously intends to compete with Donald Trump in the presidential race of 2024. How do you assess his chances and why did he decide to take such a step?

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts: Mike Spence has no chance whatsoever of prevailing over Donald Trump. Pence is running as a service to the ruling establishment. Spence is a pretend Christian Evangelical. Evangelicals don’t oppose Armageddon, because they believe they will be wafted up to Heaven, while those still on earth get consumed in fire. The Ruling American Oligarchy hopes that Spence will draw off the Christian Evangelicals from the Trump vote, thus reducing Trump’s margin of victory so that the Democrats can again steal the presidential election. As evangelicals are not very astute, the Democrats might succeed in derailing Trump and the American people. Pence, of course, would not become president.

GEOFOR: We can’t help but ask about the migration problem. After the abolition of Section 42, analysts predict a new influx of refugees from Mexico and Latin America. What will such problems lead to and will they affect the election of the head of the White House next year?

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts: The Biden regime is spending billions of dollars “to defend Ukraine’s borders,” but won’t spend one penny to defend America’s borders. The Democrats want the Hispanic and Black immigrants, who they will give the vote, because the immigrant-invaders water down the white majority population and destroy the ethnic basis of the US. Instead of a unified nation, there is a Tower of Babel.

As the Democrats control the major cities in most states and thereby the election rules and vote counting, It doesn’t matter how people vote. As Stalin said, the only thing that matters is who counts the vote. Only a total fool would expect Democrats to count votes that gave victory to Republicans.

GEOFOR: Passions around the American public debt, inflation, jobs and the possible new collapses of American banks are only growing. Tell us, please, what awaits the American economy in the foreseeable future? After all, the recession in the United States will have an impact on the whole world one way or another…

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts: The United States, despite my best efforts and the efforts of others for decades, has been destroyed by its ruling elites for the sake of short-term profits and short-term growth in power over the people. By offshoring its manufacturing jobs, the global corporations destroyed the American middle class and the ladders to upward mobility that had made America the “opportunity society.” Today many former American manufacturing and industrial cities look like the remains of bombed cities.

As US corporations produce the goods abroad that they market to Americans, the goods enter the US as imports. Thus, offshoring production for the home market worsens the trade deficit.

The trade deficit has to be financed. This is no problem for the US as long as the dollar is in demand as the reserve currency by all countries in order to pay for their international transactions, and countries with trade surpluses keep their monetary surpluses in US Treasury bonds, thus financing both the US trade and budget deficits. Washington in an act of incredible stupidity has driven a dagger through the heart of the US dollar as world reserve currency, thus ending Washington’s ability to pay its bills by printing money. The dagger was the Biden regime’s Russian and other sanctions and the seizure of Russia’s central bank deposits. This finally convinced the rest of the world that holding dollar balances exposed a country to the risk of expropriation or control by Washington.

The consequence is that the world is moving away from the use of the dollar, instead settling their trade balances in their own or other currencies. Therefore, the demand for dollars is declining, but the supply is rising because of the US trade and budget deficits.

Sooner or later the US dollar’s exchange value will fall, setting off high inflation in the US that is outside the control of the central bank. American living standards will fall, and the US will begin to look like India in 1900.The hatred of white people that Democrats have taught to blacks and immigrant-invaders will result in internal war. The only question is whether white Americans will have been so indoctrinated with their guilt that they are unable to defend themselves.

*

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Paul Craig Roberts is a renowned author and academic, chairman of The Institute for Political Economy where this article was originally published. Dr. Roberts was previously associate editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal. He was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy during the Reagan Administration. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.  

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Kiev’s Air Defense Capability Threatened

May 18th, 2023 by Lucas Leiroz de Almeida

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*** 

The recent successful Russian attacks against strategic Ukrainian targets made clear the reality that was already reported by many military experts: the Ukrainian air defense is  vulnerable. Despite all the Western aid and the incessant delivery of weapons, Kiev seems unable to improve its defense system, continuing to be an easy target for Russia’s incisive combat actions. Tracking and shooting down Russian missiles and drones has become a difficult work for Ukrainian forces, which are still failing to stop Russian weapons from reaching their targets.

However, this news coexists with Western-Ukrainian propaganda that Russian hypersonic missiles are being shot down by Kiev. Although mainstream media outlets support the Ukrainian narrative, in recent months these same newspapers have reported the weakness of the regime’s armed forces on several occasions, therefore there is a contradiction in data.

For example, in March, experts pointed out in an article published in The Washington Post that Kiev was suffering from a severe shortage of ammunition for its air defense systems. At the time, analysts said that Ukrainian forces could become absolutely unable to protect their airspace against Russian missiles and UAVs, leaving military facilities “open” to enemy attacks. Experts also warned at the time of the serious lack of qualified military personnel, stating that most of the experienced Ukrainian military had already been neutralized in the first year of the operation, leaving now few able soldiers to manage the country’s defense systems.

Even more pessimistic forecasts were exposed by the Financial Times, which also commented on the critical situation of the Ukrainian air defense, even claiming that the military capacity of this sector will be completely until late May. Experts have warned that the number of anti-missiles launched to intercept a Russian attack is usually double the number of Russian missiles or drones, in order to increase the chances of success. A side effect of this is to overspend artillery ammunition, accelerating depletion.

“[…] Officials said the continuing need to defend against Russian missile and drone attacks had systematically depleted Ukraine’s stockpiles — a warning backed up by US intelligence documents leaked online this spring that suggested Kyiv might run out of ammunition for five critical air defence systems. According to documents reviewed by the Financial Times, the US assessed in late February that Ukraine’s ability to protect its troops on the front lines would be ‘completely reduced’ by May 23”, the Financial Times articles reads.

Forbes also reported on the Ukrainian situation. In an article published on the site in April, experts said the imminent shortage of missiles was the main problem for Ukraine’s air defense. At the time, it was warned that, in addition to having dozens of their systems destroyed by Russian attacks, the Ukrainians would also be suffering from the absence of 9M38 Buk missiles. This equipment is produced in Russia, with Ukrainian stocks remaining from Soviet times. The depletion of these missiles, therefore, becomes an even more worrying issue because Kiev’s sponsors do not manufacture this weapon, which is compatible with the Soviet-era Buk systems that Ukraine has.

One solution found was the American supply of Raytheon RIM-7 Sea Sparrows, which, although different, use the same radar guidance as the 9M38. With proper technical adaptations, these American weapons could be launched using Soviet Buk systems. However, despite promises started in January, so far Washington has not been able to organize a program of constant supply of Raytheon RIM-7 Sea Sparrow missiles, thus preventing Kiev’s air defense from being re-established. Furthermore, the need for technical handling and adaptation of these weapons to Soviet systems could be a problem, considering the lack of qualified military personnel, as pointed out by the Post. With that, Ukraine’s hopes for recovery become even more complicated.

Another big outlet commenting on this problem was Deutsche Welle, which in an article published on April 22 made it clear that Ukraine is not capable of shooting down Russian guided bombs, being vulnerable to the air operations of Moscow’s forces. The newspaper at the time interviewed the representative of the Air Force of Ukraine, Yuri Ignat, who said that the systems used by his troops were not able to shoot down Russian equipment, with the need to receive new, more modern and efficient systems from the West.

As well known, most of the Western media is extremely biased and propagandistic in its narrative of the conflict, always trying to make it seem like Kiev has the advantage over the Russians. When something negative for the regime is communicated, it is because there really is no way to ignore the situation and it becomes more convenient to report it in order to seek improvements – perhaps trying to pressure western authorities to send more help to change the scenario. This seems to have been the case in recent months regarding the Ukrainian air defense.

However, now the media work has again been “optimistic” about the Ukrainian defense. Media outlets repeated the regime’s propaganda that several Russian “Kinzhal” hypersonic missiles were shot down by Ukrainian troops. In addition to no evidence of this being given, the narrative also contradicts everything that had been reported by the Western media (citing Ukrainian sources) in recent months, that the country’s air defenses were close to being disabled.

This contradictory information shows once again how the western media has been spreading lies about the conflict. Either the Ukrainian air defense is close to collapse, or it is able to shoot down “Kinzhal” missiles – there is no way to join both narratives. And the recent successful Russian air strikes across the conflict zone, neutralizing several strategic targets, already makes clear what is the correct information.

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Lucas Leiroz is a journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant. You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.

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People Love AI: Fastest Growing Application Ever

May 18th, 2023 by Karsten Riise

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*** 

ChatGPT was released 30 November 2022.Two months later, it had 100 million users!

ChatGPT end of January 2023 already had 40% of the entire US population age 15 and above – as of May 2023, ChatGPT may have grown to over 400 million, surpassing the entire US population. AI is the “killer app” – the fastest growing computer application ever.

People in the US and internationally is adopting AI because they are excited. The small circle of intellectualized opinion-dictators who are angry and scared of AI stay away – like a grumpy last-century Liberal who recently wrote a newsletter that he “didn’t use AI and didn’t want to”.

ChatGPT builds on language – which is what everybody uses. So there is a use for everybody, every child, man, woman, or organization out there for AI. Already, lots of companies are working to integrate GPT-4, the big sibling to ChatGPT, into their applications in sales, journalism, research, law, medicine, engineering, movies, architecture, music etc. And let’s not hide it – ChatGPT will be integrated into military applications as well. OpenAI expects to earn $ 1 billion already next year.

Politicians Want AI Now

Congress also desires AI, in spite of some corners voicing public concerns. The US is in an arms race in AI against China, and Congress has a deadly fear of China. It’s a tight race. Just a year ago, China was leading in AI over the US with Wu Dao 2.0, and only in November 2022 did the US take the lead over China with OpenAI’s ChatGPT. The chips embargo will slow China in AI, but not by much and not for long. Even under the chips embargo, China can buy more powerful chips than ever, and though these chips are not as powerful as the chips sold in the US, China can just buy more of them to increase computing power.

Congress knows that if it slows AI development in the US with bureaucratic rules and regulations which Congress itself doesn’t understand anyway, China will definitely take the lead in AI globally. On top of this, there are already powerful industrial interests behind AI. Not only from Microsoft, but also from scores of US corporate industries, universities, research institutions, and the US military, all of which cannot wait to get their hands on AI. It is therefore no surprise, that OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altmann got an unusually warm welcome at his appearance before Congress today 16 May 2023. See this.

OpenAI is treated differently than Facebook. Nobody in Congress cares about Zuckerman and Facebook. Come on, what is posted on Facebook is mostly just a hassle for the politicians to deal with – if Congress could close Facebook, their life would be easier. AI is a different matter. AI is real military and economic power and huge profits awaiting US corporations, incl. the influential US arms and healthcare industries.

AI represents what Congress understands. National power and corporate profits. Members of Congress all expressed “concerns” about AI, but that is just to please the public and the press. In reality, Congress covers OpenAI, its CEO Sam Altmann and the AI industry. And Sam Altmann wisely chose to meet Congress dressed nicely and expressing a humble attitude to “work with Congress”. Sam Altmann doesn’t have to worry anyway. Don’t waste time waiting for Congress to set up “regulatory body” and rules, there will be none of that in the foreseeable future.

And should rules and regulatory bodies come anyway, it will be OpenAI, Microsoft, Google, and the AI industry writing the rules anyway. OpenAI will continue creating the fastest growing computer system ever.

Full speed ahead on AI.

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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Taiwan War Becomes Real Threat and It Scares the G7

May 18th, 2023 by Karsten Riise

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*** 

One big issue is absorbing G7 these days. Possible war on Taiwan.

Chief among the points of tension is how far to go in trying to stop a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, which could trigger world war and wreck the global economy. The self-governing island, which Beijing claims as its own, provides most of the world’s advanced computer chips that are vital to the tech and defense industries.

Not all European governments are convinced it’s something they need to prioritize. See this.

From the reporting above, I deduce several things:

  1. The possibility of a Taiwan war has become very real – and it plagues all of the G7. 
  2. The US is obviously ready to go far in case of a Taiwan war – it seems even to the point of US entering war with China. 
  3. The US is pushing the EU to support a war against China, first of all with sanctions and trade embargo, but even to the point of the EU participating with the US in war with China. 
  4. Berlin and Paris don’t see a Taiwan war as their prime business. 
  5. The prospect of a Taiwan war scares the sh*t out of the EU, and especially Berlin doesn’t want to take part in hostilities – they perhaps don’t even want to break trade ties with China if a Taiwan war breaks out.

The scare of a Taiwan war comes as NATO and the EU are struggling to support Ukraine against an ever-stronger Russia in the Ukraine war.

Last night, Russia claims to have destroyed 5 Patriot missile batteries, the most advanced air defense system of the US. Reports are, that the US has ordered Ukraine to shut down remaining Patriot systems until the US knows what to do. If true that Russia can massively destroy Patriot air defenses, this leaves NATO and Taiwan completely vulnerable to Russian missiles.

Expectations for Ukraine’s “counteroffensive” are continuously being downplayed, and the “counteroffensive” is postponed all the time. In Artemovsk (Bakhmut), Ukraine has been taking enormous casualties making some progress on the flanks. But Russia has all but conquered the city itself. Russia’s capture of Artemovsk is soon to be announced.

Understandably, Paris and especially Berlin have a waning appetite for being involved in a second far bigger war on Taiwan, in that case against an even stronger adversary than Russia.

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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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*** 

For almost as long as the West supplies Ukraine with weapons to kill Russians, it is known that most of these weapons – billions of dollars and euros-worth of weapons, would never reach the front, but would instead be sold on the black-market.

The West knew that from the very beginning. BBC and CNN were reporting on this calamity already in 2022. At one point BBC was reporting that up to 70% of the weaponry supplied by the West would disappear on the black market.

Of course, in the meantime all such references have been either deleted from the internet, or “fact-checked” away. The mainstream of the mainstream may not be seen or heard to say the truth. They are paid to lie or be silent.

However, there are some who speak up, who do not mind risking their reputation – but dare bringing the truth to the people. Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh is one of them. He recently spoke to Afshin Rattansi, a British broadcaster, journalist and author who presents Going Underground which is broadcast around the world, except in the UK and EU, on television stations including the RT network.

According to his data, Hersh said, shortly after the conflict started between Kiev and Moscow in February 2022, “Poland, Romania, other countries on the border were being flooded with US and allies supplied weapons which were shipped to Ukraine to support the war against Russia.”

Hersh noted that there was concern in the West, especially about Stinger shoulder-launched missiles, as they could be used to “shoot down an airplane at considerable height.”

In other words, the West was concerned that these shoulder launchers could shoot down Western civilian planes, either by accident or, of course, also on purpose, depending in who’s hands they landed.

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So the West knew from the very beginning that most of their weaponry – paid for with US, European, UK and other so-called Western allies’ taxpayer’s money – ended up on the black market, often through what is called the “Dark Net”.

Journalist Hersh also said that “CBS wrote a story about it that they were forced to retract.” When asked why the story was withdrawn, the CBS journalists said, “We are on the side of Ukraine. We all hate Russia.”

This referred most likely to a CBS documentary, “Arming Ukraine”, aired in August 2022, in which CBS claimed that only about 30% of military aid actually reached the frontline. This part was removed, as it was taken out of similar reports by BBC and CNN.

People must not know that 70% of the weapons they paid for Ukraine to kill Russians, are going to the black market, most probably ending up in hands of terrorist groups. They would be so disappointed and risked no longer supporting their governments’ anti-Russia stance.

On many occasions, Russian official warned about Western supplied arms being smuggled outside Ukraine, causing a severe security risk. Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova estimated in October 2022, the black market at $1billion per month. See this for the full interview and this 6-min video clip (below) by “CRUX” Finland, confirming Russia’s concern of western weapons via black-market feeding world terrorist gangs.

There is logic behind the fact that up to 70% of Western weaponry ends up on the Dark Net or directly on the black market being sold to all sorts of potential organizations, no questions asked. Amazing, isn’t it?

And the logic is that the Ukrainian army is far from being equipped to absorb and handle these masses of weaponry, some of them highly sophisticated, for which no Ukrainian soldiers were trained. But the West knows all that.

Ms. Donatella Rovera, a senior crisis adviser with Amnesty International, told CBS,

“There is really no information as to where they’re [the weapons] going at all. What is really worrying is that some countries that are sending weapons do not seem to think that it is their responsibility to put in place a very robust oversight mechanism.”

Likewise, a US intelligence source told CNN already in April 2022 that Washington has “almost zero” idea what happens to these arms, describing the shipments as dropping “into a big black hole” once they enter Ukraine.

Also, Canadian sources said that they have “no idea” where their weapons deliveries end up.

And so does Europol; they believe that some of these weapons have ended up in the hands of organized crime groups in the EU.

Russian government officials are afraid that many of these weapons are ending up in the Middle East.

According to Transparency International, Ukraine is consistently ranked as one of the most corrupt countries, if not the most corrupt country, in the world.

See this.

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Let’s jump to another dimension. If the West knew that most of their weaponry supposedly destined for Ukraine’s war against Russia will end up on the black market and find its way eventually to terrorist groups, why did they not stop it, police it, at the borders, make sure that no weapon reaches the Dark Net or the black market?

Putting in place a rigorous security apparatus would have been worth the money to avoid more terror groups roaming the world and attacking “randomly” Western civilization.

The West did not put such a security system in place. Could it be – just hypothetically — that there was and is a special agenda behind this reckless and thoughtless behavior of the Western anti-Russian alliance?

Is this perhaps a plan to arm existing or new Western-founded terrorist groups, à la al-Qaeda, ISIS, the Islamic State and others – mind you, to be repeated, ALL created and funded by the West, mostly by the CIA, NATO and other US/UK/EU secret service organizations – so as to be ready to use these terror organization when needed by the West?

For example, to intimidate an ever-more “awakening” populace, to the terror and wars waged against people by the US/Western quest towards full hegemony?

Armed with Ukraine weaponry, commanded by CIA, NATO, or even the unelected European Commission, in accordance with “rules-based orders”, such old and new terror groups could carry out random or not so random mass killings, thereby keeping the populace worldwide in check, afraid, submissive.

This could be a new tentacle of the failing octopus, reaching around the globe for full spectrum dominance, trying to keep the illusion of US Western hegemony alive as long as possible, continuing killing and maiming people by the millions, and destroying economies – as per the Great Reset and Agenda 2030 playbook.

Like mentioned earlier, it is just a hypothesis but a real one. Nothing is beyond the intent and reach of this diabolical dark Deep State Death Cult, currently engulfing Mother Earth, her sentient beings and perhaps foremost her generous supply of natural resources.

Remember the Club of Rome’s doctrine of “Limits to Growth”, a blueprint still underpinning the agenda of the billionaires’ elite, the Cult that wants to reduce the current world population by 90%, and produces highly sophisticated man-made ENMOD-type “climate changes”, severe droughts, floods, cold and hot spells, and even earthquakes, to bring about famine, destruction of infrastructure, of economies, shifting resources from the bottom to the top and killing masses of people, genocide-style.

When we dare staring the enemy – the Antichrist roaming among us – in the eye, stepping out of the circle of fear, we may also find the way to another conscience where Light and Love reigns, leading us out of and away from the digital gulag – into FREEDOM.

*

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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he worked for over 30 years around the world. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals and is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed; and co-author of Cynthia McKinney’s book “When China Sneezes: From the Coronavirus Lockdown to the Global Politico-Economic Crisis” (Clarity Press – November 1, 2020).

Peter is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He is also a non-resident Senior Fellow of the Chongyang Institute of Renmin University, Beijing. 

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*** 

It is sad and bewildering, albeit not surprising, how many Israelis completely distort the nature and the ultimate objective of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. The reactions to my article from April 30, “An Occupying Power Cannot Be a Beacon of Democracy,” by many well-versed individuals, reveal how misguided they are and how comfortable they feel about their distorted views about the occupation, which they have embraced for more than five decades. What is extremely disturbing is that these views are prevalent among Jews in and outside Israel, which has allowed successive Israeli governments to maintain the occupation for 56 years with near-impunity on the basis of several groundless arguments.

To demonstrate how absurd some of these arguments are, I selected six comments out of many which illuminate the irrationality and false equivalence they resort to in justifying their positions.

Before I provide counter arguments, I want first to briefly reestablish the premise on which my article was based. First, I argued that an occupying power—Israel—cannot be a beacon of democracy as long as it remains an occupying power. That successive right-wing Israeli governments have systematically been misleading and brainwashing the public to justify the occupation on the grounds of national security. That they have methodically been portraying the Palestinians as an irredeemable foe, while engaging in misleading public narratives to keep the Israeli public minimally informed about the ruthlessness of the occupation. That they are portraying the occupation as central to keeping the Palestinians at bay while stamping out their aspiration to establish an independent state of their own. That they have been promoting the notion that the Palestinians are bent on destroying Israel even if they establish their own state. And finally, that they have been normalizing the occupation of the West Bank as if it were simply an extension of Israel proper.

Given that the concept of democracy plays a significant role in these arguments, it is best to define it. Democracy, literally meaning “rule by the people,” empowers individuals to exercise political control over the form and functions of their government. While democracies may vary in form, they all share certain features in common, including competitive elections, freedom of expression, and protection of individual civil liberties and human rights. Ultimately, democracy is a system of government based on the belief in freedom and equality between people. The concept of democracy derives its moral strength and legitimacy from two key principles. First is individual autonomy, the idea that no one should be subject to rules which have been imposed by others. People should be able to exercise self-determination and control over their own lives. As the philosopher Alain Badiou puts it, democracy is a political system that “does not prohibit or restrain, or not excessively.” The second principle is equality, the idea that everyone should be granted an equal opportunity to influence the decisions that affect people in society.

The following are the six contrarian arguments and my counterarguments, which I believe shed important light at the extent of the absurdities which much of the Israeli public and some diaspora Jews invoke in making their case in favor of continuing the occupation.

“Judaea and Samaria belong to Israel in accordance with the San Remo treaty. Israel is not an occupying power.”

The San Remo Conference, which was held April 19-26, 1920, between Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan, with the United States as a neutral observer, established that Palestine would be placed under British Mandatory rule, specifically stating “The Mandatory will be responsible for…. the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people…”

The critic, however conveniently ignored the second part of the sentence, which continues, “…it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine….”

Moreover, the critic also chose to disregard the fact that the UNSC passed Resolution 194 in 1947 (the Partition Plan) that called for the establishment of a Jewish state and a Palestinian state. The legitimacy that was accorded to the establishment of Israel by the UNSC is exactly the same that was accorded to the Palestinians. Dismissing Resolution 194 and selectively citing only a part of the San Remo agreement is gravely misleading and harmful as it does nothing but obscure the truth and help to prolong the conflict at a terrible political, economic, and psychological cost for both sides.

“I think we can all agree that peace will be good for Israeli democracy, but it’s simply not true that an occupying power can’t be a beacon of democracy. It can and often has been. Britain conquered and occupied many countries and not only remained a beacon of democracy. Its empire was instrumental in its spreading of democracy. India and many other countries wouldn’t be democracies today except for this. Same with America’s occupation of Japan and Germany. Same probably with the democracy and empire of classical Athens. As I remember it, Lewis Samuel Feuer gave some solid analysis on this in his book on imperialism.”

An occupying power can indeed be a beacon of democracy, provided that such a power promulgates the principles of democracy in the country it occupies and subsequently leaves it to be governed by its own representative government. Unlike Israel, however, neither Britain nor the US are building settlements, annexing Indian, Japanese, or German territory, or applying two sets of rules—one for the US or British citizens with all the rights and privileges, and another set of rules akin to marshal laws to govern these countries’ respective citizens.

If Britain still occupied India, or if the US similarly still occupied Japan and Germany and treated them the way Israel is treating the Palestinians next door, neither the US nor Britain would be considered democracies. Citing these examples by this critic is a fundamentally false equivalence. Indeed, no country can be a democracy when it continues to occupy other people, especially when these people (the Palestinians) live on a contiguous land mass with Israel and even share the same territory, with hundreds of thousands of Israeli Jews living in their midst in the West Bank, enjoying all the rights and privileges of Israeli citizenship while the Palestinians are subjugated to harsh military rules as Israel imposes in the West Bank.

“An Occupying Power Cannot Be a Beacon of Democracy”? Nonsense. How about US occupying a hunk of Germany? US occupying Japan? US occupying Afghanistan? US occupying Iraq? In each of those cases, US was a beacon of democracy. In some places it was followed by the occupied, in others it wasn’t — but the fact remains that what you say makes no sense… Sorry…”

To equate the American military presence in Germany, which is an integral part of NATO’s military installations in Europe, to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, is baffling. Moreover, American troops in Germany are welcome in the country, and while the German people are split over the presence of US military bases, successive German governments want them to stay. The critic obviously did not do his homework. There are military bases and American troops ranging from tens to tens of thousands in approximately 80 countries. Thus, according to the logic of this critic, the US currently occupies 80 different countries, which is of course the height of absurdity.

Furthermore, the US is not incarcerating thousands of foreign citizens in the countries where it maintains military bases. It is not conducting night raids, it is not restricting the movement of people in their own land, and it is not settling civilian communities throughout their territories, all of which Israel practices routinely in the West Bank. If, for example South Korea or Japan had a contiguous land mass with the US and if their people lived side-by-side with US citizens but did not enjoy the same rights and privileges as US citizens, then the US would be considered undemocratic, an apartheid state at that. Simply put, no country can call itself a democracy while it simultaneously exercises authoritarianism over other countries and people that share the same land mass.

“How can a nation be an occupier of its own ancestral land? Or maybe you mean New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona? So, which is the occupier?”

I wonder if this critic will be willing to apply the same postulate to other people anywhere else in the world. If every indigenous peoples came back to reclaim the land of their ancestors from 2,000 years ago, the world’s map would not even remotely resemble the current borders that delineate nearly 200 countries. Moreover, I wonder how this critic will respond to the following hypothesis: suppose the Jews were living in Palestine for hundreds of years, yet the Palestinians occupied the same land more than 2,000 years before, and now have come back to reclaim it. Should the Israeli Jews concede that the land indeed belongs to the Palestinians, because it was their ancestral land two millennia ago? Indeed, for how many centuries do people need to live on any land to claim it as their own?

Instead of finding a formula whereby both people, Israelis and Palestinians, can coexist peacefully and negotiate a two-state solution, if for no other reason other than the fact that Israel simply cannot evict all three million Palestinians from the West Bank, instead, Israel is opting to maintain the occupation and conveniently claim that a nation cannot be an occupier of its own ancestral land, despite the passage of thousands of years and the peoples who have lived on the land in the intervening millennia. If this is not twisted logic, I don’t know what is.

“You are delusional. Either the IDF controls Judea/Samaria or Iran controls Judea/Samaria. Pick one. I guess you pick Iran. So, tell your readers that!”

Can this or any other critic tell us how and by what means Iran will be able to control Judea and Samaria, the West Bank? Any talk of a two-state solution that will put an end to the occupation will have to be based on categorical and unshakable security arrangements between Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. This has been discussed time and again in the past, and the Palestinians want such security arrangements for their own sake just the same. Even at the present, Israel and the Palestinian Authority collaborate on all security matters.

The PA knows full well that Israel will not relinquish a single inch of territory unless there is an iron clad security arrangement in place to ensure its national security. Moreover, no country, including Iran, will ever be in a position to control the West Bank given Israel’s formidable military prowess that will crush any foreign power that challenges Israel’s military dominance now or at any time in the future, even if an independent Palestinian state has been established.

“I agree with every word you write. However, I think that before talking about a Palestinian state, Israel must improve the situation of its own Arab population. The Israeli Arabs can and must become the bridge between the Jewish Israelis and the Palestinians.”

There should be no doubt that Israel must address the discrimination against its own Arab citizens; however, it cannot ignore the urgent need to find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The two are not mutually exclusive and must be tackled simultaneously, as indeed one can complement the other.

In last week’s demonstration in Tel Aviv against the so-called judicial reforms, demonstrators also carried banners proclaiming that the occupation is incompatible with democracy. As they see it, the judicial reforms if enacted and the continuing occupation would destroy Israel’s democracy, and the public must now relentlessly fight against these two menaces to save Israel’s democracy.

To be sure, the Israeli occupation has no logical, political, or biblical justification or even national security implications. It not only adversely affects the Palestinians, instigating militancy and endless violence as we are witnessing day in and day out; the occupation is dangerously eroding Israel’s social fabric and moral standing, regardless of what kind of spins are put on it.

Admitting the truth about the occupation is the one bitter pill that none of its supporters wants to swallow. Should we now leave it to the demagogues who concoct utterly illogical scenarios to mislead the public about the true nature of the occupation, to which only fools would subscribe?

*

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Dr. Alon Ben-Meir is a retired professor of international relations at the Center for Global Affairs at NYU. He teaches courses on international negotiation and Middle Eastern studies. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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*** 

 

This is the sixth and final post in a six-part review of the documentary film called Never Again Is Now Global.

The series is structured as follows:

1. The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 1

2. The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 2

3. The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 3

4. The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 4

5. The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 5

6. The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 6 – Conclusion (this post)

  • Parts 1 to 5 Recap
  • Series Conclusion
  • Dedication
  • Full Series eBook of The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison

Trailer

***

The Covid-19 – Holocaust Comparison, Part 6 – Conclusion

Parts 1 to 5 Recap 

Part 1 of this six-part series presented the documentary film under review, Never Again Is Now Global, and the methodology to examine its merits from an independent and objective lens.

For this, key claims (shown hereunder) from each episode of the documentary film are presented and evaluated. Here is what has been examined thus far:

Series Conclusion

On January 30, 2023, a five-part documentary series called Never Again is Now Global premiered.

The film, produced by Holocaust survivor Vera Sharav, highlights the parallels between Nazi Germany and global pandemic policies and mandates related to Covid-19.

Each part of the series lasts about an hour and is filled with poignant testimonies and captivating visuals along with observations and claims made by participants about various abuses suffered by billions around the globe during the pandemic.

This author embarked on a mission to objectively review some of these key claims, setting aside the rhetoric and drama of the film itself, instead focusing on the facts about the events and measures surrounding the pandemic in order to arrive at the truth on these matters.  

In all, 12 claims brought forth by participants in the film were reviewed for their veracity and accuracy by thorough examination of supporting evidence.

The range of topics about these claims are listed in the previous section of this post (Parts 1 to 5 Recap).

All claims but one proved to be completely true, and the supporting evidence is quite undeniable.   

The only claim that wasn’t entirely proven true is that of Dr. Vladimir Zelenko about how the Covid-19 vaccinations were causing the equivalent of AIDS in patients. While this particular claim had some backing from scientific data and literature, as was outlined in Part 2 of this review series, more research is needed into the subject to fully substantiate it.

When we set aside the melancholic tone and rhetoric of the documentary, the overall substance of its subject matter remains mostly true and honest.

Despite the events of the Holocaust and the Covid-19 Pandemic being nearly eight decades apart, the comparisons are uncannily similar.

The level of technology may have changed since, but the concepts and tactics are the same.

FEAR and PROPAGANDA, in particular, have been employed with great skill and deception during both periods.

In the years leading up to World War II, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party created the Propaganda Ministry which took control of film, radio, theatre, and the press.

The Propaganda Ministry aimed further to control the content of news and editorial pages, handing down instructions to editors and journalists.

Newspapers in Germany printed cartoons that used antisemitic caricatures to depict Jews in a negative light.

We can easily compare how the mainstream Western press has similarly fomented copious amounts of fear at the onset of the Covid-19 Pandemic and propagated consistent, single-sided narratives regarding pandemic measures and the so-called “safety and efficacy” of the Covid-19 vaccines throughout the debacle.

Moreover, a large part of the mainstream press ran articles which vilified people who chose to not be subject to the experimental vaccinations, often labelling them “anti-vaxx” or “anti-vaxxers” who “don’t believe in science,” as the Canadian Prime Minister often uttered. They also regularly shamed and ostracised medical doctors who questioned the efficacy and safety of these novel experimental treatments, rather than giving them an opportunity to present their legitimate concerns.

On television and via social media outlets, entertainers and celebrity figures also chimed the same narratives, rarely deviating from the established orthodoxy.

During the Nazi era of WWII, MEDICAL EXPERIMENTATION was performed on Jews and other minorities as eugenics disguised as science – which was really pseudoscience.

Similarly, but on a much larger scale, medical experimentation was at the forefront of with billions of citizens across the globe serving as unsuspecting guinea pigs during the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Most were psychologically manipulated or coerced into taking highly unproven and experimental mRNA technologies which were not even technically vaccines even though cheaper, safer, and more effective drugs such as Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin were available for treatment of the Covid-19 disease.

In Part 1 of this review series, it was hypothesized, through a Canadian researcher’s work, that the number of deaths from the Covid-19 vaccines worldwide could amount to around 13 million – more than twice the amount of deaths attributable to the Holocaust from WWII (and nearly double the actual deaths attributable to the Covid-19 disease).

Whether this figure eventually proves to be valid certainly remains to be seen. Time will tell. Regardless, the sheer number of individuals who have died or suffered serious adverse effects from taking the experimental “vaccines” is enormous and is most likely to grow as months and years pass by.

Many of the health institutions (such as the CDC & FDA), hospitals and their leaders (such as Dr. Anthony Fauci) around the world have proven themselves to be far too obliging in support of the financial interests of pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson

Though it was not a claim that was explored in this review series, the film Never Again is Now Global touched upon the subject of FASCISM and how corporate giants such as Ford and General Motors (GM), IBM, John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil, and Dupont profited from the war and contributed and even enabled the atrocities committed against the Jewry.

The series also outlines the fascist parallels that are occurring today. Not only are pharmaceutical giants in on the action, but also hoards of private enterprises that are benefitting from the Covid-19 gravy train.

Part 2 of this review series focused on the symbiotic relationships between private corporations, governments, and public institutions for profit-making and the aggrandizement of power and control.

Some of the principal power players involved in these fascistic endeavors include the likes of members of the World Economic Forum, the World Health Organization (WHO), and United Nations with their Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).   

The promise of gargantuan profits and the enlargement of power are central to this corporate takeover which takes the form of biomedical/pharmaceutical products, Digital IDs, Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), vaccine passports, increased surveillance and censorship, among other power grabs.  

Finally, EUGENICS figures among the major arcs and parallels between the Holocaust and the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Part 3 of this review series was the longest of the lot and focused on three main aspects of the Eugenics Movement: its origins, the quest for the purest and fittest of human species – what we now refer to as transhumanism, and biowarfare.

As was explored, thoroughly documented and evidenced, the origins of the Eugenics Movements has its ideological roots from the elites and tycoons of Britain and the United States. Hitler’s Germany espoused and imported their lethal methods so as to more systematically exterminate Jews and other races they deemed as inferior stock, or breed.

In the 20th century, organisations largely funded by the industrialists’ so-called philanthropic foundations emerged to further accelerate the depopulation of the unwanted classes by means of access to birth control, abortion, sterilisation, and vaccines.

While claiming that the Eugenics agenda is continuing to this day may, at prima facie, appear far-fetched or even absurd, there is plenty of evidence to confirm that it is occurring at an accelerated pace, not the least of which includes plummeting fertility rates which are particular steep in African nations – the main targets of “global health” (which really means eugenics) by foundations of the billionaire classes, many of which have been exposed in Part 5 of this series.

And while it is still early to tell just how much of the carefully planned biowarfare methods that were used against the global population during the Covid-19 Pandemic have resulted in the extermination of relatively healthy people, the global scale at which it is occurring is rather alarming.

The silver lining in this monumental Covid-19 plot – with all its fear porn, mandates, diktats, and malevolence – is that people have risen up, resisted, and are rejecting unlawful and immoral commands which seek to shred their God-given freedoms and human dignity.

“It’s a race between enslavement and expansion of global human consciousness,” stated Dr. Vladimir Zelenko in the Never Again Is Now Global trailer.

Dedication 

This work is dedicated to all the lost souls who have suffered the ultimate fate of Covid-19 as well as all the courageous persons who have never lost their integrity and common decency to speak out about abuses. These include nurses and doctors such as Dr. Daniel Nagase, Dr. Mark Trozzi, Dr. Patrick Phillips, Dr. Crystal Luchkiw, Dr. William Makis, Dr. Paul Alexander, Dr. Peter McCullough, Dr. Robert Malone, along with many others. It also dedicated to truth warriors such as Steve Kirsch, Karen Kingston, Peter Halligan, Prof. Patrick Provost, former Ontario Provincial Police investigator Vincent Gircys, and Christian Leray from Réinfo Covid Québec.

Full Series eBook of The COVID-19 – Holocaust Comparison

I have compiled all six parts into a single PDF eBook which can be downloaded either by clicking this link or the image hereunder.

I hereby release this 188-page eBook into the Public Domain but ask that all its contents including hyperlinks be preserved in its entirety.

Please share far and wide.

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This article was originally published on Dan Fournier’s Inconvenient Truths.

Dan Fournier is from Canada. After having worked for over 35 years in the education sector, 22 as a teacher (including at the collegiate level), he has recently transitioned into investigative journalism. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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*** 

May 15 saw the release of the much-awaited Durham report, which detailed how the FBI initiated what was essentially a phony and heavily politicized investigation into Donald Trump’s Russia ties based on “raw, unanalyzed, and uncorroborated intelligence.”

John Durham was appointed Special Counsel by Attorney General William Barr in May 2019 to investigate the FBI’s Operation Crossfire Hurricane which, from July 31, 2016, to May 17, 2017, looked into coordination between the Trump campaign and Russians during the election.

Drawing on 480 interviews and review of one million documents, the Durham report makes clear that there was never any evidence that anyone in the Trump campaign had been in contact with any Russian intelligence officials during the 2016 election campaign.

Read the Durham report here.

These latter findings dovetailed with the 2019 Mueller Report, which concluded that there was no evidence of any collusion between the Russian government and members of the Trump administration to try to influence the 2016 election.

For years Democratic Party officials and liberal media outlets like CNN and MSNBC claimed that Trump had been blackmailed by the Russians who allegedly received a video showing that Trump had slept with Russian prostitutes at a Moscow hotel and watched them urinate.

The existence of these alleged tapes were detailed in the infamous “Steele dossier,” named after a former British MI6 spy, Christopher Steele, who was hired by Fusion GPS, a private eye firm employed by Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign to conduct oppositional research on Trump and his associates.

The Durham report emphasized that the FBI could not corroborate any of the information presented in the Steele dossier.

Steele’s main source, Igor Danchenko, a Russian national living in the U.S. and former Brookings Institution fellow, said that he could not corroborate any of the information that he gave Steele, which he defined as “rumor and speculation.”

The FBI wanted to pay Danchenko $300,000—even after the Bureau found his evidence not credible—in an apparent bid to buy his silence.

Danchenko’s source of information for the Steele dossier was Charles Dolan, a Virginia-based aide to Hillary Clinton who admitted to fabricating information presented in the Steele dossier, and said that his information derived from a Russian public relations executive, Olga Galkina, who was promised a job in the State Department if Hillary Clinton won the presidency in 2016.

Though aware of Dolan’s connection to Danchenko, the FBI inexplicably failed to interview him so they could try to corroborate what he was saying. The FBI also did not take basic steps, such as securing telephone call recordings for Danchenko or another dubious Steele dossier source, Belarusian businessman Sergei Millian, while ignoring red flags about their credibility.

The Crossfire investigation was first initiated after FBI headquarters in Australia received unverified information about comments allegedly made by George Papadopoulos, a Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, in a tavern.

Belief in the existence of a secret communications channel between the Trump organization and the Russian-based Alfa Bank derived from the false claims of employees of Hillary Clinton’s campaign who were helping their boss to divert attention from the growing scandal over Clinton’s use of a private email server for official business as Secretary of State.

These same Clinton operatives planted salacious stories in media outlets like The New York Times and CNN, which displayed the same lack of critical rigor as the FBI.

The Durham report includes leaked text messages between Peter Strzok, Section Chief and Deputy Assistant in the FBI’s counter-intelligence division, and his lover, FBI lawyer Lisa Page, in which Strzok called Trump a “douche,” “utter idiot” and “disaster,” and said that Hillary “should win [the 2016 election] 100,000,000-0.”

Durham ultimately concluded that there was no political motivation for the FBI’s “mistakes” although these quotes indicate there was along with a desire to reignite the climate of the Cold War as a means of sustaining support for record military budgets that were presented to the public as being necessary to counter the big, bad Russians.

Nail in the Coffin to Russia Gate—But What About the CIA?

Promoters of Russia Gate, like MSNBC host Rachel Maddow, predictably underplayed the breadth of Durham’s findings after the report’s release, saying it posessed nothing “we already didn’t know”—an admission that the report was factually accurate. Peter Strzok appeared on MSNBC to claim the report “didn’t come up with anything,” calling it a “predictable, sad ending to an investigation that never should have taken place.”

A person in a black shirt Description automatically generated with low confidence

Source: greenvillepost.com

But the report is actually significant in delivering the nail in the coffin to the Russia Gate narrative that so many people bought into for so long.

The Durham report nevertheless is very limited in its focus on the FBI—and failure to investigate the role that the CIA and White House played in Russia Gate.

The CIA Director at the time, John Brennan, is known as the “godfather of Russia Gate.” Soon after the start of the FBI’s Operation Crossfire Hurricane, Brennan briefed Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) on alleged Russian election interference.

Reid then wrote to then-FBI Director James Comey, warning him not to ignore “the evidence of a direct connection between the Russian government and Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.” Comey apparently responded by initiating Crossfire Hurricane.

A person in a suit and tie speaking into a microphone Description automatically generated with medium confidence

Source: sott.net

Brennan subsequently oversaw the drafting of an Intelligence Community Assessment that was released in January 2017, which falsely suggested illicit ties between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin, while also revealing that such contacts were the subject of a federal investigation.

The release of the assessment cast a pall of suspicion over Trump just days before he took office, setting the tone for the unfounded allegations of conspiracy and treason that engulfed his presidency—which Brennan continued to advance as an MSNBC news commentator.[1]

Brennan was especially close to President Barack Obama, who with Hillary Clinton played a central role in manufacturing the Russia Gate scandal.

Brennan had performed a vital service when he helped destroy documents that exposed deceits in the story told by Barack Obama about his family background prior to the 2008 election. Obama has strong family ties to the CIA, worked for a CIA front company after college; wrote a memoir that has all the trademarks of a CIA disinformation/psywar pamphlet; and basically gave the CIA everything that it wanted when he was President.[2]

Handwritten notes by Peter Strzok about a January 5, 2017, meeting show Obama, with then-Vice President Joe Biden, encouraging the FBI and Justice Department’s investigation of Michael Flynn, Trump’s first National Security Adviser, for allegedly lying to the FBI about a conversation he had with the Russian ambassador, even as they were told that Flynn’s actions “appear legit.”

On learning that the FBI was set to close its investigation into Flynn after finding no evidence of wrongdoing, Obama and Biden suggested finding ways to keep it open, with Biden bringing up the dead-letter Logan Act.

The notes additionally have Obama ordering that the continued investigation be kept secret from incoming President Trump and his people.

While the latter shenanigans were going on, Obama’s administration was escalating U.S. military support to Ukraine while it was engaged in a dirty war in the east of that country that resulted in the deaths of more than ten thousand civilians.

After promoting a policy reset toward Russia during his first term, Obama reignited the Cold War by levying sanctions on Russia under fraudulent pretexts and triggering a right-wing anti-Russian coup in Ukraine.[3]

Additional Known CIA Involvement

In April 2015, the Democratic National Committee hired a Ukrainian-American activist, Alexandra Chalupa, as a $5,000-a-month consultant.

Chalupa was convinced that Trump’s Achilles heel was Paul Manafort, a lobbyist who had done work for the party led by Viktor Yanukovych, Ukraine’s pro-Russian president from 2010 to 2014.

Chalupa’s effort to attack Trump by exposing Manafort’s alleged Russian ties was the seed of the collusion hoax.

Journalist Paul Sperry reported that Chalupa visited the White House at least 27 times during 2015 and 2016.

Among the government officials she worked closely with was Eric Ciaramella, the CIA detailee to the White House who would later be the “whistleblower” regarding Trump’s 2019 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that led to his first impeachment (for allegedly threatening to withhold military aid to Zelensky if he did not investigate Hunter Biden’s corruption in Ukraine).

Protection from a Company Man

The $64,000 question is why Durham was only tasked with investigating the FBI and not the CIA, which played a central role in Russia Gate.

The answer is not difficult to discern: The CIA is very good at public relations and able to protect its good name by penetrating the highest reaches of the U.S. government—as it routinely does foreign governments.

Durham was considered a trusted functionary because he had helped protect the Agency when he failed to issue any indictments after heading an investigation into the destruction of CIA videotapes of detainee interrogations in 2008, and legality of CIA enhanced interrogation techniques in 2009.

The man who commissioned Durham’s report, former Attorney General William Barr, is a company man who was officially employed by the CIA from 1971 to 1977. Barr’s father Donald was in the CIA before becoming headmaster of the prestigious Dalton School in Manhattan, where Jeffrey Epstein taught.

According to CIA whistleblower Terry Reed, as a right-hand man to CIA Director William Casey in the 1980s, Barr helped oversee illegal arms and drug-smuggling operations to the Nicaraguan Contras out of Mena, Arkansas, in coordination with then-Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton—another company man.[4]

Company men are always loyal to the CIA and use their powers to protect the Agency. The Durham report is an example of this as it placed blame for Russia Gate on the FBI rather than the CIA, when both agencies are culpable for the fraud that was perpetrated on the American people.

*

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Jeremy Kuzmarov is Managing Editor of CovertAction Magazine. He is the author of four books on U.S. foreign policy, including Obama’s Unending Wars (Clarity Press, 2019) and The Russians Are Coming, Again, with John Marciano (Monthly Review Press, 2018). He can be reached at: [email protected].

Notes

  1. Brennan’s top deputy, Avril Haines, who became Director of National Intelligence in the Biden administration, was part of a select inner circle that invented and then directed the Russia Gate psychological warfare operation. To try to substantiate some of his salacious claims, Brennan relied on a Kremlin informant who was later found to be a mid-level official with limited access to Putin’s inner circle. 

  2. See Wayne Madsen, The Manufacturing of a President (self-published, 2012); Jeremy Kuzmarov, Obama’s Unending Wars: Fronting the Foreign Policy of the Permanent Warfare State (Atlanta: Clarity Press, 2009). 
  3. Kuzmarov, Obama’s Unending Wars. 
  4. See Terry Reed, Compromised: Clinton, Bush and the CIA (New York: SPI Books, 1994). 

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*** 

Although Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s victory in the second round of the presidential election in Turkey is almost assured ahead of the second round of votes, opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, in case of victory, would alter the country’s foreign policy and put the relationship with Russia into a framework that is acceptable to the US. The question surrounding Kilicdaroglu is whether he would introduce sanctions against Russia or turn Turkey away from its newfound independent foreign policy.

Turkey is heading to the second round of the election after Erdogan achieved a better-than-expected result in the polls and has a significant lead over his rival, but not enough to win in the first round. Neither Erdogan nor the opposition candidate received 50 per cent and will face off again on May 28.

The second round was expected, but Erdogan still surprised everyone by achieving a figure of nearly 50 per cent, precisely 49.51% against Kilidaroglu’s 44.88%. Erdogan gained much more than the polls gave him credit for. Still, the pollsters often fail, especially in Turkey, because they do not include many groups of people, such as the diaspora, those who work in the state bureaucracy, nationalists, young people, and pensioners.

American President Joseph Biden did not influence the elections in Turkey and to the disappointment of the entire West, who openly expressed dissatisfaction with Erdogan’s increasingly independent foreign policy. Erdogan is responsible for transforming Turkey from Kemalist ideology to a more Islamist one, and one not entirely beholden to the West, as has been the situation since the country became a NATO member in 1952.

Erdogan’s candidate rival has received much adulation from the West, which is constantly growing and will probably be connected to the constant effort to compromise Russia as an international actor. The current Turkish president never questioned the country’s membership in NATO because he did not want Turkey to be just a regular member of the Alliance but rather a partner with independent interests that must be respected. This will characterise Ankara’s relations with the West even if Kemal Kilicdaroglu eventually prevails.

Kilicdaroglu’s statements about loyalty to NATO were made only in terms of electoral support because any criticism and belittling of Turkey would not be supported. The opposition leader will have to come to terms with the fact that Turkey is not the same as it was 20 years ago when Erdogan first became ruler of the country, but that now it is an independent regional power and that the Alliance is only one source of support it receives.

Even supposing that Kilicdaroglu eventually wins the election, he would be advised to maintain many elements of Ankara’s current official policy, such as Turkey’s relationship with the US and not changing military partnerships. Instead, the opposition leader would not help Russia too much to get out of isolation, like the oil hub, and there is still the question of whether he would introduce sanctions because it would be counterproductive for Turkey. 

One of the crucial issues related to these elections is the economic crisis that has hit Turkey. The bad news for Turkey is that inflation is almost 60 per cent, even if a large gas field has been reportedly discovered in the Black Sea.

Erdogan is attempting to remedy this situation, something he has already experienced twice. The main difference, however, is that previous economic crises were not before an election. To try and deal with the economic crisis, he raised the interest rates at which the state borrows money. This means that money was withdrawn from the market, which affected the poor the most. Today, Erdogan is looking for innovative solutions, but people are still determining how it will turn out. 

What is visible is that Kilicdaroglu needs to make a statement on the matter. The political program of the opposition is 250 pages long and full of ambiguities because Islamists, liberals, pro-Kurds, and nationalists are all cooperating. Effectively, the opposition leader can only hope to reach some saving arrangement with the West.

On the eve of the second round, the question arises regarding whom the third-placed Sinan Ogan will support, especially since he received 5.2 percent of the voters’ support in the first round. Ogan’s family are Azerbaijani, and he is essential in promoting pan-Turanism/Turkism. He also leads the anti-immigrant coalition, so neither Erdogan nor Kilicdaroglu suits him. However, he will have to pivot to one side, and it will be interesting to observe who he chooses.

With Kilicdaroglu representing the West and its interests, Erdogan represents independence and sovereignty to make decisions without interference. It is this dichotomy that Turks must choose between, and for now it seemingly appears that they are once against choosing Erdogan.

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Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.

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*** 

I recently penned an article about Tucker Carlson’s musings over the mysterious collapse of Building 7.

Building 7, also known as the Salomon Brothers building, was not struck by an airplane or any such projectile that day. Nonetheless, it collapsed at free-fall speed neatly into its own footprint.

Anyone who’s ever seen a controlled demolition will recognize the kinetic pattern.

Predictably, I was attacked by a few disgruntled readers/trolls with the “conspiracy theorist” smear.

Fair enough. That 9/11 was either actively facilitated or passively allowed by the powers that be is a conspiracy theory, and it’s one that I subscribe to.

I bear the cross with joy.

Have such detractors ever sincerely grappled with the endless anomalies and curiosities surrounding the event?

For instance, Larry Silverstein, Building 7’s owner, admitted that he liaised with the New York Fire Department on 9/11 and they decided to “pull it… and then we watched the building go down.”

“I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, ‘We’ve had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.’ And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse,” Silverstein recalled.

“Fact check” organization Snopes later claimed that Silverstein actually meant “pull the firefighters out of the building.”

That’s plausible – super sketchy, but plausible. One would think he would have used the plural pronoun “them” as in “pull them,” but whatever.

Then there’s the spectacle of the BBC reporting that Building 7 – which, again, was not struck by any projectile – had collapsed a full twenty minutes prior to its actual collapse. You can actually see Building 7 in the background of the New York skyline during the report.

How curious, indeed, if not dispositive of malfeasance. It won’t be enough to dissuade the skeptics, who swallowed the government line, from their reflexive trust in the authorities’ version of events. They’re impervious to persuasion.

We should probably expect, then, that they will also willfully ignore the recent bombshell court filing that implicates the CIA in the attacks.

Via The Gray Zone:

“A newly-released court filing raises grave questions about the relationship between Alec Station, a CIA unit set up to track Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden and his associates, and two 9/11 hijackers leading up to the attacks, which was subject to a coverup at the highest levels of the FBI…

The filing is a 21-page declaration by Don Canestraro, a lead investigator for the Office of Military Commissions, the legal body overseeing the cases of 9/11 defendants…

When originally released in 2021 on the Office’s public court docket, every part of the document was redacted except an “unclassified” marking. Given its explosive contents, it is not difficult to see why: as Canestraro’s investigation concluded, at least two 9/11 hijackers had been recruited either knowingly or unknowingly into a joint CIA-Saudi intelligence operation which may have gone awry.”

The article is labyrinthine in its details. It painstakingly documents the process by which these pair of hijackers were identified by US intelligence in Kuala Lumpur while at an al-Qaeda summit, subsequently put on a flight to LA, bypassing customs scrutiny, handed an apartment (the CIA paying for the lease), and then potentially groomed to carry out the 9/11 attack.

Read the court filing in its entirety.

The facts of Alec Station and its potential grooming of two 9/11 hijackers are obscured by heavy bureaucratic redaction of relevant documents and FBI-vs-CIA infighting. We may never know the full extent of the CIA’s relationship with these figures.

There are, indeed, many unanswered questions about the cozy ties between the Deep State and the Saudis as it relates to their activities preceding and following the attacks.

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, while the FAA had the entire US airspace locked down, US intelligence whisked several prominent Saudis, including members of the bin Laden clan, out of the country.

Via LA Times:

“It began with a chartered flight from Tampa, Fla., to Lexington, Ky., on Sept. 13. Soon there were at least eight planes stopping in 12 U.S. cities to fly Saudis out. About two dozen passengers were related to Bin Laden. Because of the lockdown, the initial flight required authorization from the highest levels of government — and specifically from the White House.”

No member of the Bush administration or the permanent Deep State bureaucracy has ever been made to answer under oath for going out of their way to evacuate these people. Why wouldn’t they have been kept inside the country for interrogation?

We have overwhelming circumstantial evidence – not limited to that which has been laid out here — that elements of the US government were involved in the biggest terrorist attack in American history.

We also have motive.

Project For a New American Century was a neoconservative think tank comprised of future leaders in the Bush administration, including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz.

As its magnum opus, the group produced a 1997 document outlining its lofty geopolitical ambitions called “Rebuilding America’s Defenses”.

In it, they recognized that ramping up America’s already-bloated military budget and instigating foreign wars would be a hard sell without sufficient justification.

“This process of transformation is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event like a new Pearl Harbor,” they wrote.

A few short years later, with PNAC’s members installed in the highest levels of the Bush administration cabinet, they got their “catastrophic and catalyzing event.”

What blissful serendipity! What a fortuitous turn of fate!

The only piece of evidence we don’t have is the proverbial smoking gun, like a full-throated admission from one of the attack’s architects regarding the US government’s complicity.

Unfortunately, such conclusive evidence may never be forthcoming, so you can put the puzzle pieces together however you will.

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This article was originally published on The Daily Bell.

Ben Bartee is an independent Bangkok-based American journalist with opposable thumbs.

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Dr. Rosalie Bertell: Zero Tolerance for the Destructive Power of War. Illuminating the Path to Peace

By Dr. Rosalie Bertell and Hildegard Bechler, May 18, 2023

The problems we face at the beginning of the twenty-first century involve interconnected issues of militarism, economics, social policy and the environment. Global consumption of resources is exceeding Earth’s restorative capacity by at least 33 per cent.

NATO Is Creeping Into Asia, Warns North Korea

By Countercurrents.org, May 18, 2023

North Korea’s Foreign Ministry has claimed NATO is seeking to increase its influence in Asia, citing growing “military collusion” with Japan, which hosted a delegation from the military alliance last month to discuss ways to step up cooperation.

Russia, Ukraine and the African Mediators

By Kester Kenn Klomegah, May 18, 2023

Local Russian and foreign media awash with the latest potential peace efforts, this time, from African leaders. Presumably this group of peace-makers, headed by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, will demonstrate collective efforts at resolving the heightened political differences between Russia and its neighbouring Ukraine.

South Africa “Mischief-makers”? Is Ugly-American Ambassador to Pretoria Reuben Brigety Correct, that South Africa Weapons Were Shipped to Russia?

By Prof. Patrick Bond, May 18, 2023

Godongwana said all South African weapons sales had to be vetted by a cabinet committee, and no official decision had been taken to supply Russia. “If it did happen as the Americans claim, it could be a conduct of people who were mischief makers.”

Ongoing Fascist Repression in Pakistan

By Junaid S. Ahmad, May 18, 2023

Confirmed and corroborated by at least two dozen of my former students both inside Pakistan’s military-intelligence apparatus as well as those protesting it. This is the face of fascism, the culmination of a year-long Washington-backed regime change operation against former prime minister Imran Khan.

Ukraine City of Khmelnytskyi: Did Russia Vaporize Depleted Uranium Shells?

By Larry Johnson, May 18, 2023

Russia’s aerial attack on the Ukrainian city of Khmelnytskyi is catching quite a bit of attention because of reports of a spike in Gamma rays following multiple, massive explosions. Educated speculation believes that the increase in Gamma radiation may be a consequence of Russian bombs blasting British supplied depleted uranium rounds into dust.

US Aid to Kiev About to “Dry Up”

By Lucas Leiroz de Almeida, May 18, 2023

US military aid to Ukraine may be close to drying up. According to a recent report by an important American media outlet, until July, Washington will be unable to continue sending large amounts of military aid to Kiev, thus risking the supply necessary for Kiev to continue fighting in the proxy war with Russia.

Biden’s New NIH Director Nominee, Who Was Selected by Fauci, Received $290 Million in Grant Funding from Pfizer

By Jordan Schachtel, May 17, 2023

Dr Bertagnolli has received a stunning $290.8 million in research funding from Pfizer. The Daily Signal, a project of the Heritage Foundation, reported that from 2015 through 2021, she “received more than 116 grants from Pfizer, totaling $290.8 million, making up 89% of her research grants.”

Russia’s ‘Kinzhal’ Hypersonic Missile Destroys Kiev’s U.S. Patriot Air Defense System

By Drago Bosnic, May 17, 2023

For most of this month, the mainstream propaganda machine has been parroting the same story over and over again – a Russian 9-A-7660 “Kinzhal” air-launched hypersonic missile was shot down by a US-made “Patriot” SAM (surface-to-air missile) system.

The Antichrist Symbolic or Biblical? Towards a One World Order (OWO)?

By Peter Koenig, May 17, 2023

What is the Antichrist? There are almost as many answers as there are questions. Is the Antichrist the biblical figure “Antichrist” appearing in the book of Revelation? Or is He a symbolic figure that may have appeared before Christ or after Christ – preventing or fighting ethics and conscience feared by the announcement of the coming of Christ, or left behind by Christ?

 

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Under president Barack Obama (2009–17) covert operations and raids by American military special forces intensified. Organisations like the US Special Operations Forces (SOF), Navy SEALs and CIA were infiltrating different states, violating their national sovereignty in kill/capture offensives aimed ostensibly at Islamic insurgents.

The countries targeted were those such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen, Sudan, etc. The kill/capture targets highlighted by Washington comprised part of a Joint Prioritized Effects List (JPEL), which even included some American citizens abroad deemed as enemies, and which was based on legal or extralegal assumptions according to classified information from president Obama.

The Pentagon chose to wage “unconventional war” through elite military units, through proxy forces and sabotage groups.

In executing night raids and other activities, the US special forces were often focused on countries outside of Washington’s influence, in efforts to align them with the Western liberal order. For example president George W. Bush, Obama’s predecessor, had sent special forces such as the Green Berets, along with US Marine Corps troops, to the Caucasus state of Georgia where they trained Georgian military personnel (1). The goal was to turn Georgia, which borders Russia to the north, into a permanent US client nation.

John Nagl, a US lieutenant-colonel, described the kill/capture campaign as “an almost industrial-scale counterterrorism killing machine”. Nagl said that, in a 3 month period in 2010, US forces from the Special Operations Command (SOCOM) carried out 3,000 military operations in Afghanistan (2). This involved entering villages in the middle of the night, in order to kill or take prisoner Islamic militants.

From mid-2010 to mid-2011, US special forces liquidated or captured 12,000 Islamic fighters according to the US military (3). Many of the night raids were executed through faulty intelligence or recklessness, and as the months went by hundreds of innocent people and civilians were also killed. Under the leadership of General Stanley McChrystal, appointed by Obama as the top commander in Afghanistan in summer 2009, the US special forces killed or took prisoner 700 insurgent officers. In another 3 month period, from July to September 2010, US-led NATO forces executed 3,279 operations, resulting in the deaths of 293 insurgent commanders and the capture of 2,169 Islamic fighters. (4)

In July 2010, General David Petraeus succeeded McChrystal as overall commander of US-led forces in Afghanistan, as McChrystal had irreconcilable differences with the Obama administration. In a 1 year period, from 25 April 2010 to 25 April 2011, the US Special Operations Forces killed 3,200 insurgents and captured 800. Between February to May 2011, NATO purported it had carried out 1,400 operations in Afghanistan, which they said resulted in the deaths or capture of 500 “insurgent leaders” and 2,700 “lower-level insurgents” (5). These attacks, because of their often indiscriminate nature, would have again resulted in significant loss of life to non-combatants.

In 2011 president Obama authorised the construction of a network of US military bases on the Arabian Peninsula, and in the Horn of Africa (east Africa), with another base on the island of Seychelles in the Indian Ocean.

More US bases were established in central and east Africa, such as in South Sudan, Ethiopia and the Central African Republic. Obama dispatched special forces soldiers to central areas of Africa, apparently to assist in hunting down Joseph Kony, the Ugandan-born rebel commander (6). Kony was often described as “the world’s most wanted warlord” in Western media and he was never found. The US commandos have been operating in the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire), the Central African Republic and South Sudan.

The likelihood is that, rather than the main focus being the capture of people like Kony, the US has attempted to increase its presence in Africa for strategic purposes. Hundreds of American soldiers from the Special Operations Forces have been stationed at the US military base in Djibouti, east Africa, called Camp Lemonnier, where they work under concealed identities and have co-ordinated the flight path for American aircraft and drones. About 3,200 people, including some civilians, were stationed at Camp Lemonnier where US troops have provided training to foreign militants.

22nd MEU Harrier pilots train with French Mirage pilots 140330-M-HZ646-232.jpg

A US Marine Corps AV-8B Harrier landing at Camp Lemonnier in 2014 (Licensed under the Public Domain)

The Camp Lemonnier base is of importance, due to its location between east Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. The Port of Djibouti offers access to the Indian Ocean and Red Sea, and from Camp Lemonnier the US military can hit targets in nearby Somalia and Yemen within minutes. Washington continued to launch strikes over Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen, countries which the Americans were not officially at war with. (7)

Washington was implementing a kill/capture offensive inside Pakistan, traditionally a pro-American country. An independent research organisation based in Pakistan, the Conflict Monitoring Center, estimated that the kill/capture raids in Pakistan during the 5 years up to June 2011 resulted in the deaths of 2,052 people, the majority of whom were civilians. From July 2008 to June 2011, the CIA carried out 220 attacks within Pakistan, and in doing so the CIA claimed to have killed 1,400 “suspects” along with 30 civilians. (8)

The American raids and drone strikes inside Pakistan swelled the ranks of armed radical groups, like the Taliban and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. The Pakistani author Ahmed Rashid believed that, around 2011, the Taliban within Pakistan was more formidable than the Taliban in Afghanistan. The US military attacks on Pakistan and Afghanistan also boosted the legitimacy of Al Qaeda, whose members could rely on numerous safehouses in which to plan their operations.

Mistrust between the US and Pakistan increased on 26 November 2011, when NATO helicopters and aircraft bombed an outpost in northern Pakistan in an unprovoked attack, killing at least 24 Pakistani soldiers, in the Mohmand District (9). Pakistan’s government quickly retaliated, by cutting supply routes for US-NATO troops into Afghanistan, and demanded that Washington shut down its drone launch base. The Americans, despite these actions, did not want to lose Pakistan as an ally; because Pakistan, a strategically important country and nuclear power, shares borders with Afghanistan, India, Iran and China, and has a lengthy coastline which provides the Pakistanis with access to lucrative sea routes.

The US was pursuing two kill/capture campaigns inside Yemen (10). One was overseen by the CIA and the other was executed by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC). General James Jones, of the US Marine Corps, said Yemen was “an embryonic theater that we weren’t really familiar with”. The Americans, however, were aware that Yemen like Pakistan is strategically placed, beside crucial sea lanes and the Persian Gulf’s oil reserves.

The CIA was operating as a de facto paramilitary force. On top of the CIA’s intelligence activities, it was partaking in many of the tasks assigned to the special forces. On 17 September 2001, Bush had authorised a secret presidential finding, which enabled the CIA to develop teams with the goal of catching, killing or apprehending designated insurgents in different countries.

Obama greatly surpassed Bush in the deployment of elite units, such as from the Joint Special Operations Command. In the middle of 2010, the US Special Operations Forces were present in 75 countries at that time (11). Colonel Tim Nye, a Pentagon spokesman, said the Special Operations Forces would probably be operating in 120 countries by late 2011. Unsurprisingly then, Obama had requested a 5.7% increase in the Special Operations Forces budget for 2011, amounting to $6.3 billion with a contingency fund of another $3.5 billion. By 2015 it was reported the Special Operations Forces were active in 135 countries that year, clearly a mind-boggling number. (12)

The combined population, of the US and its allies, is much lower than that of the states of Eurasia and the Global South, many of whom increasingly desire a multipolar world rather than a unipolar world governed by the US. European nations like Britain, in decline for generations and losing its sovereignty, has hung on to the coat-tails of the US empire. The American-led NATO continues expanding but this is not, as the liberal media insists, a strategic defeat for Russia or China. NATO enlargement endangers the world, including the US, which would suffer a total defeat in a nuclear war as is known.

When Obama assumed the presidency in January 2009, he was faced with the upheaval that Bush left behind. There was the very high cost and failure of the war in Iraq, and ongoing uncertainty with the conflict in Afghanistan, another distant country which most Americans had a limited understanding of.

A survey conducted by the American media in March 2012, over a decade after the US invasion of Afghanistan was launched, revealed that 69% of American adults who partook in the survey did not want their nation involved in the war in Afghanistan. Only 23% of respondents felt America was “doing the right thing” by participating in the war. Twenty-seven per cent of Americans believed the conflict “has been mostly a success for the US”, just 25% felt the fighting was progressing well, and 59% stated that it had not been a successful war. (13)

Obama decided to pursue more cost-effective methods, and which he felt would not risk as many American lives. Obama, advised by intelligence expert and CIA director John Brennan, changed the “war on terror” to a “high-tech war”. The conflicts created more jobs in the US arms industry, and shored up the tax revenues of the states where the weapons firms are based, such as in Texas, California, Virginia, Massachusetts and Maryland.

Between 2001 and 2007, the US arms companies Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Boeing Defense, Space & Security recorded over $30 billion in yearly sales, and Raytheon and General Dynamics posted annual revenues of more than $20 billion during the same period (14). In June 2015 Obama sanctioned the National Military Strategy which outlined that Iran, Russia, China and North Korea are the countries most challenging to US interests in various regions. Yet the Pentagon’s Military Strategy conceded that none of the above countries was seeking a direct armed conflict, against the US or its allies. (15)

With Obama as president, US foreign policy continued to be focused on expansionist doctrines. In announcing a “pivot” to Asia, Obama tried to encircle and contain China with the construction of large numbers of bases in the Asia-Pacific areas, while he maintained the Pentagon military budget at over $600 billion per year. Contingency plans have been made for a US military attack on China, which is a nuclear state.

The American commander, Douglas MacArthur, had wanted to pursue a US-backed invasion of China in the early 1950s. General MacArthur, who at the time was commanding US-led forces in the Korean War, wished to extend the conflict to China in order to overthrow the communist government in Beijing. MacArthur supported the use of atomic bombs during the Korean War, but he had fallen out with president Harry Truman, and he was removed from his position as overall commander in April 1951. (16)

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Shane Quinn obtained an honors journalism degree and he writes primarily on foreign affairs and historical subjects. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

Notes

1 Luiz Alberto Moniz Bandeira, The Second Cold War: Geopolitics and the Strategic Dimensions of the USA (Springer; 1st ed., 23 June 2017) p. 48

2 Ibid., p. 130

3 “What is the secretive U.S. ‘Kill/Capture’ Campaign?’, PBS, 17 June 2011

4 Bandeira, The Second Cold War, p. 130

5 “Daily brief: U.S. prepared for fights with Pakistanis during bin Laden raid: report”, Foreign Policy Magazine, 10 May 2011

6 “Obama sends U.S. military advisers to central Africa”, Reuters, 14 October 2011

7 Bandeira, The Second Cold War, p. 136

8 Ibid., p. 138

9 “Pakistan outrage after ‘NATO attack kills soldiers'”, BBC News, 26 November 2011

10 Bandeira, The Second Cold War, p. 213

11 “A Secret War in 120 Countries: The Pentagon’s New Power Elite”, Commondreams.org, 4 August 2011

12 “American special operations forces have been deployed to 135 countries this year alone”, The Independent, 25 September 2015

13 “Poll: Support for war in Afghanistan hits all-time low”, CBS News, 26 March 2012

14 Bandeira, The Second Cold War, p. 132

15 “Pentagon releases National Military Strategy”, Defense News, 1 July 2015

16 “Douglas MacArthur”, Spartacus Educational, September 199 (updated November 2021)

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NATO Is Creeping Into Asia, Warns North Korea

May 18th, 2023 by Countercurrents.org

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Russia, Ukraine and the African Mediators

May 18th, 2023 by Kester Kenn Klomegah

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Local Russian and foreign media awash with the latest potential peace efforts, this time, from African leaders. Presumably this group of peace-makers, headed by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, will demonstrate collective efforts at resolving the heightened political differences between Russia and its neighbouring Ukraine.

According official sources monitored by this author, the peace plan is backed by African leaders of  the Comoro Islands (who now hold the rotating presidency of the African Union), Senegal, Uganda, Egypt, the Republic of the Congo and Zambia. Four of those six African countries – South Africa, Congo, Senegal and Uganda – abstained from a U.N. vote last year on condemning Russia’s invasion. Zambia and Egypt voted in favour of the motion.

These countries are now trying to persuade UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and other countries, including the United States and the United Kingdom, to support the African initiative. The document includes a provision on immediate ceasefire and designates the United Nations as the main platform for the Ukrainian peace process. Ramaphosa expressed hope that the African initiative will be actively discussed by the parties involved.

Zambia has historical ties with Russia. Uganda is a U.S. ally on regional security in East Africa, but Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has spoken of his country’s friendship with Russia and its neutral position in the war in Ukraine. Previously, the African Union, regional economic organizations have officially called for the adoption of diplomacy mechanisms and negotiations through which to end the crisis between Russia and Ukraine.

Last year in March, Senegalese President Macky Sall and the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, held discussions on the main aspects of the special military operation and on the importance of humanitarian issues and suggested ending the conflict through diplomacy with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In a phone conversation May 12, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said Putin supported his idea of several African leaders participating in the Ukrainian settlement. The South African leader pointed out that the Ukrainian crisis negatively impacts Africa because it triggered growing food and fuel prices. “A group of African heads of states took the view that Africa does need to put forward an initiative, a peace initiative, that could help to contribute to the solution of that conflict,” he added, according to report by Singapore’s CABC radio station.

Ramaphosa said he spoke with Putin and Zelenskyy by phone over the weekend and they each agreed to host “an African leaders peace mission” in Moscow and Kyiv, respectively. “Principal to our discussions are efforts to find a peaceful resolution to the devastating conflict in the Ukraine,” Ramaphosa was quoted in media reports.

According to Russian media, a group of African countries is in the process of coordinating the terms and timeframes of its visit to Moscow and Kiev in order to lay out their Ukrainian reconciliation initiative. It said further that “the modalities of the trip are being worked on with both countries. It’s a group of African Heads of State.”

It said the governments of Russia and Ukraine had agreed to receive an African delegation, whose goal is to find a peaceful solution to the Ukrainian conflict. Vladimir Putin and Vladimir Zelenskyy have given their consent to receive the African delegation in Moscow and Kiev.

Details of the plan have not been publicly released, although Ukraine’s stated position for any peace deal is that all Russian troops must withdraw from its territory. But Ramaphosa said the United States and Britain had expressed “cautious” support for the plan and the U.N. Secretary General had also been briefed about the initiative.

Considered one of Moscow’s closest allies on the continent, South Africa says it is impartial and has abstained from voting on U.N. resolutions on the war. Last week, it rejected claims by U.S. ambassador to South Africa that weapons were loaded onto a Russian vessel from a naval base in Cape Town in December. Reports said Ramaphosa had opened an inquiry into the allegation.

South Africa is preparing to attend the next Russia-Africa Summit in July 2023 in St. Petersburg. In August, it will host the next BRICS gathering in Durban. The BRICS group of nations  are Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. With BRICS as an example, China has attempted playing a crucial role in the conflict resolution between Russia and Ukraine.

Russia is ready to examine proposals by African and Latin American countries on resolving the ongoing Ukraine crisis, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a press conference following talks with his Belarusian counterpart Sergey Aleinik.

Lavrov stated that there were other initiatives – a Brazilian initiative and an initiative of the South African president.

“In both cases we responded to initiatives from Latin American and African friends that we were ready to consider any of their proposals that were prompted by a sincere desire to help stabilize the world order. But so far, unlike our Chinese neighbors, we have not seen documents on the issue either from the Brazilians or the Africans,” he added.

“We have confirmed our readiness to maintain contacts whenever they are interested, because it is in our interests to deliver to as many as possible of our partners on all continents the logic that becomes clear to an independent observer,” Lavrov stated.

China has been, so far, offering to mediate possible peace talks, an offer clouded by its show of political support for Moscow. Beijing released a proposed peace plan in February, and a Chinese envoy is preparing to visit Russia and Ukraine. But there appeared to be little chance of an imminent breakthrough to end the war since Ukraine and its Western allies largely dismissed the Beijing’s proposal.

The Kremlin wants Kyiv to acknowledge Russia’s annexation of the Crimean Peninsula and the Ukrainian provinces of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia, which most nations have denounced as illegal. Ukraine has rejected the demands and ruled out any talks with Russia until its troops pull back from all occupied territories. Ukraine is determined to recover all Russian-occupied areas.

Zelenskyy’s 10-point peace plan also includes a tribunal to prosecute crimes of aggression, which would enable Russia to be held accountable for its invasion. Zelenskyy had private talks with Pope Francis at the Vatican on May 14, later saying he sought support for Ukraine’s peace plan from the pontiff.

As a new world is awakening to the worsening situation, it is necessary that all countries must be guided by the principles of non-interference, respect for national sovereignty and territorial integrity. Due to its ‘special military operation’ that it started in February 2022, Russia is currently experiencing a raft of sanctions imposed by the United States and Canada, European Union, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and a host of other countries.

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Kester Kenn Klomegah, who worked previously with Inter Press Service (IPS) and InDepthNews, is now a regular contributor to Global Research. As a versatile researcher, he believes that everyone deserves equal access to quality and trustworthy media reports.

The US Should be a Force for Peace in the World

May 18th, 2023 by Eisenhower Media Network

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The following is the text of a full-page ad by the Eisenhower Media Network in the New York Times on May 16, 2023.

it is signed by prominent military and national security personnel 

The Russia-Ukraine War has been an unmitigated disaster. Hundreds of thousands have been killed or wounded. Millions have been displaced. Environmental and economic destruction have been incalculable. Future devastation could be exponentially greater as nuclear powers creep ever closer toward open war.

We deplore the violence, war crimes, indiscriminate missile strikes, terrorism, and other atrocities that are part of this war. The solution to this shocking violence is not more weapons or more war, with their guarantee of further death and destruction.

As Americans and national security experts, we urge President Biden and Congress to use their full power to end the Russia-Ukraine War speedily through diplomacy, especially given the grave dangers of military escalation that could spiral out of control.

Sixty years ago, President John F. Kennedy made an observation that is crucial for our survival today.

“Above all, while defending our own vital interests, nuclear powers must avert those confrontations which bring an adversary to a choice of either a humiliating retreat or a nuclear war. To adopt that kind of course in the nuclear age would be evidence only of the bankruptcy of our policy–or of a collective death-wish for the world.”

The immediate cause of this disastrous war in Ukraine is Russia’s invasion. Yet the plans and actions to expand NATO to Russia’s borders served to provoke Russian fears. And Russian leaders made this point for 30 years. A failure of diplomacy led to war. Now diplomacy is urgently needed to end the Russia-Ukraine War before it destroys Ukraine and endangers humanity.

The Potential for Peace

Russia’s current geopolitical anxiety is informed by memories of invasion from Charles XII, Napoleon, the Kaiser and Hitler. U.S. troops were among an Allied invasion force that intervened unsuccessfully against the winning side in Russia’s post-World War I civil war. Russia sees NATO enlargement and presence on its borders as a direct threat; the U.S. and NATO see only prudent preparedness. In diplomacy, one must attempt to see with strategic empathy, seeking to understand one’s adversaries. This is not weakness: it is wisdom.

We reject the idea that diplomats, seeking peace, must choose sides, in this case either Russia or Ukraine. In favoring diplomacy we choose the side of sanity. Of humanity. Of peace.

We consider President Biden’s promise to back Ukraine “as long as it takes” to be a license to pursue ill-defined and ultimately unachievable goals. It could prove as catastrophic as President Putin’s decision last year to launch his criminal invasion and occupation. We cannot and will not endorse the strategy of fighting Russia to the last Ukrainian.

We advocate for a meaningful and genuine commitment to diplomacy, specifically an immediate ceasefire and negotiations without any disqualifying or prohibitive preconditions. Deliberate provocations delivered the Russia-Ukraine War. In the same manner, deliberate diplomacy can end it.

U.S. Actions and Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine

As the Soviet Union collapsed and the Cold War ended, U.S. and Western European leaders assured Soviet and then Russian leaders that NATO would not expand toward Russia’s borders. “There would be no extension of…NATO one inch to the east,” U.S. Secretary of State James Baker told Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on February 9, 1990. Similar assurances from other U.S. leaders as well as from British, German and French leaders throughout the 1990s confirm this.

Since 2007, Russia has repeatedly warned that NATO’s armed forces on Russian borders were intolerable – just as Russian forces in Mexico or Canada would be intolerable to the U.S. now, or as Soviet missiles in Cuba were in 1962. Russia further singled out NATO expansion into Ukraine as especially provocative.

Seeing the War Through Russia’s Eyes

Our attempt at understanding the Russian perspective on their war does not endorse the invasion and occupation, nor does it imply the Russians had no other option but this war.

Yet, just as Russia had other options, so too did the U.S. and NATO leading up to this moment.

The Russians made their red lines clear. In Georgia and Syria, they proved they would use force to defend those lines. In 2014, their immediate seizure of Crimea and their support of Donbas separatists demonstrated they were serious in their commitment to defending their interests. Why this was not understood by U.S. and NATO leadership is unclear; incompetence, arrogance, cynicism, or a treacherous mixture of all three are likely contributing factors.

Again, even as the Cold War ended, U.S. diplomats, generals and politicians were warning of the dangers of expanding NATO to Russia’s borders and of maliciously interfering in Russia’s sphere of influence. Former Cabinet officials Robert Gates and William Perry issued these warnings, as did venerated diplomats George Kennan, Jack Matlock and Henry Kissinger. In 1997, fifty senior U.S. foreign policy experts wrote an open letter to President Bill Clinton advising him not to expand NATO, calling it “a policy error of historic proportions.” President Clinton chose to ignore these warnings.

Most important to our understanding of the hubris and Machiavellian calculation in U.S. decision-making surrounding the Russia-Ukraine War is the dismissal of the warnings issued by Williams Burns, the current director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In a cable to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in 2008, while serving as Ambassador to Russia, Burns wrote of NATO expansion and Ukrainian membership:

“Ukraine and Georgia’s NATO aspirations not only touch a raw nerve in Russia, they engender serious concerns about the consequences for stability in the region. Not only does Russia perceive encirclement, and efforts to undermine Russia’s influence in the region, but it also fears unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences which would seriously affect Russian security interests. Experts tell us that Russia is particularly worried that the strong divisions in Ukraine over NATO membership, with much of the ethnic-Russian community against membership, could lead to a major split, involving violence or at worst, civil war. In that eventuality, Russia would have to decide whether to intervene; a decision Russia does not want to have to face.”

Why did the U.S. persist in expanding NATO despite such warnings? Profit from weapons sales was a major factor. Facing opposition to NATO expansion, a group of neoconservatives and top executives of U.S. weapons manufacturers formed the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO. Between 1996 and 1998, the largest arms manufacturers spent $51 million ($94 million today) on lobbying and millions more on campaign contributions. With this largesse, NATO expansion quickly became a done deal, after which U.S. weapons manufacturers sold billions of dollars of weapons to the new NATO members.

So far, the U.S. has sent $30 billion worth of military gear and weapons to Ukraine, with total aid to Ukraine exceeding $100 billion. War, it’s been said, is a racket, one that is highly profitable for a select few.

NATO expansion, in sum, is a key feature of a militarized U.S. foreign policy characterized by unilateralism featuring regime change and preemptive wars. Failed wars, most recently in Iraq and Afghanistan, have produced slaughter and further confrontation, a harsh reality of America’s own making. The Russia-Ukraine War has opened a new arena of confrontation and slaughter. This reality is not entirely of our own making, yet it may well be our undoing, unless we dedicate ourselves to forging a diplomatic settlement that stops the killing and defuses tensions.

Let’s make America a force for peace in the world.

Read more at www.EisenhowerMediaNetwork.org

Signed by

  • Dennis Fritz, Director, Eisenhower Media Network; Command Chief Master Sergeant, US Air Force (retired)
  • Matthew Hoh, Associate Director, Eisenhower Media Network; Former Marine Corps officer, and State and Defense official.
  • William J. Astore, Lieutenant Colonel, US Air Force (retired)
  • Karen Kwiatkowski, Lieutenant Colonel, US Air Force (retired)
  • Dennis Laich, Major General, US Army (retired)
  • Jack Matlock, U.S. Ambassador to the U.S.S.R., 1987-91; author of Reagan and Gorbachev: How the Cold War Ended
  • Todd E. Pierce, Major, Judge Advocate, U.S. Army (retired)
  • Coleen Rowley, Special Agent, FBI (retired)
  • Jeffrey Sachs, University Professor at Columbia University
  • Christian Sorensen, Former Arabic linguist, US Air Force
  • Chuck Spinney, Retired Engineer/Analyst, Office of Secretary of Defense
  • Winslow Wheeler, National security adviser to four Republican and Democratic US
  • Lawrence B. Wilkerson, Colonel, US Army (retired)
  • Ann Wright, Colonel, US Army (retired) and former US diplomat

Timeline

1990 – U.S. assures Russia that NATO will not expand towards its border “…there would be no extension of…NATO one inch to the east,” says US Secretary of State James Baker.

1996 – U.S. weapons manufacturers form the Committee to Expand NATO, spending over $51 million lobbying Congress.

1997 – 50 foreign policy experts including former senators, retired military officers and diplomats sign an open letter stating NATO expansion to be “a policy error of historic proportions.”

1999 – NATO admits Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic to NATO. U.S. and NATO bomb Russia’s ally, Serbia.

2001 – U.S. unilaterally withdraws from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

2004 – Seven more Eastern European nations join NATO. NATO troops are now directly on Russia’s border.

2004 – Russia’s parliament passed a resolution denouncing NATO’s expansion. Putin responded by saying that Russia would “build our defense and security policy correspondingly.”

2008 – NATO leaders announced plans to bring Ukraine and Georgia, also on Russia’s borders, into NATO.

2009 – U.S. announced plans to put missile systems into Poland and Romania.

2014 – Legally elected Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych, fled violence to Moscow. Russia views ouster as a coup by U.S. and NATO nations.

2016 – U.S. begins troop buildup in Europe.

2019 – U.S. unilaterally withdraws from Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty.

2020 – U.S. unilaterally withdraws from Open Skies Treaty.

2021 – Russia submits negotiation proposals while sending more forces to the border with Ukraine. U.S. and NATO officials reject the Russian proposals immediately.

Feb 24, 2022 – Russia invades Ukraine, starting the Russia-Ukraine War.

This ad reflects the views of the signers. Paid for by Eisenhower Media Network, a project of People Power Initiatives.

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This was originally published in November 2022.

World BEYOND War has launched a new online tool at worldbeyondwar.org/no-bases that allows the user to view a globe pock-marked with 867 U.S. military bases in countries other than the United States, and to zoom in for a satellite view of and detailed information on each base. The tool also allows filtering the map or list of bases by country, government type, opening date, number of personnel, or acres of land occupied.

This visual database was researched and developed by World BEYOND War to help journalists, activists, researchers, and individual readers understand the immense problem of excessive preparation for war, which inevitably leads to international bullying, meddling, threats, escalation, and mass atrocity. By illustrating the extent of the U.S. empire of military outposts, World BEYOND War hopes to call attention to the wider problem of war preparations. Thanks to davidvine.net for a variety of information included in this tool.

The United States of America, unlike any other nation, maintains this massive network of foreign military installations around the world. How was this created and how is it continued? Some of these physical installations are on land occupied as spoils of war. Most are maintained through collaborations with governments, many of them brutal and oppressive governments benefiting from the bases’ presence. In many cases, human beings were displaced to make room for these military installations, often depriving people of farmland, adding huge amounts of pollution to local water systems and the air, and existing as an unwelcome presence.

U.S. bases in foreign lands often raise geopolitical tensions, support undemocratic regimes, and serve as a recruiting tool for militant groups opposed to the U.S. presence and the governments its presence bolsters. In other cases, foreign bases have made it easier for the United States to launch and execute disastrous wars, including those in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, and Libya. Across the political spectrum and even within the U.S. military there is growing recognition that many overseas bases should have been closed decades ago, but bureaucratic inertia and misguided political interests have kept them open. Estimates of the yearly cost to the U.S. of its foreign military bases range from $100 – 250 billion.

View a video about the new bases tool.

click below top access Interactive Map:   

USA’s Military Empire: A Visual Database

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(Who, then, has been ‘making mischief’?)

Godongwana said all South African weapons sales had to be vetted by a cabinet committee, and no official decision had been taken to supply Russia.“If it did happen as the Americans claim, it could be a conduct of people who were mischief makers.” …

The rand slumped to its weakest level on record against the dollar and yields on government bonds soared last week amid investor concern that any escalation in the diplomatic row may put trade worth billions of dollars at risk. The market reaction “could have a massive disruption to our fiscal framework,” and a recovery in the rand and the nation’s bonds will depend on whether investors are comforted that the issue has been resolved, Godongwana said. “Once people realize that the matters raised by the ambassador have been dealt with, I think that things are going to stabilize.”

Panic is in the air: the credit ratings agencies do not approve.

But it’s not only subimperialist Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana, but also the head of the National Conventional Arms Control Committee, Mondli Gungubela – minister in the presidency – who is claiming that there was no official approval for SA arms exports to Russia on the red Lady R ship in the centre of the pic at the right. Oh, to correct myself, that’s not the grey battleship as I mistook it for a few days ago.

So, if the yanks are correct, who would have dunnit? Deputy public works minister Obed Bapela claimed on SAfm radio this morning, about SA’s parastatal arms manufacturer:

“I was with the management of Denel, I was there last week Friday. Denel has not been in production for the past three years.”

Although worth celebrating, that’s also confusing, because Rheinmetall-Denel has a major joint venture in Somerset West which I understand has been producing and selling quite a bit of deadly weaponry in recent weeks. They outright deny providing Putin his wicked tools, as you’d expect.

Meanwhile, the subimperialists at Armscor seems happy enough to authorise supply of SA arms to seven NATO countries, as noted below. And according to chairperson Phillip Dexter, the firm is explicitly committed to “commercialisation” of its so-called services. But as far as I know, Armscor is not an arms-manufacturer; that function was sent over to Denel some years ago.

So, if Reuben Brigety is correct that there was an upload of guns and/or ammo, and if he risked diplomatic chaos to tell that to us last Thursday, then who in SA made and arranged their delivery through a naval base last December?

Would it be the Paramount Group? Is Ivor Ichikowitz making mischief (again)? 

Meantime, Ramaphosa was tedious and evasive in this morning’s letter to the masses:

South Africa is a sovereign state, governed by a democratic Constitution and committed to the consistent application of international law. We will continue to fulfil our obligations in terms of the various international agreements and treaties to which we are signatories. These are among the principles that inform our approach to allegations that arms were loaded onto a Russian vessel that docked in Simon’s Town late last year. Since we do not have concrete evidence to support these allegations, we are establishing an independent inquiry headed by a retired judge to establish the facts.

He sounds… um… rather muffled?

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Patrick Bond, Professor, University of the Western Cape School of Government. He is a regular contributor to Global Research. 

All images in this article are from the author

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This is an excerpt from Dr. Rosalie Bertell’s book entitled Planet Earth:

The Latest Weapon of War. 

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This search into our past has admittedly been depressing….

There appear to be two paths towards global stabilization of population and resource:

  • the first would use force, and violence, to reduce populations and limit consumption;
  • the second would propose reducing the felt need for population increase through fulfilling basic survival requirements, providing security from violence, and increasing resource productivity.

This second path has many supporters…. Can we find ways of achieving greater eco-efficiency and eco-sufficiency, peace and rule by law? Can we accomplish an equitable distribution of goods and services both within and between nations?

I believe that there are clear steps we can take. As in most serious illnesses, there is emergency treatment, followed by a long recovery period, counting on nature’s own restorative power. In my view the emergency action we must take is to terminate the military. Both this and the long process of behavioural modification rest on the human ability to change.


Part III: Rethinking Security,

Chapter VI: Military Security in the New Millennium

The problems we face at the beginning of the twenty-first century involve interconnected issues of militarism, economics, social policy and the environment. Global consumption of resources is exceeding Earth’s restorative capacity by at least 33 per cent. War and the preparation for war drastically reduce the store of these resources still further, leading to a self-perpetuating cycle in which competition for raw materials leads to further conflict. This means that global survival requires a zero tolerance policy for the destructive power of war.

However, I recognize that exposing the extremes of today’s military and outlining the crisis in resources will only bring about change if we also tackle the question of security. Popular support for the military comes from fear, and that fear is based on hundreds of years of recorded history. We feel that we must have weapons to protect ourselves from the weapons of the enemy.  This fear legitimizes the development and stockpiling of new weapons and results in the election of public officials who will not hesitate to use violence. This in turn attracts the warrior to public office and reinforces his or her belief that military might is the best assurance of security. If the public were convinced that there were real, viable alternatives to war, such figures would lose their mandate.

Therefore, it is vital that a new concept of security is devised, which puts Earth and its inhabitants first. The old paradigm of security protects wealth, financial investment and privilege through the threat and use of violence. The new concept embraces a more egalitarian vision, prioritizing people, human rights, and the health of the environment. Security itself is not being abandoned; it is just being achieved through the protection and responsible stewardship of the Earth. I would call this emerging new vision ‘ecological security’. Such a shift in focus requires a complex, multi-faceted approach to resource protection and distribution, to conflict resolution and the policing of the natural world. In Chapter 7, I will outline some of the directions we might take towards achieving these goals. But in order to do this, we must first challenge the belief that military force is a necessary evil.

Working for Change, Altering the Core Belief

Social change always follows a period when a core belief is identified and rejected. As support and awareness of this new way of thinking grows, the political climate changes and the old way of doing things is no longer acceptable. That is the lesson we learn from history. I believe, for example, that the vast social changes of the 1950s and 1960s came about when people began to challenge the idea that everyone should conform to socially imposed patterns of behaviour. This shift resulted in a new understanding of human and civil rights, with a focus on the freedom of the individual and an acceptance of racial, religious and sexual diversity.

Once a core belief is overturned, related changes spread under their own impetus. In the 1950s and 1960s we saw the growth of movements for civil rights, women’s rights, black power and gay rights. Consciousness-raising in turn yields changes in legislation, social behaviour, policy, and even language. More recently we have seen the recognition of the rights of the child, the movement against child soldiers, and animal rights groups.

There will always be those who resist change—in the 1960s, the rejection of socially imposed behaviour led to fears of social chaos. But we are quick to monitor when things go ‘too far’ and we adjust our beliefs accordingly. So whilst we recognize the freedom of the individual, for example, this does not mean that we tolerate them violating the rights of another. Self-correction and adjustment following the rejection of a core belief is a vital part of the process.

The core belief being challenged today is that military power provides security. There exists more than enough evidence to show this belief is untrue….

Lobbying for Change 

The first step in change is the conviction that change is needed. This could be said to be the theoretical stage based on observation and reassessment. The next step is practical, when people come together to exchange ideas and information and to lobby for social transformation. What we find in reality is that these two processes occur simultaneously – discussion gives rise to groups of like-minded people wo engage in further analysis.

It is clear that the multi-faceted problems outlined in this book will require a multi-faceted solution. No one person or organisation will have the wisdom needed to deal with all of the issues that must be addressed. Those working for peace, economic justice, social equity and environmental integrity must all stay connected, sharing their ideas and insight. ‘Staying connected’ in such a grandiose project will never mean total agreement in everything, rather a constant cycle of communication, action, feedback and evaluation. Honest dialogue about successes and failures is a protection against major mistakes during alternative policy development.

The good thing about such a complex range of problems is that the process of change can engage a wide variety of talents. Everyone should be able to find a comfortable niche where he or she can be useful and appreciated….

Once an individual has identified the skills they have and the issue they want to address, they need to find a suitable group of like-minded people with whom they can work and from whom they can derive support…. The most important thing is that these efforts must be cooperative and not competitive. The way we organise for reform is part of the solution for healing. If confrontation and competition have led to excessive greed and violence, then we require the opposite skills to rectify the imbalance.

Phasing Out the Military

So how would we actually go about bringing an end to the military? The first and most important requirement is that the military come under civilian control; then we must look at effective disarmament and the redirection of military resources, including human resources, towards more humanitarian aims; finally we must seek alternative means of resolving conflict. We also need to bring the research community into this question so that disarmament becomes a long-term reality.

Control of the Military

Many people were shocked when NATO decided to bomb Kosovo on its own authority. If NATO or some other coalition outside of the United Nations can dictate military policy then the chances of promoting a peaceful solution to any crisis are seriously damaged. There is more security for the public when international actions are based on decisions made by a civilian authority and are backed by the rule of law…. When power is dispersed, it is less likely to be abused.

However, it is clear that the goal of change is not just civilian supervision of the military but the dismantling of the military altogether. This change will not be easy. No country is going to terminate its military forces unless it can be absolutely sure that other countries are doing the same—the fear of being vulnerable to attack would be much too strong.

Disbanding the Military

The United Nations, with the assistance of NGOs like SIPRI, has been tabulating military expenditure and arms race transfers for many years. Enough data is now available to successfully monitor a freeze in military spending….

An alternative suggestion is to redefine the military’s job description. After all, they are supposed to work for us and in our name. Proposals include using military personnel for civilian assistance in ecological crises such as floods or volcanic eruptions. They could also carry out genuine peacekeeping, with new nonviolent training programmes and the development of conflict resolution skills. Imagine unarmed peacekeepers trained in the art of diplomacy. When the option of war is not available, people are forced to think about the many possible but untried responses….

Some members, or former members, of the military have begun to question the relevance of their activities, such as the Retired Generals Opposed to Nuclear War, who have been so vocal in support of eliminating all nuclear weapons….

Of course not everyone in the military takes such an enlightened view, and there is bound to be military resistance to the new concept of security. I regard NATO as one of the greatest obstacles to general disarmament in Europe and North America….

War itself needs to be banned. There are no disputes between nations that cannot now be skills, we should be heading towards an exciting new era of real diplomacy. Indeed even after a war negotiations are necessary before ‘peace’ is established. The main accomplishment of the violence is to force concessions at the negotiating table, but because a war influences the ‘freedom’ of the loser, post-war negotiations are notoriously unjust. Often this sets the stage for the next war—one reason perhaps why the Second World War followed on so swiftly from the First. With the Chemical Weapons Convention, banning chemical warfare, which came into force on 29 April 2000, and review of nuclear weapons reduction on the United Nations agenda for the same year, it seems to be the opportune moment to push this nonviolent agenda.

Two Success Stories

Landmines

One of the most effective citizen initiatives in recent history has been the global ban on landmines. Jody Williams, who spearheaded the International Coalition to Ban Landmines, won a Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts.

The United Nations estimates that landmines kill or maim about 25,000 people every year. The problem is immense, with an estimated 60 to 70 million mines deployed around the world. Africa is the most heavily mined, with as many as 30 million devices in 18 countries.

Removing landmines is a difficult, slow, and nerve-racking job. Greg Ainsley, a 21-year-old from Edmonton, Canada, explains how it is done….

The peace movement, largely through the efforts of women, has been working to ban landmines since the early 1990s and in 1994 the International Red Cross added its voice to the protest. The campaign enlisted the help of Diana, Princess of Wales, who used her celebrity to bring the humanitarian dimension of the problem to the public, emphasizing the extraordinary proportion of children killed or maimed for life. In October 1996, the Canadian government convened a meeting in Ottawa of 50 governments favourable to a complete ban, and in December 1997 some 90 countries signed a special treaty drafted in Oslo. Britain and France, major exporters of landmines, agreed to the ban, but the US decided not to sign because it wanted to use the weapons in the demilitarised zone of Korea. Other non-signing producers of landmines were Russia, China, India, Pakistan and Israel….

The treaty does not tackle the problem of the 80 million mines already planted, nor does it prohibit mines designed to blow up vehicles or disable tanks. Nevertheless, it is one small step towards phasing out the violence of war. It clearly places great value on individual lives, especially those of women and children, and it has the added benefit of protecting agricultural land that becomes useless when strewn with bombs. The ban on landmines provides a model of cooperation between non-governmental organisations, with widespread grassroots support, and gives encouragement for future initiatives.

Nuclear Weapons

The World Court Project

A second successful initiative was the World Court Project, an idea strongly promoted by Commander Robert Green, a retired British navy officer. According to Green, although there are prohibitions against weapons of mass destruction, military personnel are told that nuclear weapons have never been outlawed. Quoting from the US Military Manual: ‘The use of atomic weapons cannot be regarded as a violation of international law in the absence of any customary law or convention restricting their use.’ As a commander of ships carrying nuclear warheads, Green has always been bothered by this. Since both the US and UK military manuals require personnel to adhere to principles of international law relating to warfare, Green reasoned that a declaration of the International Court of Justice would go a long way towards eliminating those weapons and supporting military personnel who refused to use them.

Retired Commander Green spoke out publicly in Europe and North America, in support of the International Court of Justice review. General Charles Homer, head of the US Space Command, also spoke in favour of abolishing nuclear weapons. These individuals and others, such as international law expert Richard Falk, gave impetus to popular support for the initiative. In fact, the World Court motion was accompanied by intense civilian action through a coalition of international peace groups such as the International Peace Bureau, the War and Peace Foundation, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom and the International Association of Lawyers for the Abolition of Nuclear Arms. This coalition activity focused on a provision of the World Court constitution that had never been used before. According to this provision, the judges are obliged to take into account ‘the dictates of public conscience’. For this reason over a hundred million individuals sent in a declaration of conscience, stating:

It is my deeply held conscientious belief that nuclear weapons are abhorrent and morally wrong. I therefore support the initiative to request an advisory opinion from the World Court on the legality of nuclear weapons.

After receiving briefs from various governments and these public statements of conscience, The International Court of Justice issued a Communique in July 1996 stating that:

THE COURT unanimously DECIDES a threat or use of force by means of nuclear weapons that is contrary to Article 2, paragraph 4, of the United Nations Charter and that fails to meet all the requirements of Article 51, is UNLAWFUL….

Unanimously, DECIDES, a threat or use of nuclear weapons should also be compatible with the requirements of the international law applicable in armed conflict particularly those of the principles and rules of international humanitarian law, as well as specific obligations under treaties and other undertakings which expressly deal with nuclear weapons…

By seven votes to seven, it follows from the above mentioned requirements that the threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally be contrary to the rules of international law applicable in armed conflict, and in particular the principles and rules of humanitarian law. However, in view of the current state of international law, and of the elements of fact at its disposal, the Court cannot conclude definitively whether the threat or use of nuclear weapons would be lawful or unlawful in extreme circumstances of self-defense, in which the very survival of the State would be at stake. [author’s emphasis]

Unanimously, DECIDED there exists an obligation to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective international control.

[The International Court of Justice, Peace Palace, The Hague, Communique No. 96/23, 8 July 1996]

It is interesting that the court’s support for nuclear disarmament was unanimous whilst it was split on the section dealing with ‘extreme circumstances’. Observers who were actually present at the court say that this compound statement was really a political ploy so that the court did not have to deal with each part of the resolution separately….

Overall, however, the outcome was encouraging. It demonstrated that there was some support within the military for placing limits on violence, especially for banning nuclear weapons. Moreover, it demonstrated that ordinary citizens could successfully engage international organisations like the World Court. It was heartening to see that both governments and the public respected this legal intervention to limit weapons of war. This second success story, like the first, involved collaboration between individuals, governments, and international organisations.

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Dr. Sister Rosalie Bertell, Grey Nun of the Sacred Heart, 1929-2012

Hildegard Bechler is a community activist who organized a province-wide speaking tour for Dr. Bertell, a leading expert (in 1978) on the health impacts of low-level ionizing radiation. Rosalie’s new information galvanized public opinion in support of citizens working cooperatively for 15 years to successfully prevent nuclear reactors and uranium mining in British Columbia, Canada.

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Ongoing Fascist Repression in Pakistan

May 18th, 2023 by Junaid S. Ahmad

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Confirmed and corroborated by at least two dozen of my former students both inside Pakistan’s military-intelligence apparatus as well as those protesting it. This is the face of fascism, the culmination of a year-long Washington-backed regime change operation against former prime minister Imran Khan.

“Around 7000+ PTI supporters and workers across Pakistan are in illegal custody of multiple LEAs and Police at the moment and not presented in any court after so many days of abduction.

The IG of Punjab himself claimed 3500+ abductions in Punjab. The actual number is around 5000+ for Punjab and 2000+ for KP & Islamabad.

No law permits any custody after 24 hours without presenting the accused in courts. Out of ~5000 abductions in Punjab, only ~200 presented in Punjab’s courts so far. 

None of them were not involved in any kind of vandalism at all and arrested just because they are peaceful PTI Supporters/Workers and their families. 

It’s the first time in history that political workers’ female family members are also being picked up to pressurise and humiliate them. In one case, an 8 year-old kid was also kidnapped for a few hours.

Hundreds of them are reportedly being tortured and pressurised to give false statements against PTI leadership.”

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Prof. Junaid S. Ahmad teaches Religion and Global Politics, and is the Director of the Center for the Study of Islam and Decoloniality, Islamabad, Pakistan. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image: Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan gives a speech from his home on March 15, with tear gas cannisters that had been fired at protesters by the police trying to arrest him (Source: Geopolitical Economy Report)

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Every now and then, the sharpened, dedicated means of halting a monstrous white elephant before its birth can work. The wise suddenly seem in charge, conscious and aware that folly can be averted. This, however, is a rare feat indeed. In Tasmania protests of some magnitude against a proposed stadium for Australian Rules Football are starting to have some effect. These have taken place against a dark backdrop: a persistent, critical housing crisis; the presence of homelessness; concerns about food and energy security, and healthcare.

On May 13, thousands gathered on Hobart’s parliamentary lawns protesting the $715 million proposal that envisages a redevelopment of the Macquarie Point precinct, a rather disingenuous justification to build a needless 23,000-seat structure on prime real estate using public funds. The package – totalling $745 million, also envisages upgrades for York Park (UTAS Stadium) in Launceston.

A conspicuous figure present at the protests was one of Australia’s more prominent authors, Richard Flanagan. As he wrote in The Age last month, “Tasmania, and its population of 550,000 people, has two stadiums where AFL games are routinely played.  Tasmania doesn’t have a stadium problem.  It has a housing and homelessness problem.” Rents in Australia’s poorest state have almost doubled over the last five years; affordable properties were elusive to those on Youth Allowance and JobSeeker.

In its myopic vision and scope, the stadium could be said, argues Flanagan, to be “a symbol of government inaction on these issues that blight Australia’s smallest state. In addition to housing, it has Australia’s worst public health system, and, with 50 per cent illiteracy, a public education problem.”

Also present at the protest was federal Tasmanian Senator Jacqui Lambie, who proved to be both colourful and agitated.  “Tasmanians,” she declared in her address to the crowd, “have had a bloody gutful over the stadium and you can stick it up your bum.”

In what must surely be considered an act of self-harm, the Tasmanian Liberals also find themselves in a governing minority largely because of Premier Jeremy Rockliff’s edifice fetish. A day before the large protests, Liberal backbenchers John Tucker and Lara Alexander quit the party. As Alexander reasoned, “The proposed shady deal to build a stadium in Hobart has sharply divided the community.” While she did not often agree with her opposite numbers in state parliament – both Labor and the Greens – any amount “upwards of one billion of taxpayers’ money […] should be allocated to essential services such as health and priorities like housing.”

Alexander also took issue with the Premier’s stinginess in not disclosing the full nature of the contracts. If a raid on the public purse on such a scale was going to be done so brazenly, surely a degree of transparency was in order.  “He has refused to share details of the contracts he signed with the AFL with his parliamentary colleagues, the parliament, and the community. There is zero transparency or accountability in this decision-making process.”

The two politicians also cited the government’s allergic tendency to ignore transparency and Parliamentary oversight regarding other projects, including the Marinus link and the Battery of Nation project. Be environmental, goes that theme, but go alone, without federal assistance. (By way of contrast, the as-yet-to-be-built stadium is promised $240 million by the federal government.)

Something of a vision problem has captured governments in Australia, one that has seemingly paralysed the cortex of policy making. This is evident in the opinions of the Deputy Premier and Treasurer, Michael Ferguson. While claiming to “respect that not everybody has the same opinion on these projects”, Ferguson was also clear that the government was “determined to get on with it, on the basis that we have significant federal funding which really respected, and I think demonstrated, that the business case was persuasive for Anthony Albanese, our Prime Minister.”

Miraculously, money has been found for such vanity projects as a sporting stadium being used to blackmailing effect by the AFL, for funding a yet unrealised nuclear-powered submarine fleet that will be essentially useless against any adversary. While the stadium is slated to cost under $800 million – and bound to go over – the federal government is topping that amount with $368 billion for sea vessels, all the time arguing that such profligacy will have no impact on the budget. One of the protesters’ themes summed up the indignation against these two projects superbly: “We can’t eat stadiums or submarines.”

To this can be added the disease of sporting privilege and aristocratic snobbery. The Australian Football League has become something of a spoilt, bullying brat, dictating terms to governments and smiting those disloyal to the creed. Forget the working stadia already in place; the fact that Tasmania was receiving the 19th license to play in the AFL and AFL Women’s League necessitated the extravagance of a spanking new facility. No stadium; no team. In doing so, the sporting body has not only brought Premier Rockliff to his knees, but that of Australia’s Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese.

To that end, we can only hope that the likes of Flanagan, the other state politicians in Labor and the Greens, and those tireless representatives at the federal level, MP Andrew Wilkie and Senator Lambie, can finally make those in power see sense. But stupidity, and its occasional sidekick, blindness, remain powerful forces behind the birth of white elephants.

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He currently lectures at RMIT University.  He is a regular contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research. Email: [email protected]

Featured image source

Biowarfare Through the Food Supply

May 18th, 2023 by Dr. Joseph Mercola

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Dr. Peter Lurie, president of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), and Beth Ellikidis, vice president of agriculture and environment at the Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO), argue for the genetic engineering of food. Both are connected to Bill Gates and other Great Resetters that are pushing to replace all natural foods with patentable, genetically modified foods

BIO, the world’s largest GMO trade organization, represents more than 1,000 pesticide, pharmaceutical and biotech companies in more than 30 countries. BIO claims genetic engineering is the solution to heal, fuel and feed the world, and to that end, it lobbies 15 different policy areas, including food, agriculture, and health care policy.

In 2004, BIO launched BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH), a nonprofit organization that “develops and manages programs across the for-profit and non-profit sectors to accelerate research and development for poverty-related diseases.” BVGH was launched with a $1 million start-up grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

In 2018, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation spun off a nonprofit subsidiary to the foundation called the Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute (Gates MRI), which develops biotechnologies to address health problems in poor countries.

BIO is partnered with the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), and the DOD specifically funds and provides technology transfers for the diseases that Gates MRI and BVGH are focused on: malaria, tuberculosis and Ebola.

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In an April 17, 2023, opinion piece in STAT News,1 Dr. Peter Lurie and Beth Ellikidis argue for the genetic engineering of food, claiming “newer technologies can make highly targeted changes at the base-pair level — one specific rung on the DNA ladder — enhancing precision and reducing the likelihood of ‘off-target effects’ in which the base pairs are unintentionally added to or deleted from the genome.”

While targeted genetic engineering is indeed possible, and modern technology lowers the likelihood of unintentional additions or deletions, this precision does not guarantee there won’t be adverse effects. One of the reasons for this is because many genes are multifunctional and can have multiple downstream effects.2,3

By altering a single gene, you can inadvertently affect the expression of hundreds of others. What’s more, the multifunctionality of genes is rarely intuitive. So, while it may seem convenient to genetically engineer cows without horns to prevent injury to other cows and farmhands, as suggested by Lurie and Ellikidis, there’s no telling what that tweak might do to internal organs or biological pathways.

In turn, there’s no guarantee that cascading effects will not alter the nutrition of the meat or dairy that comes from that cow. Maybe it’ll be fine, maybe it won’t. The problem is that, oftentimes with genetically engineered foods, safety testing is minimal or absent.

Who Do Lurie and Ellikidis Answer To?

When assessing the trustworthiness of people, it can be worthwhile to look at their funding and various partnerships. In the case of Lurie and Ellikidis, both are in league with Bill Gates and other Great Resetters that are pushing to replace all natural foods with patentable, genetically modified foods. 

Lurie — a former FDA associate commissioner — is the president of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). In the summer of 2020, Lurie launched a comprehensive campaign to put Mercola.com out of business by sending the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Trade Commission after us based on bogus charges.

CSPI is funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, the Rockefeller Family Fund, Bloomberg Philanthropies and other billionaire-owned foundations. It’s also partnered with the Cornell Alliance for Science, a “global communications initiative” whose primary funding comes from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Greg Jaffe, who heads up CSPI’s Biotechnology Project, is also the associate director of legal affairs at Alliance for Science.

Considering those ties, the CSPI’s long history of promoting industry science and propaganda is not surprising in the least. They supported artificial sweeteners, trans fats, GMOs, fake meat and the low-fat myth. They’ve also actively undermined transparency in labeling efforts.

Ellikidis, meanwhile, is the vice president of agriculture and environment at the Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO). She’s leading the “policy and market access strategies for BIO’s Agriculture and Environment section, which includes member companies developing and producing breakthrough technologies in food and agriculture.”4

BIO, the world’s largest GMO trade organization,5,6 represents more than 1,000 pesticide, pharmaceutical and biotech companies in more than 30 countries, as well as industry groups, academic institutions, state biotechnology centers and other related organizations.

According to BIO, genetic engineering is the solution to heal, fuel and feed the world, and to that end, it has lobbying committees dedicated to influencing 15 different policy areas, including food, agriculture, health care policy, technology transfer and finance.

According to Open Secrets,7 BIO spent $13,250,000 on “pharmaceutical and health products” lobbying in 2022. For reference, only Pfizer and the lobbying group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America spent more.8

How Gates Sets Himself Up for Success

In 2004, BIO launched BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH),9 a nonprofit organization that “strategically develops and manages programs across the for-profit and non-profit sectors to accelerate research and development (R&D) for poverty-related diseases.”

BVGH was launched with a $1 million start-up grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.10 In 2005, the BVGH received another $5.4 million to expand the biotech industry’s role in the fight against neglected diseases.11 The Rockefeller Foundation is also funding the group.

Fast-forward to 2018, and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation spun off a nonprofit subsidiary to the foundation called the Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute (Gates MRI).12 Gates MRI, funded with a $273 million, four-year grant from the Gates Foundation, is focused on developing biotechnologies to address health problems in poor countries.13

It’s a convenient setup to say the least. On the one hand, Gates is funding the R&D of biotech products through Gates MRI, and on the other, he’s funding the acceleration, coordination and management of private-public biotech programs through BVGH.

One key area where the BVGH is being inserted to manage private-public programs is the “Cancer Moonshot” program, launched in 2016 by then-Vice President Joe Biden. Biden “reignited” and highlighted the program in 2022.14 As reported in a White House fact sheet:15

“Working with African Access Initiative (AAI) partners, BIO Ventures for Global Health (BVGH) will implement cancer research projects that are determined and led by African oncologists and conducted in collaboration with U.S. cancer experts.

Through its African Consortium for Cancer Clinical Trials (AC3T) program, BVGH will facilitate five research projects, build capacity to conduct rigorous clinical research at 50 African sites, promote African primary investigator’s research interests on the AC3T platform, and coordinate the implementation of observational clinical studies.

In addition to building AC3T sites’ research capacity, BVGH will map the regulatory pathway in five AAI countries. All clinical studies involving cancer drugs will include development of market access pathways by BVGH.”

Gates MRI, in turn, intends to “apply new understanding of the human immune system learned from cancer research to prevent infectious disease.”16 Conveniently, he’s got the inside track to all of that through the BVGH.

Biowarfare Partners

Partnering with the Department of Defense to Protect the Warfighter: Investments in National Health Security, Part 1 of 3 from BIO on Vimeo.

As it so happens, BIO is also partnered with the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD),17 and the DOD specifically funds and provides technology transfers for the diseases that Gates MRI and BVGH are focused on: malaria, tuberculosis and Ebola.18,19,20,21

Not surprisingly, the DOD is also seeking to develop and adopt more mRNA-based therapeutics against other emerging biological threats22 — products that can be manufactured and deployed quickly.

One of the obvious hazards of public-private partnerships becoming more and more intertwined, as we see now, is that the government becomes less and less inclined to ensure the safety of these co-developed, co-owned products.

In a June 2022 BIO webinar, Ian Watson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for chemical and biological defense, specified that the agency will “safeguard” its industrial partners from various threats, including “foreign economic aggression and inherent marketplace vulnerability that are specific to biotechnology and biopharmaceuticals.”23

Does “market vulnerability” also include legal action by people injured by biopharmaceuticals that have been brought to market at warp speed? Judging by what we’ve seen during the COVID pandemic, it sure seems the U.S. government is doing everything it can to hide and suppress evidence of harm, so why would we expect any different in the future?

Are Foods Being Turned Into Bioweapons?

Getting back to the issue of food, just as medicine is being hijacked by the biotech industry, so is our food supply. Indeed, President Biden recently signed an executive order that makes biotechnology a key focus of every federal agency, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture.24

The transhumanist agenda is clear for everyone to see, and it’s being pushed on us from every angle, through food, medicine and national security. It recently came to light that the swine industry in the U.S. and Canada has been using customizable mRNA “vaccines” on herds since 2018,25 and to this day, there’s no research to prove the meat is safe for consumption in the long term and won’t affect the genetics of those who eat it.

Based on our experiences with the mRNA COVID shots, which more and more experts are starting to refer to as bioweapons, it’s not farfetched to wonder whether the use of mRNA in livestock might be a form of biowarfare against the public as well, this time through the food supply.

As reported by Dr. Peter McCullough,26 Chinese researchers have demonstrated that food can indeed be turned into a vaccine (or a bioweapon, depending on the antigen):27

“The nation’s food supply can be manipulated by public health agencies to influence population outcomes … Now an oral route of administration is being considered specifically for COVID-19 vaccination using mRNA in cow’s milk.

Zhang and colleagues have demonstrated that a shortened mRNA code of 675 base pairs could be loaded into phospholipid packets called exosomes derived from milk and then using that same milk, be fed to mice.

The mice gastrointestinal tract absorbed the exosomes and the mRNA must have made it into the blood stream and lymphatic tissue because antibodies were produced in fed mice against SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein (receptor binding domain) …

[G]iven the damage mRNA vaccines have generated in terms of injuries, disabilities, and deaths, these data raise considerable ethical issues. The COVID States project has shown that 25% of Americans were successful in remaining unvaccinated. This group would have strong objections to mRNA in the food supply, particularly if it was done surreptitiously or with minimal labelling/warnings …

These observations lead me to conclude that mRNA technology has just entered a whole new, much darker phase of development. Expect more research on and resistance to mRNA in our food supply. The Chinese have just taken the first of what will probably be many more dangerous steps for the world.”

Say No to mRNA in Your Food

Moving forward, it’s going to be extremely important to stay on top of what’s happening to our food supply. Many of us were surprised to realize mRNA shots have been used in swine for several years already. Soon, cattle may get these customizable mRNA shots as well, which could affect both beef and dairy products.

For now, I strongly recommend avoiding pork products. In addition to the uncertainty surrounding these untested mRNA “vaccines,” pork is also very high in linoleic acid, a harmful omega-6 fat that drives chronic disease. Hopefully, cattle ranchers will realize the danger this mRNA platform poses to their bottom-line and reject it. If they don’t, finding beef and dairy that has not been “gene therapied” could become quite the challenge.

Ultimately, if we want to be free, and if we want food safety and food security, we must focus our efforts on building a decentralized system that connects communities with farmers who grow real food in sustainable ways and distribute that food locally.

Legislative efforts are also needed. Bills that would be helpful in steering us in the right direction include the following:

  • The Processing Revival and Intrastate Meat Exemption (PRIME) Act28 This bill was introduced in 2017 and hasn’t moved since its introduction in the House. The PRIME Act would allow farmers to sell meat processed at smaller slaughtering facilities and allow states to set their own meat processing standards.

Because small slaughterhouses do not have an inspector on staff — a requirement that only large facilities can easily fulfill — they’re banned from selling their meat. The PRIME Act would lift this regulation without sacrificing safety, as random USDA inspections could still occur.

  • The Interstate Milk Freedom Act of 202129 This bill was introduced at the end of July 2021 as an amendment to the 2018 Farm bill.
  • Missouri House Bill 1169,30 which would require labeling of products, including food, that might “impact, alter or introduce genetic material or a genetic change” into the consumer.

Modern industrial farming has created a food production model that is not only unhealthy, but unsustainable as well. The reliance on GMO-derived products and the toxic chemicals used alongside them are destroying the environment and the public’s health.

To combat the encroaching influence of big GMO companies, I encourage you to support farmers and businesses that practice organic, biodynamic and regenerative farming. This food production model benefits both humans and the environment because it:

How can you play your part? The solution is actually quite simple — buy healthy, organic food. One of the best things you can do is to purchase your food from small-business farmers. To help you in your search, I recommend visiting these websites that point you to non-GMO food producers in your area:

I also urge you to support and donate to organizations like the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), as they are leading the way to promoting regenerative agriculture and sustainable farming practices. By advocating the innovative campaigns of these organizations, you are contributing to the future of regenerative agriculture.

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Notes

1 STAT April 17, 2023

2 Globe and Mail January 15, 2005

3 Scitable, Pleiotropy

4 BIO.org November 14, 2022

5 USRTK BIO Key Facts

6 Pharma-IQ Top Pharma Industry Associations August 2, 2018

7 Open Secrets BIO 2022 Lobbying Expenditures

8 Open Secrets, Industry Profile: Pharmaceuticals/Health Products, Client Totals List

9 BVGH.org

10 Gates Foundation, BIO Launches BIO Ventures

11 Gates Foundation BIO Ventures Announces Grant to Expand Biotech Industry’s Role

12, 20 JAMA 2018;320(6):539

13 Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute

14 White House February 2, 2022

15 White House December 14, 2022

16 Nature Biotechnology July 6, 2018; 36:563

17 BIO.org Partnering with DOD to Protect the Warfighter

18 Return on Innovation Report, Registered Products Table

19 BVGH.org, BVGH FundFinder Featured Funding Announcement 2017

21 BVGH The State of Drugs, Diagnostics, and Vaccines for Neglected Diseases

22 BIO.org Partnering with DOD to Protect the Warfighter Video 1, 2:55 minutes

23 BIO.org Partnering with DOD to Protect the Warfighter Video 1, 6:35 minutes

24 White House Executive Order on Advancing Biotechnology September 12, 2022

25 YouTube Global Ag Media 2018

26 Peter McCullough Substack April 7, 2023

27 bioRxiv December 20, 2022

28 HR 2657 PRIME Act

29 HR4835 Interstate Milk Freedom Act 2021

30 Missouri House bill 1169

Featured image is from Mercola

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Russia’s aerial attack on the Ukrainian city of Khmelnytskyi is catching quite a bit of attention because of reports of a spike in Gamma rays following multiple, massive explosions. Educated speculation believes that the increase in Gamma radiation may be a consequence of Russian bombs blasting British supplied depleted uranium rounds into dust.

The photo above shows the intact weapons storage facility just outside Khmelnytskyi taken some time before the Russia strike. Khmelnytskyi sits 217 miles to the west of Kiev, which means these strikes were most likely carried out by cruise missiles, such as the Kinzhal or Iskander. These strikes also provide vivid proof that Ukraine’s anti-missile air defense system is non-existent or disabled in and around Khmelnytskyi.

Let’s look at some of the video evidence. There were at least three bombs that struck this weapons depot. The first strike comes at 4:29 am (see the first video below, which shows the three strikes). That strike apparently ignited secondary explosions from ammunition and explosives stored at the targeted facility. There is a second blast recorded at 5:07 am followed by a massive explosion at 6:10 am, resulting in a black mushroom cloud towering over Khmelnytskyi.

4:29 am, 5:07 am and 6:10 am

5:10 am 13 May

6:10 am 13 May 2023

The following photo shows the aftermath of the strikes. The big crater in the upper left hand part of the image obliterated a couple of buildings and forests. Maybe this attack, with multiple missiles, will kill the tired narrative that Russia has run out of missiles and is scraping the bottom of the barrel.

It is not clear whether or not depleted uranium shells were vaporized. What is certain is that Ukraine lost an enormous quantity of munitions of various types that cannot be easily or quickly replaced. It also is noteworthy that Russia has been carrying out these kinds of strikes, not all with the same level of success, at multiple sites throughout Ukraine for the last eight days. Whatever small advances Ukraine has managed on the flanks of Bakhmut, they do not compensate for the massive loss incurred at Khmelnytskyi. This is a graphic reminder to the Ukrainians west of Kiev that they are at war and that Ukrainian military facilities are not safe.

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Military pay would become collateral damage if the U.S. government defaults on its debt next month, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told lawmakers on Thursday.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has said the United States will exhaust its ability to pay its bills by June 1 unless Congress raises the nation’s debt ceiling. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has proposed a plan to raise the debt ceiling in exchange for steep spending cuts, which would reduce the Department of Veterans Affairs budget by 22%.

President Joe Biden has said that McCarthy’s proposal is a non-starter and his administration will not negotiate over raising the debt ceiling to avoid a possible default. 

On Thursday, Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont,), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, asked Austin how the U.S. military would be affected by a default on the nation’s debt.

“What it would mean, realistically for us, is that we won’t – in some cases – be able to pay our troops with any degree of predictability, and that predictability is really important for us,” Austin said. “But this would have a real impact on the pockets of our troops and our civilians.”

Austin did not specify which troops would not get paid if the U.S. government defaults on its debt. He also did not say whether those troops and civilians would eventually receive back pay.

Since a U.S. government debt default would be an unprecedented event, the full ramifications for military pay are not yet clear, a U.S. official told Task & Purpose on Thursday. Ultimately, the Treasury Department would determine which government programs would get funded following a default.

“Our military leaders made it clear today that defaulting on the debt would be devastating for our troops and a win for our foreign adversaries like China,” Tester said in a statement to Task & Purpose on Thursday. “That is utterly unacceptable, full stop. It is time for Republicans and Democrats to come together to avoid default and deliver a budget that will protect our troops’ pay, makes sure we maintain our military advantage over Communist China, and allows America to maintain our place as the world’s leading economic superpower.”

McCarthy told reporters on Thursday that the ball is currently in the White House’s court as the clock ticks down to the default deadline.

“The House passed a plan that would responsibly raise the debt ceiling – meaning Republicans have done our part,” McCarthy said. “The House Republican plan limits government spending, saves taxpayer money, grows the economy, and simply authorizes spending levels that the United States was operating off of five months ago. It’s time for President Biden to come to the negotiating table or risk bumbling into default.”

But Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said that McCarthy is risking a debt default that would do great harm to military readiness and the Defense Department’s ability to conduct operations at a time when the United States is being challenged by Russia and China while facing persistent threats from Iran and North Korea.

“It will inflict injury on the people who serve our country and military families,” Smith said of a possible default. “That includes impacts to pay and benefits for service members, civilian employees, retirees, and veterans. Investment in critical military infrastructure will be hampered.” 

“Payments to businesses that employ millions of Americans could be limited or delayed,” Smith continued. “The Department of Defense is the country’s largest employer with over 3.5 million employees. Their pain and the economic loss felt by millions of other Americans will hit every state in the country and ripple around the world.” 

With both sides digging in, there does not appear to be a solution to the debt ceiling impasse coming in the foreseeable future.

This is far from the first time that service members and their families have faced the prospect of their lives being upended by actions – or inaction – of their elected leaders. In 2018, the Defense Department was unable to pay death gratuities to the families of two soldiers killed in a helicopter crash due to a government shutdown.

Roughly 42,000 Coast Guardsmen later had to work without pay during a much longer government shutdown that ran from December 2018 to January 2019.

For years, U.S. service members and Defense Department civilians have been used as pawns in the chess match between Republicans and Democrats over taxes and government spending.

As a result of the 2011 debt ceiling standoff, the Defense Department faced draconian spending cuts known as “sequestration,” under which the military branches used accounts for training and maintenance as billpayers and separated experienced service members before they could collect retirement benefits.

The results for military aviation were catastrophic: Mission capable rates plunged and accidents soared, as did deaths.

The world situation now is much more dire than it was during the last debt ceiling crisis. The Defense Department has provided Ukraine with more than $37 billion in military assistance, showing that the U.S. military would need a huge amount of artillery shells, rockets, and other munitions in a war against Russia or China.

The Defense Department’s budget for next fiscal year – which Congress has not approved yet – would invest $30.6 billion in munitions to start a yearslong process of getting the defense industrial base to ramp up weapons production.

Meanwhile, China’s arsenal of nuclear weapons has doubled to more than 400 warheads, and it is on track to have 1,500 warheads by 2035, a senior defense official told reporters in November.

In February, an F-22 Raptor shot down a Chinese spy balloon, which had flown across the United States. Sensitive documents that were later allegedly leaked by Airman 1st Class Jack Douglas Teixeira, revealed the U.S. military has encountered three other spy balloons from China, one of which flew over a Navy aircraft carrier group in the South China Sea.’

If the United States goes off the debt ceiling cliff in June, the consequences for the Defense Department would extend beyond pay issues, Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned lawmakers on Thursday.

“China right now describes us in their open speeches, etc. as a declining power,” Milley said during Thursday’s Senate Appropriations Committee hearing. “Defaulting on the debt will only reinforce and embolden China and increase risk to the United States.”

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Featured image: U.S. Marines with 3d Reconnaissance Battalion conduct pre-jump inspections prior to Military Free Fall and Low-Level Static Line parachute operations over Ie Shima, Okinawa, Japan, May 10, 2023. (Cpl. Michael Taggart/U.S. Marine Corps).

US Aid to Kiev About to “Dry Up”

May 18th, 2023 by Lucas Leiroz de Almeida

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US military aid to Ukraine may be close to drying up. According to a recent report by an important American media outlet, until July, Washington will be unable to continue sending large amounts of military aid to Kiev, thus risking the supply necessary for Kiev to continue fighting in the proxy war with Russia. It remains to be seen whether the absence of new aid packages will be enough to put an end to the conflict or whether the regime’s military will be forced to remain in the trenches, even without proper supplies.

The report circulating in the media was based on information provided by anonymous sources familiar with Pentagon’s affairs. They claim that “it won’t be easy” to recover the tens of billions of dollars already spent on Ukraine, which is why severe cuts are expected in the near future. It is alleged that only 6 billion of the 48 billion reserved for the assistance program would be left. With the depletion of this value, it will be difficult to allocate new resources in the program – at least on a scale as significant as it has been until now.

July is expected to be the deadline for this depletion. In about two months the money to send more military resources will end and then there is a risk of an abrupt interruption of the supply, which tends to severely damage the regime’s forces on the battlefield. So, if no effective results are achieved by the Ukrainian armed forces in the so-called “spring counteroffensive”, surely the situation will become even worse during the summer.

“Reupping [the money] won’t be easy (…) [US] has about $6 billion left (…) based on the rate of announcements, the money to draw down existing US stockpiles will expire in July. That would mean the flow of equipment could be disrupted if Kiev has to wait an extended period for a new tranche of funding”, source said.

It was added by the informants that the White House is already discussing a new aid package for Kiev, which, depending on the allocated amount, could further accelerate the depletion of military assistance reserves. It also must be remembered that in early May, Washington announced its plan to create a “modest” 1.2 billion fund to send long-term aid to Ukraine, which would focus on anti-aircraft equipment. It seems that, in the current American situation, the more aid is announced, the closer assistance to Ukraine seems to be coming to an end.

These discussions and forecasts are still taking place in the midst of the country’s serious financial crisis. Republicans and Democrats seem less and less in deal about their attempts to find solutions to national problems. So far, a final project on the country’s debt ceiling has not been presented, which could result in a default. Insiders also added that the “Congress will spend the next several months debating the [US] fiscal 2024 defense budget, a wrinkle that could complicate Ukraine funding”.

In fact, the conflict in Ukraine only keeps going because of Western help. Without the constant supply of weapons, money and mercenaries, Kiev would have been forced to surrender long ago. Maintaining the conflict no longer seems pragmatically interesting for either the Ukrainian regime or its sponsors. As much as the American military-industrial complex is profiting from the massive flow of arms production and exports, the strategic interests of the US are already beginning to be affected, since exorbitant expenses are being used with Ukraine instead of being used to solve the country’s financial and social problems.

However, for the US and NATO, this no longer seems to be a matter of strategic calculation, but of an existential decision. Allowing the rapid defeat of Ukraine will mean consolidating the process of geopolitical transition towards Multipolarity. Furthermore, a quick victory for the Russian forces would allow Moscow to alleviate its troops and prepare them appropriately for future efforts on other possible frontlines. And this is precisely one of the biggest fears of NATO, since the organization plans to keep the Russians distracted and busy, while fomenting conflicts that could “save” the unipolar order.

The Atlantic alliance is trying to promote the creation of new frontlines across Eurasia. Tensions are worsening between Moldova and Transnistria, between Georgia and the secessionist regions, and between Armenia and Azerbaijan. But so far these measures have failed, and no new flanks have emerged in the war with Russia. It seems that for Washington keeping Moscow in combat and attrition is a priority, so until eventually new flanks emerge, aid to Kiev is unlikely to cease despite possibly reducing. And even if it ceases, there will be no “carte blanche” for the puppet state to accept negotiating or surrendering.

In other words, even if Washington’s help “dries up”, certainly the Ukrainian troops will continue to be forced to fight in a precarious situation, without adequate supplies – fulfilling the promise to fight “to the last Ukrainian”.

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Lucas Leiroz is a journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant. You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.

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The White House has nominated a Pfizer-tied doctor to become the next director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

In a statement released by the White House, President Biden declared Dr. Monica Bertagnolli “a world-class physician-scientist whose vision and leadership will ensure NIH continues to be an engine of innovation to improve the health of the American people.”

The NIH is currently led by Lawrence Tabak, a Bill Gates stooge who replaced longtime NIH chief Francis Collins.

Collins resigned after emails surfaced that he and Anthony Fauci, among others, coordinated with other influential figures to silence doctors and scientists who opposed the covid hysteria narratives.

Dr Bertagnolli has received a stunning $290.8 million in research funding from Pfizer.

The Daily Signal, a project of the Heritage Foundation, reported that from 2015 through 2021, she “received more than 116 grants from Pfizer, totaling $290.8 million, making up 89% of her research grants.”

Anthony Fauci, who remains on salary at the NIH and has a taxpayer-funded U.S. Marshals security detail, told The Washington Post that he personally advocated for her selection as the next NIH director.

Bertagnolli has also received $17.4 million in grant funding from Janssen Research & Development LLC, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson.

The revolving door strikes again, now more in your face than ever before.

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For most of this month, the mainstream propaganda machine has been parroting the same story over and over again – a Russian 9-A-7660 “Kinzhal” air-launched hypersonic missile was shot down by a US-made “Patriot” SAM (surface-to-air missile) system. The “conclusive” evidence cited by the political West is laughable at best, but it was enough to convince those without specific knowledge of how weapons actually work, which includes most of the population. Moscow didn’t really comment on the claims. Or to be exact, not until the early hours of May 16, when the actual response came in a very “non-rhetorical” form.

Namely, the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) launched a SEAD (suppression of enemy air defenses) mission over Kiev, with the operation including two “Kinzhal” hypersonic missiles, which were used to neutralize at least one battery of the “Patriot” SAM system. While neither side commented on the variant of the destroyed US-made air defense system, video evidence shows that it was most likely one of the latest iterations, the PAC-3 MSE (Missile Segment Enhancement upgrade) that also includes the much-touted CRI (Cost Reduction Initiative) interceptors. The cost of a single CRI missile currently stands at close to $5,300,000, meaning that the 32 interceptors fired by the Kiev regime forces amounted to nearly $170,000,000.

Such a massive quantity of interceptors was still nowhere near enough to stop the Russian hypersonic weapons, although  the Kiev regime announced that it shot down most of the missiles fired by the VKS, including the claim that it allegedly neutralized six “Kinzhals”, despite the fact that the Russian military used only two during this attack. Although Moscow didn’t publicly reveal this, the information is based on the comments from the Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu himself. In response to the Kiev regime’s reverie, Shoigu stated laconically:

“The figures given by the Ukrainians about the interception of Russian missiles are [usually] three times higher than the amount [of weapons] we actually use.”

Several military experts estimate that the VKS used a lot of decoys of various types to bait the air defenses in and around Kiev, which would explain the claims of the local authorities that the Russian strike was “exceptional in density”. Ukrainian officials stated that the attack also included cruise missiles and drones. Local air defense forces allegedly shot down 18 missiles and nine drones, including six “Kinzhal” hypersonic missiles. The claims are widely ridiculed by military experts and numerous Telegram channels, with dozens of memes and practical jokes being posted by users and commenters.

Serhiy Popko, the head of the capital city’s military administration, stated:

“The barrage was exceptional in its density, with the maximum number of missiles in the shortest time possible, but the vast majority of enemy targets in Kiev airspace were detected and destroyed.”

CNN, the flagship of the mainstream propaganda machine, immediately resorted to damage control to save the “Patriot’s” reputation, as it only arrived late last month and just recently entered service, claiming that “a US-made ‘Patriot’ air defense system was likely damaged, but not destroyed, as the result of a Russian missile barrage in and around Kiev early Tuesday morning local time”, citing a US official as its source. The report further claims that “the US is still assessing to what degree the system was damaged”, adding that “this will determine whether the system needs to be pulled back entirely or simply repaired on the spot by Ukrainian forces”. It also noted that “a US National Security Council spokesperson referred CNN to the Ukrainian government for comment”.

Such advice by the US government can only be interpreted by the fact that even Washington DC simply wants to avoid having to do anything with the Kiev regime’s ridiculous claims. The issue obviously lies in the fact that such laughable propaganda is not only completely unsubstantiated, but also makes the US itself look like a laughingstock of the world. This is particularly noticeable when looking at somewhat less propagandistic US media, such as The National Interest. Geoff LaMear, the author of one of the analyses recently published by the TNI, stated that “Patriot missiles won’t save Ukraine“, with the following assessment:

“‘Patriot’ systems are limited to pinpoint defense of major assets and are designed to operate in tandem with air defenses engaging targets at higher and lower altitudes. Without these additions, ‘Patriot’ will have too many threats to engage and the result will either be porous coverage that doesn’t protect its defended assets, or coverage that quickly subsides when ‘Patriot’ runs out of interceptors. Moreover, ‘Patriot’ systems are themselves vulnerable. Operating a ‘Patriot’ radar system gives away its location, making it an open target for Russian attacks. This means that ‘Patriot’ is not a one-stop-shop for defending Ukraine’s military assets or its people.”

Indeed, the “Patriot” is simply one segment of the US air defense/ABM (anti-ballistic missile) doctrine that also includes several other types of longer-range systems and interceptors. However, considering how lucrative air defense contracts are, the political West will surely continue suppressing any information about the destruction of its much-touted systems, while also parroting the ludicrous claims that Russian hypersonic weapons are being shot down by these same SAM systems. Such assertions come despite the fact that even top US officials repeatedly reiterated that there’s no viable defense against maneuvering hypersonic targets. This includes President Joe Biden himself, who stated last year that the “Kinzhal” cannot be intercepted.

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Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.

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Introduction

What is the Antichrist? There are almost as many answers as there are questions. Is the Antichrist the biblical figure “Antichrist” appearing in the book of Revelation? Or is He a symbolic figure that may have appeared before Christ or after Christ – preventing or fighting ethics and conscience feared by the announcement of the coming of Christ, or left behind by Christ?

If you ask 100 people, you’ll likely get 80 different answers, according to one local pastor. What role this biblical enemy of Christ plays in what some believe will be a final confrontation, is also the subject of discussion and interpretation. See this.

The question about the Antichrist in our western “universe” seems to refer only to the Judeo-Christian Religions. That is what most of westerners believe.

But the symbolic meaning of the Antichrist is much wider and deeper and older. It goes as far back as humanity itself. It exists in Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism – there has always been an “evil force” attempting to dominate the good in a society.

Until humanity “emerges from the darkness into enlightenment”, it is fair to say that today we are dominated by the forces of a profit-driven One World Order” (OWO). 

Case in point: the Great Reset, Agenda 2030, the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and so on. We may be living right now what might be described as “the climax of the Antichrist”, and most do not even notice it.

Today, humanity is dominated by a cult of egocentricity, of a seemingly unquenchable thirst for power, for control of resources, for enslavement of fellow human beings by a financial elite. It is precisely this “Cult Elite”, also called the Deep State; the power over life and death of “lower” humanity – meaning all those who do not belong to the elite.

And the elite is defined by their material wealth. Literally. Because over the past 100 years or so, this small elite has made it their life objective to dominate Mother Earth with all its resources and sentient beings. They – and their generations to come – want to live forever with the limited resources our planet has to offer. The so-called “Antichrist” is usurping Mother Nature – against the very origins of Nature.

“This material-and-power thirsty Antichrist” has no spirituality. He exists as sheer analogue two-dimensional all-crushing monster. We can escape it only by spiritually vibrating on a higher level of conscience – in the Fifth Dimension.

Depopulation

To dominate with pure force, “they” must eliminate, so they conclude, about 90% of the current population. We are currently about eight billion people populating Mother Earth. That would leave about 800 million. According to Dennis Meadows, one of the main authors of the Club of Rome’s The Limits to Growth

“We could [ ] have eight or nine billion, probably [statement at time of writing], … But we want to have freedom and we want to have a high standard of living so we’re going to have a billion people. And we’re now at seven, so we have to get back down.  I hope that this can be slow, relatively slow and that it can be done in a way which is relatively equal, you know, so that people share the experience.”

The Big Lie 

They also must lie – flooding and engulfing the world with lies. Isn’t that what is happening today, and has been happening for most, if not all, of the last century?

The Antichrist has gone beyond all reason, beyond George Orwell’s “1984” – to limitless excesses. That is when physiology, the science of life, kicks in. Life itself, Life as in Mother Earth, is at stake. And that is when the excesses bring down the pathology of our society.

Famine

According to the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), the world can feed about 10 to 12 billion people. This is up to 50% more people than are inhabiting Mother Earth in 2023. See this.

These predictions were made in 2018. With fast advancing scientific knowledge, including in agricultural production, it could easily be assumed that with 2023 technology the world could feed up to 14 billion people.

Yet, the elite talks about overpopulation and the need to drastically reduce the planet’s population. Why? Because we have now close to a billion people who suffer from malnutrition and are at the edge of starvation. But they do not need to starve. They are being made to starve by the endless greed of the wealthy.

Each day, 25,000 people, including more than 10,000 children, die from hunger and related causes. Every three seconds somebody dies of famine in the world.

High food prices may drive another 100 million into poverty and hunger within a year. This means, one of eight world inhabitants suffers from extreme famine and under-nourishment, risking death.  See this.

Rules-based One World Order (OWO) 

None of this has anything to do with overpopulation, but everything with wanton speculation for profit and misdistribution; quite similar to natural resources – 20% of the world population consume 80% of all the world’s resources. See this.

Much of so-called food and resources shortages have to do with massive price-speculations and corporate hoarding, to make nutrition and other vital resources unaffordable for ever more people.

Now, on the heights of the reign of the “Antichrist” – in their self-designated decade 2020-2030, shortages of everything, abolishing of natural food, of farming and other means of food production, have become the “rules-based order”.

In the Netherlands about 3,000 farms, equivalent to about one third of all farmland, must disappear by 2030. See this and this. All this for a fake climate change agenda, see below. Holland is the second largest agricultural exporter in the world, after the United States.

The Antichrist is everywhere, and powerful, because we let Him be powerful.

The Elite Cult does not want this to change; they do not want a better equilibrium in the world. To the contrary, they want a One World Order, to control us all.

This Elite Cult is today’s Antichrist, vibrating on low frequency and attempting to make the oppressed vibrating at the same low frequency, by media-imposed fear and anger, so people, the masses, will not emerge from darkness into illumination. That is what is happening today without scruple, since 2020 with the onset of the Great Reset and Agenda 2030.

At the beginning of June 2016, Switzerland inaugurated at that time the world’s longest railway tunnel, the Gotthard Mountain base tunnel. The celebration was a weird Luciferian ceremony, to which notably European and some “world leaders” were invited. Most Swiss citizens were oblivious to what was happening. The celebration was filmed, televised, yet, it hardly evoked much attention.

An RT  journalist had the clear sight of reporting that if “they” come out into the open with their cult symbolism, as demonstrated by the diabolical ceremony, the actual take-over cannot be far away. Indeed, he was right.

It started with a fake plandemic in 2020, a lockdown and lockstep scenario, as already predicted in the 2010 Rockefeller Report.

The ceremony openly reveals the evil connections to the ongoing Great Reset and Agenda 2030 – see the 6-min. video below or click here.

This all-encompassing “Antichrist movement” was prepared by a long hand – at least 100 years back. The preparation was highly sophisticated to exclude failure to the very extent possible. For example, if one approach fails, several others are foreseen to secure a take-over by any means.

Lies, Trickery and Digitization of Everything

Since there is no physical reason for food shortage, it must be created with lies and trickery; since there is no physical reason for energy shortages, they must be created under false pretexts; since there is no reason for mass-dying, it must be created; and since there is no physical reason to control the population before and after the mass-dying, it has to be created.

The means to do so is full and complete digitization of all and everything. Digitization is a linear process of projecting life. But life is dynamic, never linear. What we are being imposed is an aberration of an impossible projection of life – any life. It will not work.

That is why the Antichrist must destroy life as given by nature and replace it by electronic means – “chipping life” – so, human brains and human behavior can be monitored and manipulated by this small, non-chipped, non-linear elite.

They will not succeed as dynamics outlive man-made imposed linearism.

Giant Financial Corporations and Multibillion-Billionaires

According to OXFAM (January 2023), 1% of the world population, financial corporations and multi-billionaires, own more than two thirds of the world’s total monetary wealth. And no spiritual wealth at all.

For example, BlackRock, Vanguard and StateStreet alone – not to mention other banking behemoths – control every important food, manufacturing, military and service sector by major shareholdership. See this.

They own the mainstream media and dictate to them how to trick people into believing their lies. Tavistock Institute in the UK, and DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) have developed over the past few decades extremely sophisticated technologies and methods for mind manipulation.

They work seamlessly together. The bulk of the population doesn’t have a clue. See this, Tavistock Institute “Social Engineering the Masses” by Daniel Estulin.

That is how covid came about and kept from one day to the next the entire world spellbound, at home, scared to the bones with dehumanizing masks and social distancing, keeping children away from their ill or dying parents or grandparents.

Today’s Antichrist, having little or nothing to do with religion – but with control and dictate and tyranny against all ethics and illumination – is the new “wannabe” emperor. His goal to achieve and maintain total control, is through darkness.

We, the people, must evolve onto a different level of conscience, from where we can escape and step into the light. And we will. It is just a question of time and humanity’s awakening.

One, so far, utterly effective control mechanism, that started with the Club of Rome and its infamous Darwinist theory of “Limits of Growth” – “the Antichrist’s blueprint” as of today – is at the origin of two major instruments for absolute control, massive de-population and fake climate change.

The mRNA “Vaccine” 

Despite all scientific evidence gradually coming to the fore and explaining the mass genocide being caused by the mRNA “vaccination” – the bulldozer rolls on vaxxing people around the world with mRNA-type injections, not just for covid, for EVERYTHING.

When you think you get a traditional flu-shot, an injection against Rubella, Polio, Tetanus, Whooping Cough, or whatever – you will be getting an mRNA jab – an irreversibly gene-altering shot, the effects of which will be passed on to future generations. – What is worse, you are not told about this change of “vaxxing-method”. You are kept totally in the dark.

Unfortunately, the majority of population has no clue. They cannot give informed consent, since they do not know what is being injected into their body. See this excellent explanation by Dr. Sucharit Bhakti. 

Already now, and more so in the future, is a myriad of deaths and causes of injury – difficult to trace back to the covid vaxx – see also Michael Yeadon’s video in which he explains the long-term effects, multiple diseases, from cancer to myocarditis, to sudden death, to brain damage and strokes, infertility – and much more. It will be almost impossible to connect these injuries and deaths with the vaxxes in five to ten years from now. See this.

What’s even worse, people, when told that their loved ones have died, or may be dying from the criminal covid vaxxes, they do not believe you. They will deny it. They prefer not seeing the truth. That is the well-planned reality. That is the Antichrist at His best.

It is mass-murder without punishment.

We must seek judgement for the sake of future generations.

The Fakeness of Climate Change

Climate change – just as people are gradually waking up to the fakeness of climate change, the Antichrist has an ultra-sophisticated tool of climate manipulation – or Environmental Modification (ENMOD). This technology, developed since the 1940s, had been elaborated and perfected by DARPA – the Pentagon thinktank, and later HAARP (High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program) a US Air Force executed climate and weather modifying program acting in the ionized part of the earth’s atmosphere.

ENMOD technologies can cause droughts, floods, extreme cold and heat waves. HAARP science is so sophisticated that it can trigger earthquakes.

It is suspected – though no proof yet – that the Turkey-Syria earthquake of 6 February 2023, was an ENMOD engineered disaster. Similar suspicions surround the horrendously devastating 12 January 2010 Haiti 7.0 (Richter) earthquake. See this.

The Antichrist is among us. Touchably nearby. Has always been – when we least expect it – and when we do not want to see Him.

As long as we deny his existence, although he is in plain sight – so long “He” will prevail and we may not see the light. Escaping His grip and evolving into a higher sphere of consciousness may be the biggest challenge of our life, but also our only chance to live in the spirit of LIGHT.

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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he worked for over 30 years around the world. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals and is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed; and co-author of Cynthia McKinney’s book “When China Sneezes: From the Coronavirus Lockdown to the Global Politico-Economic Crisis” (Clarity Press – November 1, 2020).

Peter is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He is also a non-resident Senior Fellow of the Chongyang Institute of Renmin University, Beijing.

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Little Rock, AR – 37 year old Officer Crystal Wyrick died unexpectedly on April 3, 2023 after walking into local hospital and collapsing (click here)

Rome, GA – 58 year old Officer Jose “Joe” Picon died unexpectedly on April 3, 2023. Cause of death was not released (click here)

Orange County, FL – 31 year old Deputy Michael Milmerstadt died on March 26, 2023 after suffering a brain injury during training session at gym which started out as severe headache after his workout (click here)

Calgary, AB – 25 year old former Calgary Police Cadet Wyatt Topolnicky died suddenly in his sleep on March 26, 2023. He was a hockey player.

Olathe, KS – 34 year old Officer Brandon Blom died on March 23, 2023 while suffering a medical emergency while off duty (click here)

Edmonton, AB – 44 year old Police Constable Corinne Kline died suddenly on March 22, 2023, she was at least triple COVID-19 vaccinated and was infected with COVID-19 at least twice (click here).

Worcester, MA – 42 year old Sergeant Derrick Leto died unexpectedly while off duty on March 17, 2023 (click here)

McAlester, OK – 52 year old Captain Richard Parker died unexpectedly at home on March 16, 2023 (click here)

Evansville, IN – 33 year old Deputy Asson Hacker died after suffering a medical emergency while participating in his basic training program, on March 2, 2023. (click here)

Memphis, TN – 36 year old Senior Patrol Officer Michael Evans died unexpectedly on Feb. 24, 2023. Cause of death not released (click here)

New York, NY – 48 year old Detective Del Caraballo died after experiencing a fatal medical emergency while driving, resulting in a crash (Feb.19, 2023)(click here)

Miami, FL – 47 year old Officer Joel Perez died after suffering an unexpected medical emergency on Feb. 13, 2023 (click here)

Cincinnati, OH – 30 year old Officer Olivia Zick died unexpectedly on Feb. 11, 2023, cause of death not released (click here)

My Take…

So many medical emergencies, leading to unexpected deaths on duty or off duty.

Look at their ages.

Many of these deaths are probably the result of COVID-19 vaccine mandates and subsequent vaccine injuries to the heart, brain or other organs.

Several very interesting cases to note here:

  • 25 year old Canadian cadet Wyatt Topolnicky died in his sleep (hockey player!).
  • 31 yo Deputy Michael Milmerstadt had a headache during gym which was fatal.
  • 37 yo Crystal Wyrick tried to seek medical attention but collapsed and died.
  • 33 yo Deputy Asson Hacker died during his basic training program!
  • 48 yo Detective Del Caraballo had fatal medical emergency while driving causing a crash – he died from the medical emergency, not the subsequent crash!

I have done several substack articles on COVID-19 vaccinated bus drivers and truck drivers collapsing behind the wheel, leading to a crash.

Vaccinated Police Officers are at a similar risk.

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Dr. William Makis is a Canadian physician with expertise in Radiology, Oncology and Immunology. Governor General’s Medal, University of Toronto Scholar. Author of 100+ peer-reviewed medical publications.


The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity

by Michel Chossudovsky

Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.

“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”

ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0,  Year: 2022,  PDF Ebook,  Pages: 164, 15 Chapters

We encourage you to support the eBook project by making a donation through Global Research’s DonorBox “Worldwide Corona Crisis” Campaign Page.

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May 8 and the Rehabilitation of Nazism in Germany

May 17th, 2023 by Peter Schwarz

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*** 

On 8 and 9 May, Berlin traditionally hosts numerous commemorative events to mark the end of the Second World War in Europe. On these two dates, the German Wehrmacht signed the unconditional surrender in 1945 in Reims, France, and in Berlin-Karlshorst, Germany. The Nazi regime was finally crushed. Adolf Hitler had committed suicide eight days earlier.

The main burden of the struggle against Hitler’s Germany was borne by the Red Army of the Soviet Union, which defeated the Wehrmacht under immense sacrifices. At least 13 million Soviet soldiers and 14 million civilians lost their lives in the war. But at the Berlin commemorative events this year, the displaying of the Soviet flag was forbidden. The Berlin Senate called on more than 1,500 police officers to enforce the ban on the three Soviet memorials in Treptower Park, Tiergarten and Schönholzer Heide. There were more police officers than visitors.

On the other hand, it was permissible to show the Ukrainian flag, which was only used by collaborators who were deeply involved in the crimes of the Nazis during World War II. For example, the Melnyk wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN-M) used the blue-yellow flag with a trident, as it is also used today in Ukraine.

While the vast majority of Ukrainian men and women, along with their Russian and other Soviet comrades in the Red Army, fought against the Nazis, the OUN-M and the rival wing around Stepan Bandera (OUN-B) joined German SS units and participated in mass murders that claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Jews, Poles, Russians and Ukrainians.

The decision to ban the display of the Soviet flag at the commemorative events was ultimately taken by the High Administrative Court of Berlin-Brandenburg. The police originally banned both Soviet and Russian as well as Ukrainian flags and justified this on the grounds that they could provoke violence against the background of the Ukrainian war. The Berlin Administrative Court lifted this ban again on the basis of a lawsuit. At the request of the police, the High Administrative Court decided to ban only the Soviet and Russian flags and to admit the Ukrainian flag.

The political significance of this decision is unequivocal: 78 years after the defeat of the Nazi regime, it is forbidden in the German capital to show the flag of the liberators. The flag of collaborators and war criminals is welcome. A clearer commitment to the criminal policy of the Nazi regime is hardly conceivable.

This is not an isolated case or a misstep. The scandalous ban illustrates how advanced the trivialization of Nazi crimes in Germany is. Not a single significant media outlet and no established party has objected to it.

The trivialization of National Socialism is inseparable from the return of German militarism. The IYSSE already warned in 2014: “The revival of German militarism requires a new interpretation of history that trivializes the crimes of the Nazi era.” At the time, the youth organization of the Socialist Equality Party (SGP) protested against the historian Jörg Baberowski, who had defended the Nazi apologist Ernst Nolte in Der Spiegel and declared that Hitler was “not vicious.”

This warning has been confirmed in the intervening years. Even then, almost all the media, the leadership of the Humboldt University and numerous politicians supported Baberowski and denounced the IYSSE for daring to criticize the far-right professor. Close cooperation with the right-wing and fascists has since become commonplace, not only in Germany, where the far-right Alternative for Germany sits on all important parliamentary committees, but also in Berlin’s foreign policy.

In official Berlin, nobody is bothered by the fact that the German-backed and -armed Zelensky regime erects monuments for Nazi collaborators and mass murderers, names numerous streets after them, cleanses the country of Russian culture (even Alexander Pushkin and other representatives of world literature are not spared) and bans numerous left-wing parties.

In the Baltic states, too, the German government and the German army work closely together with forces that revere members of the Nazi SS as heroes.

If one follows the bellicose propaganda with which the population in Germany is daily bombarded, one gets the impression that large parts of the ruling elites deeply regretted that Hitler had not achieved his goal of conquering and destroying Moscow. 

In a long commentary on 7 May, F.A.Z. journalist Konrad Schuller urged Ukraine to immediately join NATO to provide it with a “nuclear umbrella.” He warned of a “painful stalemate” if the announced offensive of the Ukrainians remains unsuccessful. The “vigilance” of the West could then weaken and “the temptation to put scarce money into other projects rather than into weapons” grows.

After NATO “had already gone out on a limb for Ukraine with material and ideological aid,” Schuller said, its solemn promises would turn out to be empty words. “The allies could then scatter like chickens when the hawk arrives.” Therefore, Ukraine must receive much more money and weapons than it does now.

Less than 80 years after large parts of Europe and Germany lay in ruins, people like Schuller are again ready to unleash a nuclear inferno to satisfy their imperialist world power fantasies.

In reality, the German ruling class has never resigned itself to the defeat of Hitler. After the end of the war, it took a full 40 years for a German head of state to refer to May 8 as “Liberation Day” for the first time. But Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker, whose father was convicted as a war criminal in Nuremberg, also added at the time: “May 8 is not a day for us Germans to celebrate.”

Today, Weizsäcker’s Christian Democratic Union posts on social media that May 8, 1945 is indeed a “day of liberation,” but “also a day of immeasurable suffering.”

Immeasurable suffering for whom, one wonders. For the surviving concentration camp inmates? For the few Jews who had escaped their murderers? For the workers who had not come to terms with the Nazis and were spied on and terrorized by the Gestapo? For the Greeks, Yugoslavs, Poles and Soviet citizens whose livelihoods and lives were destroyed by the Nazis? For the young men who were forced into uniforms and massacred at the front? Or for the fat Nazi henchmen and entrepreneurs who had enriched themselves with Aryanization and forced labor and now feared for their fortunes – which, unfortunately, remained with them.

When the historian Ernst Nolte made his first attempt to rehabilitate National Socialism in 1986, he suffered a devastating defeat in the historians’ dispute (Historikerstreit). When Baberowski defended Nolte in 2014, he was met with open arms. Today, if Nolte were still alive (he died in 2016), he would be showered with prizes.

The rehabilitation of National Socialism has objective causes. German imperialism is confronted with the same insoluble contradictions as at the beginning of the twentieth century. And it is trying to solve them with the same barbaric methods.

Imprisoned in fragmented Europe, the dynamic German economy at the beginning of the twentieth century urgently needed raw materials, investment opportunities and markets. But these were already divided among the old colonial powers. During the First World War, Germany fought against France, Great Britain and the Tsarist Empire, which was allied with France and, with its enormous territory, offered great opportunities for expansion.

But Germany lost the war. Instead of victory came the revolution, which German capitalism only survived with the help of the Social Democrats. The real winner of the war was another rising power: the United States.

The Second World War was a gigantic attempt to correct the result of the first. Germany tried to bring Europe under its rule and smash the Soviet Union in order to challenge the world power, the USA. To this end, a conspiracy around Reich President Paul von Hindenburg with the support of leading economic and military circles in January 1933 brought Adolf Hitler to power. His regime had two tasks: the violent crushing of the workers’ movement, which rejected war and militarism, and the concentration of all the country’s forces on rearmament and war.

But Germany also lost the Second World War. German capitalism survived, partly because the US needed it as a bulwark against the Soviet Union. In the post-war decades, it thrived and expanded in the slipstream of US imperialism. But that changed with the collapse of the Soviet Union. Since then, the conflicts between the imperialist powers have intensified.

The US is trying to offset its economic decline by one brutal war after another. The German government supports these wars partly openly, partly indirectly, in order to become a European leader and a world power. One day after the start of the war in Ukraine, it launched the largest rearmament offensive since 1945. Like the US, it is steadily escalating its proxy war against Russia in Ukraine and is not even shying away from nuclear annihilation.

This explains the changed view of Hitler, whose furious hatred of the Soviet Union, Marxism and the organized workers’ movement are now again gaining positive sides.

Above all, parts of the affluent urban middle class, which have enriched themselves in recent years by the stock and real estate boom, while the incomes of the workers fell, have found favor with imperialism. This explains the transformation of the Greens, which initially presented themselves as anti-fascist and pacifist, into ardent militarists.

The danger of a nuclear world war can only be stopped by an independent movement of the international working class that combines the struggle against social inequality and war with the struggle against its cause, capitalism. The same insoluble contradictions of capitalism that drive the ruling class towards war also create the conditions for the socialist revolution.

*

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Lost Souls with Nukes

May 17th, 2023 by Robert C. Koehler

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*** 

More mass killings. More bloody “normal” — not just in Texas, not just in the United States, but around the world.

Eerily, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott inadvertently reminded us of the international nature of this scourge when he referred to five recent murder victims, in a tweet announcing a $50,000 reward for the killer, as “illegal immigrants.”

Hey, this is a divided world! Were you aware of that?

There’s “us” and there’s “them” — which apparently is a viewpoint that a mass shooter shares with the governor of Texas. Abbott, of course, was inundated with flak and wound up apologizing for his careless tweet, but the reality of it won’t go away. A private belief —that someone’s immigration status matters more than life itself — suddenly went public.

And a door of awareness opens. This is about dehumanization. And it’s not an individual flaw. It’s part of our collective psychology. Ironically so. Those on both sides of a divide — be it national, ethnic, racial, political or whatever — are united in their dismissal of each other’s humanity.

Recent mass shootings include the two in Texas: in Allen, a gunman walked into an outdoor shopping mall on May 6, carrying three weapons, and opened fire at the shoppers; he killed eight people, including three children. And in the Dallas suburb of Cleveland, a gunman killed five of his neighbors on April 28, who had asked him to stop shooting his rifle in his backyard because the noise was disturbing their baby.

And, in a trans-Atlantic link, there were two recent mass shootings in the gun-saturated nation of Serbia: On May 3, a 13-year-old boy, armed with two of his father’s handguns, opened fire at his school in Belgrade, killing eight classmates and a security guard and wounding seven others. The next day, a 20-year-old wielding an assault rifle and a pistol killed eight people and wounded fourteen in a rural area south of Belgrade.

Serbia immediately erupted in protests and even, apparently, political action. People possessing weapons illegally were given 30 days of amnesty, in which they could turn in their weapons with no questions asked. According to Serbian police, some 1,500 guns were turned in on the first day.

But that’s hardly all the transnational killings of the past few weeks. Mostly they’re committed not by armed loners but by various states. It’s called self-defense. It’ called war. For example, Israel conducted an aerial bombardment of Gaza on May 9, killing thirteen people and wounding twenty. Three of those killed were members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement. The rest were, well, collateral damage, which, of course, is just a word meant to turn a victim into an abstraction. This is how we play war.

Transcending war can only start by turning victims back into human beings, for instance: Two sisters, Dania Adass, age 21, and Iman Alaa Adass, age 17, were killed when their home was hit by one of the Israeli bombs. A cousin told Al Jazeera: “Dania was getting ready for her wedding in a few days, and Iman was sad because her sister was about to leave the family home.” He pointed out Dania’s fiancé, who stood next to her body, weeping and speechless.

The process of not knowing, not caring about, such humanity, at least long enough to kill someone, is known as “othering.” It’s the opposite of connecting and cooperating. It’s the opposite of empathy. When it comes to the mass-killing phenomenon, analysts — not to mention politicians and, oh yeah, pro-gun lobbyists — mostly focus on the mental health of the individuals who commit the crime. Something’s wrong with them. They’ve. shut down their empathy.

The serious mistake in this analysis, as far as I’m concerned, is the assumption that people act alone. In a sense, yes, they do: There’s only one person pulling that trigger. But acting alone doesn’t necessarily mean thinking alone. Indeed, lonely, angry, disconnected people are not alone. They’ve merely claimed, as their own, the belief that a given enemy is the cause of their trouble, and there’s only one solution: Eliminate the enemy. Where would such a belief come from?

“Without the creation of abstract images of the enemy, and without the depersonalization of the enemy during training, battle would be impossible to sustain.”

These are the words of Richard Holmes, in his book Acts of War (as quoted by Dave Grossman in On Killing). Holmes also writes:

“ . . . the road to My Lai was paved, first and foremost, by the dehumanization of the Vietnamese and the ‘mere gook rule’ which declared that killing a Vietnamese civilian does not really count.”

OK, so what? How does an attitude like this escape from boot camp into the general public? Lots of ways, as war is glorified by both the news and (especially) entertainment media. War preparation — the endless presence of some enemy or other — contributes, as I say, to our collective psychology.

And it’s not just the unquestioned, ever-expanding, multi-trillion-dollar global military budget. It’s the presence, for God’s sake, of 12,700 nuclear warheads on this planet, 9,400 of which, according to the International Campaign of Abolish Nuclear Weapons, are in active military stockpiles. Nine countries possess nukes; five more “host” them (for the USA, of course). And a total of thirty-four countries, not counting the nine — all of them so-called first-world countries — “endorse” the use of nuclear weapons.

There’s a hostage situation at work here! Our collective psychology is trapped in a cage. Humanity, having divided itself into “us” and “them,” is under its own threat to commit suicide, rather than attempt to understand itself. Lost souls with guns are just doing their part of help out.

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*** 

New York City will begin tracking the carbon footprint of household food consumption and putting caps on how much red meat can be served in public institutions as part of a sweeping initiative to achieve a 33% reduction in carbon emissions from food by 2030.

Mayor Eric Adams and representatives from the Mayor’s Office of Food Policy and Mayor’s Office of Climate & Environmental Justice announced the new programs last month at a Brooklyn culinary center run by NYC Health + Hospitals, the city’s public healthcare system, just before Earth Day.

At the event, the Mayor’s Office of Climate & Environmental Justice shared a new chart to be included in the city’s annual greenhouse gas inventory that publicly tracks the carbon footprint created by household food consumption, the Gothamist reported.

The city already produced emissions data from energy use, transportation and waste as part of the annual inventory. But the addition of household food consumption data is part of a partnership that London and New York launched with American Express, C40 Cities and EcoData lab, Commissioner Rohit Aggarwala from the NYC Department of Environmental Protection announced at the event.

Aggarwala — who founded Google smart city subsidiary Sidewalk Labs — celebrated the expanded data collection as forging “a new standard for what cities have to do” and a new way to shape policy.

He said the inventory also will measure greenhouse gas pollution from the production and consumption of other consumer goods like apparel, whether or not those items are made in New York City. It also tracks emissions tied to services like air travel and healthcare.

But Adams’ presentation at the event focused on food consumption, particularly meat and dairy.

“Food is the third-biggest source of cities’ emissions right after buildings and transportation,” Adams said. “But all food is not created equal. The vast majority of food that is contributing to our emission crises lies in meat and dairy products.”

He added:

“It is easy to talk about the emissions that’s coming from buildings and how it impacts our environment, but we now have to talk about beef. And I don’t know if people are ready for this conversation.”

Adams — a vegan who, according to a whistleblower, also eats fish, credits his “plant-based diet” for his recovery from diabetes. He is the author of “Healthy at Last: A Plant-Based Approach to Preventing and Reversing Diabetes and Other Chronic Illnesses,” a vegan cookbook.

Adams claims that changing New Yorkers’ eating habits will have both climate and health benefits. He said:

“We already know that a plant-powered diet is better for your physical and mental health, and I am living proof of that. But the reality is that thanks to this new inventory, we’re finding out it is better for the planet.”

But agricultural economists and regenerative farmers say that calculation isn’t actually that simple.

“Different meats have different kinds of greenhouse gas footprints” because of differences in the production systems and “all land is not created equal” Melissa McKendree, Ph.D., an agricultural economist at Michigan State University, told The Defender.

Land that is suitable for cattle production, such as rangeland and pasture, often isn’t suitable for other types of agriculture, and vice versa. And all of those different ecosystems for different plants and animals, when working well, work together to create a healthy ecosystem.

Alternative grazing systems, like the regenerative agricultural systems that McKendree researches, make it possible for pasture-raised beef “to sequester carbon, and to become a carbon sink” — actually reducing the greenhouse gas footprint of food production rather than adding to it.

Regenerative livestock farmer Will Harris told The Defender, “As a practitioner who has been regenerating depleted land for 30+ years I can tell you that regenerating land is about restarting the cycles of nature that have been broken by industrial farming — and restarting those cycles cannot be done cost effectively without animal impact.”

He continued:

“All ecosystems evolved with certain kinds of animal impact and to say we’ve misused technologies to break these cycles of nature and we are going to start them back by leaving out this essential ingredient that has been around for millennia is wrong.

“Sadly there is a percentage of the populace that for whatever reason has decided that animals in the ecosystem are bad and the way to have a healthier planet is to give up that animal impact.

“Many of us have proven that there is benefit, ecological benefit to having animal impact in the equation. It has to be done right, but when it is done right there is an ecological benefit, an ecological service that we provide.

“But this sector of society is so committed to the vegetarian vegan solution, that it doesn’t matter what we demonstrate, they are going to paint us with that same brush.

“They drown out our voices by screaming the same misapplied science over and over and over.”

Organization behind 15-minute city is mapping consumption-based emissions for New York and London

The partnership between American Express, New York, London and C40 Cities to map urban emissions was formally launched last week in a C40 press release. The groups will map the consumption-based emissions of both New York and London.

The press release does not make the purpose of emissions mapping inventories explicit. It simply states the inventories “will enable London and New York City to develop a suite of actions to incentivise more sustainable consumption in collaboration with people and businesses.”

It adds that the project “will also pioneer new ways for other cities to measure emissions from urban consumption,” adding that there is an “urgent need to reduce the emissions impact of urban consumption, especially what is eaten and the waste in food systems.”

To that end, “Building data inventories in partnership with city businesses (such as supermarket chains and retailers) is important for cities to measure, plan and act to ensure our cities become better places to live for all people and sustainable business can thrive.”

The press release bases its claims on a report by the University of Leeds and developer Arup Group.

Arup is a Rockefeller-supportedWorld Economic Forum-affiliated organization that uses “fourth industrial revolution” technologies to transform cities. They promise that immense quantities of highly detailed data,” can produce a “new level of control” making possible “more efficient and sustainable use of the world’s precious materials.”

The report assesses consumption-based emissions in C40 cities across the world produced by food, clothing, transportation, building infrastructure and household appliances and calls for those emissions to be halved by 2030.

In the same press release, Adams announced that New York has signed on to the C40 Good Food Cities Accelerator, where signatory cities commit to achieving a “planetary healthy diet” by 2030, defined by more “plant-based foods,” less meat and dairy and less food waste overall.

C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group is also one of the forces driving the implementation of 15-minute city projects across the world.

The group comprises 96 mayors of cities from around the world, is funded by major corporations and philanthropic foundations and focuses on urban activism for climate change.

Then-Mayor of London Mayor Ken Livingstone founded C40 in 2005 when he convened mayors from 18 cities to agree to cap climate emissions. In 2006, C40 merged with the Clinton Climate Initiative. In July 2020, the group published a framework for cities to “build back better.”

Bloomberg Philanthropies is one of C40’s major funders. Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg previously unsuccessfully tried to impose top-down changes on how New Yorkers consume by instituting a wide-scale ban on large sodas and other sugary drinks. The policy was struck down by a state Supreme Court judge.

Will ‘meat caps’ really lower emissions and improve health?

Mayor Adams’ announcement about the C40 Good Food Cities declaration suggests the city will be serving less meat in the future to meet its 2030 goals. Officials from his administration did not specify the targets or the standards that would be used, but did indicate there would be “caps on meat.”

Kate MacKenzie, executive director of the Mayor’s Office of Food Policy, explained that the standards they are developing “set maximums for the number of times that red meat can be served each week and really introduces the plant-based proteins and a floor for that.”

“So it’s really the caps on meat,” she said, adding that the city has been moving in this direction already.

New York already instituted “meatless Mondays” as a joint initiative by Adams and former Mayor Bill De Blasio in 2019. “Vegan Friday” began in public schools last year, where children are served food such as pre-packaged burritos that received reviews such as “nasty” and “sad” on the Brian Lehrer WNYC call-in show.

Meals in the city’s hospitals have been made vegetarian by default, although people can request meat if they prefer.

New York spends roughly $300 million buying food for schools, homeless shelters, hospitals and prisons each year. According to the NYC Food Policy Dashboard, the city spends only about 1% of its food budget on “ruminate meats.”

New York’s initiative is part of a broader move by global policymakers toward targeting the food system — and meat in particular — as a source of emissions. Proposals have ranged from an outright ban on meat consumption to various types of incentives to minimize meat consumption, encourage lab-grown or alternative meat production to putting extra taxes on meat or forcing animal farmers to stop producing, as in the case of the Dutch farmers.

Meat bans, McKendree said, are “the most extreme policy [for addressing environmental impacts of meat production]. Think about what we ban. We ban toxic chemicals like Agent Orange and things that we know have those environmental impacts.”

She continued:

“But when we think about making policies, we have to ask, what’s the issue of concern? And we want to try to target that exact issue. So if our concern is reducing greenhouse gas emissions, then put policies in place that directly reduce carbon or greenhouse gas emissions.

“But banning beef doesn’t have a direct carbon or greenhouse gas emissions effect, it creates a reduction in meat consumption.”

Instead, she said, policymakers could consider a wide range of other policies — from creating certified products, to subsidies, to taxes, to education through cooperative extension at universities like hers — that would support farmers to produce meat using regenerative practices.

“I think there’s other options and opportunities besides banning or capping meat products,” she said.

In its March 2023 report on U.S. biotechnology and biomanufacturing innovation, the White House emphasized a coming focus on climate-centric agriculture in the biotech industry.

The report followed a September 2022 “Executive Order on Advancing Biotechnology and Biomanufacturing Innovation for a Sustainable, Safe and Secure American Bioeconomy,” which paves the way for biotechnology to take over food production by opening the door to more lab-grown meats and bioengineered plant foods.

Specific plans in the March “Bold Goals” report include reducing methane emissions from agriculture by 30% by 2030, in part by reducing methane emissions from ruminant livestock.

As policymakers across the world crack down on meat production, the alternative to meat markets, lab-grown meat industry and insect protein markets are booming.

Many meat alternatives require energy-intensive production and are ultra-processed, so may have serious environmental and health impacts

Obesity, Type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer and depression are but a few examples of conditions known to be promoted and exacerbated by a processed food diet.

For example, a December 2022 study in Sweden found many plant-based meat alternatives have very high phytate levels — antinutrients that inhibit the absorption of minerals in the human body.

As a result, while the meat substitute may appear to contain many of the necessary nutrients, such as iron, the body cannot absorb them according to a report in NutritionInsight.

Harris said the processed foods that will likely replace the meat that they are taking out of the meals are “less healthy, less good for the environment, and less good for the local rural economy that is rebounding by raising food right. There’s a lot of losers in this.”

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Brenda Baletti Ph.D. is a reporter for The Defender. She wrote and taught about capitalism and politics for 10 years in the writing program at Duke University. She holds a Ph.D. in human geography from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master’s from the University of Texas at Austin.

Featured image is from CHD

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*** 

The U.S. pharmaceutical industry’s aggressive and often unlawful efforts to prevent competition and keep drug prices elevated cost American patients, insurers, and federal health programs more than $40 billion in 2019 alone, according to a report released Tuesday.

The new report—put out by the American Economic Liberties Project and the Initiative for Medicines, Access, and Knowledge (I-MAK)—focuses specifically on pharmaceutical companies’ antitrust law violations, which the groups say are a key reason why U.S. drug prices are astonishingly high compared to those of other rich nations.

Examining the 100 top-selling drug products in Medicare Part D—which covers prescription medicines—and Medicaid, the report estimates that Big Pharma’s antitrust violations “increased Part D gross spending by 14.15%, or $14.82 billion, and increased Medicaid gross drug spending by 9.05%, or $3.15 billion, in 2019 for the top 100 drugs in each.”

Assuming that pharmaceutical companies’ antitrust violations similarly affected retail brand drug spending, the report estimates that “U.S. patients and payers spent an additional $40.07 billion on pharmaceuticals in 2019.”

“American families are paying far too much for prescription drugs, in large part due to rampant corporate lawlessness,” said Erik Peinert, research manager and editor at the American Economic Liberties Project.

The report highlights 10 illegal anticompetitive schemes that U.S. pharmaceutical companies deploy to juice their profits and keep prices high, including horizontal collusion, patent fraud, no-generics agreements, and sham citizen petitions aimed at convincing regulators to delay approval of potential competitor drugs.

“This report documents the many ways Big Pharma is manipulating and breaking the law to expand corporate profits at the expense of patients and taxpayers,” said Peinert. “The Federal Trade Commission has begun fighting back, but it needs more assistance from Congress and other agencies to crack down on these illegal practices and deliver for patients.”

Shortly following the new report’s release, the FTC sued to stop the biopharmaceutical giant Amgen from acquiring Horizon Therapeutics, warning that “rampant consolidation in the pharmaceutical industry has given powerful companies a pass to exorbitantly hike prescription drug prices.”

The researchers behind the report offer several specific examples of how large pharmaceutical companies have used their power and dominance of certain markets to push up prices.

The nation’s insulin market, they argue, “has been distorted by multiple overlapping anticompetitive schemes in recent years,” including the “illegal listing” of products and “collusion” among top manufacturers in violation of RICO law, as well as “exclusionary rebates to drive patients toward brand products and away from substantially cheaper authorized generic versions.”

The groups estimate that Medicare Part D and Medicaid “would have spent approximately 50% less on three of the four major insulin brands (Levemir, Novolog, Lantus) in 2019 but for the anticompetitive strategies used by the major insulin manufacturers.”

The report also accuses AbbVie and Allergan—which the former acquired in 2020—of engaging in a “sustained, consistent pattern of illegally blocking generic and biosimilar competition in violation of the antitrust laws.”

In the case of Bystolic, a blood pressure medicine, “Allergan entered illegal pay-for-delay agreements to prevent and delay generic competition” for the drug before 2019.

The groups estimate that Part D and Medicaid would have spent 90% less on Bystolic and its generic equivalents in 2019 had Allergan not entered the pay-for-delay agreement, which the FTC says cost U.S. consumers and taxpayers $3.5 billion a year in the form of higher drug prices.

The report also points to a whistleblower lawsuit alleging that Janssen Pharmaceuticals—which is owned by Johnson & Johnson—committed patent fraud to prolong its monopoly on Zytiga, a prostate cancer drug.

“The patent system is at the root of enabling many of the antitrust violations we identified and which are leading to higher drug prices,” said Tahir Amin, an executive director of I-MAK.

To combat the pharmaceutical industry’s abuses and lower costs for patients, the American Economic Liberties Project and I-MAK recommended that lawmakers and regulators act to completely ban pay-for-delay agreements, modify patent laws to “ensure that drug companies cannot use bad-faith patent strategies to perpetually extend monopolies,” and ramp up penalties for antitrust violations, among other changes.

“Until Congress and the United States Patent and Trademark Office ensure stricter standards that would prevent the granting of many of the types of patents that are leading to these violations in the first place,” Amin said, “Americans can expect to see their drug prices continue to rise.”

From Common Dreams: Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.

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Washington Wants War with China Served Hot, Not Cold

May 17th, 2023 by Connor Freeman

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The ruling class in Washington is planning on using America’s sons and daughters as cannon fodder to wage their long-awaited war against China. President Joe Biden along with the other de facto employees of the military industrial complex, including in Congress, have not made their plans a secret. Contrarily, they are quite happy to brag about basically any escalation they can get.

Hawks in the Pentagon, along with those in the administration and legislative branch—including the key leadership—have been speaking explicitly about the coming war with China for a while now, usually boasting about all they are doing to prepare for, as well as provoke, such a conflict.

This all began in earnest during the Barack Obama administration. War with China, despite the Republican Party’s obsession with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the Progressive Democrats’ project led by—among others—the likes of Obama, Biden, Hillary Clinton, Kurt Campbell, Antony Blinken, Lloyd Austin, and Michelle Flournoy.

In 2011, Obama launched the “pivot to Asia.” The policy has been expanded by each successive administration. Obama’s project for the new American century entails the largest military buildup since the Second World War, shifting hundreds of bases as well as two-thirds of all U.S. Air and Naval forces to the Asia-Pacific region. Washington is encircling China for a future war with Beijing. In the words of Lew Rockwell, “The U.S. seeks to encircle China and make it bow down before the hegemon.”

The new Cold War on China has been heating up for years, but things have taken a turn for the worse under the Biden regime which is significantly more hawkish than both the Obama and Donald Trump administrations.

In January, the top U.S. Marine Corps general in Japan explained to the Financial Times that Washington and Tokyo are “setting the theater,” for war with China. Lt. Gen. James Bierman, commander of the Third Marine Expeditionary Force (III MEF) and of Marine Forces Japan, said Washington is working with its allies in the region to prepare for the coming war with China, much like the U.S. did with its NATO allies following the 2014 U.S. backed coup in Kiev.

“Why have we achieved the level of success we’ve achieved in Ukraine? A big part of that has been because after Russian aggression in 2014 and 2015, we earnestly got after preparing for future conflict: training for the Ukrainians, prepositioning of supplies, identification of sites from which we could operate support, sustain operations,” the general said. He went on to explain this is called “setting the theater. And we are setting the theater in Japan, in the Philippines, in other locations.”

Later the same month, NBC News reported on a memo written by four-star U.S. Air Force General Mike Minihan, the head of Air Mobility Command (AMC), discussing the coming war with China. AMC includes 50,000 airmen and oversees roughly 430 aircraft. “I hope I am wrong. My gut tells me [we] will fight in 2025,” Minihan said, ordering his forces to begin preparing for war with Beijing.

In recent weeks and months, the U.S. has worked on deals to gain exclusive military access to the Federated States of Micronesia, secured an agreement with Manilla to gain access to four more military bases in the Philippines, awarded contracts to begin work on a new radar installation in Palau, announced increased cooperation between American and Japanese armed forces for a future confrontation with China, and made plans to deploy additional Marine units armed with anti-ship missiles along the Okinawa islands.

In April, Washington and Manila carried out their largest ever joint military exercises. 17,600 military personnel took part, including 12,000 American troops. The Balikatan exercises saw more than 100 Australian soldiers participate. The increasing pressure on both Russia and China has seen Moscow and Beijing step up their own cooperation in the region.

Later this year, the U.S. and Australia will carry out the “largest-ever” iteration of their Talisman Sabre war drills. This bilateral military exercise takes place every two years. As Antiwar.com News Editor Dave DeCamp has explained,

The plans for the massive exercises come after the US, Australia, and Britain unveiled their plansunder the AUKUS military pact with the ultimate goal of Canberra being able to produce nuclear-powered submarines by the 2040s.

The U.S. Navy envisions AUKUS will turn Australia into a full-service submarine hub for the United States and its allies in the region in operations targeted at China. As part of the deepening U.S.-Australian military ties, the United States also plans to deploy more troops and aircraft to Australia, including nuclear-capable B-52 bombers.

The rhetoric of U.S. military leaders may seem unhinged, but it is now all too common. In February, U.S. Army Secretary Christine Wormuth declared that “we” need to be prepared to fight a direct, hot war against China over Taiwan, and win it. “I personally am not of the view that an amphibious invasion of Taiwan is imminent,” she told an audience at the American Enterprise Institute, adding but “we obviously have to prepare, to be prepared to fight and win that war.”

Her plan consists of sending more U.S. troops and advanced weapons to the region, including hypersonic missiles. She also discussed setting up “theater distribution centers” in the region where weapons and other supplies can be pre-positioned for the coming war, suggesting Japan and Australia would make good candidates.

She said “our goal is to have Army forces in the Indo-Pacific seven to eight months out of the year,” when the war starts their job will be establishing “staging bases for the Navy, for the Marines, for the Air Force,” adding they will be providing “intra-theater sustainment.”

Wormuth also discussed what appeared to be a plan for the Army to impose martial law in the United States during the coming war with China. “If we got into a major war with China, the United States homeland would be at risk as well, with both kinetic attacks and non-kinetic attacks. Whether it’s cyberattacks on the power grids, or on pipelines, the United States Army, I have no doubt, will be called to provide defense support to civil authorities.”

In March, General Kenneth Wilsbach, the head of U.S. Pacific Air Forces, told a symposium in Colorado that his focus is on blowing up Chinese ships in the event that Beijing orders a blockade on the island of Taiwan. “You saw when Speaker Pelosi went to Taiwan, what [China] did with their ships,” Wilsbach said, adding, “They put them on the east side of Taiwan…as a sort of blockade.”

The General’s conclusion is “[w]e’ve got to sink the ships.” He continued, “sinking ships is a main objective of not only PACAF [Pacific Air Forces] but really anyone that’s going to be involved in a conflict like this.” In other words, even if the cross-strait conflict which Washington’s build up and closer ties with Taiwan is actively provoking does not immediately go kinetic, General Wilsbach will ensure that it escalates quickly as a result of his attempts to shoot through the Chinese naval blockade.

That same month, Trump’s former national security adviser Robert O’Brien said in the event of a cross-strait conflict, the U.S. would bomb and destroy Taiwan’s advanced semiconductor manufacturing facilities. The “United States and its allies are never going to let those factories fall into Chinese hands,” O’Brien threatened during an interview with Semafor.

A similar plan was laid out, as a potential joint operation with Washington and Taipei, in a 2021 paper published by the U.S. Army War College. The paper characterizes obliterating the island’s chip factories as a “scorched earth strategy” designed to leave Taiwan in ruins “not just unattractive if ever seized by force, but positively costly to maintain.”

The paper continues, explaining this “could be done most effectively by threatening to destroy facilities belonging to the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the most important chipmaker in the world and China’s most important supplier.”

This month, Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA) told a think tank conference “the U.S. should make it very clear to the Chinese that if you invade Taiwan, we’re going to blow up [the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company],” which produces most of the world’s advanced semiconductors.

Apparently, the Taiwanese military brass did not get the memo. Taiwan’s Defense Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng fired back against the Congressma, saying “[i]t is the military’s obligation to defend Taiwan and we will not tolerate any others blowing up our facilities.”

In April, for the first time, the U.S. Army’s Special Operations Command defended Taiwan from a mock Chinese invasion as part of CAPEX, the command’s annual capabilities exercise.

Lt. Gen. Jonathan P. Braga declared it was about time, these war drills are “in accordance with our national defense strategy, [China] is our true pacing challenge out there.”

According to Military.com,

[m]embers of the U.S. Army’s Special Operations Command fired Carl Gustaf recoilless rifles, breached tunnels and operated Switchblade drones that flew with an unsettling whiz over a training area…The exercise combined some of the hallmark tactics and weapons that were used during the Global War on Terror with other tools reflecting a seismic shift for the command as it prepares for potential conflict against major military rivals…and the mission they were gaming out was an insertion into Taiwan to defend against a Chinese invasion.”

Last fall, Navy Admiral Charles Richard, the head of Strategic Command, which oversees American nuclear forces, ominously warned the “Ukraine crisis that we’re in right now, this is just the warmup…The big one is coming. And it isn’t going to be very long before we’re going to get tested in ways that we haven’t been tested [in] a long time.” Unmistakably, the “big one” is the coming war with China.

For almost 50 years, the One-China policy has governed the now extremely fragile relationship between Washington and Beijing. Thirty years after Mao’s forces won the civil war, Washington accepted reality and made an agreement which has kept the peace and prevented war. Under the policy, the U.S. severed diplomatic ties with Taipei and recognized that there is but one China, with Beijing as the sole Chinese government.

One-China means the U.S. does not have an official relationship with Taipei, with Washington recognizing China and Taiwan as the same country. The U.S. also maintains “strategic ambiguity” towards Taiwan or at least it did until the Joe Biden administration unilaterally overturned that part of the delicate policy.

Per the former approach, the U.S. would never commit to defending or not defending the island against a potential attack against the breakaway province. Critically, “strategic ambiguity” has aimed to deter Beijing from attempting to retake the island by force and, at the same time, to discourage Taiwan’s radical factions seeking to declare Taiwan’s independence.

But for the bipartisan China hawks, that successful arrangement is no longer good enough. Worst of all, some are proposing, and in some cases outright issuing, defense commitments in contradiction of the longstanding U.S. policy.

Since Biden came into office, he has continued to make “gaffes” announcing the U.S. is doing away with “strategic ambiguity” and even potentially the One-China policy. Biden has seemingly committed Americans to Taiwan’s defense multiple times. But now it appears that these notorious mistakes which were often walked back by the White House, were not “gaffes” at all.

In March, speaking before a House Intelligence Committee hearing, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines announced that “strategic ambiguity” was dead and gone. When asked by Rep. Chris Stewart (R-UT) if the policy needed to be changed, Haines responded by announcing “I think it is clear to the Chinese what our position is, based on the president’s comments.”

Indeed, Washington constantly ramps up U.S. military cooperation with Taipei, committing billions of dollars in military aid to Taiwan, expanding U.S. National Guard training programs with the Taiwanese military, sending ever more Congressional delegations to the island, deploying ever higher numbers of U.S. troops to the island, concurrently training hundreds of Taiwanese soldiers for war on U.S. soil,  converting Taiwan into a “giant weapons depot,” and sailing American warships through the sensitive Taiwan strait almost every month.

The U.S. government absurdly promises these provocations are done to “deter” war, but China has made clear that Taiwan is a “red line” and Washington’s actions makes war more likely. Beijing has repeatedly said that they are seeking a “peaceful reunification” with Taiwan but they have not ruled out using force.

Even Haines appeared to admit this when, at the same hearing, she admitted “it’s not our assessment that China wants to go to war.” Bellicose members of Congress are foaming at the mouth for a confrontation with China nonetheless.

In April, during an interview on Fox News Sunday, Republican senator and neoconservative spokesman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) called for an outright reversal of “strategic ambiguity,” as well as a complete overhaul of Washington’s China policy. As the Libertarian Institute’s Kyle Anzalone reported,

Graham claimed the United States had only a short window of time to prepare for the coming conflict, calling to “increase training and get the F-16s they need in Taiwan,” He also complained about a “backlog“ of arms sales to the island, arguing the transfers should move ahead while proposing new US military deployments in Asia and elsewhere.

“I would move war forces to South Korea and Japan. I would put nuclear-tipped cruise missiles on all of our submarines all over the world,” Graham continued.

He additionally explained he was willing to send US troops to fight for Taipei, a dramatic departure from longstanding policy, saying “Yes, I’d be very much open to using US forces to defend Taiwan.”

The ultra-hawkish Republican Chair of the House Foreign Relations Committee, Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX), further declared that sending U.S. troops to fight China over the island of Taiwan is “on the table.” McCaul clarified his position that if “communist China invaded Taiwan, it would certainly be on the table and [that’s] something that would be discussed by Congress and with the American people.”

How gracious of our ostensible representatives! After more than 70 years of illegal, undeclared wars and millions killed, some are willing to concede perhaps before going to war with another nuclear superpower, it may warrant at least a discussion with the American people.

To date, we—the people—have not been consulted regarding any of these horrendous and reckless policies. The hyper-drive propaganda against China is already designedly overwhelming our neighbors’ psyches. Given the current anti-Russia hysteria among the populace, with minimal domestic resistance, the White House has been able to ratchet tensions with Moscow—via its proxy war in Ukraine—to levels not seen since the Cuban Missile Crisis. In fact, it’s even worse, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists says the risk of nuclear war has never been higher.

There is no telling what Americans may be frightened into consenting to if a cross-strait conflict kicks off, or if there is an accident or confrontation between U.S. and Chinese forces in the South China Sea. Not too long ago, some were almost calling for war with China over a weather balloon.

As is the case with Russia, the U.S. launching a direct war with Beijing is essentially guaranteed to lead to a nuclear exchange. In such a scenario, China has the ability to destroy continental American cities, not just the aircraft carrier strike groups and the hundreds of U.S. military bases encircling China.

This should go without saying, if the hawks were honest about the risks of the war with China they are proposing, and indeed cultivating, the American people would refuse to allow a continuation of the buildup at all.

It is not inconceivable that, under the circumstances, an informed American populace may collectively decide they no longer wish to be ruled by notoriously venal people in Washington irrevocably caught up in the insane, outmoded, long discredited, and arms industry funded neoconservative ideology of unipolar, global hegemony.

And yes, that is what this coming war with China is about: world domination by Washington. The same Democrats and Republicans whose hands are still covered in blood from Ukraine, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Palestine, Yemen, Somalia, and Afghanistan now want to go to war with China.

But just like the other wars you’ve likely lived through, it’s not our war—it’s their war—even if the American people are fighting it.

We must stop this madness.

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Connor Freeman is the assistant editor and a writer at the Libertarian Institute, primarily covering foreign policy. He is a co-host on Conflicts of Interest. His writing has been featured in media outlets such as Antiwar.com and Counterpunch, as well as the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity. He has also appeared on Liberty Weekly, Around the Empire, and Parallax Views. You can follow him on Twitter @FreemansMind96

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Britain’s Undeclared War with Russia

May 17th, 2023 by Thomas Scripps

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The shipment of Storm Shadow cruise missiles to Ukraine, the longest-range weapons yet received by Kiev, confirms the UK’s role as provocateur-in-chief in the NATO war against Russia.

The Ukrainian army is now not only capable of striking Crimea—Russia’s central concern in the war—but deep into the Russian mainland. It takes delivery of these weapons on the eve of a long-anticipated counteroffensive against Russian lines.

In these circumstances, all that has prevented a direct war breaking out between Britain and Russia is the Kremlin’s restraint, fearing the triggering of NATO’s collective defence clause.

At every stage of the war, Britain has led NATO’s escalation. Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced last week that the war in Ukraine “didn’t start in 2022. The war started in 2014.” This dates the beginning of NATO’s “biggest reinforcement of our collective defence since the end of the Cold War” to the Maidan coup sponsored by the US and European powers to instal an anti-Russian regime in Kiev.

The events led to the Russian annexation of Crimea and the eruption of civil war in Ukraine over the breakaway of regions in the East. The situation was formally addressed by the Minsk Agreements which were portrayed as a peace effort. Last December, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted that this was only a cover “to give Ukraine time… to become stronger.”

From that point, British imperialism was central in carrying out a joint programme of training and equipping the Ukrainian army while staging repeated anti-Russian provocations—most notably the 2019 allegations that Moscow had poisoned double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with novichok.

The UK’s war preparations

Under Operation Orbital, begun in 2015, Britain had already trained 22,000 Ukrainian troops in the seven years before the Russian invasion. It has since trained a further 14,000. In the lead up to the war, thousands of British soldiers were deployed in Eastern Europe on permanent missions or for large-scale NATO combat exercises.

The UK played a central role in NATO’s aggressive posturing from the Baltic to the Black Sea. In June 2021, a British warship entered waters claimed by Russia near Crimea, in an incident that nearly resulted in a direct exchange of fire between UK and Russian forces.

The UK’s actions have been accompanied by statements from leading military and political figures making clear Britain’s hostile intentions towards Russia.

In 2016, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon told Parliament’s Defence Select Committee that the UK would be ready for war with Russia by 2018. That year, Chief of the General Staff Sir Nick Carter declared that this included “project[ing] land capability over distances of up to some 2,000 km… copying what the Germans did very well in 1940”. Carter was referring to the preparation by Nazi Germany for Operation Barbarossa—the 1941 war of annihilation against the Soviet Union, recognised as the most brutal military campaign history has ever seen.

The 2021 Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy warned of the acute threat posed by Russia, as well as China, Iran and North Korea, and centred on increasing nuclear warhead capacity by 40 percent. In “Defence in a Competitive Age” the Ministry of Defence described Russia as “the greatest nuclear, conventional military and sub-threshold threat to European security.”

After the Ukraine war broke out in February 2022, a spokesperson for Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the UK was taking measures “to bring down the Putin regime.” New army chief General Patrick Sanders declared that the “British Army must be prepared to engage in warfare at its most violent.”

The Integrated Review Refresh 2023 is introduced by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak with the declaration, “What has changed is that our collective security now is intrinsically linked to the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine.”

Integrated Review Refresh 2023 [Photo: Open Government Licence v3.0]

Britain supplied £2.3 billion of military assistance to Ukraine in 2022, with a commitment to match that figure in 2023. Thousands of UK troops have been dispatched to Eastern Europe to participate in NATO exercises involving tens of thousands of soldiers and advanced weaponry. UK special forces troops have been deployed to Ukraine, as confirmed in leaked Pentagon files.

Russia has also accused Britain of covertly sabotaging the Nord Stream gas pipeline.

The UK’s main public role since the outbreak of war has been as an outrider for the US and European NATO powers, being the first to supply Ukraine new classes of weaponry. Prior to the provision of long-range missiles, Britain also led the way with the supply of main battle tanks, sending a squadron of Challenger IIs. This was followed by Germany sending Leopard tanks and allowing other countries to send those in their armouries. The US then agreed a shipment of Abrams tanks.

Just days after confirming shipment of the Storm Shadows, now also agreed to by France, the UK used a visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to declare a “jets coalition” aimed at securing modern F-16 fighter jets for Ukraine.

The crisis of British imperialism

Britain’s leading role in the war, outstripping to this point France and Germany, is paradoxically driven by its economic and geopolitical weakness, which it has sought to offset through a “special relationship” with the United States.

In its 2022 Congress resolution, “Mobilise the working class against imperialist war”, the Socialist Equality Party (UK) answered the lie that the war in Ukraine was the result of a supposedly unprovoked invasion by Russia, explaining, “The war against Russia is the continuation and intensification of the drive for US global hegemony that was initiated with the first invasion of Iraq in 1990-91 and intensified following the dissolution of the USSR in December 1991,” including wars and interventions against Serbia, Afghanistan, Iraq again, Libya and Syria.

It continued:

“British imperialism participated as a chief partner in every one of these bloodbaths. The UK has long acted as Washington’s foremost ally in Europe. But since Brexit this alliance has assumed an ever more essential imperative in British imperialism’s efforts to project its global interests. Opposed by Washington, Brexit lost the UK its place within the European Union as the foremost advocate of US interests in the continent, especially in opposing German and French efforts to build a European military capability independent of NATO. This has necessitated a redoubling of London’s efforts to prove its usefulness to the White House and the Pentagon. British imperialism, amid an unprecedented collapse in its world standing, is cleaving as close to the US as possible in the hope of a share of the spoils.”

Anglo-Russian enmity and anti-communism

There are deeper historical interests and old scores involved. Relations between Russia and Britain have been hostile for centuries, despite significant periodic alliances championing European reaction, including during the French Revolutionary Wars (1792-1802) waged with the political aim of combating the spread of republicanism from France.

Anti-Russian sentiment was fuelled most acutely by the Crimean War (1853–1856), when Britain and France backed the Ottoman Empire in defeating Russia, and was deepened during the “Great Game” conflict over control of Central Asia in the latter part of the nineteenth century.

Britain and Russia found themselves in alliance with France in the Triple Entente (1907) only due to the enormous geostrategic threat posed to British by German imperialism, leading up to the eruption of the First World War in 1914.

Polish, British and French officers inspecting a detachment of Polish troops of so-called Murmansk Battalion before their departure for the front, Archangelsk 1919. [Photo: This image was created and released by the Imperial War Museum on the IWM Non Commercial Licence]

The most significant cause of Anglo-Russian enmity in the 20th century was the October 1917 Revolution, led by Lenin, Trotsky and the Bolsheviks. The seizure of power by the Russian working class in the world’s first socialist overturn of capitalism was viewed as a mortal threat by the British and international bourgeoisie. Britain led the allied armies of counter-revolutionary intervention (March 1918-October 1919) and supplied more than half the troops involved from Britain, the US, Italy, Serbia, Canada and France. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the class struggle in Britain, above all during the 1926 General Strike, and the ever-present threat of socialist revolution fed into the ferocious anti-Russian sentiment within ruling circles.

The re-eruption of German militarism and imperial ambitions in the Second World War pushed Britain under Winston Churchill into an alliance with the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin. But as soon as the war was concluded the old enmities re-emerged with force.

Churchill, who gifted the world with the term “the Iron Curtain” at a speech in Fulton, Missouri in March 1946, had urged Washington to continue the war after 1945 against the USSR. “Operation Unthinkable” centred on a proposed July 1, 1945 assault by British, American, Polish and German Nazi forces against the Red Army. It was never implemented because the US was focused on the war against Japan, while Churchill was driven from office in the July 1945 general election that swept Labour to power.

Churchill in the Roman amphitheatre of ancient Carthage to address 3,000 British and American troops, June 1943 [Photo: Unknown author – Unknown source]

While leader of the opposition, Churchill met with former-US army officer Julius Ochs Adler on April 29, 1951, at the height of the Korean War, where he proposed that an ultimatum be delivered to Stalin once he was again prime minister, threatening to “atom bomb one of 20 or 30 cities”, to be followed by “if necessary, additional ones.”

Putin’s nationalist regime emerged out of the restoration of capitalism in 1991, the culmination of the Stalinist counter-revolution against October and the perspective of world socialist revolution on which it was based. Nevertheless, despite the entirely opposed nature of Putin’s government of capitalist oligarchs to Bolshevism, it is impossible to fully appreciate the extent of the UK’s hostility to Russia outside of the historic legacy of anti-communism and bitterness towards the Russian Revolution’s inspiration of anti-colonial struggles in which the British ruling class has been steeped from birth. It is an impulse ultimately rooted in class antagonisms; a hatred of the working class and socialism, shared by the upper middle class, felt so deeply that it is driving the ruling elite to contemplate war with a nuclear power that could end human civilisation.

Labour and the Tories: A single party of war

With Britain being dragged to the precipice of war with Russia, there has been no popular discussion of the consequences thanks above all to the unanimity between the Tories and the Labour Party. Sir Keir Starmer leads one half of a single, joint party of war sitting across both sides of the House of Commons.

At its latest conference, Labour delegates passed a motion submitted by the GMB trade union calling on the party to support the provision of military, economic, diplomatic, and humanitarian assistance to Ukraine, for the party to back an increase in funding for UK defence manufacturing, and supporting a long-term strategy to “tackle Putin and dictators around the world” and for the party to back an increase in funding for UK defence manufacturing.

Labour’s shadow foreign and defence secretaries David Lammy and John Healey have written in Foreign Policy magazine, “The next Labour government will ensure Britain is NATO’s leading European nation. We would apply a ‘NATO test’ to major defense projects within our first 100 days to ensure we are on track to fulfil our obligations to the alliance in full and review any capability gaps.”

These warmongers were handed leadership of the Labour Party by Jeremy Corbyn’s successful campaign to block a move by the membership to kick out the Blairites while he was in charge. The Corbynites have since either fallen silent on the war in Ukraine or, like his shadow chancellor John McDonnell, have lined up behind British imperialism and NATO.

War and the class struggle

The UK is above all driven on the path of war by acute social tensions and an eruption of class struggle at home.

Britain’s economic crisis and striving for global position dictates a brutal offensive against the working class, slashing wages, imposing speed ups and destroying social services under conditions of the worst cost-of-living crisis since the Second World War. In turn, militarism and war demands ever more draconian attacks, with the Royal United Services Institute hailing “the end of the peace dividend” such that Britain’s military spending must be prioritised over the “growing share of its national income devoted to the NHS and state pensions”.

The SEP’s 2022 Congress resolution noted:

“The catastrophic impact falls upon a society already torn by extreme levels of social inequality and widespread deprivation. Faced with a growing oppositional movement in the working class, the British ruling class is turning to war as a means of enforcing a false ‘national unity,’ with repeated calls for sacrifice from the government to justify massive hikes on the price of fuel, food and other essentials.”

The result has been a strike wave ongoing since last summer, with more than 2.8 million days lost during the winter months, the highest in three decades, and more than half a million in March alone. Sabotage and betrayals by the trade union bureaucracy of the fight by NHS, education, postal and rail workers have been vital in policing opposition, at the cost of undermining the union leaders in the eyes of millions. But the government is moving to ever more naked state repression, exemplified by the new anti-strike Minimum Services Levels Bill, set to become law on May 22.

Striking rail workers picketing during the UK wide national rail strike at the Cowlairs maintenance depot in Springburn, north Glasgow, June 25, 2022 [Photo: WSWS]

The war policy of British imperialism finds its only opposition in the working class, whose lives are being ruined and who face the prospect of death on an unimaginable scale.

But, as the SEP’s 2022 resolution warned:

“While there is enormous opposition to war among British workers, this opposition lacks a programme, perspective and leadership. The task of the Socialist Equality Party is to develop within the working class and its vanguard an understanding of the inextricable connection between war abroad and exploitation and repression at home, and in this process build a revolutionary leadership in the working class”.

Only with this perspective can workers and young people internationally fight to bring the madness of war with Russia to an end.

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On the night of May 16, Russian forces launched another massive attack on the military facilities of the AFU in Ukraine. According to Ukrainian reports explosions thundered in the capital, as well as in the Kiev, Kharkiv, Kramatorsk and Cherkasy regions.

The main direction of the recent attack was the Ukrainian capital Kiev, where the air defence systems provided by NATO states was active for several hours. The head of the local military administration called the attack on the city “exceptional in its density”. “The maximum number of attacking missiles” was recorded in a short time period.

The Kiev regime traditionally claimed that all Russian drones and missiles were intercepted, including several Kinzhal and Kalibr missiles.

Kiev Lies, US Suffers Losses: Russian Missiles Destroyed Patriot System, Other Targets In Kiev

According to the official statement Ukrainian Air Force intercepted all:

  • 6 Kinzhal ballistic missiles;
  • 9 Kalibr cruise missiles;
  • 3 ballistic/anti-aircraft missiles (to be defined);
  • 6 Shahed 136/131 strike UAVs;
  • 3 UAVs (Orlan, SuperCum).

While the military authorities claim that they miraculously intercepted 18 Russian missiles, the mayor of Kiev confirmed several strikes in the city, which allegedly resulted in some minor damage. 

According to mayor Klychko, several explosions thundered in the Solomenskiy district of the capital. Russian drones were reportedly intercepted in the Darnitsky district and near Boryspil. As a result, several cars caught fire in the city, a building was damaged and wreckage of several missile fell on the local zoo in Shevchenko district. He calmed down the world which is closely following the military developments in the country, assuring the public that

“none of the animals and workers were injured. Now anti–stress measures are being carried out with four-legged friends,” – Klitschko.

Kiev Lies, US Suffers Losses: Russian Missiles Destroyed Patriot System, Other Targets In Kiev

Ukrainian officials published photos of the burning cars to hide the real losses

Kiev Lies, US Suffers Losses: Russian Missiles Destroyed Patriot System, Other Targets In Kiev

Ukrainian officials have published photos of burning cars to hide the real losses

The official statement of Russia’s Ministry of Defense on the morning of May 16, is as follows:

Last night, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation launched a massive strike with high-precision long-range air and sea-based weapons at the locations of the AFU units, as well as storage sites for ammunition, weapons and military equipment delivered from Western countries.

The target of the strike has been achieved. All assigned objects are hit.

A high-precision strike by a hypersonic missile system “Kinzhal” in the city of Kiev hit the Patriot anti-aircraft missile system manufactured by the United States. 

The destruction of the US-made Patriot system was filmed by one of the cameras in Kiev.

The video clearly shows that the system makes about thirty launches per minute. The Patriot system is the only one deployed with the Ukrainian military capable to launch so many missiles. The deaths of US ‘military advisers’ who coordinate the operation of the advanced US weapons in Ukraine is also highly likely:

Kiev Lies, US Suffers Losses: Russian Missiles Destroyed Patriot System, Other Targets In Kiev

The video above also confirmed that several Patriot missiles failed to be launched properly and fell on the city streets. During the night strikes, numerous missiles of the Patriot and Iris air defense systems failed and fell in Kiev; they were found by the locals:

Kiev Lies, US Suffers Losses: Russian Missiles Destroyed Patriot System, Other Targets In Kiev

Kiev Lies, US Suffers Losses: Russian Missiles Destroyed Patriot System, Other Targets In Kiev

The head of the office of the President of Ukraine, asked not to film the work of the air defense. However, videos from Kiev confirmed that the Kiev regime was blatantly lying, hiding the heavy losses. Numerous targets were hit in the city:

The Kiev residents who were filming the work of the U.S air defence systems revealed the areas of their deployment.  

*

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Turkey – Emerging Election Fraud

May 17th, 2023 by Peter Koenig

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*** 

The pattern is the same throughout the world, at least the western world, where election rules require an absolute majority, more than 50%, in the first round. If not, they go into a second round or runoff election between the two leading candidates.

In Turkey, the early vote count om 14 May started with a considerable lead for the people’s favored candidate, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He had an initial advantage of more than 60% vs. about 34% over his chief adversary, Kemal Kilicdaroglu. As the vote tabulation progressed, the margin diminished gradually.

Incumbent Erdogan was first elected President in August 2014. In 2017 Turkish voters approved Constitutional Amendments, changing the election system from a Parliamentary election to an “Executive Presidency”, giving the President, i.e. Erdogan, leader of the AK Party (Justice and Development Party) more power.

Under the new system, Erdogan won elections in June 2018 for a 5-year term, renewable once.

In the 2023, the second election, for which Erdogan is an eligible candidate, more than 64 million Turks were qualified to vote, including about 3.4 million Turks living abroad, mostly in the European Union. Among the Turks abroad, a landslide majority in most European countries voted for Erdogan.

When all votes were supposedly counted, Erdogan lost the absolute majority by a minuscule margin. The final “count” was 49.5% against 44.9% for Kilicdaroglu, the darling of the west, particularly of the US and NATO.

Erdogan is pro-Russia, against Russian sanctions and against Sweden entering NATO. It was clear from the beginning, from the moment when the Turkish Supreme Election Council announced the election cycle on 18 March 2023, that the west would do whatever they could to get Erdogan out and his pro-western opponent, Kilicdaroglu, “elected” – no matter the manipulation it would take.

Mr. Kilicdaroglu is pro-west, anti-Russia, pro-Russian sanctions, and foremost, pro-NATO. The picture couldn’t be clearer.

In sophisticated voter fraud, well refined by the Tavistock Institute’s and DARPA’s mind manipulation methods, tiny margins are made more plausible to the public, than larger ones. DARPA is a semi-secretive Pentagon think-tank, and stands for Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

It would be more questionable, when the people’s preferred candidate, who was leading in the polls by a sizable margin, would suddenly lose by a considerable difference.

This subtle fraud is easier accepted, especially in cases where run-off elections are necessary between the leading candidates. In this case incumbent President Erdogan and his challenger, Mr. Kilicdaroglu, will be cast against each other for the final round on 28 May 2023.

Once there is a runoff, the election engineers will find the most subtle ways to get their candidate in the front – even if he or she wins only with the narrowest or margins. There is no way back. No recounts permitted. It’s Democracy, stupid!

While in earlier times, such small margins would have justified a vote verification, nowadays such democratic details are blocked. The recent pattern is quite informative. In October 2022,

Brazil’s Lula won by 50.9% over 49.1% by Bolsonaro; in Peru, Pedro Castillo on 11 April 2021 won by 50.6% over Geico Fujimori’s 49.4%, and in Colombia, Gustavo Petro won on 19 June 2022 a run-off election with the narrowest of margins, 50.4%.

In the meantime, on 7 December 2022, President Castillo was “lifted” from the Presidency and put without a trial for at lest 18 months, they say, in “preventive prison care”, for allegedly intending a “parliamentary coup”. He must have done something wrong in the eyes of the world rulers.

They are supposedly all “leftist” candidates. It is he most brutal betrayal of the old-style socialists, who hoped for a left-leaning leader to improve their state of life. In fact, almost all, if not all, are scholars of Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum (WEF) academy for Young Global Leaders (YGL). As a reminder: Not long ago, Schwab said, paraphrased, “We are proud having been able to infiltrate our YGLs into governments all over the world.”

In the case of Peru’s Pedro Castillo, he was immediately replaced by Vice-President Dina Boluarte, another scholar of Klaus Schwab’s Academy for YGLs. Rather than calling for new election, Ms. Boluarte seems to be poised to remain in power until next Presidential elections in 2026. The few protests have been muffled by the media, and the world keeps turning.

They are all wins with the tiniest of differences. Technically, all within margins of error. And nobody insists on a recount? Or “recounts” were just not discussed – dictate of the manipulating rulers?

In France, Emmanuel Macron narrowly survived a parliamentary vote of non-confidence in the hail of protests against the unpopular presidential “decree”, rather than parliamentary vote – of a pension age increase from 62 to 64 – by 287 against 278.

All manufactured coincidences?

The population takes it all – no questions asked. It’s democracy at play.

If you ask such questions, uncomfortable questions, people avoid your eyes. At best they say, “it’s good we don’t know all”. That’s the level of consciousness we have reached. The Antichrist is living right among us and nobody seems to care – or dares to care.

President Erdogan faces a runoff election on 28 May 2023.

The narrowest of margins for pro-west, anti-Russia, pro-NATO Kemal Kilicdaroglu would be sufficient to get rid of Mr. Erdogan, an obstacle for the west’s plan of domination with Turkey, as key NATO member between East and West and Sweden admitted to NATO, another NATO member at Moscow’s doorstep. Is Kilicdaroglu a WEF scholar, a Young Global Leader?

Nobody would ask any question.

It’s a democratic process, a democratic decision – all legal, following the rules.

*

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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he worked for over 30 years around the world. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals and is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed; and co-author of Cynthia McKinney’s book “When China Sneezes: From the Coronavirus Lockdown to the Global Politico-Economic Crisis” (Clarity Press – November 1, 2020).

Peter is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He is also a non-resident Senior Fellow of the Chongyang Institute of Renmin University, Beijing.

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Dismantling the Supreme Court

May 17th, 2023 by Renee Parsons

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*** 

There appears to be a new energy in Congress; perhaps subtle to those who disdain partisan politics but a noticeable shift especially in the Senate Judiciary Committee.  It is that consequential Committee where the Republican minority has stepped up to push back on leadership from the majority Democrats who remain trapped within their own moral bankruptcy and decadent agenda. On the House side, a razor thin Republican majority shrewdly holds together as they exhibit an obligation to put principle beyond narrow partisanship.

The American public is now confronted with a diligent campaign by Senate Democrats to dismantle the Supreme Court and its Federal system; piece by piece if necessary.  This is more than just a destabilizing effort; it is a coordinated plan to thoroughly discredit the Court’s authority and the credibility and integrity of its Constitutional majority of Justices who happen to be Republican appointees, to undermine American Constitutional values and the rule of law and most importantly, destroy America as a universal exemplar of international law as a divinely-inspired Constitutional Republic devoted to a Greater Good.

Each individual attempt has its influence yet combined as a blitzkrieg approach on the country’s 250 year old judicial process, its dismantling takes multiple forms;  whether it be submitting ideologic unqualified nominees for judicial appointment to dumb-down the Federal Courts and distort legally valid opinions, harassment of Justice Brett Kavanaugh and now Justice Clarence Thomas who is the current target, a continual noisy parade of aggressive protestors, morning or night, at the homes of Republican Justices or occasionally at the schools of their children, manipulation of a bureaucratic Commission for the sole purpose of delegitimizing the Federal judicial system as a Constitutionally based agency and most recently, a desperate attempt to increase the Court to thirteen Justices  in order to guarantee Court decisions supportive of the Democratic agenda.

*

To digress briefly for context: the origin of the Supreme Court began with the Constitutional Convention of 1787. President George Washington signed the Federal Judiciary Act on September 24, 1789 formally establishing the Supreme Court as the final arbiter of appeals and head of Federal judicial system.  The Act further elaborated with Article III of the Constitution that  “judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and such inferior Courts” as Congress determines while also creating the office of Attorney General, US Attorneys and US Marshals.

In 1803, the Court’s first decision was the authority to determine whether a law violated the Constitution; thereby including judicial review as an essential foundation of the Court’s primary role interpreting the Constitution upon which the Court has, ever since, functioned.

It is no small irony that Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, both pragmatic, innovative political thinkers and members of the Republican (Republican-Democrat) party, opposed the judicial review concept as no single arbiter should have that responsibility and criticized too much judicial power in the hands of too few as a potential for national tyranny. They both favored the sovereignty of the American people to be governed by majority rule with a decentralized government as opposed to the overreach of a strong central government and insisted that a Bill of Rights be added to the Constitution.

Since formation of the Court in 1790, there have been seventeen Chief Justices* and one hundred four  Associate Justices, each serving an average of sixteen years as the inclusion of a new Justice every two years continues to bring a new collegiality and a new focus to the Federal bench.

*

Back to the Judiciary Committee:  on the Senate side, push comes to shove on a regular basis within the Committee where the Biden Administration continues to nominate unqualified candidates who consistently exhibit a searing lack of familiarity with ethics, skilled legal scholarship or innate judgment.

In order to achieve their majority, Democrats on Judiciary must now rely on a barely functioning, wheel chair bound 90 year old Sen. Dianne Feinstein with balance and vision impediments whose votes will, nevertheless, be in complete alignment with every other Democratic member of the US Senate who vote en bloc with nary an independent thinker among them.

Upon Feinstein’s return, Democrats had the green light to move forward on three very problematic Federal District Court nominees whose nominations had been held in abeyance by Republican Senators requiring more skilled and proficient candidates; one responded that Article V nor Article II of the Constitution ‘were not coming to mind at the moment,’ while another expressed questionable opinions about sex offenders and a third, from my State of Colorado, was totally ‘unfamiliar’ with the Brady Rule.

I am not an LLD although much of my professional life has involved the law, yet even I know the significance of the Brady Rule but this young man, like other nominees before him, had not bothered to cram in expectation for the Senate grilling he would receive – which says something about their character and work ethic.

One example of Democrats lost in the fog of narrow partisanship, as if setting the stage for the impending drama on the Dobbs decision which would overturn Roe v Wade, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer succumbed to an unabashedly hysterical meltdown on the steps of the Supreme Court on March 5, 2020 as Justices were hearing arguments regarding abortion:

“I want to tell you Gorsuch” he shouted. “I want to tell you Kavanaugh… You have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price! You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions!”

While Schumer later admitted he “should not have used the words he did,” there is no missing his intent.  Schumer might take credit, that if it had not been for his not-so-subtle quasi threat, a blatant menacing dare, that threat arrived at Justice Kavanaugh’s home on June 8th with arrest of an armed man whose purpose was to assassinate Justice Kavanaugh just as it unleashed a flood of screeching protestors at the homes of Supreme Court Justices which continues to this day.

*

On April 9, 2021, President Joe Biden signed Executive Order 14023 creating a Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States with its stated purpose “to provide an analysis of the principal arguments in the contemporary public debate for and against Supreme Court reform”  and “including the role of secretive special-interest influence in and around the Court.”

One might inquire as to what ‘contemporary public debate’ the President was referring to and whether ‘secretive special interest influence” might include the American Bar Association which almost always takes a pro-con position on every Supreme Court nominee.

Curiously, thirty six Commissioners had been pre-selected to be included in the EO and appointed at the same time which appeared to put the Commission on a fast-track to somewhere; to make a timely recommendation, to offer its opinion or exhibit some impressive feat of accomplishment.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who has become a leading active critic of the Court, sent a six page letter to the newly formed Commission on May 18, 2021 expressing deep angst regarding 5-4 Court decisions (which presumably did not represent his political opinion) and outlining his significant expectations for the Commission’s collective consideration.

June 30, 2021, the Commission held its Second public meeting.

On December 7, 2021,  the Commission unanimously approved a draft 294 page final report that the Commission ‘voted unanimously” upon concluding that it had “met its charge to provide an account of the current debate over the role and operation of the Supreme Court in our constitutional system” and an “analysis of the principal arguments in the contemporary public debate for and against Supreme Court reform, including an appraisal of the merits and legality of particular reform proposals.”

In a press released written and released from the Whitehouse Senate office on December 8th, the  Senator referred to himself as a  “leading critic of special interest influence over the federal judiciary” and yet confessed that the  Commission’s final report “missed the point’ by failing to adequately address the twelve areas of concern he identified for Commission recognition.

It might be curious to know how long it takes thirty six individual members on any Commission to agree to a 294 page document on any topic as consequential as Supreme Court ethics within a seven month period from formation to issuance of a final report – or perhaps the draft report had been prepared by anonymous government bureaucrats prior to Commission consideration awaiting its proverbial rubber stamp?

Not to be deterred, Sen. Whitehouse continues to follow through with the full Judiciary Committee holding a hearing which would authorize Congress to supersede the Constitution in establishing its own parochial version of an ethics code for another Federal agency which violates the Constitutional concept of separation of powers.

*

On May 3, 2022, a draft majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito which would overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion decision was leaked to Politico, leaving little doubt that the Court would reverse Roe as the draft unleashed a level of opposition rarely seen in American political tirades.

On May 7, 2022, hundreds of sign-carrying, screaming and chanting abortion demonstrators arrived at the homes of Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Justice Samuel Alito. Meanwhile, the Biden White House offered the reassurance that Justices ‘should not have to worry about their personal safety.”

On May 11, 2022, Governors Glenn Younkin (Va) and Larry Hogan (Md) sent a joint letter to AG Merrick Garland reminding him that (US Code 1507)  “Federal law prohibits picketing at the home of Judge with the aim to influence the Judge’s decision making process” and requested the “DOJ provide the appropriate resources to safeguard the Justices and enforce the law as written.” 

On June 8, 2022 a man armed with a gun, knife, zip ties and other tools, was arrested for threatening to assassinate  Justice Brett Kavanaugh and his family at their home.

On June 24, 2022 the Court issued its landmark decision in Dobbs.

By July 3, 2022, the US Marshal at the Supreme Court requested that state officials ‘enforce’ the law citing  “for weeks on end, large groups of protesters chanting slogans, using bullhorns, and banging drums have picketed Justices’ homes in Virginia” although state officials recognized that responsibility for managing the protests belong to federal law enforcement (ie US Marshals).

On March 29, 2023, US Senator Katie Britt (R-Ala.) questioned AG Merrick Garland during a budget hearing in which an additional $21 Million to hire 42 Deputy US Marshals was requested, when she released US Marshal training slides suggesting that Marshal’s ‘refrain from arresting protestors unless absolutely necessary” for criminal enforcement action  contradicting Garland’s earlier statement that “Marshals had full authority to arrest people under the Federal statute.”  Garland denied he had ever seen the training protocol.

On May 4, 2023, based on training documents revealed by Sen. Britt,  House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan held a hearing on why US Marshals were told to “avoid” arresting protestors at Justice’s homes “despite actions clearly in violation of Federal law;” even as the lack of US Marshal arrests of demonstrators outside the home of Justice Kavanaugh et al as demonstrations continue.     To date, not one protestor at a Justice’s home has been charged or arrested in violation of 1507.

*

On March 31, 2023, fifteen Democratic Senators sent a four page letter to the Senate Appropriation Committee directing that $10 Million be withheld unless the Chief Justice notifies the Congress that the Supreme Court has put into effect a public code of ethics including “misconduct by Justices of the Court.” That letter was clearly a breach of the Constitutional separation of powers doctrine.

Seven of those Democratic Senators running for re-election in 2024 are Senators Sherrod Brown (Ohio), Robert Casey (Pa), Mazie Hirono (Hawaii), Tim Kaine (Va.), Bernie Sanders (Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (RI.)

By May, 2023, the Committee began a hearing on S.Court ethics code, Sen. Schumer had still not recouped his standing when Sen. John Kennedy (R-La) repeated Schumer’s vociferous words with the admonition:

“I think Matthew 12:36 is correct; “by thy words, you shall be justified and by thy words, you shall be condemned.” Kennedy continued that some Democratic colleagues have been on a “crusade to undermine the Supreme Court’s legitimacy and credibility of the Federal Judiciary for years.”

In that spirit they publicized the school that Justice Barrett’s children attend; a man with a gun, pepper spray, knife and zip ties went to a Justice’s home to assassinate him. Actually, his stated goal was to murder three Justices. You don’t need to be Einstein’s cousin to figure it out; they aren’t getting their way so they want to change the rules. Now some Democrats want Congress to override the Supreme Court and apply rules to its Justices. The Constitutional separation of powers means that no branch of the Federal government can dictate how another should govern itself. The Framers insulated the Federal judiciary from political control to ensure that the Justices would decide cases impartially without fear of the kind of retaliation that fills the pages of some left-of-Lenin Democrats playbook.”

Kennedy went on to suggest that Sen. Whitehouse’s proposal was unnecessary and unconstitutional; that Justices already have a code of conduct, are subject to strict financial disclosure rules with Federal law requiring recusal in certain circumstances.  He duly noted a double standard exists regarding gifts and timely reporting with current and past Justices as ignored by the Democrats.

In conclusion, Kennedy said ‘The danger is not that rogue Justices are operating without ethics; it’s that Democrats aren’t winning every fight and they find that reality intolerable.  I’ve been disappointed in some Court decisions; but my Democratic colleagues should fill out a ‘hurt feelings’ report and move on.”

*

There appears to be no level of humiliation or shame that Senate Democrats will acknowledge as they vote en bloc in a deliberate, conscious effort to annihilate a Constitutional judicial process in place since 1787.

Once the Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner was an annual Democratic celebration of two of its founders; the majority of today’s rank n file Democrats no longer honor Jefferson or Jackson.

*

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Renee Parsons served on the ACLU’s Florida State Board of Directors and as president of the ACLU Treasure Coast Chapter. She has been an elected public official in Colorado, staff in the Office of the Colorado State Public Defender, an environmental lobbyist for Friends of the Earth and a staff member of the US House of Representatives in Washington DC.

She is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image: This file photo shows the US Supreme Court building located at One First Street, NE, in Washington.

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*** 

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex… Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.” Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969), 34th President of the United States, (1953-1961), (in his ‘Farewell Address’, Jan. 17, 1961)

“Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial complex would have to remain, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.” George F. Kennan (1904-2005), American diplomat and historian, (in his preface to Norman Cousins’ 1987 book ‘The Pathology of Power’)

“A nation cannot become free and at the same time continue to oppress other nations.” Fredrich Engels (1820-1895), German social scientist and father of Marxist theory, (in “Speech on Poland’, 1847)

Sometimes politicians like to sprinkle their speeches and statements with words like “diplomacy” and “peace“. This does not insure, in so doing, that they really mean what they say. In fact, such grandiloquent talk could be a cover-up for their real intentions, which may be the very opposite to diplomatic solutions and peaceful coexistence to solving world problems. In the realm of politics, actions count more than words.

A good point in this case could be what U.S. President Joe Biden meant when he said, during a talk at the State Department on February 4, 2021: “diplomacy is back at the center of our Foreign Policy.”

He repeated the same message a few months later, in a speech at the United Nations, on September 21, 2021, saying that “we’re opening a new era of relentless diplomacy“, and pledging that “we are not seeking a new Cold War or a world divided into rigid blocs.” 

And to be well understood, Mr. Biden made the following commitment: “We must redouble our diplomacy and commit to political negotiations, not violence, as the tool of first resort to manage tensions around the world.” He even went on quoting the opening words of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “The equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom justice, and peace in the world.”

These were noble pledges.

The reality: The U.S. Government has largely abandoned multilateralism for a unilateral foreign policy mainly concentrated on NATO

However, what has really happened during the first three years of the Biden administration?

Following in the footsteps of a few preceding administrations, the Joe Biden administration has de facto abandoned the search for the common good of all countries within a multilateral approach. Indeed, far from actively leading the world with diplomacy in the hope of reducing military conflicts around the world, the Biden administration has embarked upon a bellicose foreign policy.

This is a policy inspired by neoconservative advisers, and it calls for increased military U.S. interventions abroad, on a permanent basis, outside of the framework of the U.N. Charter, which, it should be emphasized, was signed by all member nations. It has instead chosen to mainly pursue its foreign policy within the narrow framework of an increasingly offensive NATO.

Presently, there are two mainly U.S.-NATO-led proxy wars that are of immediate concern: a hot one in Ukraine directed at Russia, and one brewing in Taiwan and aimed at China.

In Ukraine, this has taken the form of the U.S. and other NATO countries shipping huge amounts of arms and equipment, and even some covert operations personnel, to that country neighboring Russia, including illegal depleted uranium weapons.

Even if public opinion in Western countries is still strongly behind the Russian-Ukrainian war, especially among the young and less among older generations, one of the consequences of the war, according to some polls, has been to isolate somewhat the United States and its NATO allies in certain parts of the world. In some countries, for example, notably in Asia, Africa and South America, the position seems to be “none of our business“.

Fall-outs from the American-NATO-led proxy wars against Russian and China

According to official propaganda, Russian embarked upon an ‘unprovoked’ war against Ukraine, on February 24, 2022. However, things are a bit more complicated, because the United States and NATO have been heavily involved in that unnecessary war since at least 2014, and credibly since 1991, as far as the U.S. government is concerned.

First of all, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, in 1991, it is widely established through declassified documents that U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, and the representatives of important European nations, made a solemn commitment to Russia, on February 9, 1990, that NATO would not be expanded “one inch” into Eastern Europe—conditional to Russia’s acceptance of the reunification of the two Germanys.

Secondly, as professor John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago has often said (and I agree), there would not have been a Ukraine War if Joe Biden had not been in the White House. It was, indeed, President Biden’s insistence on having NATO expand to the very doorsteps of Russia, with missiles pointed toward Moscow, that was the main reason why Russia felt directly threatened and why it invaded Ukraine.

Even Pope Francis arrived at the same conclusion, that the main trigger of the Ukraine War was “NATO barking at Putin’s door.”

Thirdly, let us remember that it was the Obama administration (2009-2017), with then Vice-President Joe Biden involved, that bankrolled, to a large extent, the overthrow of the elected pro-Russia Ukrainian government of Viktor Yanukovych, in February 2014.

This was clearly established by then U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland (a well-known neocon), who confirmed publicly, on December 13, 2013, that the U.S. government had invested $5 billion in Ukraine, under the pretext of ‘promoting democracy’, One may ask if it an accepted practice by democracies to overthrow elected governments?

Fourthly, published documents indicate that the policy of encircling Russia militarily, an act of war implicitly not allowed under the U.N. Charter, is a neoconservative idea originating from the Rand Corporation—a think-tank heavily financed by the military-industrial complex (MIC) and deeply involved in framing U.S. foreign policy.

Indeed, the policy of an aggressive military stand against Russia is well outlined in a 2019 report, entitled “Overextending and Unbalancing Russia“. Therefore, when Defense Secretary Gen. Lloyd Austin said publicly, on April 25, 2022, that the Biden administration’s objective in Eastern Europe was to “see Russia weakened“, it was a clear indication that the Rand Corporation’s strategy of militarily encircling Russia had become the official foreign policy of the Biden administration, even at the risk of turning such a localized conflict into a global one.

That may be a reason why people in the know do not swallow the propaganda line that the U.S. and NATO are in Ukraine to “save democracy“. In fact, there is no democracy in Ukraine, since the Ukrainian government of Volodymyr Zelensky has abolished eleven political parties.

Failed attempts by third parties to bring peace to Ukraine

The above could explain why the Biden administration has been quick to turn down any attempt to prevent or to end the Ukraine War.

For example, even when it was still possible to avoid a conflict, on December 7, 2021, during a Biden-Putin direct phone talk, President Biden undiplomatically turned down demands to consider Russian security considerations and stop pushing NATO right to Russia’s border. [N.B.: It is relevant to remember that when the shoe was on the other foot, in October 1962, and the USSR wanted to place missiles in Cuba, at 90 miles from the USA, it was seen by the John F. Kennedy administration in Washington D.C. as an unacceptable breach of American security.]

The Israeli government and the government of Turkey both have attempted to mediate a peace between Russia and Ukraine, but without any success.

First, in the beginning days of the conflict, in early March 2022, then Israeli Prime Minister (June 2021-June 2022) Naftali Bennett attempted to mediate a speedy end to the Russia-Ukraine confrontation. He came very close to succeeding when Russian President Vladimir Putin dropped his demand to seek Ukraine’s disarmament and Ukrainian President Voldymyr Zelensky promised not to join NATO. A bilateral peace deal was ready to be signed in April 2022.

Secondly, in March 2022, the Turkish government also tried to bring a peace agreement closer between Russia and Ukraine. After successful talks were held in Istanbul, between officials of both countries, the two sides agreed on the framework for a tentative deal.

Considering that both Russia and Ukraine were willing to make concessions and with peace deals close at hand, why did the Israeli and the Turkish attempts at mediation fail?

Former Israeli Prime Minister Bennett gave an answer: the Biden administration commissioned then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to go to Kyiv and sabotage any peace deal. Some Western powers saw it to their advantage that the war in Ukraine continue.

Not too surprisingly, the latest attempt to end the Ukraine War—China‘s 12-point peace proposal for a “Political Settlement for the Ukraine Crisis“, made on February 24, 2023—has so far also been derailed.

It would seem that those who planned for and ‘invested’ much in such a war do not wish to lose face. For one, President Biden has branded the Chinese plan (which calls for de-escalation toward a cease-fire in Ukraine, respect for national sovereignty, establishment of humanitarian corridors, resumption of peace talks and a stop to unilateral sanctions), as “not rational“.

While President Joe Biden has concentrated his efforts on fueling the fire of war in Ukraine, Chinese President Xi Jinping seems to have filled the void and has developed the stature of a peace broker around the world.

In the end, considering the many parties involved in the conflict (Russia, Ukraine, United States, NATO, European Union), and their intransigence, the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, threw in the towel and confessed, on May 9, 2023, that peace negotiations in Ukraine were “not possible at this time”. Warmongers are in charge in many nations, and no ceasefire can be expected at this time in Eastern Europe.

Flight from the U.S. dollar as a consequence of financial and economic sanctions

Holding financial assets denominated in U.S. dollars has recently become a risky proposition. Any government imprudent enough to do so exposes itself to political pressures from the U.S. government and, if it does not abide, its dollar assets could be arbitrarily frozen, unilaterally seized or simply confiscated. The list of countries so punitively ‘sanctioned‘ has been getting longer and longer each month.

One would think that an international currency should not be ‘weaponized’ in that way, unless one really wishes to destabilize the entire international monetary and financial system and create chaos in the world economy.

On April 16, 2023, even the U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen (1946-) mused aloud about the possibility of the U.S. dollar loosing its dominance in international finance and as a reserve currency.

Indeed, even if it is not easy, some countries have stopped settling their cross-border trade in U.S. dollars and are either using the Chinese Yuan, the Indian Rupee (INR), bilateral barter or their local currencies to do so. There are calls on the part of the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) to avoid using the U.S. dollar, as a response to unilateral U.S.-led financial and economic sanctions.

Such a movement to dedollarize global trade is an ominous development for international monetary and financial markets, with potentially enormous consequences, both monetary and economic.

In fact, the entire international monetary framework of the Bretton Woods System of payments, established in 1944 around the U.S. dollar (linked at the time to gold at a fixed rate of $35 per ounce), could be in jeopardy. Indeed, if the international payment system were to become more fragmented, the volume of international trade and the flows of capital movements could decline, and this could have a disastrous impact on the growth of the world economy.

Conclusions

As things stand now, despite efforts, hopes do not look promising for a quick resolution to the proxy war in Ukraine, and for lowering the escalating tensions over Taiwan.

First, if Great Powers hiding behind their veto at the U.N. Security council cannot contribute to peace in the world, they should at least not actively contribute to war. Unfortunately, in the 21st Century, the United Nations has become the carpet on which Great Powers wipe their feet.

Secondly, with its proxy wars, the U.S. government should realize that it is losing its moral ascendency and influence in the world. And it is evident why this is the case: the Biden administrations’s current neocon-inspired foreign policy of using NATO as its main instrument of intervention around the world, especially with its proxy conflicts with Russia and China, while snubbing the United Nations and its Charter, is shrouded with risks and may be a very bad idea.

Indeed, such a policy is isolating the United States and its NATO allies from the rest of the world. In the future, this could undermine their legitimacy, efficiency and influence outside North America and Western Europe. Pushed to the limit, such a development could result in unraveling the very international framework of global institutions that was established in the aftermath of World War II.

Thirdly, if one adds the persistent and threatening danger of a nuclear war to the equation, it would seem obvious to clear minds that a negotiated peace in Ukraine, in particular, should be preferable to a murderous and disastrous war, without ends, with few possible winners, other than arms dealers, and many losers all around.

*

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This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, Dr. Rodrigue Tremblay.

International economist Dr. Rodrigue Tremblay is the author of the book about morals “The code for Global Ethics, Ten Humanist Principles” of the book about geopolitics “The New American Empire“, and the recent book, in French, “La régression tranquille du Québec, 1980-2018“. He holds a Ph.D. in international finance from Stanford University. Please visit Dr Tremblay’s site or email to a friend here.

Prof. Rodrigue Tremblay is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)

Featured image is from Geopolitical Economy Report


The Code for Global Ethics: Ten Humanist Principles

by Rodrigue Tremblay, Preface by Paul Kurtz

Publisher: ‎ Prometheus (April 27, 2010)

Hardcover: ‎ 300 pages

ISBN-10: ‎ 1616141727

ISBN-13: ‎ 978-1616141721

Humanists have long contended that morality is a strictly human concern and should be independent of religious creeds and dogma. This principle was clearly articulated in the two Humanist Manifestos issued in the mid-twentieth century and in Humanist Manifesto 2000, which appeared at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Now this code for global ethics further elaborates ten humanist principles designed for a world community that is growing ever closer together. In the face of the obvious challenges to international stability-from nuclear proliferation, environmental degradation, economic turmoil, and reactionary and sometimes violent religious movements-a code based on the “natural dignity and inherent worth of all human beings” is needed more than ever. In separate chapters the author delves into the issues surrounding these ten humanist principles: preserving individual dignity and equality, respecting life and property, tolerance, sharing, preventing domination of others, eliminating superstition, conserving the natural environment, resolving differences cooperatively without resort to violence or war, political and economic democracy, and providing for universal education. This forward-looking, optimistic, and eminently reasonable discussion of humanist ideals makes an important contribution to laying the foundations for a just and peaceable global community.

Click here to purchase.

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A Timely Call for Peace in Ukraine by U.S. National Security Experts

By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies, May 16, 2023

On May 16, 2023, The New York Times published a full-page advertisement signed by 15 U.S. national security experts about the war in Ukraine. It was headed “The U.S. Should Be a Force for Peace in the World,” and was drafted by the Eisenhower Media Network.

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By Friends of the Earth, May 16, 2023

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By Ahmed Adel, May 16, 2023

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi announced that his country is considering opening a NATO liaison office, demonstrating that Tokyo is deepening its ties with the US and becoming more hostile to China and Russia. Tokyo’s rapprochement with NATO would strengthen the anti-China/Russia alliance and advance the US plans to create a NATO-styled organisation in the Far East.

Assassinating Vladimir Putin?

By Ron Unz, May 16, 2023

Although pro-Ukrainian forces had likely been responsible for the drone attack, our government provides all their funding, intelligence, and control, and such a momentous act must have been fully authorized by top American officials. Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland is the Neocon responsible for Ukraine issues and McGovern believed she would have been the one who signed off on the strike against the Kremlin.

The Oil and Gas Industry of Alberta Versus the Climate Change Preoccupations of the Liberal-NDP Alliance

By Prof. Anthony J. Hall, May 16, 2023

For decades the development of the separatist movement within Quebec proved most instrumental in threatening Canada’s confidence and coherence as a viable federation. This dynamic, however, is changing. These days the most direct challenge to Canada’s unified future is the growing constituency within Alberta starting to consider the possibility of moving towards sovereign independence.

Will Lawsuits Bring an End to COVID Vaccines?

By Dr. Joseph Mercola, May 16, 2023

Drug companies have a legal responsibility to provide profits for their shareholders. They do not have a legal responsibility to give patients the best and safest treatment. But the biggest scandal is that those with the responsibility to uphold scientific integrity — academic institutions, doctors, medical journals — also collude with industry for financial gain.

Big Bad Canada Pushes to Protect Profits from Mexico

By Yves Engler, May 16, 2023

Recently the Mexican government initiated more socially and ecologically sound mining legislation. The reform shortens mining concessions, tightens rules for water permits and requires companies to provide at least 10 per cent of profits to the communities where they operate.

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Image: President Harry Truman

First published by GR on September 7, 2014, minor edits. 

The Declassified documents were first posted by Global Research in December 2003

see my 2003 article on the Truman Doctrine

http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CRG312A.html

 

.

Author’s Introductory Note 

We bring to the attention of our readers the analysis of George F. Kennan (1948) which constitutes the foreign policy cornerstone of the “‘Truman doctrine.”

These documents have set the groundwork. They have a direct bearing on US foreign policy and military doctrine under the Biden Administration, specifically with regard to Germany and the European Union which are currently the object of a U.S. sponsored Act of “Economic Warfare”. 

What is of significance is that the threats directed against Germany and the EU, emanating from the Biden White House, were formulated under the “Truman Doctrine” at the very outset of the post-war era. According to George Kennan

“To achieve such a federation [EU] would be much easier if Germany were partitioned, or drastically decentralized, and if the component parts could be brought separately into the European union.”  

The military occupation of western Germany may have to go on for a long time. We may even have to be prepared to see it become a quasi-permanent feature of the European scene

In the long run there can be only three possibilities for the future of western and central Europe. One is German domination. Another is Russian domination. The third is a federated Europe, into which the parts of Germany are absorbed but in which the influence of the other countries is sufficient to hold Germany in her place.

The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better”  (George Kennan, emphasis added)

“Straight power concepts” are now designated by the U.S State Department and the media as “the rules-based order”.

See our recent articles: 

Video: America is at War with Europe

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, April 22, 2023

Video: Has Germany Become a Colony of the United States?

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, April 20, 2023

Michel Chossudovsky, May 17, 2023

***

Introduction

Today’s US-NATO sponsored wars are part of a military and foreign policy agenda extending over a period of more than half a century.

In this regard, the NeoCons’ Project for the New American Century’s blueprint formulated in 2000  should be viewed as the culmination of a post-war agenda of military hegemony and global economic domination as initially formulated by the State Department in 1948 at the outset of the Cold War.

What these 1948 State department documents reveal (see below in Annex) is continuity in US foreign policy from “Containment” during the Cold War to today’s doctrine of “Pre-emptive War”.

The Project for the New American Century (PNAC) is in many regards a continuation of the Truman Doctrine, namely a hegemonic “long war” waged by US-NATO at a global level. Military actions are to be implemented simultaneously in different regions of the world (as outlined in the PNAC): 

“Fight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theater wars” 

Needless to say, successive Democratic and Republican administrations, from Harry Truman to George W. Bush, Barack Obama [and now Joe Biden] have been involved in carrying out this hegemonic blueprint for global domination, which the Pentagon  calls the “Long War”.

Kennan’s writings point to the importance of building a dominant Anglo-American alliance based on “good relations between our country and [the] British Empire”. In today’s world, this alliance largely characterizes the military axis between Washington and London, which plays a dominant role inside NATO to the detriment of Washington’s  European allies. Kennan also pointed to the inclusion of Canada in the Anglo-American alliance, a policy which today has largely been implemented (under NAFTA and the integration of military command structures).  Canada was viewed as a go between the US and Britain, as a means for the US to also exert its influence in Britain’s colones, which later became part of the Commonwealth.

Of significance, Kennan underscores the importance of preventing the development of continental European powers (e.g. Germany and France)  which could compete with the Anglo-American axis:

Today, standing at the end rather than the beginning of this half-century, some of us see certain fundamental elements on which we suspect that American security has rested. We can see that our security has been dependent throughout much of our history on the position of Britain; that Canada, in particular, has been a useful and indispensable hostage to good relations between our country and British Empire; and that Britain’s position, in turn, has depended on the maintenance of a balance of power on the European Continent.

Thus it was essential to us, as it was to Britain, that no single Continental land power should come to dominate the entire Eurasian land mass. Our interest has lain rather in the maintenance of some sort of stable balance among the powers of the interior, in order that none of them should effect the subjugation of the others, conquer the seafaring fringes of the land mass, become a great sea power as well as land power, shatter the position of England, and enter—as in these circumstances it certainly would—on an overseas expansion hostile to ourselves and supported by the immense resources of the interior of Europe and Asia. Seeing these things, we can understand that we have had a stake in the prosperity and independence of the peripheral powers of Europe and Asia: those countries whose gazes were oriented outward, across the seas, rather than inward to the conquest of power on land. (George F. Kennan, American Diplomacy. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1951)

Today the World is at crossroads of the most serious crisis in World history. The US and its allies have launched a military adventure which threatens the future of humanity. This roadmap of global warfare has its historical roots in the 1948 Truman doctrine.

Of relevance in relation to recent developments in Ukraine and Eastern Europe, Kennan explicitly pointed in his 1948 State Department brief, to “a policy of containment of Germany, within Western Europe”. What Kennan’s observations suggest is that the US should be  supportive of  a European Project only inasmuch as it supports US hegemonic interests.

In this regard, we recall that the Franco -German alliance largely prevailed prior to the onslaught of the March 2003 US-UK invasion of Iraq, to which both France and Germany were opposed.

The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a turning point. The election of pro-US political leaders (President Sarkozy in France and Chancellor Angela Merkel in Germany) was conducive to a weakening of national sovereignty, leading to the demise of the Franco-German alliance.

Today both Francois Hollande and Angela Merkel are taking their orders directly from Washington.

Moreover, in today’s context, the US is committed to preventing Germany and France from developing political and economic relations with Russia, which in the eyes of Washington would undermine America’s hegemonic ambitions in the European Union.

“Federated Europe”

It would appear that a blueprint of  a European Union predicated on “a weakened Germany” had been envisaged by the US State Department in the late 1940s.

Writing in 1948, Kennan had envisaged the formation of a “Federated Europe” which would based on the strengthening of the dominant Anglo-American alliance between Britain and the US , the weakening of Germany as a European power and the exclusion of Russia.

According to Kennan:

In the long run there can be only three possibilities for the future of western and central Europe. One is German domination. Another is Russian domination. The third is a federated Europe, into which the parts of Germany are absorbed but in which the influence of the other countries is sufficient to hold Germany in her place.

If there is no real European federation and if Germany is restored as a strong and independent country, we must expect another attempt at German domination. If there is no real European federation and if Germany is not restored as a strong and independent country, we invite Russian domination, for an unorganized Western Europe cannot indefinitely oppose an organized Eastern Europe. The only reasonably hopeful possibility for avoiding one of these two evils is some form of federation in western and central Europe.

Moreover, it is worth noting that the US at the outset of the Cold did not favor the reunification of Germany. Quite the opposite: Germany was to remain partitioned:

Our dilemma today lies in the fact that whereas a European federation would be by all odds the best solution from the standpoint of U.S. interests, the Germans are poorly prepared for it. To achieve such a federation would be much easier if Germany were partitioned, or drastically decentralized, and if the component parts could be brought separately into the European union. To bring a unified Germany, or even a unified western Germany, into such a union would be much more difficult: for it would still over-weigh the other components, in many respects.

With regard to Asia including China and India, Kennan hints to to the importance of not only articulating a military solution but in maintaining the people of Asia in a state of poverty. What is also put forth is a strategy of creating divisions as well as ensuring that Asian countries do not establish a relationship with the Soviet Union which would hinder US hegemonic interests.

“The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better”:

Furthermore, we have about 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world-benefaction.

For these reasons, we must observe great restraint in our attitude toward the Far Eastern areas. The peoples of Asia and of the Pacific area are going to go ahead, whatever we do, with the development of their political forms and mutual interrelationships in their own way. This process cannot be a liberal or peaceful one. The greatest of the Asiatic peoples—the Chinese and the Indians—have not yet even made a beginning at the solution of the basic demographic problem involved in the relationship between their food supply and their birth rate. Until they find some solution to this problem, further hunger, distress, and violence are inevitable. All of the Asiatic peoples are faced with the necessity for evolving new forms of life to conform to the impact of modern technology. This process of adaptation will also be long and violent. It is not only possible, but probable, that in the course of this process many peoples will fall, for varying periods, under the influence of Moscow, whose ideology has a greater lure for such peoples, and probably greater reality, than anything we could oppose to it. All this, too, is probably unavoidable; and we could not hope to combat it without the diversion of a far greater portion of our national effort than our people would ever willingly concede to such a purpose.

In the face of this situation we would be better off to dispense now with a number of the concepts which have underlined our thinking with regard to the Far East. We should dispense with the aspiration to “be liked” or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded international altruism. We should stop putting ourselves in the position of being our brothers’ keeper and refrain from offering moral and ideological advice. We should cease to talk about vague and—for the Far East—unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better. (emphasis added)

From the outset of the Cold War era, Washington was also intent upon weakening the United Nations. According to Kennan:

The initial build-up of the UN in U.S. public opinion was so tremendous that it is possibly true, as is frequently alleged, that we have no choice but to make it the cornerstone of our policy in this post-hostilities period. Occasionally, it has served a useful purpose. But by and large it has created more problems than it has solved, and has led to a considerable dispersal of our diplomatic effort. And in our efforts to use the UN majority for major political purposes we are playing with a dangerous weapon which may some day turn against us. This is a situation which warrants most careful study and foresight on our part. (emphasis added)

Michel Chossudovsky, September 7, 2014, May 17, 2023  [updated from December 2003)


ANNEX

Further references including original archives:

FOREIGN RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES 1945-1950 Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment

at http://www.state.gov/www/about_state/history/intel/

Foreign Relations Series   (Kennedy through Nixon)

at http://www.state.gov/www/about_state/history/frus.html

For a list of Kennan’s writings at Princeton University library:

http://infoshare1.princeton.edu/libraries/firestone/rbsc/finding_aids/kennan/index.html

See also The United States’ Global Military Crusade (1945-2003) by Eric Waddell, Global Outlook, Issue 6, Winter 2003


 PPS/23: Review of Current Trends in U.S. Foreign Policy

Published in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1948, Volume I, pp. 509-529.Policy Planning Staff Files 1

Memorandum by the Director of the Policy Planning Staff (Kennan) 2 to the Secretary of State and the Under Secretary of State (Lovett)

TOP SECRET
PPS/23

[Washington,] February 24, 1948.

(emphasis added)

When Mr. Acheson 3 first spoke to me about the Planning Staff, he said that he thought its most important function would be to try to trace the lines of development of our foreign policy as they emerged from our actions in the past, and to project them into the future, so that we could see where we were going.

During the first months of the operation of the Staff, I hesitated to undertake any such effort, because I did not feel that any of us had a broad enough view of the problems involved to lend real value to our estimate.

I have now made an effort toward a general view of the main problems of our foreign policy, and I enclose it as a Staff paper. It is far from comprehensive and doubtless contains many defects; but it is a first step toward the unified concept of foreign policy which I hope this Staff can some day help to evolve.

The paper is submitted merely for information, and does not call for approval. I made no effort to clear it around the Department, since this would have changed its whole character. For this reason, I feel that if any of the views expressed should be made the basis for action in the Department, the views of the offices concerned should first be consulted.

This document should properly have included a chapter on Latin America. I have not included such a chapter because I am not familiar with the problems of the area, and the Staff has not yet studied them. Butler, 4 who is taking over for me in my absence, 5 has had long experience with these problems and I hope that while I am away he and the Staff will be able to work up some recommendations for basic policy objectives with regard to the Latin American countries.

George F. Kennan


[Annex]

Report by the Policy Planning Staff

TOP SECRET
PPS/23
[Washington,] February 24, 1948.

Review of Current Trends U.S. Foreign Policy

I. United States, Britain, and Europe

On the assumption that Western Europe will be rescued from communist control, the relationships between Great Britain and the continental countries, on the one hand, and between Great Britain and the United States and Canada on the other, will become for us a long term policy problem of major significance. The scope of this problem is so immense and its complexities so numerous that there can be no simple and easy answer. The solutions will have to be evolved step by step over a long period of time. But it is not too early today for us to begin to think out the broad outlines of the pattern which would best suit our national interests.

In my opinion, the following facts are basic to a consideration of the problem.

1. Some form of political, military and economic union in Western Europe will be necessary if the free nations of Europe are to hold their own against the people of the east united under Moscow rule.

2. It is questionable whether this union could be strong enough to serve its designed purpose unless it had the participation and support of Great Britain.

3. Britain’s long term economic problem, on the other hand, can scarcely be solved just by closer association with the other Western European countries, since these countries do not have, by and large, the food and raw material surpluses she needs; this problem could be far better met by closer association with Canada and the United States.

4. The only way in which a European union, embracing Britain but excluding eastern Europe, could become economically healthy would be develop the closest sort of trading relationships either with this hemisphere or with Africa.

It will be seen from the above that we stand before something of a dilemma. If we were to take Britain into our own U.S.-Canadian orbit, according to some formula of “Union now”, this would probably solve Britain’s long term economic problem and create a natural political entity of great strength. But this would tend to cut Britain off from the close political association she is seeking with continental nations and might therefore have the ultimate effect of rendering the continental nations more vulnerable to Russian pressure. If, on the other hand, the British are encouraged to seek salvation only in closer association with their continental neighbors, then there is no visible solution of the long term economic problem of either Britain or Germany, and we would be faced, at the termination of ERP, with another crises of demand on this country for European aid. 6

To me there seem only two lines of emergence from this dilemma. They are not mutually exclusive and might, in fact, supplement each, other very well.

In the first place, Britain could be encouraged to proceed vigorously with her plans for participation in a European union, and we could try to bring that entire union, rather than just Britain alone, into a closer economic association with this country and Canada. We must remember, however, that if this is to be really effective, the economic association must be so intimate as to bring about a substantial degree of currency and customs union, plus relative freedom of migration of individuals as between Europe and this continent. Only in this way can the free movement of private capital and labor be achieved which will be necessary if we are to find a real cure for the abnormal dependence of these areas on governmental aid from this country. But we should also note carefully the possible implications of such a program from the standpoint of the ITO Charter. 7 As I see it, the draft charter, as well as the whole theory behind our trade agreements program, would make it difficult for us to extend to the countries of western Europe special facilities which we did not extend in like measure to all other ITO members and trade agreement partners.

A second possible solution would lie in arrangements whereby a union of Western European nations would undertake jointly the economic development and exploitation of the colonial and dependent areas of the African Continent. The realization of such a program admittedly presents demands which are probably well above the vision and strengths and leadership capacity of present governments in Western Europe. It would take considerable prodding from outside and much patience. But the idea itself has much to recommend it. The African Continent is relatively little exposed to communist pressures: and most of it is not today a subject of great power rivalries. It lies easily accessible to the maritime nations of Western Europe, and politically they control or influence most of it. Its resources are still relatively undeveloped. It could absorb great numbers of people and a great deal of Europe’s surplus technical and administrative energy. Finally, it would lend to the idea of Western European union that tangible objective for which everyone has been rather unsuccessfully groping in recent months.

However this may be, one thing is clear: if we wish to carry through with the main purpose of the ERP we must cordially and loyally support the British effort toward a Western European union. And this support should consist not only of occasional public expressions of approval. The matter should be carefully and sympathetically discussed with the British themselves and with the other governments of Western Europe. Much could be accomplished in such discussions, both from the standpoint of the clarification of our own policy and ir the way of the exertion of a healthy and helpful influence on the Europeans themselves. In particular, we will have accomplished an immense amount if we can help to persuade the Western Europeans of the necessity of treating the Germans as citizens of Europe.

With this in mind, I think it might be well to ask each of our missions in Western Europe to make a special study of the problem of Western European union, both in general and with particular reference to the particular country concerned, and to take occasion, in the course of preparation of this study, to consult the views of the wisest and most experienced people they know in their respective capitals. These studies should be accompanied by their own recommendations as to how the basic problem could best be approached. A digest of such studies in this Department should yield a pretty sound cross-section of informed and balanced opinion on the problem in question.

II. European Recovery Program

The course of the debates in Congress now makes it possible for us to distinguish with some degree of probability the outlines of the action toward which this Government is moving in the question of aid to Europe.

1. The administration of the program.

The most significant feature of the emerging recovery program is that it is to be conducted by this Government as a technical business operation and not as a political matter. We must face realistically the fact that this will reduce drastically the program’s potential political effect and open up the road to a considerable degree of confusion, contradiction and ineffectiveness in this Government’s policies toward Europe. The conduct of relations with the European governments by a separate agency of this Government on matters of such great importance, over so long a period of time, cannot fail to cut deeply into the operations of the Department of State in European affairs and to reduce the prestige, the competence, and the effectiveness of its Missions in Europe.

In these circumstances, the possibilities for the exertion of influence by this Department over the course of our relations with European countries will become predominantly a matter of the extent to which it can influence national policy through the White House. This means that greatly increased importance must he attached to the means of liaison between the Department and the White House, and particularly to the National Security Council.

But we should not deceive ourselves into hoping that national policy conducted through channels as round about as this, and involving the use of a new and separate organization such as the ERP administration, can be as clear cut or as efficacious as that which could be conducted if policy-making functions continued to rest clearly with the regular agencies of government. No policy can become really effective unless it commands the understanding of those who carry it out. The understanding of governmental policies in the field of foreign affairs cannot be readily acquired by people who are new to that field, even when they are animated by the best will in the world. This is not a manner of briefing, or instructing, which could be done in a short time. It is a matter of educating and training, for which years are required.

Our experience with ad hoc wartime and post-hostilities agencies operating in the foreign field has demonstrated that not only are new agencies of little value in executing policies which go beyond the vision and the educational horizon of their own personnel, but that they actually develop a momentum of their own which, in the final analysis, tends to shape—rather than to serve—the national policy.

I do not think that the manner in which this aid program is to be undertaken is necessarily going to mean that its basic purpose will not be served. While we will hardly be able to use U.S. aid tactically, as a flexible political instrument, the funds and goods will nevertheless themselves constitute an important factor on the European scene. The mere availability of this amount of economic assistance will create, so to speak, a new topographic feature against which the peoples of Western Europe will be able to brace themselves in their own struggle to preserve political independence.

But we must recognize that, once the bill has been passed, the matter will be largely out of our hands. The operation of the ERP administration will make it difficult for this Department itself to conduct any incisive and vigorous policy with relation to Europe during the period in question. This does not relieve us, of course, of the duty of continuing to study carefully the development of the European scene and of contributing as best we can to the formulation of national policy relating to the European area. But it thrusts this Department back—with respect to one great area of the world’s surface—into the position it occupied in many instances during the recent war:—the position of an advisory, rather than an executive, agency.

2. The time factor and the question of amount.

The dilatoriness of the Congress in acting on this matter presents a definite danger to the success of the program. A gap between the date on which the aid becomes available and the point to which European reserves can hold out could nullify a great part of the effect of the program.

There is probably not much that we can do, by pleading or urging, to expedite Congressional action. But I think we should state very plainly to Congress the time limits involved (which our own economic analysts must determine) and the possible consequences of delay. Furthermore, we should make clear that aid granted subsequent to the specified time limits cannot be considered as a response to the recommendations of the Executive branch of the Government, and that the latter cannot take responsibility for the desirability or effectiveness of the program in these circumstances.

The same principle applies in case the program is cut in amount below what we consider to be the minimum necessary for the recovery purpose.

In either case, there will be charges we are trying to “dictate” to the Congress. But there is a serious question of responsibility involved here; and the Executive branch of the Government will find itself embarrassed in its future position if it allows itself to be forced now into accepting a share of responsibility for a program of aid which it knows will be too little, too late, or both.

3. The question of European Union.

The original reaction to the Harvard speech, 8 both in Europe and here, demonstrated how vitally important to the success of an aid program is the concept of European unity. Unless the program actually operates to bring closer together the countries participating in it, it will certainly fail in its major purpose, and it will not take on, in the eyes of the world public, the dignity and significance which would set it apart from the previous efforts at foreign economy aid.

There is real danger that this basic fact be lost sight of at this stage in the deliberations, not only in the Congress, but also in the Department.

We should therefore make it a point to lose no opportunity to stress this element in the concept of the aid program, and to insist that the principle of collaboration and joint responsibility among the 16 nations be emphasized throughout in our handling of the operation.

III. Germany 9

The coming changes with respect to the responsibility for military government in Germany provide a suitable occasion for us to evolve new long-term concepts of our objectives with respect to that country. We cannot rely on the concepts of the existing policy directives. Not only were these designed to meet another situation, but it is questionable, in many instances, whether they were sound in themselves.

The planning to be done in this connection will necessarily have to be many-sided and voluminous. But it is possible to see today the main outlines of the problem we will face and, I think, of the solutions we must seek.

In the long run there can be only three possibilities for the future of western and central Europe. One is German domination. Another is Russian domination. The third is a federated Europe, into which the parts of Germany are absorbed but in which the influence of the other countries is sufficient to hold Germany in her place.

If there is no real European federation and if Germany is restored as a strong and independent country, we must expect another attempt at German domination. If there is no real European federation and if Germany is not restored as a strong and independent country, we invite Russian domination, for an unorganized Western Europe cannot indefinitely oppose an organized Eastern Europe. The only reasonably hopeful possibility for avoiding one of these two evils is some form of federation in western and central Europe.

Our dilemma today lies in the fact that whereas a European federation would be by all odds the best solution from the standpoint of U.S. interests, the Germans are poorly prepared for it. To achieve such a federation would be much easier if Germany were partitioned, or drastically decentralized, and if the component parts could be brought separately into the European union. To bring a unified Germany, or even a unified western Germany, into such a union would be much more difficult: for it would still over-weigh the other components, in many respects.

Now a partition of the Reich might have been possible if it had been carried out resolutely and promptly in the immediate aftermath of defeat. But that moment is now past, and we have today another situation to deal with. As things stand today, the Germans are psychologically not only unprepared for any breakup of the Reich but in a frame of mind which is distinctly unfavorable thereto.

In any planning we now do for the future of Germany we will have to take account of the unpleasant fact that our occupation up to this time has been unfortunate from the standpoint of the psychology of the German people. They are emerging from this phase of the post-hostilities period in a state of mind which can only be described as sullen, bitter, unregenerate, and pathologically attached to the old chimera of German unity. Our moral and political influence over them has not made headway since the surrender. They have been impressed neither by our precepts nor by our example. They are not going to look to us for leadership. Their political life is probably going to proceed along the lines of a polarization inro extreme right and extreme left, both of which elements will be, from our standpoint, unfriendly, ugly to deal with, and contemptuous of the things we value.

We cannot rely on any such Germany to fit constructively into a pattern of European union of its own volition. Yet without the Germans, no real European federation is thinkable. And without federation, the other countries of Europe ran have no protection against a new attempt at foreign domination.

If we did not have the Russians and the German communists prepared to take advantage politically of any movement on our part toward partition we could proceed to partition Germany regardless of the will of the inhabitants, and to force the respective segments to take their place in a federated Europe. But in the circumstances prevailing today, we cannot do this without throwing the German people politically into the arms of the communists. And if that happens, the fruits of our victory in Europe will have been substantially destroyed.

Our possibilities are therefore reduced, bv the process of exclusion, to a policy which, without pressing the question of partition in Germany, would attempt to bring Germany, or western Germany, into a European federation, but do it in such a way as not. to permit her to dominate that federation or jeopardize the security interests of the other western European countries. And this would have to be accomplished in the face of the fact that we cannot rely on the German people to exercise any self-restraint of their own volition, to feel any adequate sense of responsibility vis-a-vis the other western nations, or to concern themselves for the preservation of western values in their own country and elsewhere in Europe.

I have no confidence in any of the old-fashioned concepts of collective security as a means of meeting this problem. European history has shown only too clearly the weakness of multilateral defensive alliances between complete sovereign nations as a means of opposing desperate and determined bids for domination of the European scene. Some mutual defense arrangements will no doubt be necessary as a concession to the prejudices of the other Western European peoples, whose thinking is still old fashioned and unrealistic on this subject. But we can place no reliance on them as a deterrent to renewed troublemaking on the part of the Germans.

This being the case, it is evident that the relationship of Germany to the other countries of western Europe must be so arranged as to provide mechanical and automatic safeguards against any unscrupulous exploitation of Germany’s preeminence in population and in military-industrial potential.

The first task of our planning will be to find such safeguards.

In this connection, primary consideration must be given to the problem of the Ruhr. Some form of international ownership or control of the Ruhr industries would indeed be one of the best means of automatic protection against the future misuse of Germany’s industrial resources for aggressive purposes. There may be otner devices which would also be worth exploring.

A second line of our planning will have to be in the direction of the maximum interweaving of German economy with that of the remainder of Europe. This may mean that we will nave to reverse our present policies, in certain respects. One of the most grievous mistakes, in my opinion, of our post-hostilities policy was the renewed extreme segregation of the Germans and their compression into an even smaller territory than before, in virtual isolation from the remaining peoples of Europe. This sort of segregation and compression invariably arouses precisely the worst reactions in the German character. What the Germans need is not to be thrust violently in upon themselves, which only heightens their congenital irrealism and self-pity and defiant nationalism, but to be led out of their collective egocentrism and encouraged to see things in larger terms, to have interests elsewhere in Europe and elsewhere in the world, and to learn to think of themselves as world citizens and not just as Germans.

Next, we must recognize the bankruptcy of our moral influence on the Germans, and we must make plans for the earliest possible termination of those actions and policies on our part which have been psychologically unfortunate. First of all, we must reduce as far as possible our establishment in Germany; for the residence of large numbers of representatives of a victor nation in a devastated conquered area is never a helpful factor, particularly when their living standards are as conspicuously different as are those of Americans in Germany. Secondly, we must terminate as rapidly as possible those forms of activity (denazification, re-education, and above all the Nuremberg Trials) which tend to set up as mentors and judges over internal German problems. Thirdly, we must have the courage to dispense with military government as soon as possible and to force the Germans to accept responsibility once more for their own affairs. They will never begin to do this as long as we will accept that responsibility for them.

The military occupation of western Germany may have to go on for a long time. We may even have to be prepared to see it become a quasi-permanent feature of the European scene. But military government is a different thing. Until it is removed, we cannot really make progress in the direction of a more stable Europe.

Finally, we must do everything possible from now on to coordinate our policy toward Germany with the views of Germany’s immediate western neighbors. This applies particularly to the Benelux countries, who could probably easily be induced to render valuable collaboration in the implementation of our own views. It is these neighboring countries who in the long run must live with any solution we may evolve; and it is absolutely essential to any successful ordering of western Europe that they make their full contribution and bear their full measure of responsibility. It would be better for us in many instances to temper our own policies in order to win their support than to try to act unilaterally in defiance of their feelings.

With these tasks and problems before us it is important that we should do nothing in this intervening period which would prejudice our later policies. The appropriate offices of the Department of State should be instructed to bear this in mind in their own work. We should also see to it that it is borne in mind by our military authorities in the prosecution of their policies in Germany. These considerations should be observed in any discussions we hold with representatives of other governments. This applies particularly to the forthcoming discussions with the French and the British.

IV. Mediterranean

As the situation has developed in the past year, the Soviet chances for disrupting the unity of western Europe and forcing a political entry into that area have been deteriorating in northern Europe, where the greater political maturity of the peoples is gradually asserting itself, but holding their own, if not actually increasing, in the south along the shores of the Mediterranean. Here the Russians have as assets not only the violent chauvinism of their Balkan satellites but also the desperate weakness and weariness of the Greek and Italian peoples. 10 Conditions in Greece and Italy today are peculiarly favorable to the use of fear as a weapon for political action, and hence to the tactics which are basic and familiar to the communist movement.

It cannot be too often reiterated that this Government does not possess the weapons which would be needed to enable it to meet head-on the threat to national independence presented by the communist elements in foreign countries. This poses an extremely difficult problem as to the measures which our Government can take to prevent the communists from achieving success in the countries where resistance is lowest.

The Planning Staff has given more attention to this than to any single problem which has come under its examination. Its conclusions may be summed up as follows:

(1) The use of U S. regular armed force to oppose the efforts of indigenous communist elements within foreign countries must generally be considered as a risky and profitless undertaking, apt to do more harm than good.
(2) If, however, it can be shown that the continuation of communist activities has a tendency to attract U.S. armed power to the vicinity of the affected areas, and if these areas are ones from which the Kremlin would definitely wish U.S. power excluded, there is a possibility that this may bring into play the defensive security interests of the Soviet Union and cause the Russians to exert a restraining influence on local communist forces.

The Staff has therefore felt that the wisest policy for us to follow would be to make it evident to the Russians by our actions that the further the communists go in Greece and Italy the more surely will this Government be forced to extend the deployment of its peacetime military establishment in the Mediterranean area.

There is no doubt in our minds but that if the Russians knew that the establishment of a communist government in Greece would mean the establishment of U.S. air bases in Libya and Crete, or that a communist uprising in northern Italy would lead to the renewed occupation by this country of the Foggia field, a conflict would be produced in the Kremlin councils between the interests of the Third Internationale, on the one hand, and those of the sheer military security of the Soviet Union, on the other. In conflicts of this sort, the interests of narrow Soviet nationalism usually win. If they were to win in this instance, a restraining hand would certainly be placed on the Greek and Italian communists.

This has already been, to some extent, the case. I think there is little doubt that the activity of our naval forces in the Mediterranean (including the stationing of further Marines with those forces), plus the talk of the possibility of our sending U.S. forces to Greece, has had something to do with the failure of the satellites, up to this time, to recognize the Markos Government, and possibly also with the Kremlin’s reprimand to Dimitrov. Similarly, I think the statement we made at the time of the final departure of our troops from Italy was probably the decisive factor in bringing about the abandonment of the plans which evidently existed for a communist uprising in Italy prior to the spring elections.

For this reason, I think that our policy with respect to Greece ar Italy, and the Mediterranean area in general, should be based upon the objective of demonstration to the Russians that: 

(a) the reduction of the communist threat will lead to our military withdrawal from the area; but that
(b) further communist pressure will only have the effect of involving us more deeply in a military sense.

V. Palestine and the Middle East

The Staff views on Palestine have been made known in a separate paper. 11 I do not intend to recapitulate them here. But there are two background considerations of determining importance, both for the Palestine question and for our whole position in the Middle East, which I should like to emphasize at this time.

1. The British strategic position in the Middle East.

We have decided in this Government that the security of the Middle East is vital to our own security. We have also decided that it would not be desirable or advantageous for us to attempt to duplicate or take over the strategic facilities now held by the British in that area. We have recognized that these facilities would be at our effective disposal anyway, in the event of war, and that to attempt to get them transferred, in the formal sense, from the British to ourselves would only raise a host of new and unnecessary problems, and would probably be generally unsuccessful.

This means that we must do what we can to support the maintenance of the British of their strategic position in that area. This does not mean that we must support them in every individual instance. It does not mean that we must back them up in cases where they have gotten themselves into a false position or where we would thereby be undertaking extravagant political commitments. It does mean that any policy on our part which tends to strain British relations with the Arab world and to whittle down the British position in the Arab countries is only a policy directed against ourselves and against the immediate strategic interests of our country.

2. The direction of our own policy.

The pressures to which this Government is now subjected are ones which impel us toward a position where we would shoulder major responsibility for the maintenance, and even the expansion, of a Jewish state in Palestine. To the extent that we move in this direction we will be operating directly counter to our major security interests in that area. For this reason, our policy in the Palestine issue should be dominated by the determination to avoid being impelled along this path.

We are now heavily and unfortunately involved in this Palestine question. We will apparently have to make certain further concessions to our past commitments and to domestic pressures.

These concessions will be dangerous ones; but they will not necessarily be catastrophic if we are thoroughly conscious of what we are doing, and if we lay our general course toward the avoidance of the possibility of the responsibility I have referred to. If we do not lay our course in that direction but drift along the lines of least resistance in the existing vortex of cross currents, our entire policy in the Middle Eastern area will unquestionably be carried in the direction of confusion, ineffectiveness, and grievous involvement in a situation to which there cannot be—from our standpoint—any happy ending.

I think it should be stated that if this Government is carried to a point in the Palestine controversy where it is required to send U.S. forces to Palestine in any manner whatsoever, or to agree either to the international recruitment of volunteers or the sending of small nation forces which would include those of Soviet satellites, then in my opinion, the whole structure of strategic and political planning which we have been building up for the Mediterranean and Middle Eastern areas would have to be re-examined and probably modified or replaced by something else.

For this would then mean that we had consented to be guided, in a highly important question affecting those areas, not by national interest but by other considerations. If we tried, in the face of this fact, to continue with policy in adjacent areas motivated solely bv national interest, we would be faced with a duality of purpose which would surely lead in the end to a dissipation and confusion of effort. We cannot operate with one objective in one area, and with a conflicting one next door.

If, therefore, we decide that we are obliged by past commitments or UN decision or anv other consideration to take a leading part in the enforcement of Palestine of any arrangement opposed by the great majority of the inhabitants of the Middle Eastern area, we must be prepared to face the implications of this act by revising our general policy in that part of the world. And since the Middle East is vital to the present security concepts on which this Government is basing itself in its worldwide military and political planning, this would further mean a review of our entire military and political policy.

VI. U.S.S.R.

If the Russians have further success in the coming months in their efforts at penetration and seizure of political control of the key countries outside the iron curtain (Germany, France, Italy, and Greece), they will continue, in my opinion, to be impossible to deal with at the council table. For they will see no reason to settle with us at this time over Germany when they hope that their bargaining position will soon be improved.

If, on the other hand, their situation outside the iron curtain does not improve—if the ERP aid arrives in time and in a form to do some good and if there is a general revival of confidence in western Europe, then a new situation will arise and the Russians will be prepared, for the first time since the surrender, to do business seriously with us about Germany and about Europe in general. They are conscious of this and are making allowance for this possibility in their plans. I think, in fact, that they regard it as the more probable of the two contingencies.

When that day comes, i.e. when the Russians will be prepared to talk realistically with us, we will be faced with a real test of American statesmanship, and it will not be easy to find the right solution. For what the Russians will want us to do will be to conclude with them a sphere-of-influence agreement similar to the one they concluded with the Germans in 1939. It will be our job to explain to them that we cannot do this and why. But we must also be able to demonstrate to them that it will still be worth their while:

(a) to reduce communist pressures elsewhere in Europe and the Middle East to a point where we ran afford to withdraw all our armed forces from the continent and the Mediterranean; and

(b) to acquiesce thereafter in a prolonged period of stability in Europe.

I doubt that this task will be successfully accomplished if we try to tackle it head-on in the CFM or at any other public meeting. Our public dealings with the Russians can hardly lead to any clear and satisfactory results unless they are preceded by preparatory discussions of the most secret and delicate nature with Stalin. 12 I think that those discussions can be successfully conducted only by someone who:

(a) has absolutely no personal axe to grind in the discussions, even along the lines of getting public credit for their success, and is prepared to observe strictest silence about the whole proceeding; and
(b) is thoroughly acquainted not only with the background of our policies but with Soviet philosophy and strategy and with the dialectics used by Soviet statesmen in such discussions.

(It would be highly desirable that this person be able to conduct conversations in the Russians’ language. In my opinion, this is important with Stalin.)

These discussions should not be directed toward arriving at any sort of secret protocol or any other written understanding. They should be designed to clarify the background of any written understanding that we may hope to reach at the CFM table or elsewhere. For we know now that the words of international agreements mean different things to the Russians than they mean to us; and it is desirable that in this instance we should thresh out some common understanding of what would really be meant by any further written agreements we might arrive at.

The Russians will probably not be prepared to “talk turkey” with us until after the elections. But it would be much easier to talk to them at that time if the discussions did not have to be inaugurated too abruptly and if the ground had been prepared beforehand.

The Russians recently made an interesting approach to Murphy in Berlin, obviously with a view to drawing us out and to testing our interest in talking with tbom frankly and realistically on the informal plane. I do not think Berlin a desirable place for the pursuit of further discussions of this sort. On the other hand, I do not think that we should give them a complete cold shoulder. We must always be careful not to give discouragement to people in the Kremlin who may urge the desirability of better understanding with us.

I think, in the light of the above, we should give careful attention to the personnel arrangements which we make with relation to the Russian field in the next few months, and that we should play our cards throughout with a view to the possibility of arriving eventually at some sort of a background understanding with the Kremlin. But we must bear in mind that this understanding would necessarily have to be limited and coldly realistic, could not be reduced to paper, and could not be expected to outlast the general international situation which had given rise to it.

I may add that I think such an understanding would have to be restricted pretty much to the European and western Mediterranean area. I doubt that it could be extended to apply to the Middle East and Far East. The situation in these latter areas is too unsettled, the prospects for the future too confusing, the possibilities of one sort or another too vast and unforeseeable, to admit of such discussions. The economic exchanges between Japan and Manchuria might be revived in a guarded and modified form, by some sort of barter arrangement. This is an objective well worth holding in mind, from our standpoint. Rut we should meanwhile have to frame our policies in Japan with a view to creating better bargaining power for such discussions than we now possess.

VII. Far East

My main impression with regard to the position of this Government with regard to the Far East is that we are greatly over-extended in our whole thinking about what we can accomplish, and should try to accomplish, in that area. This applies, unfortunately, to the people in our country as well as to the Government.

It is urgently necessary that we recognize our own limitations as a moral and ideological force among the Asiatic peoples.

Our political philosophy and our patterns for living have very little applicability to masses of people in Asia. They may be all right for us, with our highly developed political traditions running back into the centuries and with our peculiarly favorable geographic position; but they are simply not practical or helpful, today, for most of the people in Asia.

This being the case, we must be very careful when we speak of exercising “leadership” in Asia. We are deceiving ourselves and others when we pretend to have the answers to the problems which agitate many of these Asiatic peoples.

Furthermore, we have about 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world-benefaction.

For these reasons, we must observe great restraint in our attitude toward the Far Eastern areas. The peoples of Asia and of the Pacific area are going to go ahead, whatever we do, with the development of their political forms and mutual interrelationships in their own way. This process cannot be a liberal or peaceful one.

The greatest of the Asiatic peoples—the Chinese and the Indians—have not yet even made a beginning at the solution of the basic demographic problem involved in the relationship between their food supply and their birth rate. Until they find some solution to this problem, further hunger, distress, and violence are inevitable. All of the Asiatic peoples are faced with the necessity for evolving new forms of life to conform to the impact of modern technology. This process of adaptation will also be long and violent. It is not only possible, but probable, that in the course of this process many peoples will fall, for varying periods, under the influence of Moscow, whose ideology has a greater lure for such peoples, and probably greater reality, than anything we could oppose to it. All this, too, is probably unavoidable; and we could not hope to combat it without the diversion of a far greater portion of our national effort than our people would ever willingly concede to such a purpose.

In the face of this situation we would be better off to dispense now with a number of the concepts which have underlined our thinking with regard to the Far East. We should dispense with the aspiration to “be liked” or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded international altruism. We should stop putting ourselves in the position of being our brothers’ keeper and refrain from offering moral and ideological advice. We should cease to talk about vague and—for the Far East—unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.

We should recognize that our influence in the Far Eastern area in the coming period is going to be primarily military and economic. We should make a careful study to see what parts of the Pacific and Far Eastern world are absolutely vital to our security, and we should concentrate our policy on seeing to it that those areas remain in hands which we can control or rely on. It is my own guess, on the basis of such study as we have given the problem so far, that Japan and the Philippines will be found to be the corner-stones of such a Pacific security system and if we can contrive to retain effective control over these areas there can be no serious threat to our security from the East within our time.

Only when we have assured this first objective, can we allow ourselves the luxury of going farther afield in our thinking and our planning.

If these basic concepts are accepted, then our objectives for the immediate coming period should be:

(a) to liquidate as rapidly as possible our unsound commitments in China and to recover, vis-à-vis that country, a position of detachment and freedom of action;
(b) to devise policies with respect to Japan which assure the security of those islands from communist penetration and domination as well as from Soviet military attack, and which will permit the economic potential of that country to become again an important force in the Far East, responsive to the interests of peace and stability in the Pacific area; and
(c) to shape our relationship to the Philippines in such a way as to permit the Philippine Government a continued independence in all internal affairs but to preserve the archipelago as a bulwark of U.S. security in that area.

Of these three objectives, the one relating to Japan is the one where there is the greatest need for immediate attention on the part of our Government and the greatest possibility for immediate action. It should therefore be made the focal point of our policy for the Far East in the coming period.

VIII. International Organization

A broad conflict runs through U.S. policy today between what may be called the universalistic and the particularized approaches to the solution of international problems.

The universalistic approach looks to the solution of international problems by providing a universalistic pattern of rules and procedures which would be applicable to all countries, or at least all countries prepared to join, in an identical way. This approach has the tendency to rule out political solutions (that is, solutions related to the peculiarities in the positions anil attitudes of the individual peoples). It favors legalistic and mechanical solutions, applicable to all countries alike. It has already been embodied in the United Nations, in the proposed ITO Charter, in UNESCO, in the PICAO, and in similar efforts at universal world collaboration in given spheres of foreign policy.

This universalistic approach has a strong appeal to U.S. public opinion: for it appears to obviate the necessity of dealing with the national peculiarities and diverging political philosophies of foreign peoples; which many of our people find confusing and irritating. In this sense, it contains a strong vein of escapism. To the extent that it could be made to apply, it would relieve us of the necessity of dealing with the world as it is. It assumes that if all countries could be induced to subscribe to certain standard rules of behavior, the ugly realities—the power aspirations, the national prejudices, the irrational hatreds and jealousies—would be forced to recede behind the protecting curtain of accepted legal restraint, and that the problems of our foreign policy could thus be reduced to the familiar terms of parliamentary procedure and majority decision. The outward form established for international dealings would then cover and conceal the inner content. And instead of being compelled to make the sordid and involved political choices inherent in traditional diplomacy, we could make decisions on the lofty but simple plane of moral principle and under the protecting cover of majority decision.

The particularized approach is one which is skeptical of any scheme for compressing international affairs into legalistic concepts. It holds that the content is more important than the form, and will force its way through any formal structure which is placed upon it. It considers that the thirst for power is still dominant among so many peoples that it cannot be assuaged or controlled by anything but counter-force. It does not reject entirely the idea of alliance as a suitable form of counter-force; but it considers that if alliance is to be effective it must be based upon real community of interest and outlook, which is to be found only among limited groups of governments, and not upon the abstract formalism of universal international law or international organization. It places no credence in the readiness of most peoples to wage war or to make national sacrifices in the interests of an abstraction called “peace”. On the contrary, it sees in universal undertakings a series of obligations which might, in view of the short-sightedness and timidity of other governments, prevent this country from taking vigorous and incisive measures for its own defense and for the defense of concepts of international relations which might be of vital importance to world stability as a whole. It sees effective and determined U.S. policy being caught, at decisive moments, in the meshes of a sterile and cumbersome international parliamentarianism, if the univeralistic concepts are applied.

Finally, the particularized approach to foreign policy problems distrusts the theory of national sovereignty as it expresses itself today in international organization. The modern techniques of aggressive expansion lend themselves too well to the pouring of new wine. into old vessels—to the infusion of a foreign political will into the personality of an ostensibly independent nation. In these circumstances, the parliamentary principle in world affairs can easily become distorted and abused as it has been in the case of White Russia, the Ukraine and the Russian satellites. This is not to mention the problem of the distinction between large and small states, and the voice that they should have, respectively, in world affairs.

This Government is now conducting a dual policy, which combines elements of both of these approaches. This finds its reflection in the Department of State, where the functional (or universalistic) concept vies with the geographic (or particularized) in the framing and conduct of policy, as well as in the principles of Departmental organization.

This duality is something to which we are now deeply committed. I do not mean to recommend that we should make any sudden changes. We cannot today abruptly renounce aspirations which have become for many people here and abroad a symbol of our belief in the possibility of a peaceful world.

But it is my own belief that in our pursuance of a workable world order we have started from the wrong end. Instead of beginning at the center, which is our own immediate neighborhood—the area of our own political and economic tradition—and working outward, we have started on the periphery of the entire circle, i.e., on the universalistic principle of the UN, and have attempted to work inward. This has meant a great dispersal of our effort, and has brought perilously close to discredit those very concepts of a universal world order to which we were so attached. If we wish to preserve those concepts for the future we must hasten to remove some of the strain we have placed upon them and to build a solid structure, proceeding from a central foundation, which can be thrust up to meet them before they collapse of their own weight.

This is the significance of the ERP, the idea of European union, and the cultivation of a closer association with the U.K. and Canada. For a truly stable world order can proceed, within our lifetime, only from the older, mellower and more advanced nations of the world—nations for which the concept of order, as opposed to power, has value and meaning. If these nations do not have the strength to seize and hold real leadership in world affairs today, through that combination of political greatness and wise restraint which goes only with a ripe and settled civilization, then, as Plato once remarked: “. . . cities will never have rest from their evils,—no, nor the human race, as I believe.”

[Here follows Part IX, “Department and Foreign Service.”]

X. Conclusions

An attempt to survey the whole panorama of U.S. policy and to sketch the lines of direction along which this country is moving in its relations with the rest of the world yields little cause for complacency.

We are still faced with an extremely serious threat to our whole security in the form of the men in the Kremlin. These men are an able, shrewd and utterly ruthless group, absolutely devoid of respect for us or our institutions. They wish for nothing more than the destruction of our national strength. They operate through a political organization of unparalleled flexibility, discipline, cynicism and toughness. They command the resources of one of the world’s greatest industrial and agricultural nations. Natural force, independent of our policies, may go far to absorb and eventually defeat the efforts of this group. But we cannot depend on this.

Our own diplomacy has a decisive part to play in this connection. The problems involved are new to us, and we are only beginning to adjust ourselves to them. We have made some progress; but we are not yet nearly far enough advanced. Our operations in foreign affairs must attain a far higher degree of purposefulness, of economy of effort, and of disciplined co-ordination if we are to be sure of accomplishing our purposes.

In the western European area communism has suffered a momentary check; but the issue is still in the balance. This Government has as yet evolved no firm plans for helping Britain meet her basic long-term economic problem, or for fitting Germany into western Europe in a way that gives permanence of assuring the continued independence and prosperity of the other nations of western Europe.

In the Mediterranean and Middle East, we have a situation where a vigorous and collective national effort, utilizing both our political and military resources, could probably prevent the area from falling under Soviet influence and preserve it as a highly important factor in our world strategic position. But we are deeply involved, in that same area, in a situation which has no direct relation to our national security, and where the motives our involvement lie solely in past commitments of dubious wisdom and in our attachment to the UN itself. If we do not effect a fairly radical reversal of the trend of our policy to date, we will end up either in the position of being ourselves militarily responsible for the protection of the Jewish population in Palestine against the declared hostility of the Arab world, or of sharing that responsibility with the Russians and thus assisting at their installation as one of the military powers of the area. In either case, the clarity and efficiency of a sound national policy for that area will be shattered.

In the Far East, our position is not bad; and we still have a reasonably firm grip on most of what is strategically essential to us. But our present controls are temporary ones which cannot long endure, and we have not yet worked out realistic plans for replacing them with a permanent structure. Meanwhile, our own public has been grievously misled by the sentimentalists on the significance of the area to ourselves; and we are only beginning with the long and contentious process of re-education which will be necessary before a realistic Far Eastern policy can receive the popular understanding it deserves.

In all areas of the world, we still find ourselves the victims of many of the romantic and universalistic concepts with which we emerged from the recent war. The initial build-up of the UN in U.S. public opinion was so tremendous that it is possibly true, as is frequently alleged, that we have no choice but to make it the cornerstone of our policy in this post-hostilities period. Occasionally, it has served a useful purpose. But by and large it has created more problems than it has solved, and has led to a considerable dispersal of our diplomatic effort. And in our efforts to use the UN majority for major political purposes we are playing with a dangerous weapon which may some day turn against us. This is a situation which warrants most careful study and foresight on our part.

Notes

1 Lot 64D563, files of the Policy Planning Staff of the Department of State, 1947-1953.

2 The Policy Planning Staff of the Department of State was established on May 7, 1947, to consider the development of long range policy and to draw together the views of the geographic and functional offices of the Department. With the enactment of the National Security Act of 1947, the Policy Planning Staf undertook responsibility for the preparation of the position of the Department of State on matters before the National Security Council. For additional information on the activities of the Policy Planning Staff and its Director, see George F. Kennan, Memoirs 1925-1950 (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1967), pp. 313-500.

3 Dean Acheson, Under Secretary of State, August 1945-June 1947.

4 George H. Butler, Deputy Director of the Policy Planning Staff.

5 On February 26, Kennan departed for Japan to consult with United States officials. Subsequent illness prevented him from returning to the Department of State until April 19.

6 For documentation on United States policy with respect to the economic situation in Europe, see vol. III, pp. 352.

7 For documentation on United States policy with respect to the proposed International Trade Organization, see pp. 802 ff.

8 For text of Secretary Marshall’s address at commencement exercises at Harvard University, June 5, 1947, see Foreign Relations, 1947, vol. III, p. 237, or Department of State Bulletin, June 15, 1947, p. 1159.

9 For documentation on United States policy with respect to the occupation and control of Germany, see vol. II, pp. 1285 ff.

10 For documentation on United States efforts in support of democratic forces in Italy, see vol. III, pp. 816 ff. Regarding United States economic and military support for Greece, see vol. IV, pp. 1 ff.

11 For the views of the Policy Planning Staff on this subject, see PPS 19, January 20, 1948, and PPS 21, February 11, 1948, in vol. V, Part 2, pp. 545 and 656 respectively.

12 Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union.

 

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The Party’s Over, the Gloves Are Off

May 16th, 2023 by Daniel Patrick Welch

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This whole Ukranian episode of the Forever War is more and more like a caricature every day. In the first place, it’s not a Ukranian war. We have to abandon that propaganda narrative that we’ve been aiding and abetting. It’s not a war where “the Ukranians did this, the Russians did this, the Ukranians, the Russians…” and on and on. That’s not what’s happening. It is–and has always been–a proxy war of the combined west against Russia. Absolutely every bit of that is true.

And now even the word “proxy” is getting to be a little creaky. Because all they are using is foreign investment in weapons: missiles that shoot farther, uranium depleted weapons. All those things are overseen by NATO and by the US. What provides an interesting light shone on this idea of it being just another chapter in the Forever War is this weird foreign trip of Zelensky. You now have the President of Ukraine going to the Germans. To ask *The Germans* to be the greatest provider of weapons in his fight against Russia. 

Is this 1939? Is W.H. Auden going to write about this? Is Stepan Bandera actually alive? What is this? The trouble is that this is exactly what it is– to replay of the end of World War II. Which, let’s be honest—let’s be completely honest—didn’t quite end the way the west wanted. From that space which the Nazis share. ALL the Nazis! I don’t mean the German word “Nazi.” I  mean it sounds cool, and it’s fun to say the word, Nazi! But Nazi isn’t a German tradition. And they certainly weren’t the only Nazis around!

In fact, they shared all that space with Bandera, with half the aristocracy of the British Empire, with all the great titans of American corporations who were building up Hitler to ruin Russia. This is what happens with exceptionalists, supremacists. It’s okay to kill the people who live on the land you want to take. And you can flip Auden either way you want from that time until now:

“I and the public know./ What all schoolchildren learn,/ Those to whom evil is done/ Do evil in return.”

This is what is happening. And what is going to happen. The ending is no different. The movie is the same. The Russians (Soviets) lost 27 million people. And it might as well have happened yesterday.

The same people are providing the same weapons to the same people (with the details slightly tweaked). These are the Somozas! This is the very origin of the Proxy. Older than Somoza. Older than SAVAK. Older than settlers in South Africa—well maybe not, I don’t know. But certainly Bandera is revered in this corner, in this northwest corner of Ukraine, for “making it free from 1939 to 1945.” 

How? By slaughtering tens of thousands of Poles, Russians, Jews. Friends of Hitler! Friends of Hitler have never been enemies of the United States in its policy machinations.

They’re the first ones they went to! And one of the first things they do is to demonize the hell out of anything that has to do with those people targeted. The attack–the slaughter—on Russian language, Russian tradition, Russian history. Is mindblowing. So much so that Americans don’t even know how brain dead they are. And they should. I mean, if so many of us come from Ireland, and we had to suffer historically what the British do. Which is sell the narrative that says Ah, the Irish are all drunks anyway. And they’re lazy. And they’re most likely terrorists. So we just march in with Cromwell and slaughter them all. And take that land! 

So you always have the resonance of that war, of World War II…all the wars come back and feed into each other. What the Wolfe Tones sang in the 80’s: Cromwell’s men are here again! England’s name again is sullied in the eyes of honest men. 

And it is ridiculous to think that you can change that. That history is just the long arm of a clock that if you have enough necons running things and enough capitalists on your payroll, you can stop that hand. You can move it! Guess what? You can’t. 

And the Russians know it. What are you going to do? Bring in all sorts of long range missiles? Well, we’ll blow them up where they are. These go 300 or 400 kilometers? Then I guess that is how far we have to push in. None of this s**t is going to be a threat to Russia. Period. 

Americans? The neocons who run things? They don’t understand that. Partly because they come out of this tradition. Edward VIII, King of England! Was pro Nazi. He had to abdicate partly because of that. Truman said Eh, if the Russians win, we’ll help the Germans, and if the Germans win we’ll help the Russians. Today. Today, in 2023, there is a woman sitting as an advisor to President Biden, who actually said you know what? Hitler might have been controversial, but no one really sings his praises for fighting communism to the death. 

What is this? Its okay to be soft on Hitler now?

Then what the hell was that all for? Ah, we know. We know what it was all for. And guess what? It had very little to do with communism. I’m sorry. I don’t buy that. I know that that is the narrative.

But it’s about Russia—it’s not about Lenin, Stalin, or even Marx. It’s about Mackinder! It’s about The Heartland. About preventing anyone from uniting that central part of—fast-forward now–Russia and China. And that is the threat! And the irony is that these people are so arrogant, and so full of themselves that they can’t see that they have made that even more inevitable than time itself. Russia and China are now joined at the hip because they know their existence depends on it. 

These wars are not proxies. These are fingers of a LONG armed puppet. They are dangerous. And they are threats everywhere.

So just like you do at a dinner party with friends you don’t really like or trust. You nod and smile. Find the exit. And jump and run to it—quick as you can—when it feels like you’re in danger. And—unknowingly, apparently–that is what the west is facing. They can’t help it. It is the demise of their control for the last five hundred years. It will yield incredible shortages and difficulties for the hundreds of millions of us who live under the western regime. But the party is over. 

*

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Daniel Patrick Welch is a writer of political commentary and analysis. He lives and writes in Salem, Massachusetts with his wife. Together they run The Greenhouse School. He has traveled widely, speaks five languages and studied Russian History and Literature at Harvard University. Welch has also appeared as a guest on several TV and radio channels to speak on topics of foreign affairs and political analysis.

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Mercantilismo, crisis financiera y guerra

May 16th, 2023 by Mónica Peralta Ramos

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*** 

It would seem that American politicians and media think that the entire world should rightly conform to the marching orders emanating from Washington, even though that pretense has become a bit shopworn after more than twenty years of pointless wars initiated and sustained by a serious of clueless presidents and Congress. Increasingly, the international community is looking for a way out of the tight embrace offered by the White House, a growing sense that a multipolar world would be much better than “rule of law” dictated by any self-proclaimed superpower.

Recently there have been indications that rather than Washington being the center of the universe that title should rightly belong to Jerusalem as an extremist-led Israel has demonstrated its power over the self-anointed idiots who fancy themselves to be the “leaders” of the United States of America.

Why do I think that? I truly believe that there have been several interactions lately involving US politicians and the Israelis that illustrate just how ignorant and self-absorbed America’s governing class actually is. The most egregious example of the “wag the dog” syndrome whereby Israel says “jump” and the fawning American government representatives beg to ask “How high?” comes from none other the newly appointed Speaker of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy, who spoke before the Israeli Knesset on May 1st. McCarthy made it a point to flatter his Israeli hosts by emphasizing that traveling to Israel was his first foreign trip as speaker, underlining the value of the relationship, and observing that he was also only the second speaker invited to make the trip to the Jewish state to address the Knesset.

McCarthy was accompanied by the usual cast of congressional toadies who flock to Israel during every recess. The group was bipartisan and included the loathsome Steny Hoyer of Maryland who has made and even led the groveling entourage more than twenty times. The ambition-driven McCarthy, who has never been accused of having a great deal of brain power, delivered a predictable speech that produced the pro forma standing ovations from the audience, but I would call attention to one part of it in particular where he said the following: “This is the foundation of our special relationship: We are the only two countries in history that were conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that we are all equal. Our values are your values. Our heritage is your heritage. Our dreams are your dreams. America is grateful for our friendship with Israel. We are a better nation because of it. And we must never shy away from defending it… As long as I am speaker, America will continue to support fully funding for security assistance in Israel.”

Nearly every line in this part of the McCarthy speech is basically either an out-and-out lie or a twisting of reality to such an extent that it is incomprehensible. Palestine, by the way, was not mentioned by McCarthy, but how Israel can claim to be “conceived in liberty” with the “proposition that we are all equal” when it has been engaged in genocide and expulsion as well as government endorsed violence directed against its Christian and Muslim subject population? And if American and Israeli values are identical, can we expect in the US different laws based on religion. And our common “heritage?” Israeli Jews claim to be “chosen,” don’t they? And finally, how on earth does McCarthy claim that the United States is a better nation because of its ties to Israel? It is ridiculous and insulting, but it leads to the punchline that McCarthy is making an unconstitutional pledge to defend Israel, no matter what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his band of criminals do, presumably to include attacking Iran. McCarthy should be impeached. Or even better he should magically become a Palestinian and spend a couple of months under the Israeli occupation. He might change his tune.

McCarthy continued his exaltation of Israel campaign after his return to Washington. On May 9th, he blocked an effort by Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib to host a gathering at the Capitol Visitor Center that would have included least nine groups for an event entitled “Nakba 75 and the Palestinian People.” “Nakba” in the title of Tlaib’s canceled event is the Arabic word for “catastrophe,” which would have meant the speakers would be describing the founding of the state of Israel as a “catastrophe” for the Arab inhabitants of historic Palestine, which it was with hundreds of thousands left homeless, many winding up in refugee camps. McCarthy announced in a message that he was shutting down the event, tweeting that “This event in the US Capitol is canceled. Instead, I will host a bipartisan discussion to honor the 75th anniversary of the US-Israel relationship.” McCarthy announcement was in response to a letter from Anti-Defamation League (ADL) CEO Jonathan Greenblatt to him which said ADL had concerns that some of the organizers of the “Nakba” event “have a record of rhetoric that demonizes and delegitimizes Israel, as well as dangerous stereotypes about Israel’s supporters.” Apparently free speech relating to a historic event is not even allowed to congressmen in today’s Zionist-occupied America.

If more evidence of the slime that is at the heart of the American political class is needed, I would cite another event which took place in Jerusalem on April 27th as both shameful and a disgrace. And “no” I am not referring to the Israeli police and army shooting dead more Palestinian teenagers on and around that date before stealing their family homes and destroying their livelihoods. I am referring to Florida’s governor and presidential aspirant Ron DeSantis’s groveling performance in bowing to Jewish power and money during his own trip to Israel. His abhorrent crawling before his masters culminated in his signing a new state law that will inter alia exploit the “hate” mechanism to criminalize nearly all criticism or even skepticism regarding Israeli apartheid, of the co-called holocaust narrative, or of the behavior of Jewish groups and individuals.

At the signing, DeSantis boasted how “We are doing what we can do in Florida to enhance the ability to hold people accountable when that really crosses the line into threatening conduct. We are fighting back.” He also made clear that the legislation was as much about Israel as about Judaism, arguing that rejecting “Israel’s right to exist is antisemitism” and adding that the non-violent Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is “DOA” in his state. He also bizarrely described “Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons” as an “existential threat to the state of Israel and to the United States of America.”

Perhaps DeSantis should have checked with the CIA and even Mossad before commenting on Iran as both have confirmed that the Iranians do not currently have a nuclear weapons program. Unsurprisingly DeSantis claims that “Florida is the most Israel-friendly state in the country and as long as I’m Governor, we will continue to stand with the Jewish community.” In that he is no doubt correct. Twenty-six other states have penalized anyone seeking to either boycott Israel or promote doing so, sometimes to include denial of government jobs or benefits, but there is no doubt that Florida is currently number one in its deference to the Jewish state and its claimed interests.

The bill (HB 269/SB 994), which passed unanimously in both chambers of the Florida legislature, attempts to criminalize what it perceives as anti-Semitism. Even though its language avoids identifying Jews as the protected class, the clear intent of the document is to do just that. It accomplishes that by transforming what would have once been seen as trivial incidents into hate crimes, which are felonies. It includes “to litter a yard with a flier, harass people, disrupt schools or religious services, deface graves and certain buildings, or project images on someone else’s property” as possible actions rendered felonious based on racial or ethnic prejudice, making them hate crimes. It might mean, for example, that if someone laughs at another person’s clothes and if the attire is considered “ethnic or religious” that person can be arrested and charged with a third-degree felony as a hate crime. Or if a student in a college history class disputes the standard largely fabricated narrative relating to the founding of Israel, a Jewish student can feign distress and demand that the offender be arrested.

One of the bill’s co-sponsor’s State Representative Randy Fine, who was present at the signing in Jerusalem, explained how “There is no First Amendment right to conduct. If you graffiti a building, it is a crime now, but if your motivation is hate, it will be a third-degree felony and you will spend five years in prison. If you want to litter, it’s a crime right now, but if you litter and your motivation is a hate crime, it will be a third-degree felony and you will spend 5 years in jail.” After the bill passed the Senate, Fine tweeted that the bill was “the strongest antisemitism bill in the United States” adding “To Florida’s Nazi thugs, I have news: attack Jews on their property and you’re going to prison. Never again means never again.” Another co-sponsor Mike Caruso warned “If we do nothing, we are going to have 1933’s Nazi Germany all over again.”

DeSantis, who is seeking Jewish money and media support for his run at the presidency, turned in something of a repeat performance of his inaugural trip to Israel back in 2019. At that time, he boasted, like Kevin McCarthy, that his first foreign trip was to good friend and perpetual ally Israel. He took his entire gubernatorial cabinet with him to celebrate his election and theatrically signed an earlier bill (HB 741) in Jerusalem that sought to “criminalize ordinary political speech” by making religion as a “protected class” similar to “racism” to be included in “hate crime” legislation. The new designation specifically included attempts to “demonize Israel.”

The Florida bill also included the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-Semitism, similar to that which is favored by the office of the US Department of State’s Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, maintaining that “anti-Semitism” is “a certain perception of Jewish people, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jewish people, rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-Semitism directed toward a person, his or her property, or toward Jewish community institutions or religious facilities.” Under the bill, the BDS movement was defined as a terrorist “hate” group no different than the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) or the Islamic State in Syria (ISIS), which at that time prompted some civil libertarians to question if criticism of the behavior of the Jewish state could be deliberately mischaracterized as being an “anti-Semitic hate crime” that should or might be construed as criticism of the Jewish people and their religion.

HB 741 amended Florida’s “hate crime” statute to include such “antisemitic” acts as:

  • “Calling for, aiding, or justifying violence against Jews.
  • “Alleging myths about a world Jewish conspiracy or that Jews control the media, economy, government, or other institutions.
  • “Accusing Jewish people as a whole of being responsible for real or imaginary wrongdoing by a single Jewish person, group, or the state of Israel, or for acts of non-Jews.
  • “Accusing the Jewish people of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.
  • “Accusing Jewish citizens of countries other than Israel of being more loyal to Israel than their own nations.
  • “Demonizing, applying a double standard to, or delegitimizing Israel.”

DeSantis has long nurtured political ambitions and, recognizing the power and wealth of those who are passionate about Israel, he harbors a particular “sensitivity” to Jewish and Israel issues as a means to help him move onwards and upwards. When he was a congressman, survivors from the Israeli attack on the USS Liberty that killed 34 American seamen who lived in his district in Florida report that they sought to meet with him to discuss the possibility of opening a new inquiry into the incident. Even though DeSantis is a former Navy officer, he refused to meet with them.

The power of international Jewry has been most observable in the largely successful attempts to silence criticism of Israel by making such activity describable as motivated by anti-Semitism. Former Israeli government minister Shulamit Aloni has even described the practice of labeling all critics as anti-Semites as “It’s a trick. We always use it…the suffering of the Jewish people” is routinely used to “justify everything we do to the Palestinians.” A number of European countries have also criminalized what is described as “holocaust denial” and in Germany and France have imprisoned those who violate the laws, even when that denial only consists of questioning some of the facts that are employed in the standard accepted narrative of the event. The most recent country to climb onto the “hate speech” express is Ireland, where new legislation is being considered by the country’s parliament. Interestingly, the debate over what one is allowed to say without criminally offending someone else has largely focused on transexuals and gender identity, but it has also been observed that the law would impact on supporters of the Palestinian cause who would perforce criticize Israel, the Jewish state. That might easily be construed as anti-Semitism and lead to heavy fines or even prison time. Interestingly, the bill even criminalizes the mere possession of material considered to be “hateful.”

In any event, the domestic war dedicated to stamping out what is referred to as anti-Semitism continues and grows in the United States, even when it is trivial, largely imaginary, or even fabricated by hate groups like the ADL headed by the hideous Jonathan Greenblatt. And if free speech and honest inquiry have to be sacrificed along the way, so be it. On May 10th the Biden Administration used its United Nations Security Council veto to block a report on Israel’s war crimes in targeting civilians while bombing Gaza, which has killed 25 Palestinians, mostly women and children. Unsurprisingly, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan responded to the development by declaring their unwavering support for “Israel’s right to defend itself.”

Clearly, for the vast majority of politicians in Washington and even at the states level, allegiance and subservience to Israel and its interests are more important than protecting constitutional rights or managing a sane and responsible foreign policy. One wonders whether Ron DeSantis, if elected president in 2024, just might hold his inauguration in Jerusalem, just as he did when he became governor. It would actually be something of a relief – at last the ultimate acknowledgement of who is really in charge back here in America.

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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is [email protected].

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Will Lawsuits Bring an End to COVID Vaccines?

May 16th, 2023 by Dr. Joseph Mercola

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Drug companies have a legal responsibility to provide profits for their shareholders. They do not have a legal responsibility to give patients the best and safest treatment. But the biggest scandal is that those with the responsibility to uphold scientific integrity — academic institutions, doctors, medical journals — also collude with industry for financial gain.

Five hundred Australians have joined a class action lawsuit against the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), arguing the agency did not fulfil its duty to properly regulate the vaccines, which resulted in considerable harm to Australians.

Australians who have experienced a serious adverse event following COVID-19 vaccination are invited to register for this class action.

A similar class action is taking place in the U.K., where attorneys representing approximately 75 people injured by AstraZeneca’s shot, and family members of those killed by it, are suing the drug company.

***

There’s now overwhelming evidence showing that the COVID shots were a disaster from the start, and that regulatory agencies knew it but went ahead anyway. Now, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky is trying to rewrite history by giving provably false testimony before Congress

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In the video above, Joe Rogan interviews cardiologist Dr. Aseem Malhotra about Big Pharma’s control over research. What many don’t realize is that researchers who do peer-review of drug company-sponsored trials do not get access to the raw data. All they get is the drug company’s analysis of that data, which leaves the door wide open for manipulation and obfuscation.

As noted by Malhotra, “It’s not scientific, it’s not ethical … and it’s not democratic.” Most doctors, unless they’re involved in the peer review process, are not even aware of this, which is why they rarely ever question published science. Yet data analyses by Stanford professor Dr. John Ionnidis show that “the greater the financial interest in a given field, the less likely the research findings are to be true,” Malhotra says.

No One Protects Patients Anymore

So, is the drug industry all about satisfying shareholders and increasing profits by any means, with no real regard for public health? Rogan wonders. Basically yes. As noted by Malhotra, drug companies have a legal responsibility to provide profits for their shareholders. They do not have a legal responsibility to give patients the best and safest treatment.

But the biggest scandal here, Malhotra says, is that “those with the responsibility to uphold scientific integrity — academic institutions, doctors, medical journals — collude with industry for financial gain.” I would add that our regulatory agencies are also “on the take.” They’ve all been captured by industry, which leaves patients with no one to protect them from Big Pharma’s malfeasance.

Malhotra goes on to discuss Dr. Robert Hare, a forensic psychologist who developed the original DSM criteria for psychopathy, and how Hare noted that the way drug companies conduct business, as legal entities, fulfill the definition of psychopath: “callous unconcern for the feelings of others, incapacity to experience guilt, deceitfulness and conning others for profit.”

Between 2003 and 2016, drug companies paid fines totaling $33 billion. Many of these cases involved the illegal marketing of drugs, scientific fraud, hiding data on harms and the suppression of negative results. These fines never curtailed the behavior, however, because the fines were a drop in the bucket compared to the profits they made on these drugs. The fines were just considered the cost of doing business.

What Is the Net Effect of Pharmaceutical Drugs?

While the drug industry has created crucial life-saving drugs, the big question we need to ask is “What is the net effect of them?” Malhotra says. He points out that, in the U.S., of the 667 drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration between 2000 and 2008, 75% were copies of old ones.

Off-patent drugs were repatented after minor tweaks to the formulations, thereby boosting profits from already existing drugs. Of those, only 11% were found to have a clinical benefit over the previous drug.

Similarly, in France, of the nearly 1,000 drugs approved between 2000 and 2011, most were copies and, importantly, 15% of the reformulations were found to be MORE harmful than the predecessor, whereas only 8% had clinical benefit over the previous drugs. So, what does this tell us?

It tells us that “the overall net effect of the drug industry on society in the last few decades [has been] a negative one,” Malhotra says. Of course, when it comes to dangerous drugs, nothing can match the COVID jabs, rolled out in December 2020. Add them into the equation, and the drug industry becomes the No. 1 cause of death and disability worldwide, hands down.

For the past three years, I and many others have been shouting warnings from the rooftops to little avail — our voices drowned out in a sea of corrupt “fact” checkers. Now, however, the ramifications of this mass experiment are becoming so glaringly obvious, legal experts are starting to take note, and to file lawsuits.

As reported by Spectator Australia at the end of April 2023, 500 Australians have joined a class action lawsuit filed by Brisbane lawyer Natalie Strijland:1

“All have suffered serious or life-threatening events or are the relatives of those who have died following COVID vaccination. Many have have been left with significant disabilities. As the news filters out about the class action, the first of its kind in Australia, more people are joining each day.

Dr. Melissa McCann, who instigated the action, is crowdfunding to assist with legal and travel costs. Any compensation awarded will be shared entirely by the injured and the bereaved.

The applicants will argue that the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) did not fulfil its duty to properly regulate the vaccines which resulted in considerable harm to Australians.

The respondents are the Australian government, the Department of Health and Aged Care Secretary Dr Brendan Murphy, who announced in early April that he will retire in July, and the former head of the TGA Adjunct Professor John Skerritt who just retired from the public service in mid-April.”

Strijland told news.com.au:2

“[The class] action arises upon the basis that the government did not truly establish that the vaccines were indeed safe or effective for use by the Australian public, and the claim now proceeds upon the basis that the government in fact acted negligently in approving the vaccines and also by failing to withdraw them after approval based upon the known evidence.

Australians who have experienced a serious adverse event following COVID-19 vaccination are invited to step forward and register for this class action.”

AstraZeneca Sued in UK

A similar class action is taking place in the U.K., where attorneys representing people injured by AstraZeneca’s shot, and family members of those killed by it, are suing the drug company.

Among the plaintiffs in this suit is the husband of BBC North radio broadcaster Lisa Shaw,3 who died from vaccine-induced immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia one week after her AstraZeneca jab. She was 44. The wife of psychologist Stephen Wright, a National Health Service (NHS) employee who died 10 days after his first dose in January 2021, is also suing.4 Wright was 32. As reported by The BMJ, March 28, 2023:5

“Lawyers have sent the company pre-action protocol letters, the first step in a legal claim on behalf of around 75 claimants. Some have lost relatives and some have survived with catastrophic injuries following blood clots …

[In] 2021 the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency confirmed a possible link between the vaccine, known as Vaxzevria, and a rare condition involving blood clots along with abnormally low platelet levels. Those taking legal action have been diagnosed with vaccine induced thrombotic thrombocytopenia.

The claimants are pursuing a two pronged strategy: taking legal action under the Consumer Protection Act 1987 as well as claiming payment under the government run Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme. The scheme … is limited to £120 000 per claim and applicants must prove severe disablement … Those taking action under the Consumer Protection Act must show that the vaccine was not as safe as the public were entitled to expect.

Peter Todd, a consultant solicitor with Scott-Moncrieff & Associates, one of two lawyers handling claims, told The BMJ that the complications included stroke, heart failure, and leg amputations. He said the technology involved in the AstraZeneca vaccine was ‘risky.’

Even though the legal claim is against AstraZeneca, the UK taxpayer will have to pay any compensation awarded, under a legal indemnity that the government gave the company early in the pandemic …

Damages for individuals in the court action could be in the millions. [Sarah] Moore [attorney with Hausfeld law firm] added, ‘We’ve been trying to get the government to reform their statutory scheme. We didn’t want to litigate but the government has forced us into a corner. The only way these families can get compensation is to fight the battle they didn’t want to fight.’”

CDC Director Tries to Rewrite History

There’s now overwhelming evidence showing that the COVID shots were a disaster from the start, and that regulatory agencies knew it but went ahead anyway.

Apparently, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky believes the best way to deal with the agency’s clear culpability in widespread death and disability is to rewrite history and double down on provable falsehoods. As reported by investigative journalist Maryanne Demasi, April 20, 2023:6,7

“This week, CDC director Rochelle Walensky provided witness testimony to the House Committee on Appropriations … But serious questions have been raised about the veracity of Walensky’s testimony.

Congressman Andrew Clyde (R-Ga) asked Walensky if her March 2021 public statement on MSNBC,8 in which she unequivocally said that ‘vaccinated people do not carry the virus, they do not get sick’ was accurate. ‘At the time it was [accurate]’ Walensky replied confidently.

She then proceeded to explain, ‘We’ve had an evolution of the science and an evolution of the virus’ and that ‘all the data at the time suggested that vaccinated people, even if they got sick, could not transmit the virus.’ However, there was no such evidence at the time …

Walensky should have known that when mRNA vaccines were first authorised in 2020, the FDA listed critical ‘gaps’ in the knowledge base.9 One of them was the vaccine’s unknown effectiveness against viral transmission.

Also, in Pfizer’s10 and Moderna’s11 original pivotal trials, there were 8 and 11 people respectively, who developed symptomatic COVID-19 in the vaccine group, proving the vaccines never had absolute effectiveness, like Walensky had claimed.”

What’s more, as detailed in “‘Speed of Science’ — A Scandal Beyond Your Wildest Nightmare,” in early October 2022, during a COVID hearing in the European Parliament, Pfizer’s president of international developed markets, Janine Small, admitted that Pfizer never tested whether their jab would prevent transmission because they had to “move at the speed of science to understand what is happening in the market … and we had to do everything at risk.”

As the head of the CDC, how could Walensky be unaware that the COVID shot had NEVER been tested for transmission? And how could she, at any point, claim that it would stop transmission when that was never tested? Clearly, Walensky is trying to invent science that never existed.

Walensky Falsely Claims Mask Review Was Retracted

Even more egregiously, Walensky falsely claimed12 that part of the 2023 Cochrane review13 and meta-analysis of the available evidence on face masks for prevention of respiratory infections had been retracted. According to this review, the use of face masks in the community “probably makes little to no difference” in preventing viral transmission.

“I think it’s notable, that the editor-in-chief of Cochrane actually said that the summary of that review was … [stumble] … he retracted the summary of that review and said that it was inaccurate,” Walensky told Congress.

However, neither the summary nor the review was ever retracted. Nor has any of the language in the summary been altered. So, what the heck is Walensky even talking about? Demasi suspects Walensky may have repeated a falsehood previously published by The New York Times.14,15 This wouldn’t surprise me, seeing how this isn’t the first time Walensky has relied on mainstream propaganda rather than scientific data when making public statements. As reported by Demasi:

“In response to Walensky’s comments, Tom Jefferson, lead author of the Cochrane study said, ‘Walensky is plain wrong. There has been no retraction of anything. It’s worth reiterating that we are the copyright holders of the review, so we decide what goes in or out of the review and we will not change our review on the basis of what the media wants or what Walensky says’ …

[Professor of health policy at Stanford University School of Medicine Jay] Bhattacharya was also stunned by Walensky’s comments. ‘It’s irresponsible for her to claim that the Cochrane review [summary] was retracted when it was not. It damages her credibility and harms the scientific process, which requires public officials to be honest about scientific results,’ he said.”

CDC Artificially Inflated COVID Deaths

In other news relating to CDC malfeasance, the agency also inflated the number of COVID deaths, as Dr. Scott Jensen told Dr. Jordan Peterson in an April 2023 interview. As explained by Jensen, March 24, 2020, the CDC changed how death certificates were recorded for COVID-19.

“COVID-19 should be reported on the death certificate for all decedents where the disease caused or is assumed to have caused or contributed to death,” the notice said.16 It’s important to note that this change was exclusively for COVID. In all other instances, contributing conditions are listed in the Contributing Causes box.

Why would the CDC do this? Jensen suspected the CDC wanted people to be afraid of COVID and needed statistics to support their claims that COVID-19 was a lethal infection. But these data are completely misleading. If someone is dying from cancer and tests positive for COVID, cancer should be listed as the cause of death and COVID-19 should be listed as a contributing factor, not THE cause of death, because they died with COVID (assuming it wasn’t a false positive), not from it.

DHHS Incentivized Misdiagnosing COVID-19

But it didn’t end there. Two days later, March 26, 2020, the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) also issued massive financial incentive — $100 billion, to be exact — to diagnose patients with COVID-19.17

Fortunately for doctors and hospitals, it was really easy to cash in on this because the CDC, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the World Health Organization also set such high cycle thresholds for the PCR test that about 90% of the tests came out as false positives. I reviewed this in “Bombshell Admission — The COVID Tests Don’t Work.”

According to a Harvard Medical School study, analyses of the blood oxygen levels of nearly 50,000 hospital patients across the U.S. suggest 48% of all hospitalized “COVID patients” in 2021 were admitted for reasons unrelated to COVID.18

That means the number of “hospitalized COVID cases” was exaggerated by some 96%. In short, we had a “casedemic,” and an artificially created one at that. As suggested by Peterson, bureaucracy was weaponized to facilitate tyranny. And that’s where we’re still at, today.

COVID Patients Killed for Profit

On top of all that, the U.S. government also financially incentivized hospitals to exclusively use the most dangerous COVID treatments possible,19 while banning doctors from using ANY of the many safe and effective remedies that have been shown to work, including off-patent drugs and nutraceuticals. U.S., hospitals lost their federal funding if they failed or refused to administer remdesivir and/or ventilation.

Hospitals even had a financial incentive to log COVID deaths, which meant a COVID patient who left the hospital in a body bag was worth the most money. These “sticks and carrots” also drove up the COVID death toll. I detailed this scandal in “How COVID Patients Died for Profit.”

How to Save Your Life and Those You Love When Hospitalized

The good news is we now have a new process, a new strategy, with which you can help save yourself and your loved ones from being victimized by greedy hospitals. In response to overwhelming need, Laura Bartlett and Greta Crawford, with the aid of a hospital administrator insider, came up with a template for a document that puts you, the patient, back in the driver’s seat. It’s the most powerful way I’ve seen so far to do that.

Filing a written medical consent form can literally help save your life, because no doctor can override your written decision (consent) declining certain medications or treatments. Verbal communication is not enough. It must be in writing, notarized and delivered in a manner that formally serves the hospital and puts their physicians on notice.

When you enter a hospital, you must sign a general consent authorization form. This is basically a contract between you and the hospital. Since you have bodily autonomy, they need your consent before they can do anything to you.

Typically, the general consent form authorizes hospital staff to test, treat and care for you in whatever way they see fit — and when a patient signs the general consent authorization, physicians feel justified that they can implement a hospital protocol without further explaining the risks, benefits or alternatives of that protocol to the patient.

Now, if you’re well enough to read the entire document, and see something in there that you don’t agree with, you can strike the sentence or paragraph and initial it, to indicate that you do not consent to that specific detail. However, that still doesn’t offer you much protection.

What you need is a much more specific document where you detail the types of treatments you consent to and the ones you don’t. You need to carve out a niche from the general consent form that specifies exactly what you do (and do not) consent to. And you need to be clear. Fortunately, the Caregivers and Consent document that Bartlett and Crawford created carves out that niche to communicate clearly to all physicians what your exact consent wishes are. So, there’s no confusion.

The template is available for download on OurPatientRights.com. You can find more information on ProtocolKills.com.

This Caregivers and Consent document can be altered in any way you wish. For example, I would recommend to add: “I do not consent to receiving ANY processed food, such as high-fructose corn syrup or seed oils. The only acceptable oil for me is butter, ghee, beef tallow or coconut oil.

Acceptable forms of protein would be eggs, lamb, bison, beef or non-farmed seafood; but they must not be prepared with seed oils. If the hospital is unable to provide this food for me, my family or friends will bring it for me.”

Important: Follow Proper Procedure!

How you deliver this document to the hospital is of crucial importance. Here’s a summary of all the necessary steps:

1. Complete your customized and personalized Caregivers and Consent document BEFORE you ever need to go to the hospital.

2. Get the form notarized. Make sure you sign the document in front of the notary.

3. Send the completed, signed, notarized document to the CEO of the hospital in two ways: (1) via a professional courier (one that specializes in delivering legal documents); and (2) via the Postal system with certified mail, return receipt requested.

The CEO is responsible for all legal business relating to the hospital, including the medical records, so the CEO, not your attending physician, is the one whose responsibility it is to get your consent forms entered into your electronic medical record.

4. Make at least 10 copies of the signed, notarized form and keep one copy on your person or in your wallet or purse, and another in the glove compartment of your car, in case you ever have an accident. Also provide copies to family or friends. If you happen to be hospitalized before you’ve had the chance to send the documents, have one of them follow the delivery procedure outlined.

5. Once you’re hospitalized, you or one of your contacts will give one copy to your attending physician and another to your nurse and inform them that this document is already in your electronic medical record, or that the hospital will be served the documents shortly. Distribute additional copies to other care providers as needed.

6. Also, upon hospitalization, request to see your electronic medical record to make sure your Caregivers and Consent form has been entered. It is your right to see your electronic medical record, and it’s available through an online portal, so don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

Also routinely check your medical record (or have your patient advocate do it for you) to make sure your wishes are being followed and that you’re not being given something you’ve denied consent for.

7. Add the additional statement that I included in my interview on the diet changes in the hospital.

Final Thoughts

Having this document in your medical record virtually guarantees that they cannot harm you by doing something you don’t agree with — such as giving you a COVID shot or any other vaccine without your knowledge or consent. Of course, some psychopath might ignore your directives, but they’ll have to pay a hefty price, as they’re guaranteed to lose a malpractice suit and be stripped of their medical license.

Keep in mind that while you can request and consent to certain treatments, such as ivermectin, for example, this document CANNOT force your doctor or hospital to use that treatment. They can still refuse to administer something you’ve consented to.

They cannot, however, administer something that you’ve declined consent for. The ace up your sleeve at that point is that you can still sign out AMA (against medical advice), get out alive, and seek desired treatment elsewhere. Getting out alive is the key goal.

Please share this information with everyone you know. Bring it to your church, synagogue and local community groups. Everyone needs to know they can secure their patient right to informed consent and how to do it so that their wishes cannot be ignored. This is the most effective way to empower yourself when it comes to your medical care. So please, help spread the word.

To circle back to where we started, class action lawsuits over the COVID shots are now getting started, so, hopefully, it’s only a matter of time before that house of cards comes crashing down. That doesn’t mean we’re out of harms way though.

The medical system has clearly become so corrupted that no one is safe. We can only speculate as to what they might come up with for the next pandemic. So, get prepared, and get your current consent wishes into your electronic medical record. If millions of us do it, it might even change the entire system for the better.

*

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Notes

1, 3 Spectator Australia April 29, 2023

2 News.com.au April 27, 2023

4 BBC April 19, 2023

5 The BMJ March 28, 2023

6, 12 Maryanne Demasi Substack April 20, 2023

7 Twitter Maryanne Demasi April 20, 2023

8 MSNBC Transcript March 29, 2021

9 FDA EUA No. 27034

10 NEJM 2020; 383: 2603-2615

11 NEJM 2021; 384: 403-416

13 Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews January 30, 2023

14 New York Times March 10, 2023

15 Maryanne Demasi Substack March 15, 2023

16, 17 Twitter KanekoaTheGreat May 1, 2023 NVSS March 24, 2020 Document

18 The Atlantic September 13, 2021

19 Fox News April 9, 2020

Featured image is from Children’s Health Defense


The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity

by Michel Chossudovsky

Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.

“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”

ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0,  Year: 2022,  PDF Ebook,  Pages: 164, 15 Chapters

Price: $11.50 Get yours for FREE! Click here to download.

We encourage you to support the eBook project by making a donation through Global Research’s DonorBox “Worldwide Corona Crisis” Campaign Page

The US Supreme Court Corruption Bonanza

May 16th, 2023 by Dr. Binoy Kampmark

All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name.

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*** 

When ProPublica’s investigation into links between Republican donor Harlan Crow and the US Supreme Court surfaced, there was a sense that dark waters lurked beneath the revelations.  While Justice Clarence Thomas featured prominently as the recipient of largesse and pomp from Crow – island hopping in Indonesia, private jet travel, among other treats – things were bound to get worse.

At the time of the unveiling of such ignominious conduct, Thomas did not heed the wise injunction of Lord Acton to avoid too much explaining lest the excuses become too many.  His hand caught in the till, Thomas dismissed such generosity as mere hospitality, a point reiterated in a statement from Crow.  Besides, he had been advised by his fellow brethren – troublingly so – that he could accept such gifts of hospitality without fear of conflict and compromise.  The clincher here: that Crow did not have any business before the court.

The Thomas-Crow relationship has had a decent pickling, stretching back a good number of years.  In 2011, Crow lavished $500,000 upon Thomas’ wife to form a Tea Party Group.  Thomas also received a $19,000 Bible said to belong to Frederick Douglass.  In rather smelly fashion – odorous, that is, in the links between think-tank land, wealth and policy – Thomas received a $15,000 gift from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), with Crow serving on the board at the time.  More recently, it has also been revealed that Crow’s generosity extended to funding the private school education of Thomas’s grandnephew to the sum of $6,000 a month.

The pong becomes a full raging stench with the realisation that the AEI filed three briefs with the Supreme Court soon after giving Thomas the gift, with all rulings being decided in their favour.  While influence should not be confused with association, the appearance of conflict would be fatal to even the most disciplined of judicial minds.

The link with Crow becomes even more taut with revelations from ThinkProgress in 2011 about the legal successes of the Crow-affiliated group, Center for the Community Interest, at least when facing the less than critical eye of Justice Thomas.  Not once did Thomas waiver in his judgments favouring the CCI.

Not to be outdone, Neil Gorsuch, along with two individuals, sold land to the chief executive of Greenberg Traurig, a firm often engaged in business before the Supreme Court.  The timing of the purchase is also of interest, given that the property in question had been on the market for almost two years till Gorsuch was confirmed to the Supreme Court.

In a less tawdry way, Justice Samuel Alito has also been found wanting for shooting off his mouth before dinner guests regarding the outcome of the 2014 case Burwell v Hobby Lobby months before its official publication.  Good judgment can be rare – even on Olympus.

Efforts to impose an ethical code upon the justices akin to the lower courts have floundered over the years, much of this due to the saboteurs of the Supreme Court.  At best, reliance has been placed upon the less than satisfactory statute requirement that justices, including those on the Supreme Court bench, recuse themselves in any case “in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned”.

Chief Justice John Roberts was even threatening in his 2011 report, implying that any Congressional effort to constrain the bench by the imposition of such a code would violate the Constitution.  In a rather novel interpretation, the fact that the lower courts were bound by the Code of Conduct “reflects a fundamental difference between the Supreme Court and the other federal courts.”

Lower court judges, were they to refuse recusing themselves from individual cases, could have their decisions reviewed, all the way to the Supreme Court.  But on the high summit of Olympus, the country’s top judicial officers were intended to be wise and immune, “a consequence of the Constitution’s command that there be only ‘one supreme Court’.”  To also leave the assessment of recusal to fellow judges might “affect the outcome of a case by selecting who among its Members may participate.”  Such reasoning is so idiosyncratic as to be suspicious.

A gaggle of Democrats are wondering how to bring the Supreme Court to heel on the issue, being particularly agitated at the Chief Justice’s refusal to take up an invitation to testify about ethics reform for the court.  “Testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee by the Chief Justice of the United States,” he snootily declared in a letter to the chairman, “is exceedingly rare, as one might expect in light of separation of powers concerns and the importance of preserving judicial independence.”

The idea of funding is being mooted as a potential point of pressure.  According to Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I), the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, Congress can draw upon court decisions making the point “that, in interbranch disputes, it is completely appropriate and proper for the legislative branch to use the power of the purse to influence the other branches in doing what they ought to be doing.”

Such suggestions risk having an opposite effect, stirring the justices into a sense of martyrdom while sailing close to the winds of violating the separation of powers.  But those occupying the bench, in their breathtakingly irresponsible links with private interest groups, have done their fair share in soiling the stables of US justice.  For that, the withering gaze of fairness should be directed not merely upon the likes of Crow, but such bodies as the Federalist Society, the sort that ensures that the Supreme Court, once bought, stays bought.

*

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He currently lectures at RMIT University. He is a regular contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research. Email: [email protected]

Featured image: Harlan Crow and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas with Randolph-Macon Academy (George W. Bush Presidential Center, Getty, Google Maps)

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*** 

Three Rhode Island teachers who were fired for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine have been offered their jobs back with full back pay after reaching a settlement with the school district.

Teachers Stephanie Hines, Brittany DiOrio, and Kerri Thurber were terminated from their positions in Barrington Public Schools after they had requested a religious exemption after the school mandated employees get the vaccine.

Last week, their attorney, Greg Piccirilli, and the school district said they had reached a settlement, allowing the teachers to return to their jobs. They are also each entitled to $33,333 in damages along with their back pay. DiOrio will get $150,000, Thurber will get $128,000, and Hines will receive $65,000 under the agreement.

“The three teachers have the opportunity to return to teaching positions within the Barrington School District should they choose to do so, at the steps they would have been at had they worked continuously,” the Barrington Public Schools district said in a statement on May 11.

In a statement to the Boston Globe, Piccirilli said that his clients are “extremely gratified that they’ve been vindicated in their position,” adding that he will get $50,000 in attorneys fees as part of the settlement. “A lot of people were dismissive and skeptical of their claims at the time,” he told the Boston Globe. “They went through a lot of personal trauma dealing with this. Their faith has gotten them through this.”

Meanwhile, Barrington Public Schools told the Providence Journal that it reached the settlement because the litigation would likely put a drag on the school’s resources and funding. It attempted to distance itself from its own vaccine mandate by claiming that it was dealing with the spread of COVID-19, although there is a growing body of evidence that shows the vaccines do not prevent the spread of the virus.

“Our district was navigating an unprecedented health pandemic and leaned on the important recommendations by the CDC and the Rhode Island Department of Health to ensure the safety of our students and school community,” the Barrington School Committee said Thursday, according to the outlet. “Our then-policy helped combat the pressing public health crisis of the time, while keeping schools open, and [was] one that nearly all faculty and staff adhered to.”

It added that “we determined this ongoing, expensive litigation” would likely continue for a lengthy period of time, and a resolution should be reached because the “administration’s time, and our district’s financial resources, should be spent on the daily work and mission of Barrington Public Schools … our School Committee looks forward to continuing to support this important work.”

Details

The three were first placed on unpaid leave in late 2021 before they were fired in January 2022, according to statements made by the district and the teachers. During a hearing in Barrington in October 2021, DiOrio said that she “did nothing wrong.”

“I have done nothing wrong. This is destroying my future ability to earn a living,” she said of the mandate. “What makes me more of a threat now? Is this how a highly-rated school department treats its people?”

At the time,  Sara Rapport, a lawyer representing the School Committee, said that the teachers were violating the school policy for not complying, adding that committees have the plenary authority over school interests. She said that the teachers’ decision not to get vaccinated pose a greater risk to students.

“Teachers have a right not to be vaccinated,” she said in late 2021. “But every decision has consequences. Religious beliefs do not override the health and safety of the community.”

It’s not clear if Thurber, Hines, or DiOrio will return to their previous teaching positions. During an interview with Legal Insurrection, Piccirilli said that the settlement should be seen as a victory for others who were fired because they refused to take COVID-19 vaccines.

“They’ve shown amazing resilience to stick by their faith. A lot of other people with similar situations have gone through this. And hopefully [this resolution] will serve as an example of how others should be vindicated the same way, for sticking up for what they believe in,” he said.

Last year, a Rhode Island Superior Court judge issued a ruling in favor of the three teachers who were fired, saying the district violated the state’s Open Meetings Act laws over their mandating the vaccine. The Barrington School Committee said after the ruling that officials disagree with the judge’s opinion.

“This case is not about whether mandating vaccinations is appropriate. Regardless of the significant political stance which the public may take for or against that issue, the issue here is whether the Barrington School Committee provided sufficient notice before enacting the Emergency Policy on COVID-19 Related Issues in August and September 2021. This Court finds that violations occurred,” Judge Jeffrey Lanphear wrote at the time.

Piccirilli, meanwhile, has said that the school committee did not possess the legal authority to implement a vaccine mandate and asserted it didn’t follow proper procedures in carrying it out. For example, he said that the district didn’t advertise it correctly.

“It’s shocking to me that the rule of law seems to have gone out the window in a lot of these situations,” Piccirilli said in 2021, reported the Globe. “There’s supposed to be a process.”

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Featured image is from Shutterstock


The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity

by Michel Chossudovsky

Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.

“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”

ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0,  Year: 2022,  PDF Ebook,  Pages: 164, 15 Chapters

Price: $11.50 Get yours for FREE! Click here to download.

We encourage you to support the eBook project by making a donation through Global Research’s DonorBox “Worldwide Corona Crisis” Campaign Page

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  • Comments Off on Fired Teachers Who Refused COVID Vaccine to Get Full Reinstatement and Back Pay

Is Your Money Spying on You?

May 16th, 2023 by Kevin Stocklin

All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name.

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*** 

Slowly but steadily, our money is taking on a new role; in addition to its traditional function as a medium of exchange and store of value, money is increasingly becoming a means of surveillance and control.

Financial privacy has become one of the biggest casualties in the world’s relentless march to a digital payments system. Not only do corporations like your bank, credit card issuer, PayPal, and Amazon know your buying habits intimately, this data is routinely passed on to government to be mined in a warrantless search for criminal activity.

Behind this phenomenon is what some call the “war on cash,” with the goal of a cashless society. This transition includes partnerships of banking and tech companies, and the rise of the “fintech” industry.

A report by McKinsey, a management consultancy, states that 89 percent of Americans are now using some form of digital payments and more than two-thirds of Americans use or expect to use digital wallets in the next two years. The service providers for these digital wallets include banks, PayPal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay.

An August 2022 Gallup poll found that 60 percent of Americans now say they make “only a few” or no purchases with cash today, nearly double the 32 percent who said so five years ago. And the phasing out of cash also brings the decline of the most private medium of exchange available today.

“You have, on the one hand, a desire to be more efficient on the consumers’ part, on the part of businesses, and on the part of banks,” E.J. Antoni, an economist at the Heritage Foundation, told The Epoch Times. “On the other hand, you do have people who want a cashless society because it eases the transition to a central bank digital currency, and the problem is that both of these groups want the exact same thing.”

Banks, credit card issuers, payment companies, and tech companies profit from the fee income that comes with digital payments. And for banks, there is the cost savings from not having to handle physical cash or interact with customers in person, as well as the fact that digital transactions ultimately require having accounts with a bank or other fintech company. In short, it is a system outside of which few can survive today.

Consumers have embraced this transition because of the convenience, and are either unaware of, or unconcerned about, the loss of personal privacy it brings. Law enforcement also supports the transition because digital transactions leave fingerprints that can be tracked and data-mined.

Advancing Financial Surveillance

Under the digital financial system, the means of surveillance and control are extensive. A series of laws, starting with the 1970 Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), and including the 2001 PATRIOT Act, and most recently the 2021 Infrastructure Act, banks, broker dealers, casinos, mortgage companies, mutual funds, money service companies and other financial institutions must report to the federal Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) all transactions over $10,000 (pdf) and any other transactions they consider “suspicious.”

One thing these laws have in common is that, while widening the net of information the government is allowed to collect on private citizens, they also stipulate that neither the financial institutions nor government officials should inform customers that their accounts are being searched.

“Instead of protecting the privacy of their depositors, financial institutions are forced to protect the secrecy of government investigations,” Nicholas Anthony states in a Cato Institute report, “whether those investigations have a legitimate criminal predicate or not.”

In 2019 alone, FinCen reported that more than 20 million suspicious activity reports (SARs) were filed by more than 97,000 U.S. financial institutions, “providing a wealth of potentially useful information to agencies whose mission is to detect and prevent money laundering, other financial crimes, and terrorism.”

While the $10,000 threshold set in 1970 under the BSA would be more than $72,000 today, taking inflation into account, this threshold was not indexed for inflation, meaning that an ever-widening number of Americans are now being tracked under a law that was originally intended to capture large-scale criminal transactions. In 2021, the Biden administration attempted to enact an even lower threshold for reporting transactions of $600, though this effort was ultimately put on hold.

In February 2022, the New York Post reported that Bank of America had data-mined its customer accounts after the Jan. 6 riots to determine who among their customers may have traveled to Washington D.C., made purchases or used ATMs there, or bought firearms around that time. The account information of more than 200 customers, collected without a warrant, was reportedly handed over to the FBI.

Expanding the surveillance network beyond banks, credit card companies Visa, MasterCard, and American Express agreed in September 2022 to begin tracking firearms purchases, with the goal of handing over the law enforcement any purchases they deemed “suspicious.” Following a public outcry, the card companies have put this effort on hold at present.

All of these actions create enormous pools of data for government officials to collect and sort through, despite the fact that this sort of warrantless surveillance violates the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment, which prohibits government searches without “probable cause” that citizens being searched have committed a crime.

Despite Constitutional protections, the Supreme Court has rejected challenges to the BSA, ruling that the government can conduct warrantless searches under what is called the “third party” doctrine, or the notion that when a person shares their personal data with a third party such as a bank, the right to privacy no longer applies. There is reason to believe, however, that the Supreme Court as currently composed may take a different view.

In his Cato report, Anthony states that the use of bank accounts and digital payment services is so essential to everyday living today that it becomes exceedingly difficult for most Americans to transact, or even survive, outside the system. For this reason, both liberal and conservative Supreme Court justices appear willing to reconsider the “third party” doctrine, and roll back the ability of government officials to conduct warrantless searches, if a relevant case were to come before them.

“It may be necessary to reconsider the premise that an individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information disclosed to third parties,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in the 2012 case United States v. Jones. “This approach is ill suited to the digital age, in which people reveal a great deal of information about themselves to third parties in the course of carrying out mundane tasks.”

The Cashless Society Vanguard

As the world progresses toward a cashless society, one of the countries in the vanguard is Sweden.

Using fintech apps like Swish, BankID, and Klarna, the percentage of Swedes still paying in cash fell from 39 percent in 2010 to 9 percent in 2020. A microchip implanted in a person’s hand that can simply be waived over a sensor in stores to make payments has become popular, with thousands of Swedes opting to have it implanted. Sweden is also piloting a CBDC called the E-krona.

A British-Polish firm called Walletmor has also developed an implanted payment chip, which lights up under your skin when making a payment.

Walletmor founder and CEO Wojtek Paprota says the chip is “entirely safe, has regulatory approval, works immediately after being implanted, and will stay firmly in place. It also does not require a battery, or other power source.”

The cashless society is advancing in the United States as well. A Pew Research survey in October 2022 found that “in less than a decade, the share of Americans who go cashless in a typical week has increased by double digits.” Today, the survey found, 41 percent of Americans say none of their purchases in a typical week are paid for using cash, up from 24 percent in 2015.

But the decline in cash payments is uneven across demographic groups. For example, among Americans who earn more than $100,000 per year, only 5 percent make a significant number of purchases in cash. Among those earning less than $40,000 per year, about 20 percent use cash frequently or exclusively.

In addition, a cashless society is something Americans say they do not want. A survey by Civic Science found that 62 percent of Americans say they are against the idea of a cashless society. While the elderly are typically more attached to cash payments and younger generations are more likely to embrace fintech, the survey also found that “younger adults are also the most likely to use cash and the least likely to directly use debit or credit cards for purchases. Gen Z in particular is embracing alternatives to plastic, including writing checks.”

The Endgame: Central Bank Digital Currencies

One thing that few outside of government seem to want is a central bank digital currency (CBDC). For many governments including the Biden administration, however, introducing a CBDC, which is a programmable, traceable digital form of money issued directly by government agencies and held in digital “wallets,” is a top priority.

According to the Atlantic Council’s CBDC Tracker, as of March 1, 65 countries are in the advanced stage of developing a CBDC, more than 20 countries have launched pilots, and in total 119 countries are in some stage of developing CBDCs, representing more than 95 percent of the world’s GDP. The Biden administration has also thrown its weight behind the development of a U.S. CBDC, and the Fed has beta-tested versions of it, both for domestic payments and international settlements.

“The usual model of [CBDCs] is everybody can have a bank account on the books of the Federal Reserve System, and that certainly is a pathway to surveillance,” Lawrence White, economics professor at George Mason University, told The Epoch Times. “Your bank account is not as private as you might think now, but at least the federal authorities don’t have real time access to every check you wrote and don’t know where you spent it and where you received your money from; with a central bank, digital currency they could.

“That, of course, is the purpose of the system that’s being implemented in China,” White said. “It’s being implemented precisely in order to surveil people and to restrict their spending on things that are not approved. So that’s certainly not a model we want to emulate in the United States, and there is the danger, not that anybody at the Fed wants to be in the surveillance business, but that they will be pressured by other federal agencies that do want information about their customers, and the Fed is not in a position to resist them.”

“We don’t know who is using a $100 bill today, we don’t know who’s using a 1,000-peso bill today,” Agustin Carstens, general manager of the Bank of International Settlements, stated in October 2020. “The key difference with a CBDC is the central bank will have absolute control of the rules and regulations that will determine the use of that central bank liability, and also we will have the technology to enforce that.”

“One of the things you can do with a central bank digital currency is, instead of trying to manipulate people through the tax code, you can directly affect their purchases by simply saying only X percent of your income can be spent on anything fossil fuel related, whether that’s a gasoline powered car, a fossil fuel powered appliance, whatever the case may be,” Antoni said. “Maybe a certain percentage of your electricity comes from fossil fuels, in which case you’re only allowed to use a certain number of kilowatt hours per month.”

Republicans in Congress and several conservative U.S. states have taken steps to block the Biden administration from establishing a CBDC. In March, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) introduced a bill to ban the federal government from adopting a CBDC. Also in March, Florida and Texas took action to ban the introduction of a CBDC in America.

“I think that resistance in the U.S. is important because I don’t think in other countries there will be enough resistance to it,” Dror Goldberg, economics professor at Open University of Israel, told The Epoch Times. “I think in the U.S., you might be able to put up a good fight and prevent it. In other countries, I don’t see that happening.”

Freezing Dissidents’ Accounts

One of the most striking incidents of financial control, even without a CBDC, occurred in Canada in February 2022, when the Canadian government ordered banks to freeze the accounts and credit cards of truckers who were protesting pandemic restrictions.

“We are today serving notice if your truck is being used in these illegal blockades, your corporate accounts will be frozen,” Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland stated. “The insurance on your vehicle will be suspended,” she said, adding that personal accounts would also be included in the order.

Canadian officials threatened donors who had given to apps like GoFundMe and GiveSendGo in support of the truckers with similar punishment. Many Americans believed that this could not occur in the United States, but some analysts are less confident.

Given the “demonstrable willingness of Congress to expand the weaponization of the financial infrastructure,” Anthony states, “it’s reasonable to think the United States will do the same if presented with a similar emergency situation.”

“It’s something that [George] Orwell probably could not have even dreamed of because the technology just wasn’t available,” Antoni said. “But as technology continues to progress, we are seeing a continued march, unfortunately, towards serfdom, to borrow a phrase from [F.A.] Hayek.”

If the U.S. government needed to enforce a given policy, it wouldn’t necessarily have to arrest people for non-compliance, Antoni said. “What they would do instead is simply make it so that when you go to buy groceries, your credit card is declined.”

“Your money is absolutely turning into a means of control and not just a medium of exchange.”

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The Trudeau government is pressing Mexico to maintain its loosely regulated, pro-capitalist mining policies.

Recently the Mexican government initiated more socially and ecologically sound mining legislation. The reform shortens mining concessions, tightens rules for water permits and requires companies to provide at least 10 per cent of profits to the communities where they operate. In “Mexico’s ‘shock’ new mining law hurts juniors most,” Mining.com complains that “companies now have to deal with an increased burden of pre-consultation, impact studies and water concessions, among other things. The new law also requires financial commitments (bonding) that would be difficult to meet for junior explorers.” While Canada’s many “junior” exploration firms will be adversely affected, the reforms will benefit local communities and the environment. But that hasn’t stopped Ottawa from pressing the Mexican government to shift gears.

Two weeks ago, Trade Minister Mary Ng publicly criticized the mining reforms. In a statement released after speaking with Mexican Economy Minister Raquel Buenrostro, Ng “expressed her concern with Mexico’s proposed mining reforms, which could affect Canadian investment in Mexico’s mining sector, as well as potential impacts on North American competitiveness and supply chain resiliency. The minister reiterated the importance of conducting broad and transparent consultations with all stakeholders regarding the proposed reforms, including with Canadians companies, which represent the largest group of foreign investors in Mexico’s mining sector. Minister Ng reiterated the important contributions of Canadian mining companies to the Mexican economy.”

A week later Ng raised the matter with US Trade Representative Katherine Tai. Afterwards they released a statement suggesting that “recent changes in Mexico’s mining law” violated the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. The next day Canada’s ambassador to Mexico and the representatives of multiple Canadian mining companies met Minister Buenrostro.

Seventy per cent of foreign-owned mining companies operating in Mexico are Canadian-based. Two years ago the front page of national daily La Jornada blared: “Poseen mineras canadienses 60% del oro mexicano” (Canadian mining companies own 60% of Mexican gold). Canadian firms have had many disputes with local communities over the impact of their operations on local water systems and ecosystems. Similarly, Canadian companies have been implicated in many rights violations including high-profile killings.

The Canadian Embassy in Mexico City has openly backed some of the most controversial firms. For its part, the Trudeau government went to bat for half a dozen mining companies embroiled in a dispute over US$360 million in tax rebates with the Mexican government. “In a string of meetings, Canadian officials have pressed Mexico to fix the problem”, noted a June 2017 Reuters story. During a trade mission to Mexico that year natural resources minister Jim Carr “raised the matter with Mexico’s Secretary of the Economy.”

Canadian mining companies have benefited from neoliberal economic policies in Mexico. There were no Canadian mines operating in Mexico in 1994. By 2010 there were about 375 Canadian-run projects. Before the reforms that came with the North American Free Trade Agreement, Mexico’s constitution dictated that land, subsoil and its riches were the property of the state and recognized the collective right of communities to land through the ejido system. Constitutional changes in 1992 allowed for sale of lands to third parties, including multinational corporations. Combined with a new Law on Foreign Investment, the Mining Law of 1992 allowed for 100 percent foreign control in the exploration and production of mines. Canadian mining companies have been the biggest winners from these reforms.

As President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) has reversed decades of neoliberal reforms Canadian companies are faced with a less profitable prospects. Unsurprisingly, they are pushing back and the Trudeau government is assisting them despite the social and ecological benefits gained by the mining reforms. It’s the Ugly Canadian in action.

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It’s late April 1948, in Haifa, northern Palestine.

After more than 25 years, British officers are leaving their “mandate” over the territory and have set a withdrawal date: 15 May.

The exit is not going smoothly. Ethnic cleansing and violent atrocities are taking place across areas Britain is about to vacate. 

Zionist armed groups, allowed to flourish in Palestine by the British over three decades and subsequently trained and armed by the colonial power, are sweeping across Palestinian towns and villages, forcibly displacing residents from house to house.

Palestinians put up some resistance, helped by nominal forces from neighbouring countries, but are vastly outnumbered and under-equipped. Britain states that it is remaining neutral.

Cyril Marriott, consul-general in Haifa, is one of the last British officials to leave the embattled city.

He wonders, in a 21 April diplomatic cable sent to London and seen by Middle East Eye, whether Britain’s reputation will be damaged by “abandoning the pretence of keeping law and order before the expiry of the Mandate”.

“Any loss of prestige we may suffer is insignificant compared with the strong feeling that will be aroused in the United Kingdom if heavy British casualties are caused by our armed intervention between Jews and Arabs,” he writes. 

Months before Marriott’s cable, in November, the United Nations passed a resolution to split Mandatory Palestine into Jewish and Arab states – a policy Palestinian Arabs rejected. 

Britain, which by then was coming under violent attack from the Zionist groups it had once propped up, declared it would leave by midnight on 14 May.

Haifa 1948

Jewish fighters in Haifa, 1948 (Wikimedia)

But 15 May 1948 would not just be remembered as the day that Britain left Palestine.

It was also the day that the State of Israel was declared, and the date generations of Palestinians continue to mark as the Nakba – or Catastrophe – 75 years later.

At least 13,000 Palestinians were killed and hundreds of villages were destroyed. In the end, 750,000 people were forcibly displaced from their homes.

More than 6,000 Israeli Jews, including 4,000 soldiers and 2,000 civilians, were killed

Previously classified diplomatic cables, seen by Middle East Eye at the National Archives in London, show that Britain was well aware of mass killings and displacement, in Haifa and beyond, during the final days of its Mandate.

But London would play down the scale of the events, refuse to intervene or allow others to do so, and would eventually label Palestinians and their allies as masters of their own downfall. 

Regional leaders warn of massacre

By the final days of April, leaders in Egypt and Syria were raising the alarm about the spiralling situation across their borders. 

Azzam Pasha, an Egyptian diplomat and the Arab League’s first secretary-general, told British envoy Ronald Campbell in Cairo that Palestinians were being massacred in Haifa, Tiberias and Deir Yassin.

“This massacre was, [Pasha] was convinced, part of a Jewish military plan designed to terrorise the Arab population inside the Jewish state so that by May 15th they would be relieved of having to deal with any fifth column,” Campbell recounted to London on 22 April. 

Pasha told journalists that same day, as transcribed in a British foreign office memo: “They have committed at Haifa acts as reprehensible as at Tiberias [and Deir Yassin] attacking women, children and old people. So far the British forces have displayed their inability to protect defenceless persons.”

On 9 April, in what became known as the Deir Yassin massacre, Zionist groups went house to house, killing over 100 Palestinians in the small village near Jerusalem, despite having agreed to an earlier truce. 

Nine days later, Tiberias fell to Zionist militias too, where 6,000 Palestinians were forcibly expelled.

Then on 21 April, Jewish paramilitary organisations ethnically cleansed Haifa, ejecting tens of thousands of Palestinians.

Phillip Broadmead, British envoy in Damascus, wrote to the foreign office on 23 April following a meeting with Syrian President Shukri al-Quwatli, who was disturbed by events in Haifa. 

Quwatli complained to Broadmead that a local British commander in Haifa had refused “to take measures to stop the killing of Arab women and children”, unless Palestinians delivered all their arms to Zionist groups, as per a truce proposal rejected by the Arabs.

nakba military campaigns graphic

Damascus lamented that Britain had promised to maintain law and order by 15 May, but “the events at Deir Yassin and Haifa made it clear this was no longer the case”. 

In Cairo, Pasha told Campbell that there was “a fully mobilised Jewish force in the country whose activities were out of control”, but no counter-balancing Palestinian force.

According to British figures at the time, there were around 15,000 troops from Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan, in addition to 5,000 volunteers from the Arab Liberation Army. They were comfortably outnumbered by over 70,000 Jewish troops.

Cairo pleaded with Britain to turn a “blind eye” and allow volunteer Arab forces to enter Palestine before the Mandate expired to provide that “counter balance” to the mass killings and ethnic cleansing. London refused. 

Pasha told Campbell that if the British continued this stance until 15 May, “the result would be that Jewish forces would by that date have occupied all the strategic positions they required and the Arabs would find themselves at a great disadvantage”. 

He was right. Arab armies did enter Palestine to push back Israeli military advances after the expiry of the Mandate, but by then most of the key areas of what is now modern-day Israel had been depopulated and taken over by Zionist groups.

‘Reports have been exaggerated’

Despite the warnings, British officials significantly downplayed the scale of what was happening, including in Haifa. 

On 23 April, facing pressure from Arab governments, the foreign office wrote to its envoys in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iraq.

“You should inform [the] Government to which you are accredited accordingly, and point out that previous reports have clearly been exaggerated,” it said. “In particular press stories of evacuation of 23,000 Arabs [in Haifa] are a considerable exaggeration.”

Five days later, junior foreign minister Christopher Mayhew would take to the floor in parliament and state: “Early reports of widespread massacre in the town [of Haifa] are untrue and were merely rumours caused by panic.”

Eventually, a few days later, British officials admitted in classified memos that the vast majority of Palestinian inhabitants had indeed left Haifa. The officials were nevertheless keen to promote the idea that those residents would return immediately.

“There are 6,000 Arabs in Haifa and many more are returning. Others wishing to return may be assured that under present conditions their security is guaranteed and that there is every reason to think that after 15th May they will be safe there,” said Alan Cunningham, then British High Commissioner in Palestine. 

“We are giving publicity to the fact that many are returning in the hope that this will spread confidence.”

They did not return. The Palestinian population of Haifa was reduced from 70,000 to around 6,000 in a matter of days.

There are at least 250,000 registered refugees from Haifa living around the world, according to figures from 2008. 

British officials parrotted the claim, which proved wholly untrue, that Jewish leaders would not allow for the mass evacuation of Palestinians due to the adverse impact it would have on the local economy. 

“If the Jews press their terms too harshly the Arabs would be likely to evacuate Haifa, a course not welcome to the Jews as the life of the town would be interrupted,” a 23 April memo sent from Palestine to London stated.

“It is probable therefore that the Jews will temper their terms to prevent total evacuation.” 

Britain appeared to be presenting a narrative contrary to the reality on the ground. 

It asked its various envoys in the Middle East to remind Arab governments that British troops had engaged Jewish mortars, referring to military action taken against Zionist fighters in Jaffa. 

British troops briefly halted Operation Hametz, an ultimately successful attempt to blockade Palestinian towns around Jaffa. 

It was the first direct battle between British forces and Irgun, the militant right-wing Zionist organisation that had bombed the British administrative headquarters at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem two years earlier. 

Following that confrontation, British officials claimed several times that “the morale of the Jews had considerably deteriorated, as Arab morale had risen”. 

Palestinian existence will ‘become precarious’

Any such high morale was short-lived. Zionist advances on Jaffa were only halted temporarily.

Britain knew, and admitted in private, that Palestinians stood no chance of remaining in the port city that would become part of Israel’s Tel Aviv.

In a top-secret telegram memo from late April, the commanders-in-chief of the Middle East Land Forces (MELF) predicted what would happen once its forces left the city.

“The Jewish community is firmly and securely established and once our own security forces withdraw there will be little question of the Arabs seriously threatening Jewish life or property,” they told the defence ministry back in London.

“Indeed, the existence of Arabs will become precarious.” 

That assessment was correct. Jaffa was completely obliterated, with around 96 percent of Arab villages there destroyed by May 1948. Its entire population of over 50,000 Palestinian inhabitants were expelled, according to Ilan Pappe‘s The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

There are now over 230,000 refugees from Jaffa living across the globe.

In total, those expelled from Palestine in 1948 and their descendants number 5.8 million refugees, mostly living in neighbouring countries.

They have never been allowed to return, making it the longest unresolved refugee crisis in modern history.

British commanders in Palestine knew that Jewish groups would take control, not just of Jaffa, but in towns and cities across Palestine. 

“Between now and the surrender of the Mandate[,] clashes are likely to intensify in numbers, scope and duration. In these clashes the Jews are likely to hold their own,” the Land Forces central command said.

“Ultimate success is likely to be with the Jews with their far greater material resources and intense unity of purpose.”

That superiority did not occur in a vacuum: during the Arab Revolt of the late 1930s, British forces weakened Palestinian society, including gutting its paramilitary forces. 

Palestinian historian Rashid Khalidi argues in The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948, that Palestine was not lost in the 1940s, but the decade prior, by the British crushing of its civil and military institutions. 

Britain blames Arab ‘ineptitude’

In the final days of the Mandate, in several different memos across a number of days, Britain’s ambassador claimed that Palestinians and their allies only had themselves to blame. 

“Arab military forces in Palestine are now suffering the inevitable consequences of incompetent leadership and lack of discipline and morale,” said Cunningham. 

“In their hearts the Arabs realise that their much vaunted Liberation Army is poorly equipped and badly led; they feel that their monetary subscriptions have been squandered and they themselves misled. 

“They must pin blame on someone and who more deserving than the British!” he added sarcastically. 

British military leaders also took aim at other Arab governments in the region, blaming them for provoking Zionist miltias.

“Foreign Arab irregular forces, having stirred up a hornets’ nest have now been prudently withdrawn, leaving unfortunate Palestine Arabs to be stung,” said Cunningham.

“The Jews for their part can hardly be blamed if in the face of past Arab irregular action and of continued threats of interference by Arab regular forces, they take time by the forelock and consolidate their position while they can.” 

The military central command agreed with Cunningham’s appraisal of Arab forces, hitting out at their “cowardly behaviour” and “refusal to follow our advice to restrain themselves”.

On 15 May, Marriott, the consular-general in Haifa, was one of the few Brits to remain in the territory, after 100,000 officers had left in the days and weeks prior.

He gives a mistakenly optimistic final assessment. 

“Jews control the town but their armed forces are little in evidence. They obviously want the Arab labour force to return and are doing their best to instil confidence,” Marriott said. 

“Life in town is almost normal even last night[,] except of course for the absence of Arabs. I see no reason why Palestine Arab residents of Haifa and neighbourhood should not return.”

Seventy-five years later, those residents of Haifa and their descendants are still waiting for that return.

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Featured image: ETHNIC CLEANSING: Palestinian refugees in 1948 Photo: Public Domain

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On May 16, 2023, The New York Times published a full-page advertisement signed by 15 U.S. national security experts about the war in Ukraine. It was headed “The U.S. Should Be a Force for Peace in the World,” and was drafted by the Eisenhower Media Network.

While condemning Russia’s invasion, the statement provides a more objective account of the crisis in Ukraine than the U.S. government or The New York Times has previously presented to the public, including the disastrous U.S. role in NATO expansion, the warnings ignored by successive U.S. administrations and the escalating tensions that ultimately led to war.

The statement calls the war an “unmitigated disaster,” and urges President Biden and Congress “to end the war speedily through diplomacy, especially given the dangers of military escalation that could spiral out of control.”

This call for diplomacy by wise, experienced former insiders—U.S. diplomats, military officers and civilian officials—would have been a welcome intervention on any one of the past 442 days of this war. Yet their appeal now comes at an especially critical moment in the war.

On May 10th, President Zelenskyy announced that he is delaying Ukraine’s long-awaited “spring offensive” to avoid “unacceptable” losses to Ukrainian forces. Western policy has repeatedly put Zelenskyy in near-impossible positions, caught between the need to show signs of progress on the battlefield to justify further Western support and arms deliveries and, on the other hand, the shocking human cost of continued war represented by the fresh graveyards where tens of thousands of Ukrainians now lie buried.

It is not clear how a delay in the planned Ukrainian counter-attack would prevent it leading to unacceptable Ukrainian losses when it finally occurs, unless the delay in fact leads to scaling back and calling off many of the operations that have been planned. Zelenskyy appears to be reaching a limit in terms of how many more of his people he is willing to sacrifice to satisfy Western demands for signs of military progress to hold together the Western alliance and maintain the flow of weapons and money to Ukraine.

Zelenskyy’s predicament is certainly the fault of Russia’s invasion, but also of his April 2022 deal with the devil in the shape of then-U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Johnson promised Zelenskyy that the U.K. and the “collective West” were “in it for the long run” and would back him to recover all of Ukraine’s former territory, just as long as Ukraine stopped negotiating with Russia.

Johnson was never in a position to fulfill that promise and, since he was forced to resign as prime minister, he has endorsed a Russian withdrawal only from the territory it invaded since February 2022, not a return to pre-2014 borders. Yet that compromise was exactly what he talked Zelenskyy out of agreeing to in April 2022, when most of the war’s dead were still alive and the framework of a peace agreement was on the table at diplomatic talks in Turkey.

Zelenskyy has tried desperately to hold his Western backers to Johnson’s overblown promise. But short of direct U.S. and NATO military intervention, it seems that no quantity of Western weapons can decisively break the stalemate in what has degenerated into a brutal war of attrition, fought mainly by artillery and trench and urban warfare.

An American general bragged that the West has supplied Ukraine with 600 different weapons systems, but this itself creates problems. For example, the different 105 mm guns sent by the U.K., France, Germany and the U.S. all use different shells. And each time heavy losses force Ukraine to re-form survivors into new units, many of them have to be retrained on weapons and equipment they’ve never used before.

Despite U.S. deliveries of at least six types of anti-aircraft missiles—Stinger, NASAMS, Hawk, Rim-7, Avenger and at least one Patriot missile battery—a leaked Pentagon document revealed that Ukraine’s Russian-built S-300 and Buk anti-aircraft systems still make up almost 90 percent of its main air defenses. NATO countries have searched their weapons stockpiles for all the missiles they can provide for those systems, but Ukraine has nearly exhausted those supplies, leaving its forces newly vulnerable to Russian air strikes just as it prepares to launch its new counter-attack.

Since at least June 2022, President Biden and other U.S. officials have acknowledged that the war must end in a diplomatic settlement, and have insisted that they are arming Ukraine to put it “in the strongest possible position at the negotiating table.” Until now, they have claimed that each new weapons system they have sent and each Ukrainian counter-offensive have contributed to that goal and left Ukraine in a stronger position.

But the leaked Pentagon documents and recent statements by U.S. and Ukrainian officials make it clear that Ukraine’s planned spring offensive, already delayed into summer, would lack the previous element of surprise and encounter stronger Russian defenses than the offensives that recovered some of its lost territory last fall.

One leaked Pentagon document warned that “enduring Ukrainian deficiencies in training and munitions supplies probably will strain progress and exacerbate casualties during the offensive,” concluding that it would probably make smaller territorial gains than the fall offensives did.

How can a new offensive with mixed results and higher casualties put Ukraine in a stronger position at a currently non-existent negotiating table? If the offensive reveals that even huge quantities of Western military aid have failed to give Ukraine military superiority or reduce its casualties to a sustainable level, it could very well leave Ukraine in a weaker negotiating position, instead of a stronger one.

Meanwhile, offers to mediate peace talks have been pouring in from countries all over the world, from the Vatican to China to Brazil. It has been six months since the U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, suggested publicly, after Ukraine’s military gains last fall, that the moment had come to negotiate from a position of strength. “When there’s an opportunity to negotiate, when peace can be achieved, seize it,” he said.

It would be doubly or triply tragic if, on top of the diplomatic failures that led to the war in the first place and the U.S. and U.K. undermining peace negotiations in April 2022, the chance for diplomacy that General Milley wanted to seize is lost in the forlorn hope of attaining an even stronger negotiating position that is not really achievable.

If the United States persists in backing the plan for a Ukrainian offensive, instead of encouraging Zelenskyy to seize the moment for diplomacy, it will share considerable responsibility for the failure to seize the chance for peace, and for the appalling and ever-rising human costs of this war.

The experts who signed The New York Times statement recalled that, in 1997, 50 senior U.S. foreign policy experts warned President Clinton that expanding NATO was a “policy error of historic proportions” and that, unfortunately, Clinton chose to ignore the warning. President Biden, who is now pursuing his own policy error of historic proportions by prolonging this war, would do well to take the advice of today’s policy experts by helping to forge a diplomatic settlement and making the United States a force for peace in the world.

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Medea Benjamin is the cofounder of CODEPINK for Peace, and the author of several books, including Inside Iran: The Real History and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran

Nicolas J. S. Davies is an independent journalist, a researcher with CODEPINK and the author of Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq.

Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies are the authors of War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, published by OR Books in November 2022. They are regular contributors to Global Research.

Featured image: President Zelenskyy meets Pope Francis at the Vatican on May 13, 2023. Photo credit: EFE