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The History of Nazism in Ukraine. Who Is Stepan Bandera?

By Timothy Alexander Guzman, March 27, 2022

It’s a tragedy in the making. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is reprehensible and should never have happened, but it is a fact that Russian President Vladimir Putin for several years had been warning Washington and its allies of an impending danger, that NATO expansion to its borders could lead to military confrontation.

Tens of Thousands Threatened with Property Tax Foreclosures in Detroit

By Abayomi Azikiwe, March 28, 2022

March 31 has been designated as the deadline for Wayne County residents to pay back property taxes from 2019 and before despite the failure of the relevant authorities to provide adequate assistance to working and impoverished households.

Uncovering the Corona Narrative

By Dr. Robert Malone and Ernst Wolff, March 28, 2022

Many who have followed this coronavirus “public health crisis” and the non-sensical response provided by most of the western nations (including the USA) have been perplexed by two big questions – how was this done (in such a globally coordinated fashion), and why was it done?

Will Humans be the Next ‘Freedom Fries’?

By Ray McGovern, March 28, 2022

Here’s the thing: the Russians have good reason to be on hair-trigger alert. Their early-warning radar system is so inadequate that there are situations (including those involving innocent rocket launches) under which Russian President Putin would have only a few minutes – if that – to decide whether or not to launch nuclear missiles to destroy the rest of the world – on the suspicion that Russia was under nuclear attack.

Reporting From Southern Ukrainian City of Henichesk along the Sea of Azov: “Russians Welcomed as Liberators”

By Sonja van den Ende, March 27, 2022

The Russian army, patrolling the city, went with us—the embedded journalists—for protection. But actually the protection was not really needed; the people in Henichesk, at least the majority with whom I spoke, were very happy that the Russian army was there.

Nightmare Scenario: Operational Miscalculation Triggering Nuclear War

By Nauman Sadiq, March 27, 2022

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark A. Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have tried to set up phone calls with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Gen. Valery Gerasimov but the Russians “have so far declined to engage,” said Pentagon spokesman John Kirby in a statement Wednesday, March 23.

95% of Committee Members Advising on U.S. Dietary Guidelines Had Ties to Big Pharma, Big Food

By Michael Nevradakis, March 27, 2022

Describing their findings as “particularly worrisome,” the authors of a study published Monday in Public Health Nutrition noted that in the U.S., the Dietary Guidelines for Americans form “the foundation for all national nutrition programs,” which amount to nearly $100 billion annually.

Aroused by Power: Why Madeleine Albright Was Not Right

By Dr. Binoy Kampmark, March 27, 2022

The late US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright will always be tied with the appallingly named humanitarian war in Kosovo in 1999, one that saw NATO attacks on Serbian civilian targets while aiding the forces of the Kosovo Liberation Army.  It was a distinct backing of sides in a vicious, tribal conflict, where good might miraculously bubble up, winged by angels.  Those angels never came.

NATO Wants a Ground-War in Ukraine?

By Mike Whitney, March 26, 2022

Didn’t Putin say that pouring arms into Ukraine would increase the likelihood of war? Yes, he did, but the US and NATO continue sending more shipments anyway. Why? And why does Ukraine need more weapons?

White House Plans Major Escalation of NATO’s Proxy War with Russia

By Andre Damon, March 27, 2022

One month since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, US President Joe Biden will begin a tour of the continent this week in an effort to mobilize the NATO powers in a major escalation of the conflict against Russia.

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March 31 has been designated as the deadline for Wayne County residents to pay back property taxes from 2019 and before despite the failure of the relevant authorities to provide adequate assistance to working and impoverished households.

For the last two years, Wayne County Treasurer Eric Sabree has not foreclosed on properties due to the COVID-19 pandemic which has had a disproportionate impact on area residents, particularly African Americans who make up approximately 80 percent of the Detroit population.

This issue is not a new one in Detroit and Wayne County. Since 2005, there have been tens of thousands of homes and small businesses seized due in part to over assessments which grew out of the mortgage crisis during the first decade of the century. Values of homes were artificially inflated by financial institutions in order to sell more first-time and refinancing loans which proved beneficial only to the banks and insurance companies.

Detroit and the state of Michigan were at the epicenter of the economic crisis leading up to and during the so-called “Great Recession” from 2007 to 2010. The impact of the mortgage home foreclosures was to create even more neighborhood abandonment and blight. Successive state and local officials refused to take effective measures through the implementation of long-term moratoriums along with legal actions against the banks which created the housing crisis.

Moreover, the working and poor people of the United States were saddled with bailing out the banks and insurance firms that engineered the economic downturn. Legislation passed by Congress during the final quarter of 2008 placed the burden of the recession on taxpayers within the proletariat. This bailing out of the banks coincided with similar efforts related to the automotive industry where both General Motors and Chrysler were subsidized by public funding in order save them from consolidation or liquidation.

These factors are largely responsible for the housing situation in Detroit and Wayne County where more than a quarter of the population (240,0000) were driven out of the region between 2000-2010. In Detroit, the population, according to the latest Census figures, has declined an additional 80,000 since 2010. At present, population estimates indicate that the state’s largest municipality has a population of 635,000.

Detroit demonstration outside Wayne County Treasurer’s Office downtown (Source: Abayomi Azikiwe)

Detroit’s population reached its maximum in 1950 with approximately 1.8 million. Therefore, over the last 72 years, 1.2 million people have been relocated from the city. This massive displacement was both voluntary and forced when government entities such as the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) and the National Interstate and Defense Highway Act facilitated the destruction of majority African American communities and the suburbanization of whites outside the city limits.

The deliberate downsizing and disinvestment in heavy and light industrial production from inside the city center to suburban, out-of-state and offshore locations fueled the migration from the municipality by workers seeking viable employment. The current property tax foreclosure crisis will only further depopulate and impoverish the city.

Corporate Restructuring and the Legacy of Residential Depopulation

Since the contrived and illegal bankruptcy which was imposed on Detroit during 2013-2014, the city has fallen into deeper poverty and community underdevelopment. The appropriation of city assets such as Belle Isle, public works, lighting, the Detroit Institute of Arts, and other institutions, has not reversed the economic trajectory of the municipality.

Tax incremental funding, popularly referred to as “tax captures”, are touted for their utility in fostering “development” largely centered in key areas of the city such as downtown, Midtown, New Center and industrial sites including the new Flex-N-Gate, Stellantis, and the now under construction Amazon facilities located on the eastside of Detroit. Yet these plants and the opening of three casino hotels since 1999, has not fostered sustainable development and a rise in household incomes.

These prestige projects where the owners are largely absolved from paying corporate and other taxes are profiting at the expense of the majority Black population. At present some plants have been forced to lay-off workers as a result of supply chain problems stemming from the continuing impact of the pandemic since 2020. Noise and other forms of environmental pollution caused by these plants are also forcing people from neighborhoods.

Moratorium NOW! Coalition Calls for Mobilization Against Tax Foreclosures

On March 30, the Moratorium NOW! Coalition and other housing activists are holding a press conference and rally outside the Wayne County Treasurer’s Office located at 400 Monroe in Greektown section of downtown. Sabree says he is being pressured to not extend the moratorium on home seizures despite the ongoing crisis related to the pandemic and the overall economic situation.

In a statement issued by Moratorium NOW! Coalition on March 23, it says that:

“There is no reasonable cause for the home seizures to resume when many households have not recovered from the economic and social impact of a public health crisis not witnessed in more than a century. We are calling on the Wayne County Treasurer to stop the foreclosures; protect renters from evictions where taxes are delinquent; and to work towards a long-term plan to put an end to the housing property tax disaster which has been in existence for more than a decade-and-a-half. A list of over 17,000 homes is being threatened with seizure. The problem is so severe that the Treasurer’s Office is not answering calls from the public seeking assistance. This is totally unacceptable. The only solution is to halt the foreclosures and work towards a sustainable solution.”

The ultimate solution to the housing crisis in Detroit lies within the necessity to change the rubric which guides property rights. Housing should be considered a human right and not a profit-making mechanism controlled by real estate firms and financial institutions. The existing model has only forced more people into homeless and poverty.

Housing Remains a National Crisis

Property tax foreclosures, rising rents, the current inflationary spiral plaguing the U.S. and the subsequent social instability, are all manifestations of the failure of the current administration of President Joe Biden and the Congress to pass legislation that would assist millions of households. None of the social spending initiatives proposed by progressive elements within the House of Representatives and the Senate have passed into law.

Therefore, the striking down of a public health moratorium enacted through the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) by the Supreme Court has never been reversed through legislative measures. This holds true as well for the programs to provide permanent child tax credits to working families along with investments in childcare and the lifting of the minimum wage to at least $15 per hour.

The Supreme Court since 2013 has eviscerated the enforcement provisions of 1965 Voting Rights Act while Congress even with a democratic majority in both the House and Senate have failed to take action to guarantee universal suffrage. A series of Civil Rights bills passed by Congress between 1957 and 1968 are effectively null and void. Due to the passage by states of restrictive voting laws, millions of African Americans and other people of color communities will be subjected to massive disenfranchisement across the U.S. in 2022 and 2024.

Yet these issues have been taken off the agenda by the Biden administration and the corporate media which are exclusively promoting sanctions and war against the Russian Federation. Biden travelled to the Western European North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries during late March to drum up support for further hostilities against Russia and the People’s Republic of China. Meanwhile, workers are paying more than $6 per gallon for gasoline in California along with astronomical inflationary increases for the prices for automobiles, auto services, food and housing expenses throughout the length and breath of the U.S.

Consequently, the struggle to win housing rights is an important aspect of the overall movement against austerity and imperialist war. Working people and the nationally oppressed must organize independently of the Democratic and Republican parties in order to wage the necessary campaigns aimed at improving living conditions and social stability.

*

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Abayomi Azikiwe is the editor of the Pan-African News Wire. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from Abayomi Azikiwe

Uncovering the Corona Narrative

March 28th, 2022 by Dr. Robert Malone

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***

Many who have followed this coronavirus “public health crisis” and the non-sensical response provided by most of the western nations (including the USA) have been perplexed by two big questions – how was this done (in such a globally coordinated fashion), and why was it done?

In my case, I have tried to follow the various threads of facts and logic, to confront the perplexingly dysfunctional public policies, and to make sense of what is so deeply illogical. What I have found has been layers of lies, one on top of another, which seem to require an amazingly coordinated and globally comprehensive control and shaping of information in the form of propaganda and censorship on a scale which was previously unimaginable. Total information control, and total unrestricted, all encompassing information warfare. Modern media manipulation of thought and minds without boundaries, and without any ethical constraints.

One constant thread which runs through all of the mismanagement, all of the authoritarian policies, all of the totalitarian logic and messaging, has been the role of the World Economic Forum (WEF) and its acolytes.

WEF is a key think tank and meeting place for global capitalism management, and arguably qualifies as the leading global Deep State organization. Under the leadership of Professor Klaus Schwab, it has played an increasingly important role in coordinating the globalized hegemony of transnational capital and large corporations over Western democracies during the last three decades.

Many of its members actively use Covid-19 as cover to carry out a “Great Reset” as described in Schwab’s writings.

This Great Reset involves implementation of digital tracking and control of people, ushering in techno-feudalism, and the WEF objective of a fourth industrial revolution incorporating technologies collectively referred to as “transhumanism.”

Western governments and WEF have identified genetic mRNA vaccines as a first step toward an inevitable transhuman society which they seek to guide us towards. The WEF has developed and implemented a training program which has yielded thousands of acolytes who have been placed into positions of power throughout the western world. A small representative sampling of these includes the following drawn from the ranks of the United States government and industry:

  • Politics and policy: White House coronavirus response coordinator Jeffrey Zients, lobby group #Masks4All co-founder Jeremy Howard, California Governor Gavin Newsom, 2020 presidential candidate and U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg, Chelsea Clinton, Hillary Clinton confidante Huma Abedin, former U.S. ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, former U.S. ambassador to the UN and USAID administrator Samantha Power, Eurasia Group founder Ian Bremmer, U.S.-British financier Bill Browder, Jonathan Soros (son of George Soros), Human Rights Watch director Kenneth Roth, economist Paul Krugman, former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, Black Lives Matter co-founder Alicia Garza, Ivanka Trump, and former U.S. Representative Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii).
  • Legacy media: CNN medical analyst Leana Wen, CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta, Twitter personality Eric Feigl-Ding, New York Times financial columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, ABC News commentator George Stephanopoulos, Fox CEO and News Corp co-chair Lachlan Murdoch, Bloomberg columnist Justin Fox, and CNN commentator Anderson Cooper.
  • Technology and social media: Microsoft founder Bill Gates, former Microsoft CEO Steven Ballmer, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales, PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, eBay co-founder Pierre Omidyar, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla, and Pfizer VP Vasudha Vats.

So how does this all tie together? How does reading and listening to the pronouncements of Klaus Schwab and his WEF organization help make sense out of the otherwise nonsensical? What is the underlying answer to the big “how” and “why” questions?

In August 2021, German author, journalist, International Monetary Fund and financial expert Ernst Wolff provided his explanation and hypotheses in a seminal lecture which many find useful as they try to make sense out of all that we have experienced and continue to find ourselves having to adapt to. The following is English language translation of the lecture, which was provided in German. Whether you agree or disagree, I suggest that his insights deserve consideration. I always recommend that you do your own thinking, and some may dismiss his thoughts as conspiracy theories, but this presentation certainly provides plenty to think about.

***

August 2021 presentation given by Ernst Wolff

The American president Franklin Delano Roosevelt, once said:

“Nothing happens accidentally in politics, and when something happens, you can bet on it that it was exactly planned that way.”

When one looks at what happened in the last year and a half, then these words are especially alarming.

Can it really be the case, that everything that we’ve experienced was planned?

I’ll say one thing right away. I can’t produce any evidence for such a plan, in the form of verified documents, but after studying this topic in detail for 18 months, I must say that there is an impressive number of signs and indications pointing in exactly this direction.

It is this and the consequences thereof that I want to talk about today. The current situation we find ourselves in is unique in the history of mankind. Never before has the whole world been thrown under the rule of this type of coercive regime as now in our time, and never have so many measures been taken which at first glance appear so unintelligible, partly so nonsensical, and in many cases so contradictory.

Officially, this is about the most serious health crisis in living memory, but the measures being used against this have not improved the situation but continuously made things worse. Every doctor today can confirm the health condition of people, the majority of people, is worse than before the crisis, and even from the point of view of those who ordered the measures we are faced with a shamble. The allegedly threatening 4th wave, and the announcement of the need for 3rd, 4th and 5th vaccinations, show that the purpose of the measures up to now, namely preventing the illness, has failed completely.

But that is not all by far.

As a consequence of the lockdowns up to now, we have a severe global economic crisis to manage.

Worldwide production hangs in complete disarray. Global logistics is on the floor, supply chains are broken, harvests are being lost, food supply bottlenecks, and on top of this a scarcity for a large part of the economy of essential semi-conductors. But also, in this we are seeing the problems are not being addressed and solved, but multiplied and magnified, via the application of further measures, and the constant threats of new restrictions.

The most recent example, in China, a port freight terminal, the 3rd largest in the world, has been closed down due to a single positive test from a worker there. Or, take New Zealand, where in all seriousness during the last week, 5 million people were put in lockdown for 3 days, because a single 58-year-old had a positive test.

A further crisis is affecting the small to medium business sector, which by a long way provides the most jobs worldwide and additionally, supplies the largest share of tax revenues. The Mittelstand (small to medium industry sector), is being driven from week-to-week further to the wall, through the incessant uncertainty and new regulations, and has never before been stuck in such a deep crisis as today.

But that is not all.

We are experiencing at present, a brutally increasing worldwide inflation, especially for raw materials, with produce prices and with food products. But also, here, nothing is being done to alleviate the situation. But rather the opposite. The flood of money printing continues, and will even be further increased. Countries and central banks, have, since the start of the crisis, thrown in almost USD 20 trillion into the worldwide monetary system. Without any end in sight! And the International Monetary Fund, as the most powerful financial organization in the world will give out next Monday, with USD 650 billion, the largest amount ever of its own currency under special withdrawing rights.

And the situation in society is no better.

Just one example.

In the USA, the strongest economy in the world, almost 4 million people are threatened with eviction because they cannot pay their rent or cannot cover their mortgage costs. And more than ten times as many, in the USA, note in the richest country in the world, are not in a position to feed themselves from their own income, and that, which the intentional destruction of the economy and the rising inflation have not managed to accomplish, politicians have managed to do.

A country wide fracture of the population as we have never witnessed before, and now, on top of this come vicious measures as the crowning of the whole thing. The premeditated change of power in Afghanistan managed by the USA. There, the Taliban have been deliberately handed military materials, to the value of $20 billion, a complete air force, with 11 airfield support bases available for use, which with absolute certainty will cause the next enormous flood wave of refugees. Why this, one asks oneself?

Why were worldwide measures taken which have caused one disaster after another and pushed the majority of humanity deeper towards the abyss, instead of lifting them out of their misery?

To answer this question, one has to ask two further questions, namely: Who has an interest in this global agenda, and who profits from this?

The answer to both questions is clear. The biggest profiteer of the current crisis, and the most important string puller behind the scenes, is the digital-financial complex. So, a type of special interest community, with the largest IT corporations and the largest asset managers of our time at its head.

The largest IT concerns, include: Apple, the Google parent company Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft and Facebook. The market capitalization of these 5 companies alone at present amount to an incredible USA 9.1 trillion. Just for comparison, the gross GDP of Germany, France and Italy is USD 8.6 trillion.

Along with these digital concerns, we also have the large asset managers, namely, BlackRock, Vanguard, State Street and Fidelity. They are significantly involved in all IT companies, and not only this, these four companies alone, currently manage a total USD 220.6 trillion. Again, for comparison, the GDP of all 28 nations of the EU last year amounted to USD 15.7 trillion.

But it is not just the monstrous financial clout of these concerns which makes the digital-financial complex so powerful.

Let’s first take the IT corporations. They don’t just have an enormous power themselves. They also control hundreds of thousands of other companies, because they organize the digital systems of these other businesses, and in this way have a constant overview of their data streams. The IT industry is nothing other than a tumor, which, in the course of the past years has metastasized into all other branches of the economy, to make them dependent upon it and in the meantime to completely dominate them.

And it is not any different with the asset managers They are involved in every large company in the world, and able to influence every popular brand in the world. The largest of them, BlackRock, supplies with the more than 40 years old data analysis system “Aladdin Data Cloud”, the greatest fund and financial information the world has ever seen. And in the background, BlackRock uses this knowledge, to advise the largest central banks in the world, the Federal Reserve and the EZB (European Central Bank). Through the huge information advantage which BlackRock has, it is very clear who is dependent upon whom.

So, this has to do with a unique historic mix, of raw financial power and the discretionary power over an unimaginable huge data pool. This combination allowed these corporations to make a business upswing, since the beginning of the crisis as never before.

And not only that. Their advantage is accelerating continuously. Alone, in the last quarter of this year, April, May and June, these companies have made the largest profits in their whole history and also, in view of these facts, there’s not much left to the imagination.

And to come to the conclusion, it is this digital-financial complex which is a global power center which drives everything.

The digital-financial complex stands far above all governments, and is ready at all times to bring every government cabinet in the world to its knees and make it compliant.

One must wonder, however, all the more about the methods introduced by the digital-financial complex since the start of the crisis. Because it seems almost as if, as if it is undermining the very system from which it benefits.

Here are a few examples:

If the digital-financial complex destroys small to medium businesses, then really it is destroying its own livelihood, because, s we just heard, the small to medium business sector (Mittlestand) pays the greatest share of taxes revenues and creates the most jobs, and when inflation increases that also hurts the digital-financial complex, and when it destroys social peace through increasing inequality, then it also destroys those who it makes its business from.

All these are valid objections. But they miss the reality.

Namely, this is how it works.

The digital-financial complex has no other choice other than to do what it does at present. What we currently experience is namely, is not something which is a formulated written agenda with which it will accumulate yet more money and power and then sit back to enjoy the fruits of its labors. What we are experiencing at this time is a gigantic act of desperation, probably the biggest that has ever occurred in the whole history of mankind.

The cause of this act of desperation, is that the system to which the digital-financial system owes its existence, can no longer be kept alive with the previous business model. It was very close to its demise already during the world financial crisis of 2007-8. If governments back then had not mobilized huge amounts of tax money and the central banks instructed oodles of money to be created out of nothing the system would have collapsed there and then.

But salvation was only temporary.

The amounts of money had to be continuously increased over a period of 12 years and the interest rates had to be reduced several times. So, the system was made ever more unstable. In the long term that could not go well. And last year it was to the point that the next collapse was threatening. And this collapse has been postponed through a final feat of strength namely the reduction of interest rates to zero and the injection of billions and billions for one final time.

With that however, a qualitatively new situation has come about. A further deferral would require interest rates to be dropped into the minus range, and this would destroy the foundation of the current banking system. Banks cannot operate long-term with negative interest rates. This means that a further deferral with the previously used approach will not be possible. In the present situation one can inject billions and billions into the system at maximum one more time. However, with the result that the already strongly growing rate of inflation will further overhead and will be driven into hyperinflation.

The situation in which the digital-financial complex finds itself is between the alternatives of, on one side the final collapse and hyper-inflation on the other side. So, the total loss of value of money. That means, historically we’ve arrived at a point in which the digital-financial complex, in the framework of the existing system, only still has the choice between two various forms of collapse.

So, what can they do?

Quite clearly, they have, in this situation, chosen to install a new system and a double strategy. On one side, in the background and away from public view, they are preparing a new system. And on the other side, they are using the end phase of the present dying system, to plunder it using all tricks at their disposal. This is exactly what we’ve seen since March 2020. The quite deliberate and premeditated destruction of the world economy, for the exclusive expansion of the digital-financial complex, with simultaneous preparation via the central banks of a new system and in collaboration with the IT corporations. And we already know how this system will look. It is about the complete removal of cash and banks in their previous form, and the introduction of digital money from central banks. The end goal as it appears, is that we will all have just a single account through which all transactions run. And this account will not reside in a business or high-street bank but with the central bank.

The background to this plan is the following: Digital central bank money is programmable, and because central banks can create unlimited money out of nothing, one can indeed operate in this way with negative interest rates without having to destroy the system. But that is furthermore, not the only feature of digital central bank money. It will allow governments to watch over all transactions made.

To assign us various tax rates and impose upon us individual fines. Governments can also place an expiry limit on a part of our money and require that we spend certain amounts within certain time periods. But it can also require the money to be used for specific purposes, and require that specific amounts be paid only for certain products, or that they be sourced only from certain regions. Above all, government will be in the position to cancel our ability to make all transactions with a single mouse click, and so, shut us down financially. Digital central bank money would be the most efficient tax collection method for society that has ever occurred in the whole history of man, and with that, nothing more and nothing less than the realization of an all-encompassing dictatorship brought about through money.

However, the whole thing has a huge snag. Namely, the expected resistance from the public. One can be very certain that a large proportion of people won’t accept this form of disenfranchisement. So, the introduction of digital central bank money would be expected to produce huge social unrest. And it is exactly this problem that the digital-financial complex has quite obviously thought about, to reverse the process of introducing this (digital) currency. So, they won’t try to make this switch to digital currency gradually, but and thereby risking huge resistance will do it exactly the other way around. They will drive society into chaos, in order to present the introduction of digital central bank money as the solution to all problems. Namely, in the form of a Universal Basic Income (UBI).

For anyone who thinks this is a “conspiracy theory” pulled out of the air, I recommend that you once again, take a close look at everything we’ve experience in the past 18 months. Under the pretext of fighting an illness devastating and irreparable damages have been done to health, economy and finances, whose full effects are only beginning to show up so far in traces. But at the same time, day by day work is being done to increase these damages, and in parallel, the social rift in society is being systematically deepened, by constantly driving new wedges between people. All of this leades us purposefully in one single direction, social unrest to the point of a civil war, and indeed, worldwide. Exactly that, according to all available information I have, is what is wanted (by the other side).

We are experiencing today is that by using all conceivable means, one is trying to create the maximum social chaos, and then at the high point of this chaos, bring in a panacea with the name “Universal Basic Income”, and in this way effect a change, from maximum chaos to maximum control.

By the way, there is a second reason why, from the perspective of these power brokers UBI must come. We are sitting right in the middle of the 4th Industrial Revolution, and expect, in the period ahead of us, the loss of millions and millions of jobs, due to the introduction of Artificial Intelligence.

This means, millions of consumers will disappear. The demand for consumer goods will increasingly collapse and because the current economic system is consumer driven, one must, to maintain life, break through this downward spiral. And that can only happen, if all these unemployed consumers who cannot find work are provided with an income.

We see that what has happened in the last 18 months and what is still going on is obviously all following a (prepared) plan. And the name of this plan is: “Deconstruction of the present economic system to the benefit of elites”. The generation of the maximum economic and social chaos and the establishment of a new system, under the guise of wanting to provide humanitarian help. This plan is however available to read and that is in both books about the Fourth Industrial Revolution and The Great Reset, by Klaus Schwab, whose World Economic Forum (WEF) plays a key role in this whole agenda.

The WEF has succeeded over the past 50 years to become the most important control center of the digital-financial complex. First of all, business leaders were brought together, then later all politicians, and still later, media creators, and in commanding roles, and prominent figure all networking with one another.

Additionally, in the 90’s, people were subjected to a targeted training program. We know today that since 1992 the “Global Leaders of Tomorrow” and since 2005 the “Young Global Leaders” always received a systematic onboarding schooling from the WEF, and it is exactly these same people who right now, occupy positions of political power and influence. Whether it is Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos or Mark Zuckerberg from the IT area. Whether it is CEO Larry Rink of BlackRock, head of the IMF Kristalina Georgieva, or former head of the Bank of England Mark Carney from the finance sector. Or Emanuel Macron, Sebastien Kurz, or Angela Merkel from politics. All of these people have been either trained by the WEF or they sit on its leadership board.

And it is not just the 1300 members, of this closely networked elite leader group who pull the strings worldwide. Since 2012, there is also a further ten thousand under 30-year-olds, so-called “Global Shapers” who have joined the club and who have also been brought together by the WEF and in its sense, exert influence on the course of world events. And we know how these events should look. To see this, I recommend looking into the work of WEF founder, Klaus Schwab.

For those who still cannot believe that everything we have experienced follows a plan, they should check the publishing date of Schwab’s work, “The Great Reset”. This book appeared on 20th June 2020, not even 4 months after the worldwide lockdown and already gives exact instructions on how one should use Covid-19 in order to put it darkly creatively destroy the world and build up a new world in the image of the man he (Schwab) has drawn up, which is reminiscent of the darkest times of national socialism.

I know that all of this sounds shocking, like a carefully prepared apocalypse. Indeed, the agenda is being followed here is obviously not only planned but also, can hardly be surpassed in terms of evilness and deceitfulness. Who would ever have suspected that under the guise of protecting mankind from the effects of a disease, the world economy would be driven to a total collapse? To take away: people’s freedom to travel, their rights of association and free speech, their freedom to express opinions, and in addition, to condemn more than 100 million people to starvation, and all this allegedly “for their own protection”!

And who would have thought that an unapologetic eugenicist named Klaus Schwab would be put in a position to not only spread worldwide his gruesome vision of a melding of the human being with machine intelligence (AI), but also to have this vision driven forward by ten thousand helpers. All of these are deeply destructive developments with which we are now living and having to suffer under, and their details are enough to freeze the blood in the veins of any normal thinking and feeling person.

But now I am coming to the most important message that I have to give today.

The whole thing also has another side to it. A quite different side and above all one which gives us a huge boost and a great amount of power for our future work.

The plan of the elites, the visions of Klaus Schwab, are namely, are condemned to fail, and this is for several reasons, the most important is that the narrative of a deadly virus which is an existential threat to humanity cannot be sustained in the long run, we already see how the pack of lies is collapsing in on itself from all sides.

We see how, in efforts to legitimize it, resort is made to ever more absurd arguments and rabid defamation. It is important to recognize here, that the vehemence the media are displaying these days, testifies not to their strength but to their weakness. Whoever, with. Ever more emphasis, spreads ever more grotesque lies, like the pandemic of the unvaccinated, who declares healthy people public enemy number one, and whoever on the basis of a single illness or test “case”, locks down whole countries, they are doing this only because they have run out of arguments and in desperation are blindly lashing out.

Abraham Lincoln once said “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all of the time.”

Exactly that, the truth will appear in our time, and this naturally has an enormous meaning for us, because ironically, it opens up for us that which Klaus Schwab has termed “ a unique window of opportunity”, however, in exactly the reverse dynamic (to what he intended).

Namely, that via the collapsing narrative, the credibility of those who have led us into this situation is being buried by the day, and because of that, a unique window of opportunity has opened for all of us for a vast and comprehensive campaign of enlightenment. The objective conditions to enlighten others about the real background to the alleged “pandemic”, about the real balance of power in the world, and the real threats we face, have never been as good as now and they are getting better day by day because the other side are getting entangled in their increasingly unbelievable lies and even if the digital-financial complex should succeed in introducing the new currency that would also not be the end of the world. Digital central bank money can, namely only function as the basis of a comprehensive coercive system. One will always introduce new price controls, continuously increase the Universal Basic Income and create permanent inflation with emphatic pressure, which in turn will lead to a continuous impoverishment of the population and constant conflict with the state and the authorities.

What we need to understand is the following:

Without any doubt, we stand before turbulent and also dangerous times, but we hold an historic trump card in our hands. It consists in the fact that the other side does not act according to the rules of reason but strives out of motives of greed and power and therefore, cannot do anything other than bring itself into ever greater difficulties. We should use exactly that (weakness) and always keep in view, that the other side likes more money, more property and additionally, to have available all the weapons in the world. But their power is not based on their money, nor on their possessions or their weapons but relies solely upon one factor: And that is the ignorance of the majority of people. i.e., the majority doesn’t understand the evil game that this minority are playing with them.

As terrible as everything is that the digital-financial complex and it’s helpers have served up in the past 18 months, and still continue to serve up, it has put itself in a situation which it cannot get out of and in which, out of despair it must cross ever more “red lines.”

This means for all of us, that in this exceptional situation we should quite simply, keep the peace, consistently expose all the lies, and show people bit by bit, why, and by whom, they are being deceived.

When we do that, and in doing so reflect on the strength of our arguments, then, we can not only solve the current problem, but possibly, achieve something much bigger, namely, use one of the deepest crises of humanity to turn around the direction of human history, and so, open the door to a new (and better) era.

Thank you.

*

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Will Humans be the Next ‘Freedom Fries’?

March 28th, 2022 by Ray McGovern

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***

U.S. pundits and strategic experts seem blissfully unaware of how close we all are to being fried in a nuclear strike by Russia. (Fair Labeling: if you are simply looking for yet another reason to demonize Putin, rather than to understand where he is coming from, save time and read no further.)

Here’s the thing: the Russians have good reason to be on hair-trigger alert. Their early-warning radar system is so inadequate that there are situations (including those involving innocent rocket launches) under which Russian President Putin would have only a few minutes – if that – to decide whether or not to launch nuclear missiles to destroy the rest of the world – on the suspicion that Russia was under nuclear attack.

“If that”? Yes, launch-to-target time is now so short that it is altogether likely that the authority to launch nuclear weapons is now vested in subordinate commanders “in the field,” so to speak. Readers of Daniel Ellsberg’s Doomsday Machine are aware of how the US actually devolved this authority during the days of the first cold war. I, for one, was shocked to learn that. Worse: today the subordinate commanders might be non-commissioned computers.

Russia, of course, is not about to admit that its early-warning system is far inferior to the US’s world-wide, satellite-based capability. But such is the case. The implications could not be more serious.

This came to mind today as former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the Kremlin would never allow the destruction of Russia. He warned, however, that if Washington did achieve what he described as its destructive aims, the world could face a dystopian crisis that would end in a “big nuclear explosion.”

President Putin addressed this issue four years ago, shortly after unveiling Russia’s new nuclear arsenal, including hypersonic missiles and other highly advanced weapons. Commenting on nuclear war, Putin told an interviewer:

“Certainly, it would be a global disaster for humanity; a disaster for the entire world.” He added that “as a citizen of Russia and the head of the Russian state I must ask myself: Why would we want a world without Russia?”

Use Them or Lose Them

Putin went on to say that, despite the disastrous consequences, Russia would be forced to defend itself using all available means, if its very existence were put at stake:

“A decision on the use of nuclear weapons may only be taken if our ballistic missile attack warning system not only detects a launch, but also predicts that the warheads would hit Russian territory. This is called a retaliation strike.”

That’s the rub. Some radar “detects” and “predicts,” and we’re all toast – or freedom fries. While Russia now has in its operation inventory sophisticated weaponry that can defeat any traditional Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) defense, it lags the US in the capability for early warning.

Think about it. Which should you fear more: getting fried on purpose, or getting fried by mistake? Macabre. Are not these choices incredibly stupid for rational human beings? If forced to choose, though, I think I’d resent much more getting fried by “Opps, pardon our mistake”. Please read what follows and ask yourself whether an immediate ceasefire is needed in Ukraine, or whether those who want to risk war with Russia should be given their head.

Russia: Limited Early-Warning Coverage

The US’s satellite “global situational awareness” alert system enables it to detect immediately the launch and location of a ballistic missile anywhere on the planet, including the sea. Russia lacks that worldwide capability. If this technical shortcoming is not taken into account (and there are signs that the Pentagon is paying it no heed), we could all suddenly be very dead – or “mostly dead” (to quote Billy Christal in The Princess Bride). (Ted Postol spelled this out in some detail at a Committee for the Republic virtual salon on March 17.

Postol, a retired MIT professor of physics and senior Pentagon adviser, provided a brief case study, which I summarize below:

On Jan. 25, 1995, Russian generals were focused on a rocket that was launched from Norway and detected by their automatic-alarm radar. Could this be the opening volley of a large-scale nuclear attack including sea-launched ballistic missiles? Given Russia’s inability to detect missile launches from submarines at sea, those generals could not rule out the possibility that Russia was already under attack by nuclear-armed Trident submarines.

A saving grace in 1995 was that those same generals had reliable intelligence that US ICBMs were not about to attack. At least equally important, in 1995 relations between Russia and the US were on a relatively even keel. Now? Not so much.

Postol added the following to indicate Russia’s redoubled concern over its early warning deficiency: the US has now increased the overall killing power of US ballistic missile forces by a factor of between two or three. This is exactly the kind of capability that a nuclear-armed state would build if it wanted to have the capacity to fight and “win” a nuclear war by a disarming first-strike.

The rocket from Norway? Scientists launched it to study the Northern Lights, but apparently no one had thought to tell the Russians.

Aside from asking the Norwegians to forewarn the Russians next time, what else can be done? The Washington can stop making relations still more tense over Ukraine. The Pentagon may boast about its formidable offensive strategic capabilities, but it has no way to protect us from a Russian nuclear attack. And if a false alert occurs a la 1995, this time sans the “saving grace” of a decent bilateral relationship with Russia, we could all end up as human fries. It should give us zero consolation to know that most Russians would too.

*

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Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. His 27-year career as a CIA analyst includes serving as Chief of the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch and preparer/briefer of the President’s Daily Brief. He is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).


Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War” 

by Michel Chossudovsky

Available to order from Global Research! 

ISBN Number: 978-0-9737147-5-3
Year: 2012
Pages: 102

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Michel Chossudovsky is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), which hosts the critically acclaimed website www.globalresearch.ca . He is a contributor to the Encyclopedia Britannica. His writings have been translated into more than 20 languages.

Reviews

“This book is a ‘must’ resource – a richly documented and systematic diagnosis of the supremely pathological geo-strategic planning of US wars since ‘9-11’ against non-nuclear countries to seize their oil fields and resources under cover of ‘freedom and democracy’.”
John McMurtry, Professor of Philosophy, Guelph University

“In a world where engineered, pre-emptive, or more fashionably “humanitarian” wars of aggression have become the norm, this challenging book may be our final wake-up call.”
-Denis Halliday, Former Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations

Michel Chossudovsky exposes the insanity of our privatized war machine. Iran is being targeted with nuclear weapons as part of a war agenda built on distortions and lies for the purpose of private profit. The real aims are oil, financial hegemony and global control. The price could be nuclear holocaust. When weapons become the hottest export of the world’s only superpower, and diplomats work as salesmen for the defense industry, the whole world is recklessly endangered. If we must have a military, it belongs entirely in the public sector. No one should profit from mass death and destruction.
Ellen Brown, author of ‘Web of Debt’ and president of the Public Banking Institute  

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***

Last week I was embedded with the Russian army and visited two towns in southeastern Ukraine. The first town was called Henichesk, a port city along the Sea of Azov in Kherson Oblast (province) of southern Ukraine, bordering on Crimea.

The Russian army, patrolling the city, went with us—the embedded journalists—for protection. But actually the protection was not really needed; the people in Henichesk, at least the majority with whom I spoke, were very happy that the Russian army was there.

The people that I spoke to all said the same thing: They felt protected from the criminal gangs, with their Nazi ideology, who raged the towns. They in turn hoped that Ukraine will prosper again.

Henichesk Strait - Wikipedia

Source: wikipedia.org

Since the coup d’état of 2014, the economy of Ukraine has become very bad, according to many citizens in Henichesk.

I could see that people were standing in line to get money from ATM machines outside the banks, money which was barely there.

At the market, the food was scarce. The Russian army is providing humanitarian aid, which they do in every village and town, liberated from these criminal gangs. This is how many Ukrainians call them.

Sonja Vandenende with Henichesk resident. [Photo courtesy of Sonja Vandenende]

Numerous villagers in Henichesk told me that, as the Russians entered their town, they left everything intact. I heard this stated many times. No damage, no dead, no wounded. Most people, they said, are happy that the Russians were there.

The town of Henichesk was undamaged after the Russian army came. People were rushing on the streets to do their shopping or just talking and socializing on the street. The population was very diverse. It included ethnic Russians, Ukrainians and Tatars. They have churches and mosques.

According to residents, before the 2014 coup d’état,[1] the people lived in harmony. Many Tatars originating from Crimea live in Henichesk. They have been allowed to go back to Crimea since Vladimir Putin became Russia’s president.

A picture containing sky, outdoor, person Description automatically generated

Photo courtesy of Sonja Vandenende

Propaganda has been spread on the Wikipedia page of Henichesk, stating the following:

“On 24 February 2022, Henichesk was captured by the Russian Army in the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. It was where the famous incident occurred where an old woman confronted Russian soldiers and said ‘Put sunflower seeds in your pockets so they grow on Ukraine soil when you die,’ as well as the death of Vitalii Shakun blowing up a bridge to stop their advance.”

Indeed, Shakun tried to blow up the bridge connecting Crimea with southern Ukraine. But they neglect to say that he was not from southern Ukraine, but from Lviv, in the western part of Ukraine. He was also a combat engineer with the Ukrainian Army. The damage his explosives caused to the bridge was actually minor and the bridge is still passable. It is a pity generally that boys (Shakun was born in 1996) should die for a false ideology, by blowing up a bridge without success.

Fact Versus Fiction

Western propaganda claims that the Russian army is besieging towns and that the population is starving. From my observation, the latter was not true in Henichesk or in the next town called Melitopol, which I also visited (to be discussed in a future article).[2]

The Western countries are pouring in weapons, most of them old Soviet weapons into Ukraine to shoot at the “evil Russians,” and imposing sanctions. Nothing positive is being done to help the long suffering people of Ukraine.

Photo courtesy of Sonja Vandenende

Waiting for humanitarian aid being distributed by the Russian army. [Photo courtesy of Sonja Vandenende]

Ukraine is left by itself to bleed.

Western countries have no interest in its economy or people, because Ukrainian people have many similarities with their “brother” countries—Russia and Belarus—and would naturally be aligned with them.

They share the same culture, language, and history of being invaded by the Nazis in World War II.

The West is only interested in benefits to their own economies.

Many buildings and factories are left to “rot” away and money for infrastructure was never there. Ukraine has been “bleeding” since 2014 and no one in the West has cared.

Ukraine is the breadbasket of Europe and the largest producer of sunflower oil, while Russia is the largest producer of fertilizer necessary for growing crops. However, with the war, production will be affected and the whole world economy may suffer. But the leaders in the West, who helped provoke the war, do not care—the Ukrainian people to them are pawns in a larger geopolitical game that will cause potential disaster for all humanity.

*

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Sonja is a freelance journalist from the Netherlands who has written about Syria, the Middle East, and Russia among other topics. Sonja can be reached at: [email protected].

Notes

  1. In February 2014, the U.S. government supported an insurrection against the legally elected government of Viktor Yanukovych, a pro-Russian leader who spurned an IMF structural adjustment program that would have been terrible for Ukraine. Victoria Nuland famously was photographed handing out cookies to the demonstrators, many of whom worshipped World War II Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera. For more details on these events, see Chris Kaspar de Ploeg, Ukraine in the Crossfire (Atlanta: Clarity Press, 2019).
  2. These observations correlate with other eyewitness accounts. The Grayzone Project recently ran an important article pointing to misinformation about the destruction of the Mariupol theater, showing how the Azov Battalion was likely responsible for the destruction.

Featured image: Russian troops in Henichesk. [Photo courtesy of Sonja Vandenende]

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The History of Nazism in Ukraine. Who is Stepan Bandera?

March 27th, 2022 by Timothy Alexander Guzman

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***

It’s a tragedy in the making. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is reprehensible and should never have happened, but it is a fact that Russian President Vladimir Putin for several years had been warning Washington and its allies of an impending danger, that NATO expansion to its borders could lead to military confrontation. 

Meanwhile, the Western media is painting a picture of Ukraine as a democracy with a president by the name of Volodymyr Zelenskyy who is a brave soul fighting for freedom and democracy, a small country against the Russian bear, a modern version of David vs. Goliath.

Russia, the bully picking on an innocent Ukraine.  But what does the world know about Ukraine? 

The Western media has kept us in the Dark. Most Americans do not know about Ukraine’s politics or its history.

Do Americans, Europeans and others around the world know the truth about Ukraine and their history of Nazi ideology?

According to The Times of Israel ‘Hundreds in Ukraine attend marches celebrating Nazi SS soldiers’ reported on a Nazi celebration in 2021 in Ukraine’s city of Kyiv:

Hundreds of Ukrainians attended marches celebrating Nazi SS soldiers, including the first such event in Kyiv.  The so-called Embroidery March took place in the capital on April 28, the 78th anniversary of the establishment of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS, also known as the 1st Galician. It was a force set up under German occupation auspices comprised of ethnic Ukrainian and German volunteers and conscripts. The marchers held banners displaying the unit’s symbol.

The Kyiv march by about 300 people was an import from the western city of Lviv, which for several years has hosted such events. A day earlier, hundreds attended a larger Embroidery March there.  Ukraine has a large minority of ethnic Russians, who oppose the glorification of Nazi collaborators. Such actions were taboo in Ukraine until the early 2000s, when nationalists demanded and obtained state recognition for collaborators as heroes for their actions against the Soviet Union, which dominated Ukraine until 1991

The Father of Nazi Ideology in Ukraine: Stepan Bandera

His name was Stepan Bandera, considered a Ukrainian hero who collaborated with the Nazis during World War II and who was the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN/B), an extreme far-right organization.  Bandera was born to a Greek-Catholic family in Galicia which was part of the Austro-Hungarian empire, but later in life he became a radical Ukrainian nationalist after his country of birth had collapsed thus becoming the West Ukrainian People’s Republic, but then it became part of Poland after the Polish-Ukrainian war of 1918-1919.

In 1934, Bandera who was very angry with the new geopolitical development had organized the assassination of Poland’s Minister of the Interior, Bronislaw Pieracki.

Bandera was arrested for the crime, found guilty and sentenced to death but his conviction was later commuted to a life sentence.

In 1939, following the German–Soviet invasion of Poland also known as the September Campaign divided the country under the German-Soviet Frontier Treaty.  Soon after, Bandera was released from prison and moved to Kraków, Poland which was already occupied by the Nazis.

Bandera was convinced that working with the Nazis would allow him to establish his own government in Ukraine leading to an independent nation that would be allied with the Nazis and free from Soviet occupation.  It was well-known that the Nazis, Bandera and his lieutenants from his organization blamed Jews for establishing communism in Ukraine as a statement from Bandera at the time read that

“The Jews of the Soviet Union are the most loyal supporters of the Bolshevik Regime and the vanguard of Muscovite imperialism in the Ukraine.”

Then in June 1941, the Nazis invaded the USSR and occupied the East Galician capital of Lvov and this was where the OUN/B and the National-Socialist Greater Germany under Adolf Hitler collaborated and launched ‘pogroms’ of genocide against jews and poles including men, women and children of all ages over the duration of the war.

Then the relationship between the Nazis and the Bandera faction got complicated.  During the war, a declaration of independence or what is known as the Act of Restoration of the Ukrainian State was announced in homage to Bandera by his own lieutenants.

At the same time, the declaration for an independent Ukraine became a serious concern for the Nazi regime since they wanted Ukraine under their sphere of influence.  So, the alliance between the Ukrainian nationalists and the Nazis became problematic.

On September 15th, 1941, the Gestapo began to arrest its leaders including Bandera and Yaroslav Stetsko who was the prime minister of the Ukrainian National government for refusing to dismiss the Act of Renewal of Ukrainian statehood.

By January 1942, Bandera found himself in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp for high-profile political prisoners.

In 1944, the Soviets and allied forces advanced on Nazi-occupied territories, so the Nazis recruited Bandera and Stetsko to create diversions to help destroy Soviet forces who were gaining ground.

Bandera who was still the leader of the OUN/B moved to West Germany with his family and continued to work with anti-communist organizations or we can say the fascists for many years to come such as the Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council and the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations.

In 1959, Bandera was poisoned by cyanide gas and two years later, the German judiciary claimed that the KGB was behind his assassination.  In 2022, Bandera remains a hero to the neo-Nazis in Ukraine.  The US and the European Union support Ukraine who happens to be one of the most corrupt countries in the world with proven human rights abuses that has strong ties to neo-Nazis who admire Adolf Hitler and Stepan Bandera, now if that is not hypocrisy, I don’t know what is.

The CIA and the Nazis: A Match Made in Hell  

According to author and journalist Wayne Madsen in 2016 entitled: ‘CIA: Undermining and Nazifying Ukraine Since 1953’ 

“the recent declassification of over 3800 documents by the Central Intelligence Agency provides detailed proof that since 1953 the CIA operated two major programs intent on not only destabilizing Ukraine but Nazifying it with followers of the World War II Ukrainian Nazi leader Stepan Bandera.”

Nazism has been in existence in Ukraine for a long-time under the CIA’s Project AERODYNAMIC which was “to provide for the exploitation and expansion of the anti-Soviet Ukrainian resistance movement for cold war and hot war purposes” it included several groups including the Ukrainian Supreme Council of Liberation (UBVR) and its Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the Foreign. Representation of the Ukrainian Supreme Council of Liberation (ZPUHVR) in Western Europe and the United States, and other organizations such as OUN/B will be utilized.

We can say that for close to 70 years, the CIA’s operation of Nazifying Ukraine had been a success.

However, the earlier version of Project AERODYNAMIC was intended to destabilize Ukraine with exiled Ukrainians who were trained by the CIA operating inside Soviet-Ukrainian territories.  

The CIA coordinated airdrops of communications, supplies, weapons and ammunition to its operatives inside Ukrainian territory who were trained in West Germany with the US Army’s Foreign Intelligence Political and Psychological (FI-PP) unit.  In other words, the CIA is Guilty as charged for helping cultivate the neo-Nazis or what we can call the ‘fascists’ in Ukraine in order to fight the communists.

Today, far-right neo-Nazi groups are a serious problem for the Ukrainian people since many of these extremists are embedded in various levels of the Ukrainian government including members from the notorious Azov and Aidar Battalions.

Both groups were also involved in the 2014 Maidan coup that overthrew pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych, a coup that was backed by the US and the European Union.

Other far-right neo-Nazi groups who were also involved in the Maidan coup was the Right Sector and the Svoboda Party.  In other words, the US and its European allies have created a monster and it will only get worse for the people in Ukraine in the years to come.

Recently, a Ukrainian television journalist by the name of Fahruddin Sharafmal quoted Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi war criminal on live TV:

Click here to watch the video.

“And Given Russia calls us Nazis, Fascists anyway – I will allow myself to quote Adolf Eichmann who said that in order to destroy a nation, it is imperative to first destroy their children because if you kill parents – these children grow up and seek revenge, but if you kill children – they never grow up and the nation dies out.”

*

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Timothy Alexander Guzman writes on his own blog site, Silent Crow News, where this article was originally published. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from SCN

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***

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. Mark A. Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have tried to set up phone calls with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Gen. Valery Gerasimov but the Russians “have so far declined to engage,” said Pentagon spokesman John Kirby in a statement Wednesday, March 23.

“A nightmare scenario would be a Russian missile or attack aircraft that destroys a U.S. command post across the Polish-Ukrainian border,” James Stavridis, a retired admiral who served as the Supreme Allied Commander at NATO from 2009 to 2013, told the Washington Post [1]. “A local commander might respond immediately, thinking the event was a precursor to a wider attack. This could lead to rapid and irreversible escalation, to include potential use of nuclear weapons.”

According to a CNN report [2] detailing a rare face-to-face meeting between Russian and US military officials last week, the US believes that the refusal for high-level meetings is due to Kremlin worries that the encounters would show them to be vulnerable if they allowed such meetings, because it risks a tacit admission that an abnormal situation exists, according to the readout of the meeting.

Though the assumption of vulnerability appears misconceived considering while the Pentagon has allegedly attempted to maintain high-level contacts with Russian counterparts, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has not attempted any conversations with his counterpart, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, since the start of the conflict last month.

The real reason the Russian military leadership has allegedly shunned maintaining high-level contacts with the Pentagon’s top brass appears to be the duplicitous and treacherous role played by the transatlantic NATO alliance of significantly escalating the conflict by substantially increasing the NATO military footprint in Eastern Europe along Russia’s western flank, publicly providing billions of dollars’ worth lethal weapons to Ukraine’s security forces and allied neo-Nazi militias while asininely claiming to be “peacemakers” extending chivalrous courtesies to the arch-rival.

Ahead of the NATO summit attended by President Biden Thursday, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced the transatlantic military alliance would double the number of battlegroups it had deployed in Eastern Europe.

“The first step is the deployment of four new NATO battlegroups in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia, along with our existing forces in the Baltic countries and Poland,” Stoltenberg said. “This means that we will have eight multinational NATO battlegroups all along the eastern flank, from the Baltic to the Black Sea.”

NATO issued a statement [3] after Thursday’s emergency summit attended by Joe Biden and European leaders:

“In response to Russia’s actions, we have activated NATO’s defense plans, deployed elements of the NATO Response Force, and placed 40,000 troops on our eastern flank, along with significant air and naval assets, under direct NATO command supported by Allies’ national deployments. We are also establishing four additional multinational battlegroups in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia.”

Last week, President Biden announced an unprecedented package of $1 billion in military assistance to Ukraine in addition to $350 million previously pledged which was disbursed within days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24. The new package includes 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 2,000 anti-armor Javelins, 1,000 light anti-armor weapons, 6,000 AT-4 anti-armor systems and 100 Switchblade kamikaze drones.

Besides providing abundance of anti-aircraft and anti-armor munitions to Ukraine’s largely conscript military and allied irregular militias, a senior US administration official told Reuters [4] Washington and its allies were also working on providing anti-ship weapons to protect Ukraine’s coast. Ukrainian forces claimed on Thursday to have blown up a Russian landing ship in a Russian-occupied port.

Nonetheless, what must have exasperated Russia’s military leadership is a secret plan [5] for a “peacekeeping mission” involving 10,000 NATO troops from the member states surreptitiously occupying western Ukraine and imposing a limited no-fly zone over Lviv and rest of towns which is allegedly being prepared by the Polish government.

The plan is seemingly on hiatus due to a disagreement between Polish President Andrzej Duda and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the deputy prime minister of Poland and the head of Law and Justice (PiS) Party. Duda wants Washington’s approval before going ahead, whereas Kaczynski appears desperate to obtain political mileage from the Ukraine crisis.

The prime ministers of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovenia traveled via train to the embattled Ukrainian capital of Kyiv and met with President Volodymyr Zelensky on March 15 in a show of support for Ukraine. De facto leader of Poland, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, accompanied them. Speaking on the occasion, Kaczynski said:

“I think that it is necessary to have a peace mission—NATO, possibly some wider international structure—but a mission that will be able to defend itself, which will operate on Ukrainian territory.”

In response, Russian officials condemned Poland’s proposal to send NATO “peacekeeping forces” into Ukraine as a “very reckless and extremely dangerous” idea that would risk a full-scale war between the alliance and Moscow.

“This will be the direct clash between the Russian and NATO armed forces that everyone has not only tried to avoid but said should not take place in principle,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said.

Regarding how operational-level miscalculations could lead to all-out war between belligerents, it’s pertinent to recall that on February 7, 2018, US B-52 bombers and Apache helicopters struck a contingent of Syrian government troops and allied forces in Deir al-Zor province of eastern Syria that reportedly [6] killed and wounded scores of Russian military contractors working for the Russian private security firm, the Wagner Group.

The survivors described the bombing as an absolute massacre, and Moscow lost more Russian nationals in one day than it had lost during its entire military campaign in support of the Syrian government since September 2015.

Washington’s objective in striking Russian contractors was that the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – which is mainly comprised of Kurdish YPG militias – had reportedly handed over the control of some areas east of the Euphrates River to Deir al-Zor Military Council (DMC), which was the Arab-led component of SDF, and had relocated several battalions of Kurdish YPG militias to Afrin and along Syria’s northern border with Turkey in order to defend the Kurdish-held areas against the onslaught of the Turkish armed forces and allied Syrian militant proxies during Ankara’s “Operation Olive Branch” in Syria’s northwest that lasted from January to March 2018.

Syrian forces with the backing of Russian contractors took advantage of the opportunity and crossed the Euphrates River to capture an oil refinery located to the east of the Euphrates River in the Kurdish-held area of Deir al-Zor.

The US Air Force responded with full force, knowing well the ragtag Arab component of SDF – mainly comprised of local Arab tribesmen and mercenaries to make the Kurdish-led SDF appear more representative and inclusive in outlook – was simply not a match for the superior training and arms of the Syrian troops and Russian military contractors, consequently causing a carnage in which scores of Russian nationals lost their lives.

A month after the massacre of Russian military contractors in Syria, on March 4, 2018, Sergei Skripal, a Russian double agent working for the British foreign intelligence service, and his daughter Yulia were found unconscious on a public bench outside a shopping center in Salisbury. A few months later, in July 2018, a British woman, Dawn Sturgess, died after touching the container of the nerve agent that allegedly poisoned the Skripals.

In the case of the Skripals, Theresa May, then the prime minister of the United Kingdom, promptly accused Russia of attempted assassinations and the British government concluded that Skripal and his daughter were poisoned with a Moscow-made, military-grade nerve agent, novichok.

Sergei Skripal was recruited by the British MI6 in 1995, and before his arrest in Russia in December 2004, he was alleged to have blown the cover of scores of Russian secret agents. He was released in a spy swap deal in 2010 and was allowed to settle in Salisbury. Both Sergei Skripal and his daughter have since recovered and were discharged from hospital in May 2018.

In the aftermath of the Salisbury poisonings in March 2018, the US, UK and several European nations expelled scores of Russian diplomats and Washington ordered the closure of the Russian consulate in Seattle.

In a retaliatory move, Russia also expelled a similar number of American, British and European diplomats, and ordered the closure of American consulate in Saint Petersburg. The number of American diplomatic personnel stationed in Russia drastically dropped from 1,200 before the escalation to 120, and the relations between Moscow and Western powers reached their lowest ebb since the break-up of the former Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War in December 1991.

Notwithstanding, five years following a potentially catastrophic incident that could’ve inundated Islamic State’s former capital Raqqa and many towns downstream Euphrates River in eastern Syria and caused more deaths than the deployment of any weapon of mass destruction, the New York Times reported in January [7] that at the height of US-led international coalition’s war against the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, US B-52 bombers struck Tabqa Dam with 2,000-pound bombs, including at least one bunker-busting bomb that fortunately didn’t explode.

In March 2017, alternative media was abuzz with reports that the dam was about to collapse and entire civilian population downstream Euphrates River needed to be urgently evacuated to prevent the inevitable catastrophe. But Washington issued a gag order to the corporate media “not to sensationalize the issue.”

The explosive report noted that the dam was contested between the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, the Syrian government and the Islamic State. A firefight broke out in which SDF incurred heavy casualties. It was then that a top secret US special operations unit Task Force 9 called for airstrikes on the dam after repeated requests from the Kurdish leadership of the SDF.

“The explosions on March 26, 2017, knocked dam workers to the ground. A fire spread and crucial equipment failed. The flow of the Euphrates River suddenly had no way through, the reservoir began to rise and authorities used loudspeakers to warn people downstream to flee.

“The Islamic State group, the Syrian government and Russia blamed the United States, but the dam was on the US military’s ‘no-strike list’ of protected civilian sites, and the commander of the US offensive at the time, then-Lt. Gen. Stephen J. Townsend, said allegations of US involvement were based on ‘crazy reporting.’”

It’s worth noting that it was the same rogue Pentagon General Stephen J. Townsend, currently the commander of US AFRICOM and then the commander of Combined Joint Task Force (CJTF) – Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR) responsible for leading the war against the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, whose “operational miscalculation” was responsible for the reckless confrontation an year later in February 2018 when US B-52 bombers struck Russian military contractors, killing and wounding scores, a tragic incident that brought two nuclear powers engaged in the Syrian conflict almost to the brink of a full-scale war.

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Nauman Sadiq is an Islamabad-based geopolitical and national security analyst focused on geo-strategic affairs and hybrid warfare in the Af-Pak and Middle East regions. His domains of expertise include neocolonialism, military-industrial complex and petro-imperialism. He is a regular contributor of diligently researched investigative reports to Global Research.

Notes

[1] Top Russian military leaders repeatedly decline calls from US

[2] Inside a rare US meeting with a Russian general in Moscow

[3] NATO doubles battlegroups in ‘Eastern Flank’ States

[4] Russia signals scaled-back war aims, Ukrainians advance near Kyiv

[5] Secret Plan to Send 10,000 NATO “Peacekeeping Troops” Into Ukraine

[6] Russian toll in Syria battle was 300 killed and wounded

[7] A dam in Syria was on a ‘no-strike’ list. The US bombed it anyway


Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War” 

by Michel Chossudovsky

Available to order from Global Research! 

ISBN Number: 978-0-9737147-5-3
Year: 2012
Pages: 102

PDF Edition:  $6.50 (sent directly to your email account!)

Michel Chossudovsky is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), which hosts the critically acclaimed website www.globalresearch.ca . He is a contributor to the Encyclopedia Britannica. His writings have been translated into more than 20 languages.

Reviews

“This book is a ‘must’ resource – a richly documented and systematic diagnosis of the supremely pathological geo-strategic planning of US wars since ‘9-11’ against non-nuclear countries to seize their oil fields and resources under cover of ‘freedom and democracy’.”
John McMurtry, Professor of Philosophy, Guelph University

“In a world where engineered, pre-emptive, or more fashionably “humanitarian” wars of aggression have become the norm, this challenging book may be our final wake-up call.”
-Denis Halliday, Former Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations

Michel Chossudovsky exposes the insanity of our privatized war machine. Iran is being targeted with nuclear weapons as part of a war agenda built on distortions and lies for the purpose of private profit. The real aims are oil, financial hegemony and global control. The price could be nuclear holocaust. When weapons become the hottest export of the world’s only superpower, and diplomats work as salesmen for the defense industry, the whole world is recklessly endangered. If we must have a military, it belongs entirely in the public sector. No one should profit from mass death and destruction.
Ellen Brown, author of ‘Web of Debt’ and president of the Public Banking Institute  

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***

One month since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, US President Joe Biden will begin a tour of the continent this week in an effort to mobilize the NATO powers in a major escalation of the conflict against Russia.

The meetings, including those of NATO and the European Council, will seek to galvanize “international efforts to… impose severe and unprecedented costs on Russia,” the White House said.

Ahead of Biden’s trip, NATO military officials have been discussing plans, to be announced at the summit, to vastly expand the positioning of NATO forces on Russia’s borders in Europe as part of an effort to put the continent on a war footing, including potentially doubling the US troop presence in Europe.

The series of meetings being held this week are councils of war. According to the White House:

  • On Monday, Biden held a call with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to discuss “providing security assistance to the brave Ukrainians who are defending their country from Russian aggression.” The same day, the European Union announced that it would send an additional €500 million in weapons to Ukraine
  • Later that evening, Biden addressed the CEOs of America’s largest corporations to “discuss the United States’ response to Russia’s unprovoked and unjustified war with Ukraine.”
  • On Wednesday, Biden will arrive in Brussels, Belgium, to attend a meeting of the European Council, which will also include UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, despite the UK’s exit from the European Union.
  • On Thursday, Biden will attend a NATO summit focused on “ongoing deterrence and defense efforts in response to Russia’s unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine.”
  • On Friday, Biden will travel to Warsaw, Poland, where he will hold a bilateral meeting with President Andrzej Duda. Last week, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki proposed the deployment of a NATO “peacekeeping mission” to Ukraine.

This series of meetings was preceded by clear signals from the White House that, despite statements from Ukraine that it is pursuing negotiations with Russia, the United States has no interest in finding a diplomatic solution to the war.

On Thursday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said,

“From where I sit, diplomacy obviously requires both sides engaging in good faith to de-escalate.” He added, “The actions that we’re seeing Russia take… are in total contrast to any serious diplomatic effort to end the war.”

Following these statements, Biden seemed to do everything he could to personally antagonize Russian President Vladimir Putin, referring to him as a “thug,” a “dictator” and a “war criminal.”

Under conditions where a war is raging out of control, killing hundreds of people, and nuclear tensions are at the highest level since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, these statements are a deliberate effort to escalate tensions. The Kremlin will see them as a US declaration of intent to carry out regime-change in Russia or massively escalate US involvement in the war.

In response to what Russia called “insults,” Russia’s foreign ministry announced that it had summoned US Ambassador John Sullivan to declare that “Russian-American relations [are] on the verge of rupture.” The “rupture” of relations between states generally signifies that war is imminent.

Indeed, Biden’s whirlwind tour of Europe in an effort to mobilize the United States’ European allies for war has been carefully prepared by extensive military discussions.

The Wall Street Journal reported:

“U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met at NATO headquarters last week with his counterparts from other alliance members to discuss beefing up forces even further. They directed military planners from all of the NATO members to draft plans that are likely to be discussed when President Biden meets with other alliance heads of government in Europe this week.”

“I expect there will be a rough doubling of the U.S. presence,” Douglas Lute, a former US ambassador to NATO and a retired Army lieutenant general, told the Journal.

The United States has deployed more than 15,000 additional troops to Europe since the outbreak of the war, and the US troop levels in Europe have reached over 100,000—the first time this figure has been surpassed since the end of the Cold War. If, as Lute suggests, the number of US troops deployed in Europe will double, this would mean the dispatch of 100,000 more US troops to Russia’s borders.

The Journal wrote:

“Troops deployed in Eastern Europe will likely be augmented with more ground units equipped with tanks, other armored vehicles, artillery and attack helicopters, instead of the primarily light infantry forces that are already positioned close to NATO’s eastern borders, current and former officials said.”

The greater significance and implications of war generally emerge as it develops. While the US succeeded in goading the Russian government to take the first shot, it is clear that the war in Ukraine is the first stage of a much broader conflict. Having provoked the Russian government into a desperate and disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the United States is using the war to reassert its global hegemony, building a war coalition for what the United States has termed “great power conflict” targeting not only Russia, but China as well.

On Friday, in a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Biden threatened China with unspecified “consequences” if it provided any material support to Russia. A day earlier, Blinken declared that the US would “not hesitate to impose costs” on China.

This bullying language was turned into open military threats as Biden prepared to set off to Europe. U.S. Indo-Pacific Commander Adm. John C. Aquilino staged a press conference to the Associated Press aboard a military surveillance aircraft plane over territory claimed by China. “Should deterrence fail,” he declared, “my second mission is to be prepared to fight and win.”

The preparations for world war are being carried out behind the backs of the American population. Biden pledged to end America’s “forever wars,” promising to “close this period of relentless war” and initiate “a new era of relentless diplomacy.” Instead, the Biden administration is carrying out the greatest military escalation since the launching of the “war on terror” in 2001.

In the United States, the 2023 military budget is expected to total $800 billion: $60 billion more than the $740 billion authorized for fiscal year 2022. There are calls for an even more rapid funneling of money into the US war machine.

The bill for this massive expansion of military spending will be paid by the working class. It will be utilized to attack the living standards of the working class, criminalize working class political opposition and distract attention from the deadly surge of COVID-19.

The reckless military escalation threatens to spiral out of control, potentially precipitating the first use of nuclear weapons since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the Second World War.

There is no way out of this crisis within the framework of capitalist politics. Only one force can stop the looming catastrophe: the international working class, united in a struggle against imperialism, militarism, the historically obsolete nation-state system and the capitalist social order.

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***

President Vladimir Putin has accused the West of trying to cancel Russian culture, including the works of great composers such as Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Dmitri Shostakovich and Sergei Rachmaninoff.

At a televised meeting with leading cultural figures on Friday, Putin compared the cancellation of a number of Russian cultural events in recent weeks with the actions of Nazi Germany in the 1930s.

“Today, they are trying to cancel a thousand-year-old country,” Putin said.

“I am talking about the progressive discrimination against everything connected with Russia, about this trend that is unfolding in a number of Western states, with the full connivance and sometimes with the encouragement of Western elites,” Putin added.

“The proverbial ‘cancel culture’ has become a cancellation of culture,” Putin said, adding that works by Russian composers were being excluded from concerts and books by Russian authors were being “banned”.

“The last time such a mass campaign to destroy unwanted literature was carried out was by the Nazis in Germany almost 90 years ago … books were burned right on the squares,” Putin said.

Since Putin sent Russian troops into Ukraine on February 24, the West has piled sanctions on Moscow that have seen Russia increasingly isolated, politically and financially, and extending to spheres such as sports and culture.

Speaking about “cancel culture”, Putin singled out British author JK Rowling, who was criticised following controversial tweets about transgender people.

“Not so long ago children’s author JK Rowling was cancelled because she, a writer of books that have sold millions of copies around the world, didn’t please fans of so-called ‘gender freedoms’,” Putin said.

A number of events involving Russian cultural figures who have voiced support for the war have been cancelled, including some involving Valery Gergiev, general director of the St Petersburg Mariinsky Theatre, who spoke to Putin during Friday’s meeting.

Our thanks to Al Jazeera for bringing this article to our attention

Click here to read the full article.

 

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Aroused by Power: Why Madeleine Albright Was Not Right

March 27th, 2022 by Dr. Binoy Kampmark

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***

When involved in war, those who feel like benefactors are bound to congratulate the gun toting initiators.  If you so happen to be on the losing end, sentiments are rather different.  Complicity and cause in murder come to mind.

The late US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright will always be tied with the appallingly named humanitarian war in Kosovo in 1999, one that saw NATO attacks on Serbian civilian targets while aiding the forces of the Kosovo Liberation Army.  It was a distinct backing of sides in a vicious, tribal conflict, where good might miraculously bubble up, winged by angels.  Those angels never came.

Through her tenure in public office, Albright showed a distinct arousal for US military power.  In 1992, she rounded on the then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell for refusing to deploy US forces to Bosnia.  “What’s the point of having this superb military machine you’re always talking about if we can’t use it?”

Too many apologists have come out to explain why Albright was so adamant about the use of such force.  Biographical details are cited: born in Czechoslovakia as Marie Jana Korbelová; of Jewish roots rinsed in the blood wine of Roman Catholicism.  She fled with her family to Britain, eventually finding refuge in Notting Hill Gate.  She went to school, spent time in air raid shelters, sang A Hundred Green Bottles Hanging on the Wall.

The NATO intervention – and this point was never lost on Russian President Vladimir Putin, who reiterated it in his February address – took place without UN Security Council authorisation.  For the law abiders and totemic worshipers of the UN Charter keen to get at Russia’s latest misconduct in Ukraine, this served to illustrate the fickleness of international law’s supporters.  At a given moment, they are bound to turn tail, becoming might-is-right types.  The persecuted, in time, can become persecutors.

NATO, in fact, became an alliance Albright wished to see expanded and fed, not trimmed and diminished.  The historical role of Germany and Russia in central and eastern Europe became the rationale for expanding a neutralising alliance that would include previous “victim” countries.  A weakened Moscow could be ignored.  “We do not need Russia to agree to enlargement,” she told US Senators in 1997.

Paul Wilson, considering the Albright legacy, wrote in 2012 about the danger of following analogies in history to the letter.  “Historical analogies are seductive and often treacherous.  [Slobodan] Milošević was not Hitler and the Kosovar Liberation Army was not a champion of liberal democracy.”

In fact, the KLA was previously designated by the State Department to be a terrorist organisation.  “The Kosovar Albanians,” wrote the regretful former UN Commander in Bosnia Major General Lewis MacKenzie in April 2003, “played us like a Stradivarius violin.”  In his view, NATO and the international community had “subsidised and indirectly supported their violent campaign for an ethnically pure Kosovo.  We have never blamed them for being perpetrators of violence in the early 1990s, and we continue to portray them as the designated victim today, in spite of evidence to the contrary.”

Such is the treacherous nature of the sort of perverse humanitarianism embraced by Albright and her colleagues.  Such a policy, Alan J. Kuperman remarks with gloomy accuracy, “creates a moral hazard that encourages the excessively risky or fraudulent behaviour of rebellion by members of groups that are vulnerable to genocidal retaliation, but it cannot fully protect against the backlash.”

One such encouraged individual, Kosovo President Vjosa Osmani, was all gushing over Albright’s legacy.

“She gave us hope when we didn’t have it.  She became our voice and our arm and when we had neither voice nor an arm ourselves.  She felt our people’s pain because she had experienced herself persecution in childhood.”

The first female Secretary of State will also be linked with the Clinton Administration’s sanctions policy that killed numerous citizens and maimed the country of Iraq, only for it to then be invaded by the venal architects of regime toppling in the succeeding Bush Administration.  This sickening episode sank any heroic notions of law and justice, showing that Albright was content using a wretched calculus on life and death when necessary.

On May 12, 1996, Albright was asked by Lesley Stahl on the CBS program 60 Minutes about the impact of the sanctions that served to profitlessly kill hundreds of thousands.  “We have heard that half a million children have died.  I mean, that’s more children than have died in Hiroshima.  And, you know, is the price worth it?”  Then US Ambassador Albright did not flinch.  “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price – we think the price is worth it.”

In September 2000, she was still crazed by the sanctions formula against Iraq, telling the United Nations in an absurd address that Baghdad had to be stood up to, being “against the United Nations authority and international law.”  Meek acknowledgment was given to the fact that “the hardships faced by Iraq’s people” needed to be dealt with.  What came first was “the integrity of this institution, our security, and international law.”

Albright could be sketchy on sanctions.  In instances where Congress imposed automatic sanctions, Albright could express furious disagreement.  When this happened to both India and Pakistan in 1998 in the aftermath of nuclear weapons testing, she could barely conceal her irritation on CNN’s Late Edition.  “I think we must do something about it, because sanctions that have no flexibility, no waiver authority, are just blunt instruments.  And diplomacy requires us to have some finesse.”

The hagiographic salutations have been many.  One, from Caroline Kelly at CNN, is simply too much.  Albright “championed the expansion of NATO, pushed for the alliance to intervene in the Balkans to stop genocide and ethnic cleansing, sought to reduce the spread of nuclear weapons, and championed human rights democracy across the globe.”

As Secretary of State, she presided in an administration of the world’s only surviving superpower, uncontained, unrestrained, dangerously optimistic.  There was much hubris – all that strength, and lack of assuredness as to how to use it.  The Cold War narrative and rivals were absent, and the Clinton Administration became a soap opera of scandal and indiscretion.

In her later years, she worried about the onset of authoritarianism, of power going to people’s heads, the inner tyrant unleashed in the playpen of international relations.  She had much to complain about regarding Donald Trump, Putin and Brexit.  In encouraging the loud return of the US to front and centre of international politics, she ignored its previous abuses, including some perpetrated by her office.  When given such power, is it not axiomatic that corruption will follow?

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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 is from Wikimedia Commons

No Entangling Alliances

March 27th, 2022 by Jacob G. Hornberger

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***

 

Assuming that America can avoid a nuclear war with Russia, the American people would be well-served to ponder and reflect on some of the good founding principles of our country. One of those good founding principles was “no entangling alliances.”

It would be difficult to find a better example of an entangling alliance than NATO, which is really nothing more than a Cold War dinosaur. Having been called into existence as part of the U.S. national-security establishment’s Cold War racket, it should have gone out of existence at the ostensible end of the Cold War. 

Instead, not only was it kept in existence, it actually became the root cause of the current crisis in Ukraine. That’s because it continued moving eastward, absorbing former members of the Warsaw Pact and ultimately threatening to absorb Ukraine, knowing full well that Russia had made it very clear that it would never permit U.S. military bases, missiles, troops, tanks, and other weaponry to be established on its border, just as the Pentagon would never permit Russian military bases, missiles, tanks, troops, and weaponry to be established in Cuba or along the Mexico-U.S. border.

By now, every American should be aware of the dangers surrounding America’s involvement in NATO. If Russia attacks any of the Eastern European countries that are furnishing weapons to Ukraine, that means that the United States and Russia are now automatically at war with one another. That’s because the entangling alliance with NATO automatically commits the United States to go to war with any nation that attacks any other member of NATO.

Once the United States and Russia are in a state of war, the chances of the war going nuclear expand exponentially. That’s because it is in the interests of each nation to unleash its nuclear weapons first in the hope of disabling the other nation’s nuclear capability as much as possible.

As John Quincy Adams put it in his famous speech, “In Search of Monsters to Destroy,” Europe has always been besieged with wars. The United States, he said, is in a unique position given that the Atlantic Ocean stands between the U.S. and Europe. Therefore, he counseled, the United States should continue staying out of Europe’s incessant conflicts and instead devote ourselves to establishing a free, prosperous, peaceful and harmonious nation here at home. 

And yet, with NATO, it’s the exact opposite. In the event Russia or any other nation attacks Moldova, Poland, North Macedonia, or any other NATO member, the American people are now automatically at war. No national debate. No congressional declaration of war. No protests. Automatically at war, thanks to the Pentagon’s decision to entangle America in the old Cold War dinosaur NATO and, in the process, invite some 30 (yes, 30!) nations to join.

It’s time to get out. It’s time to make this Cold War dinosaur extinct. Our national well-being and perhaps even our very existence turn on returning to sound founding principles, especially “no entangling alliances.”

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Jacob G. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation. He was born and raised in Laredo, Texas, and received his B.A. in economics from Virginia Military Institute and his law degree from the University of Texas. He was a trial attorney for twelve years in Texas. He also was an adjunct professor at the University of Dallas, where he taught law and economics. In 1987, Mr. Hornberger left the practice of law to become director of programs at the Foundation for Economic Education. He has advanced freedom and free markets on talk-radio stations all across the country as well as on Fox News’ Neil Cavuto and Greta van Susteren shows and he appeared as a regular commentator on Judge Andrew Napolitano’s show Freedom Watch. View these interviews at LewRockwell.com and from Full Context. Send him email.

Washington Helped Trigger the Ukraine War

March 27th, 2022 by Ted Galen Carpenter

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***

An article by Yahoo national security correspondent Zach Dorfman praising U.S. intelligence agencies for accurately predicting Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine inadvertently highlights the extent of Washington’s military provocations in Ukraine during the period before the outbreak of hostilities. Those measures went well beyond the ill-advised political decision on the part of George Bush’s administration and its successors to push for Ukraine’s admission to NATO.

Earlier warnings from realist scholars that NATO’s eastward expansion to Russia’s border was poisoning relations with Moscow are finally getting attention in the establishment news media and generating a vigorous debate. A few analysts outside the realism and restraint camp even have conceded that trying to gain NATO membership for Ukraine may have been imprudent. But the magnitude of the aggressive moves taken by the Pentagon and CIA are just now becoming apparent.

For years, the Kremlin made it emphatically clear that inviting Ukraine to join NATO would cross a red line that threatened Russia’s vital security interests. However, it was never merely an issue of Kiev’s formal accession to the alliance. Comments from Russian President Vladimir Putin and other officials signaled that the truly intolerable development was Ukraine becoming a NATO military asset and an arena for the deployment of U.S. and NATO forces. That danger could—and ultimately did—arise, even though France and Germany continued to block a formal membership invitation.

Evidence grew in recent years that the United States had begun to treat Ukraine as a NATO ally in all but name. Steps included pouring nearly $3 billion in “security assistance” (primarily weaponry) into the country since 2014. Such armaments included the deadly Javelin anti-tank missiles. Military collaboration also included joint military exercises between U.S. and Ukrainian troops—and between NATO and Ukrainian forces. A segment on National Public Radio in 2019 featured U.S. officials preening about how such measures had strengthened Ukraine’s deterrence capabilities.

In his article, Dorfman documented the extent of other provocative military measures Washington pursued with respect to Ukraine. The CIA “made a series of covert moves that have helped prepare the Ukrainian security services for the current crisis. Shortly after Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, the agency initiated secret paramilitary training programs for Ukrainian special operations personnel in the U.S. and on Ukraine’s former eastern front.” (The eastern front was the Donbas region where Ukrainian forces were attempting to suppress Russian-backed separatist fighters.) Current and former intelligence officials clearly thought that those programs were especially clever initiatives, insisting that they “helped teach forces loyal to Kyiv the skills that have enabled it to mount an unexpectedly fierce resistance to the Russian onslaught.”

An earlier article by Dorfman noted that coordination between the United States and Ukraine on intelligence matters also expanded greatly after 2014 (following U.S. support for the Maidan revolution that overthrew Ukraine’s elected, pro-Russia president and Moscow’s subsequent annexation of Crimea). “U.S. and Ukrainian intelligence have even participated in joint offensive cyber operations against Russian government targets, according to former officials. CIA officials have also regularly traveled to Ukraine on intelligence exchanges, and Ukrainian intelligence officials have made reciprocal visits to the U.S. to swap information.” Dorfman quoted another “former senior official” who asserted that “in many ways the U.S.-Ukraine intelligence relationship “is about as robust” as Washington’s intelligence collaboration with “just about anybody else in Europe.” That last comment implicitly referred to NATO members.

Once again, the United States was treating Ukraine as a full-fledged, albeit still informal, NATO strategic ally. One has to wonder whether U.S. leaders were so arrogant and obtuse that they believed such missions could be pursued without Russia learning about them. If so, it was a serious miscalculation, if not an epic blunder. Conversely, if policymakers in the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations realized that Moscow would get wind of the intelligence and military collaboration, then they embraced an extraordinarily reckless set of provocations.

Engaging in a mental exercise based on role reversal illustrates the inherent danger of Washington’s policies. How would U.S. leaders (and the American people) react if China or some other major power engaged in ever-growing levels of intelligence and military cooperation with an anti-U.S. government in Canada or Mexico? The answer is rather obvious: Washington would be warning Beijing to back off, and it would be threatening Ottawa or Mexico City with dire consequences if such collaboration continued. It is difficult to explain why U.S. officials and members of the foreign policy elite were unable or unwilling to comprehend that Moscow would have a similar reaction to Washington’s provocations in Ukraine.

Predictably, such conduct ultimately produced a geopolitical explosion. U.S. and NATO officials used Ukraine as a strategic pawn against Russia and are now fuming with outrage at Moscow’s decision to go to war. Russia’s invasion was indeed a horrid overreaction, but it was far from being unprovoked. The Ukrainian people, unfortunately, are the ones paying a high price in blood for the gullibility of their country’s leaders and the shocking arrogance of U.S. leaders.

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Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow in defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute and a contributing editor at The American Conservative, is the author of 12 books and more than 950 articles on international affairs.

Featured image is from The Unz Review

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Joe Biden spoke to troops with the 82nd Airborne in Poland Friday, telling them what to expect to see when they go to Ukraine. Biden also appears to have let slip that some troops have already been in Ukraine. The White House later clarified there has been no change in U.S. policy about not sending troops to Ukraine. Who to believe, Biden or his handlers?

Transcribed by Gateway Pundit.

The Ukrainian people, Ukrainian people have a lot of backbone, they have a lot of guts. And I’m sure you’re observing it. And I don’t mean just the military which is, we’ve been training since back when they uh, Russia moved into the southeast, southeast um, Ukraine. But also the average citizen. Look at how they’re stepping up. Look at how they’re stepping up. And you’re gonna see when you’re there, and some of you have been there, you’re gonna see, you’re gonna see women, young people standing, standing in the middle, in front of damn tank just, just saying, “I’m not leaving, I’m holding my ground.” They’re incredible. But they take a lot of inspiration from us. And you know, woman who just died, the secretary of State used to have an expression, she said, “we are the essential nation.” It sounds like a bit of uh, hyperbole but the truth of the matter is you are the organizational principle around which the rest of the world, the free world is moving.”

Note: In addition to not remembering her name, Biden misquoted the late Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. She said in 1998,

“Let me say that we are doing everything possible so that American men and women in uniform do not have to go out there again. It is the threat of the use of force and our line-up there that is going to put force behind the diplomacy. But if we have to use force, it is because we are America; we are the indispensable nation. We stand tall and we see further than other countries into the future, and we see the danger here to all of us. I know that the American men and women in uniform are always prepared to sacrifice for freedom, democracy and the American way of life.”

Shorter version:

The White House clarified: “UPDATE: A @WhiteHouse spokesperson tells me: “The President has been clear we are not sending U.S. troops to Ukraine and there is no change in that position.”

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Kristinn Taylor has contributed to The Gateway Pundit for over ten years. Mr. Taylor previously wrote for Breitbart, worked for Judicial Watch and was co-leader of the D.C. Chapter of FreeRepublic.com. Mr. Taylor studied journalism in high school, visited the Newseum and once met David Brinkley. Mr. Taylor is on Twitter.

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Describing their findings as “particularly worrisome,” the authors of a study published Monday in Public Health Nutrition noted that in the U.S., the Dietary Guidelines for Americans form “the foundation for all national nutrition programs,” which amount to nearly $100 billion annually.

A study released Monday found 95% — 19 of the 20 members — of the U.S. government-run committee responsible for establishing dietary guidelines for Americans have one or more conflicts of interest (COIs) with industry actors in Big Food, Big Ag and Big Pharma.

The U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans Advisory Committee (DGAC) sets the guidelines used by U.S. policymakers, healthcare providers, nutrition educators and federal nutrition program operators, including those responsible for school lunch programs, on what foods and beverages “meet nutrient needs, promote health and prevent disease.”

According to the study, 129 industry actors had relationships with the 20 DGAC members, based on the COI disclosures submitted by the members of the committee.

Describing their findings as “particularly worrisome,” the authors of the study explained why this is a matter of public concern, noting that in the U.S., the Dietary Guidelines for Americans form “the foundation for all national nutrition programs,” which amount to nearly $100 billion annually.

The DGA also offers guidance to state and local governments, as well as healthcare professionals, hospitals, and community groups, among others, as “overarching dietary recommendations.”

The study’s authors added:

“Trustworthy dietary guidelines result from a transparent, objective, and science-based, process. Our analysis has shown that the significant and widespread COI on the committee prevent the DGA from achieving the recommended standard for transparency without mechanisms in place to make this information publicly available.

“Our findings here are particularly worrisome, as industry influence and COI can result in diverting the scientific process underpinning the U.S. national dietary guidelines, to one that is responsive to profit-driven interests rather than the public health.”

The study appeared in Public Health Nutrition, published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Nutrition Society, a UK-based nonprofit whose mission is to advance the scientific study of nutrition.

The DGAC, first convened in 1977, operates under the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The report, since its introduction in 1980, is revised and re-released every five years.

The DGAC’s latest report, issued in July 2020, led to the publication in December 2020 of the ninth version of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

Did committee members influence policy on breastmilk substitutes to promote product sales?

In an example of the depth and extent of the conflicts of interest identified, the authors of the study highlighted examples such as the following, involving food and nutritional products produced for infants and young children:

“[T]he Pregnancy and Lactation Subcommittee of the DGAC had six members, four of whom, or two thirds, had COI involving manufacturers of breastmilk substitutes: SD, RK, KD, JS [referring to DGAC committee members] all had instances of COI with Mead Johnson, and SD had COI with Wyeth and Abbot [sic].

“The Birth to Age 24 Months Subcommittee, which also addressed infant and young child nutrition, had four of its six members having COI involving manufacturers of breastmilk substitutes: SD, RK, KD also served on the Pregnancy and Lactation Subcommittee, with the same COI mentioned above; and TD had at least one COI with Abbott.

“There is evidence that those companies producing breastmilk substitutes regularly use science and try to influence policy in order to protect and promote the sales of their products, and their relationships with DGAC members may have had a direct impact on the work of those members.”

The study also highlighted the following findings:

“Our analysis found that 95% of the committee members had COI [conflicts of interest] with the food, and/or pharmaceutical industries and that particular actors, including Kellogg, Abbott, Kraft, Mead Johnson, General Mills, Dannon, and the International Life Sciences [Institute or ILSI] had connections with multiple members.

“Research funding and membership of an advisory/executive board jointly accounted for more than 60% of the total number of COI documented.

“We observed the existence of extensive, varied and long-standing relationships between some DGAC members and industry actors whose products are directly affected by the DGAC report ́s recommendations as well as the DGA themselves.

“[W]e can observe that Kellogg, Abbott, Kraft, Mead Johnson, ILSI, General Mills and Dannon are well-positioned to advance their interests within the DGAC given the existence of relationships (in some cases long-held) with several DGAC members.

“The most prevalent type of COI was research funding, followed by DGAC members being on a board/committee in a company, and consultant positions. Some industry actors, such as Mead Johnson, General Mills and Kellogg’s and the industry-funded organization, ILSI, have interacted with an extensive number of DGAC members.

“Conversely, other industry actors have prolonged relationships with only a handful of DGAC members. Amongst the top 15 industry actors by overall number of COI are ILSI and three trade associations or programs funded by them (California Walnut Commission, Almond Board of California and Beef Checkoff). Each of these actors has diverse means and ends to potentially influence scientific research and the DGA process.”

How ‘revolving door’ policies come into play

The apparent conflicts of interest also extend beyond the committee members themselves, as noted in the study:

“The use of what is called a ‘revolving door’ might also be problematic, with for example the Secretary of Agriculture, who spent much of his career in the agribusiness sector, having the ultimate say over the final content of the guidelines.

“In both cases, there seems to be an interplay between the strategic interests of industry actors, the professional interests of the researcher and, ultimately, the scientific work produced by the former.”

The study’s authors identified a possible “strategy by corporations to develop relationships that maximize their impact on science and policy,” and stated:

“DGAC members appear to disclose relationships each with a different group of industry actors, which are largely a reflection of how their own research speaks to a different industry sector, albeit most of them exhibit ties to corporations both in the food and pharmaceutical sectors.”

A fundamental lack of transparency?

Uncovering information about the 20 members of the DGAC, or even ascertaining who the members of the committee are, is challenging, in part, because the names of the members are buried in an appendix beginning on page 822 of the committee’s 835-page report.

While the report states that it provides “brief biographical information for each member of the 2020 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee as it relates to the Committee’s scope and charge,” none of the information provided appears to provide any indication of the conflicts of interest for any of the committee members.

This is of particular significance in light of the study’s finding that 95% of the committee members had at least one conflict of interest.

Indeed, according to the study, the top three committee members in terms of COIs identified were Sharon Donovan, Jamy Ard and Heather Leidy, with 152, 92 and 84 COIs identified, respectively, and identified connections to 31, 12 and 31 industry actors, respectively.

Another committee member, Richard Mattes, had 33 connections to industry actors, in addition to 65 COIs.

The authors of the study further noted the above figures may, in fact, understate the extent to which conflicts of interest actually exist, due to the criteria and time frame involved in the above determinations:

“Nonetheless, given that our method is also prone to underreporting, these percentages illustrate what are effectively the two main pillars underpinning long-term relationships between scientific experts and industry actors: (1) funding for research projects and (2) advisory roles in corporate boards.

“The current process for assessing COI, based on annually self-reported disclosures, does not capture the long-standing relationships between the DGAC and industry actors that we identified here.

“A ‘COI timespan’ of at least three-to-five years is normal, although our paper demonstrates that a longer timespan would be beneficial to understanding the breadth and depth of an expert’s long-term relationships with industry.

“Moreover, to be as thorough as possible, COI declarations should include past positions, revolving door situations, and COI involving third parties, such as industry front groups (e.g., ILSI).”

The study’s authors also questioned the transparency with which the members of the DGAC were selected in the first place, noting that the process was less than fully public:

“There is, in addition, a need for more transparency in the process for selecting DGAC members — a process where all pertinent information is made public (e.g., information contained in Form 450).

“The DGAC report states that Forms 450 were posted online, but we could not find them on the DGA website at the time of our data collection.

“It is this paper’s contention that the USDA-HHS should publicly post all COI of appointed DGAC members, as recommended by the 2017 NASEM [National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine] report permanently during and after completion of the DGA.”

According to the study, members of the DGAC are considered temporary federal workers, thereby requiring them to follow USDA ethics rules, and to “place loyalty to the United States Constitution, Federal laws, and ethical principles above private gain,” adding that they “may not ‘participate personally and substantially in a ‘particular matter’ in which [they] have a financial interest.”

Nevertheless, according to the study:

“In particular, the food industry has historically been observed to seek to influence the DGA process in its favor, for example by pushing for recommendations for particular foods or food groups, such as dairy products, grains or meat.

“For instance, of the comments submitted by organizations to the public consultation for selection of topics for the development of the 2020-25 DGA … nearly 70% were from industry actors, particularly those in the food industry.

“Moreover, trade associations such as the American Beverage Association, the Grocery Manufacturers Association (now the Consumer Brands Association), and the National Potato Council, as well as companies like Unilever, nominated experts to be appointed to the DGAC through an informal step.”

The study’s methodology

The study was conducted between January and February 2022, with the purpose of measuring the “incidence of conflicts of interest (COI) with food and pharmaceutical industry actors on the advisory committee for the 2020-2025 U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) and assess the adequacy of current mechanisms to disclose and manage COI among the committee’s members.”

Searches were conducted by the study’s authors during the two-month period, utilizing publicly available data.

The authors defined a conflict of interest as any relationship “between a DGAC member and an industry actor in a given year.”

Specifically, according to the authors:

“We documented the year in which the COI was disclosed as the year for which the COI existed, even if the relationship between the DGAC members and the organization might have been maintained for a longer period of time than that disclosed.

“Furthermore, lacking evidence to the contrary, we considered funding from industry to be a COI for any DGAC member who is a co-author on a study sponsored by industry.

“We argue that the time dimension is important in order to shed light on long-term relationships between industry and DGAC members. Therefore, we considered COI without date restrictions, allowing us to go as far back in time as information is publicly available.

“We focused on the COI of DGAC members with corporate actors from the food, drink and pharmaceutical industries, as well as third parties working with them such as trade associations or front groups.

“We included pharmaceutical companies, because some sell infant nutrition products and often offer devices or drugs that compete with food-based solutions to chronic diseases.

“We took a conservative approach using exclusively primary data to obtain evidence of a COI. We considered primary data sources as those platforms where information about COI is disclosed either directly by a DGAC member (e.g., scientific publication or a Curriculum Vitae), or by the institutions to which they were affiliated (e.g., bios on institutional websites).

“Primary data sources were excluded where a COI was discussed without a reference to the original information source.”

Further remarking on the possibility that there are even more COIs that were not identified by the study, Nina Teicholz of The Nutrition Coalition, one of the study’s authors, told The Defender in an email:

“It is true that some evidence of COI has disappeared from the Internet after various groups (including the Nutrition Coalition here and here) published articles on the committee’s COIs.

If these were not on the internet at the time of this paper’s search, then we did not include them.”

In summarizing the significance of their findings, and the importance of the DGA’s role in providing nutritional guidance to the American public, the authors did not mince words:

“It is critical to underscore the DGA’s impact on public health, especially for communities who are most impacted by diet-related diseases.

“For Americans to be able to trust the guidance from the DGA as sound, objective, and science-based, it is imperative to ensure that each step of the process, from the selection and appointment of the DGAC to the final release of the DGA, is publicly accessible, transparently administered, and largely free of COI and influence from actors whose profit-driven interests are often at odds with those in public health.

“Our analysis of COI of DGAC members has shown that this is far from true.”

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Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D., is an independent journalist and researcher based in Athens, Greece.

Featured image is from CHD

NATO Wants a Ground-War in Ukraine?

March 26th, 2022 by Mike Whitney

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“While the US succeeded in goading the Russian government to take the first shot, it is clear that the war in Ukraine is the first stage of a much broader conflict. Having provoked the Russian government into a desperate and disastrous invasion of Ukraine, the United States is using the war to reassert its global hegemony, building a war coalition for what the United States has termed “great power conflict” targeting not only Russia, but China as well.” Andre Damon, World Socialist Web Site

“What is important to our managerial and foreign policy elites, is, above all, the major effort and push for a globalist “Great Reset” using the Ukrainian conflict to finally accomplish their objective of bringing the entire world in accord with their plans for a New World Order. And to do that, Russia, which now stands athwart their designs, must be diminished and brought into line.” Boyd D. Cathey, The Unz Review

Why is NATO sending more lethal weaponry to Ukraine?

Didn’t Putin say that pouring arms into Ukraine would increase the likelihood of war?

Yes, he did, but the US and NATO continue sending more shipments anyway. Why?

And why does Ukraine need more weapons?

Could it be that Ukraine’s 600,000-strong military is collapsing like a trailer park in a hurricane? Is that it? Is that why NATO had an emergency confab in Brussels on Thursday to restate their support for a NATO-trained army that has not successfully launched even one major counteroffensive against the Russian military?

The media insists that the Russian offensive “has stalled”. Is that what you call it when your opponent captures an area the size of the UK in less than 3 weeks or when all your air and naval assets have been obliterated or when your Command-and-Control centers have gone up in smoke or when most of your combat troops are either encircled by Russian forces or fleeing to locations west of the Dnieper River? Is that what “stalled” looks like?

Do you get the impression that the media is not being entirely straightforward in their coverage of the war in Ukraine? Do you think that maybe their WEF-linked owners might have a dog in this fight? Here’s how Archbishop Vigano summed it up recently in an article linking “Covid tyranny” to the war in Ukraine:

“The ideological continuity between the pandemic farce and the Russian-Ukrainian crisis continues to emerge, beyond the evidence of the events and statements of the subjects involved, in the fact that the ultimate perpetrators of both are the same, all attributable to the globalist cabal of the World Economic Forum.” (“Exclusive: Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò”, Gateway Pundit)

Truer words were never spoken. It’s all manipulation by globalist “stakeholders” pursuing their own narrow interests. As for the war, check out this analysis from a post at Larry Johnson’s new blog A Son of the New American Revolution. I can’t vouch for the author, but he sounds a lot more credible than CNN:

“Official claims of a major Ukrainian counteroffensive near Kiev are completely fake; it’s totally made-up, it never happened—they simply don’t have a coherent military force in the Kiev area that’s capable of conducting an organized counteroffensive. All they have in and around Kiev is various bits and pieces including police and army special forces, civilian militia, regular police, some air defense, and a few artillery batteries. It’s not an offensive force—it’s a crazy quilt. …

What’s left of the Ukrainian army east of the Dniepr river is running out of diesel, and should be out of tube and rocket artillery munitions (and in fact, artillery) by the first week of April. Outside of the Donbass, it’s a war of attrition, with Russia wearing away the Ukraine’s ability to fight, using stand-off weapons (air and missiles) first and foremost. On Sunday, Russia hit a cache of munitions that was being hidden—Hamas-style—at a “vacant” retail and sports complex in downtown Kiev. Russia is finding tons and tons of Ukrainian army materiel, and methodically destroying them….

Russian and Donetsk/Lugansk forces have picked up so many U.S. and British antitank weapons, it’s visually documented they’re now using them on the battlefield. ..

And, the Stinger missile project has failed totally—Uncle Sam & Co. have moved and continue to move hundreds of Stingers into the Ukraine, but it’s only been documented to have brought down about seven manned aircraft since the invasion, and none in the last ten days or so. Some of those hundreds will get out and be sold and… perhaps you shouldn’t fly internationally anymore…

I’m not looking to sugarcoat it for Russia—those Ukrainian military units that did not simply melt away and disappear in the first days, are putting up a fight. But at some point, very likely in the first half of April, they will simply run out of everything, and they will crumble and then the Russian and Donetsk/Lugansk forces will take all or most of “Left Bank” (east of the Dnieper) Ukraine. (“Dreizin Report–Poland prepares to intervene, Ukraine slides into dictatorship”, Jacob Dreizin, The Son of a New American Revolution)

Yes, but can the author be trusted?

I don’t know but– let’s face it– when the media lies relentlessly for 4 years about “Russian collusion” followed by another 2 years of “Everyone’s going to die from the flu”; any critical thinking person is going to look for other sources of information, right? It’s a credibility issue, and, regrettably, “credibility” is a term that is never applied to the mainstream media.

So, where do we go from here?

Good question; and you can see from NATO’s statement that leaders in Washington and across Europe are determined to throw more gas on the fire. That’s the message they’re sending to the world; ‘We are united in our determination to defeat Russia whether we blow up the planet or not.’ Got it? Here’s a clip from their declaration on Thursday:

“Since 2014, we have provided extensive support to Ukraine’s ability to exercise that right. We have trained Ukraine’s armed forces, strengthening their military capabilities and capacities and enhancing their resilience. NATO Allies have stepped up their support and will continue to provide further political and practical support to Ukraine as it continues to defend itself. …..We remain determined to maintain coordinated international pressure on Russia. We will continue to coordinate closely with relevant stakeholders and other international organizations, including the European Union.

Russia’s unprovoked war against Ukraine represents a fundamental challenge to the values and norms that have brought security and prosperity to all on the European continent” (“Statement by NATO Heads of State and Government”, NATO)

Are you surprised that NATO would openly boast about arming and training thousands of Ukrainian combatants since 2014? What if an enemy of the United States did the same thing in Mexico or Canada. How would the US react? Here’s how Noam Chomsky put it:

“… for Ukraine to join NATO would be rather like Mexico joining a China-run military alliance, hosting joint maneuvers with the Chinese army and maintaining weapons aimed at Washington. To insist on Mexico’s sovereign right to do so would surpass idiocy. Washington’s insistence on Ukraine’s sovereign right to join NATO is even worse, since it sets up an insurmountable barrier to a peaceful resolution of a crisis that is already a shocking crime and will soon become much worse unless resolved — by the negotiations that Washington refuses to join.” (Truthout)

It looks to me like Chomsky thinks arming Ukraine was a deliberate provocation. Which it was. NATO stuffed the country full of weapons, trained its combat troops and paramilitaries, conducted military operations with NATO, ordered their army to the east so they could terrorize the ethnic Russian population, and then– to top it off– threatened to develop nuclear weapons. In short, they put a gun to Putin’s head and threatened to blow his brains out. If that’s not a provocation, then what is? Here’s more from an article at the WSWS:

(NATO chief) Stoltenberg’s historical reference point was not the Russian invasion of Ukraine last month but the 2014 fascist-led coup that turned Ukraine into a proxy for NATO. “Since 2014, [NATO] Allies have trained Ukraine’s armed forces and significantly strengthened their capabilities. They are putting that training into practice now, on the front lines, with great bravery.”

Stoltenberg made no effort to conceal NATO’s massive military buildup of Ukrainian forces over the past eight years. NATO, he said, has been “providing anti-tank and air defense systems, drones, fuel and ammunition. As well as financial aid.”

He went on, “I would like to commend the courage and the professionalism of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. I have met them in Ukraine, and we are all aware that compared to where they were back in 2014, this is a totally different force than eight years ago. The Ukrainian Armed Forces today is much bigger, much better equipped, much better trained, much better commanded. They have much better logistics than they had back in 2014.” (“NATO meets to plot next stage in Ukraine proxy war”, World Socialist Web Site)

Stoltenberg can hardly conceal his elation over the ‘courage and the professionalism” of his NWO army that is acting as cannon fodder in a US proxy-war with Russia. But do the brave Ukrainians that are fighting in this fiasco, know what they’re fighting for?

No, they don’t. They think they’re risking their lives for their country, but, actually, they’re fighting to preserve US global hegemony by annihilating Russia, encircling China and establishing America’s dominance over the world’s most populous and prosperous region of the next century. That’s what they’re fighting for, Washington’s “pivot to Asia”. As the author of the WSWS article admits:

“It is clear that what is involved is not only a war in Ukraine, but a campaign by the US and NATO imperialist powers for war against Russia and a redivision of the world.”

Yes, that’s right, and Biden doesn’t even try to hide it. Here’s what he said just two days ago:

“Now is a time when things are shifting. … There’s going to be a new world order out there, and we’ve got to lead it.” (Biden Talks NWO,You Tube)

“New World Order”? You mean, this isn’t about “Ukraine’s borders”, after all?

Nope. That’s all patriotic claptrap dolled-up for the serfs. Here’s how Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov summed it up on Tuesday:

“This is not about Ukraine, this is about a world order in which the United States wants to be the sole sovereign and dominate… This all is about removing the obstacle in the form of Russia on the way to building a unipolar world.”

Indeed, that is the objective, and the US is not going to be timid in pursuing its interests. China and Russia are under the illusion that the emergence of various “power centers” will inevitably bring about change in the global order. But the world doesn’t work that way. The world leader will not willingly concede defeat or graciously abdicate the throne. He must be knocked from his pedestal much like the schoolyard bully must be subdued through force. Regrettably, Ukraine is shaping up to be the battleground where these matters are going to be resolved through force of arms.

In any event, we should try to go beyond the media’s propaganda and see if we can identify the real causes of the current conflict. Why, for example, is the US targeting Russia? In what way is Russia an “obstacle” that is blocking Washington’s strategic ambitions?

The former Undersecretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz, answers that question in one short paragraph written more than two decades ago. It is as relevant today as it was then:

“Our first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the territory of the former Soviet Union or elsewhere, that poses a threat on the order of that posed formerly by the Soviet Union. This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defense strategy and requires that we endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power.”

In short, Washington sees Russia as a “hostile power” because it sits atop an ocean of oil and gas reserves and because it “defiantly” conducts its own independent foreign policy. For these reasons, Russia is Uncle Sam’s mortal enemy.

Second, Russia’s has been gradually strengthening ties with Europe posing a serious challenge to US economic dominance. The building of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline– which would have greatly increased Europe’s dependency on Russian gas– meant that Washington’s influence would steadily erode while Europe and Asia would move closer to a common economic area in which neither the US Dollar nor NATO security would be necessary. This is why Washington went to such great lengths to provoke Russia to invade Ukraine. They needed to force the severing of economic ties to prevent further integration with EU markets.

The third reason why Russia has become Washington’s Enemy Number 1, is because the US is currently “rebalancing” assets and resources to the Asia-Pacific to take advantage of the anticipated growth-surge in the region. Hillary Clinton famously referred to this as “the pivot to Asia”, a term that was coined in a speech she delivered in 2011. Here’s what she said:

“Harnessing Asia’s growth and dynamism is central to American economic and strategic interests and a key priority for President Obama. Open markets in Asia provide the United States with unprecedented opportunities for investment, trade, and access to cutting-edge technology…..American firms (need) to tap into the vast and growing consumer base of Asia…The future of politics will be decided in Asia, not Afghanistan or Iraq, and the United States will be right at the center of the action…” (“America’s Pacific Century”,Secretary of State Hillary Clinton”, Foreign Policy Magazine, 2011)

Those are the geopolitical imperatives driving the conflict:

  1. “To prevent the re-emergence of a new rival on the territory of the former Soviet Union that can dominate their own resources and, thus, challenge US power.
  2. The threat of further economic integration that would unavoidably lead to a massive free trade zone spanning Europe and Asia.
  3. The “pivot” plan to dominate the world’s most populous and prosperous region of the next century.

These are the three strategic policies that are fueling the war. They only relate to Ukraine inasmuch as Ukraine is the unfortunate staging-ground for the “Great Power Conflict” which is steadily gaining momentum. Tuesday’s recommendation, by Polish political leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynsk, that he would recommend that peacekeepers be sent to Ukraine shows that NATO is planning a major escalation of the conflict in the very near future. According to Reuters, Kaczynsk, will propose that:

“An international peacekeeping mission should be sent to Ukraine and be given the means to defend itself….

“I think that it is necessary to have a peace mission – NATO, possibly some wider international structure – but a mission that will be able to defend itself, which will operate on Ukrainian territory,” Kaczynski told a news conference.”

“It will be a mission that will strive for peace, to give humanitarian aid, but at the same time it will also be protected by appropriate forces, armed forces,” said Kaczynski, who is seen as the main decision-maker in Poland.” (“Top Polish politician calls for peacekeeping mission in Ukraine”, Reuters)

Think about that for a minute. Think about what it would mean. The peacekeeping mission:

  1. “will operate on Ukrainian territory (where Russia is carrying out its military operation)
  2. will be able to defend itself. (which means they will be armed.)
  3. will be (protected by) “some wider international structure” (NATO)

Does anyone think this sounds like a good idea? Won’t this  force Russia to treat the NATO personnel as enemy belligerents that are interfering with their military operation?

Of course, it will. So, what are they trying to achieve; WW3? Is that the point? And what does this tell us about Washington’s strategy for Ukraine?

It also tells us that NATO is preparing to engage Russia militarily within Ukraine. That’s what it tells us. Until today, most people had assumed that NATO would not engage Russia militarily because they believed that would greatly increase the prospects of a nuclear exchange. But that is not how the foreign policy establishment sees things. After dealing with Putin for over 20 years, they see Putin as a rational actor who will not escalate unless Russia faces an imminent existence-threat. (A nuclear attack) In other words, the foreign policy mandarins have made the calculation that they can engage Putin in a bloody and protracted ground-war– that will drain Russia’s resources and destroy its economy– without Putin using his nuclear arsenal. It is a risky strategy but not entirely unreasonable given Putin’s behavior in the past. Putin has always been extremely cautious and never impulsive. The foreign policy wonks think they can use that against him. Like we said, it is a high-risk strategy.

Naturally, Russia is appalled by the ‘peacekeeper idea’ as it makes a clash between the two nuclear-armed superpowers almost unavoidable. Here’s what Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in response to the news:

“Our Polish colleagues have already stated that there will be a NATO summit now, and peacekeepers should be deployed. I hope they understand what is at stake. This will be a direct clash between the Russian and NATO armed forces, which everyone not only wanted to avoid but said that it should never take place in principle.”

Is Lavrov being overly courteous?

Yes, he is. If the United States had issued the warning, they would have said something much more ominous, like this:

“Any armed formations will be treated as legitimate enemy targets and destroyed. Full stop.”

That’s how you deliver a warning. You don’t try to ingratiate yourself with the person who wants to kill your soldiers and erase your country from the map. That doesn’t make any sense at all. If there was ever a time for straight talk, this is it. Lives are at stake.

The “peacekeeper” incident suggests something I’ve suspected for quite a while; that Washington is itching for a land-war in Ukraine, and to some extent, it makes sense. It further polarizes and weakens Russia, it unites the allies around a common cause, and it reinforces NATO’s role as guarantor of regional security. The downside, of course, is that the conflict could quickly escalate leading to a full-blown nuclear war. I believe the neocons at the State Department do not see that as a plausible scenario, so they are pushing as hard as they can to intensify the fighting. Here’s a short clip from the piece by veteran Jacob Dreizin who appears to see things the same way:

“I am confident that, out of impotent rage if nothing else, NATO forces will move into western Ukraine from Poland by mid-April at the latest, if the war is still on by then. The heavy equipment is already there near the border; bringing in the personnel to link up with it is the easy part. With the recent Russian bombing of the U.S./UK “Ho Chi Minh trail” hub at the Yavorov base near the Polish border, they will get in on the ground … to make a statement like, “Not again, because we’re here openly now.”

No, Brandon doesn’t want to do it, but the hawks in Congress and the MSM are running the show now. There will be escalation. It is baked into the cake. In fact, I predicted before the invasion that Poland would take advantage of the war to create a protectorate in western Ukraine, and I stand by my prediction…” (“Dreizin Report–Poland prepares to intervene, Ukraine slides into dictatorship”,Jacob Dreizin, The Son of a New American Revolution)

I think Dreizin is onto something here. Brandon is not on board with the planned escalation, but it might not matter, because the State Department is a hotbed of neocons that are doing whatever they can to grease the skids for a scorched earth, no-holds-barred cage-match with their most-reviled rival, Vladimir Putin.

It’s the State Department, the Intel agencies, the Congress and the media that are steering the ship of state now, not Biden. Perhaps, you wondered why the NY Times suddenly decided to ‘come clean’ on the Hunter Biden laptop story? You probably know that it’s not because the Times editors had a change-of-heart and wanted to inform the public or “speak truth to power”. Of course, not. The Times trotted out the laptop dossier to let Biden know that they “got him by the shorthairs” and if he doesn’t play ball, he’s toast.

Blackmail? Would the neocons really blackmail the President of the United States in order to escalate in Ukraine?

You bet, they would.

The neocons have their heart-set on a land-war war in Europe, and from the looks of things, they might just get one.

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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.

Mike Whitney, renowned geopolitical and social analyst based in Washington State. He initiated his career as an independent citizen-journalist in 2002 with a commitment to honest journalism, social justice and World peace.

He is Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

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First published on March 24, 2022

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“We must recommit ourselves to the work of strengthening our democracies, and demonstrate the principled leadership people are looking for,” said Trudeau at the European Parliament.

See what happened after Trudeau’s historic failed address to the European Parliament. (Scroll down)

No analysis by Canada’s mainstream media.

 

Video: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addresses the European Parliament

 

Earlier statement by Romanian MEP Christian Terhes, followed by March 23 statement.

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First published on February 25, 2022

 

 

 

Sunlight is the best disinfectant.  A promotional video from the Canadian Bankers Association (CBA) helps to neatly connect all the dots about why the Canadian government made such a quick reversal in their bank asset seizures in the last 24 hours {Go Deep}.  And yes, as we suspected, it was almost certainly contact from the World Economic Forum to Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland that triggered the change in position.

When Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland announced they would use the Emergency Act declaration to target the financial support systems, banks and accounts of the people who were protesting against COVID mandates, they not only undermined the integrity of the Canadian banking system – but they also inadvertently stuck a wrench into the plans of the World Economic Forum and the collaborative use of the Canadian Bankers Association to create a digital id.

Against the backdrop of the Canadian government action, WATCH THIS VIDEO:

If the Canadian government can arbitrarily block citizen access to their banking institution without any due process, what does that say about the system the Canadian Banking Association (CBA) was putting into place as part of their Digital ID network?

If the CBA digital identity were in place, the same people targeted by Trudeau’s use of the Emergency Act would have their entire identity blocked by the same government measures.  The realization of the issue, reflected by a severe undermining of faith in the banking system, is a dramatic problem for those working to create and promote the Digital ID.

It is not coincidental the financial targeting mechanism deployed by Trudeau/Freeland, the Canadian banking system, is the same system being used to create the digital identity.  As a result of the government targeting bank accounts, Finance Minister Freeland just created a reference point for those who would argue against allowing the creation of a comprehensive digital identity.

The motive for the World Economic Forum and Canadian Bankers Association to immediately reach out to Trudeau and Freeland and tell them to back off their plan is crystal clear.  THAT is almost certainly why Freeland appeared so admonished, shocked and incapable of getting her footing yesterday {Go Deep}, and why the Canadian government simultaneously informed Parliament they were unfreezing the bank accounts.

Justin Trudeau and Chrystia Freeland essentially broke the financial code of Omerta, by highlighting how easy it is for government to seize your bank accounts, credit cards, retirement accounts, insurance, mortgages, loan access and cut you off from money (without due process).

The unintended consequence was an immediate and clear reference point if government did the same action with a digital ID in place.

However, this undermined confidence and faith in the banking system cannot be restored quickly.  The toothpaste cannot be put back into the tube. The horse has left the barn.

Quickly this becomes a moment for immediate damage control by the Canadian government. This explains why Justin Trudeau dropped the declaration of the Emergency Act.

It all makes sense now.  All of it.

Indeed, the government leaders who take their instructions from the multinational corporations in charge of the World Economic Forum, which is to say almost all of them, are so entrenched in their need to use COVID-19 as the pry bar for the Build Back Better agenda, they simply cannot let it go.

Without COVID-19, they can’t keep the vaccination push.  Without the vaccination push, they can’t keep the vaccine passport process in place.  Without the vaccination passport registration process to track and monitor human behavior, the governing authorities cannot fulfill the mission of a comprehensive digital identity and social credit tracking system.  Indeed, everything they seek is contingent upon keeping the premise of COVID-19 alive.

It is not accidental the World Economic Forum is at the epicenter of this

As we previously noted, the architects of the Build Back Better society (WEF) are guiding various governments on ways to create efficient registration and compliance systems, i.e. ways that permit citizens to prove their vaccinated and compliant status.  As these discussions are taking place, it is prudent to pause and think very carefully, wisely.

We all know, as we are reading this, under the guise of enhancing our safety, the U.S. Federal Government is in discussions with the medical community, multinational corporations and employers of citizens to create a more efficient process for you to register your vaccine compliance.

We know their conversation under the terminology of a COVID Passport.  The current goal is to make a system for us to show and prove our authorized work status, which, as you know, is based on your obedience to a mandated vaccine.

Beta tests are being conducted in various nations, each with different perspectives and constitutional limitations, based on pesky archaic rules and laws that govern freedom.

For the western, or for lack of a better word ‘democratic‘ outlook, Australia, New Zealand, France and Europe are leading the way with their technological system of vaccination check points and registered state/national vaccination status tied to your registration identification.

New York City joined the vaccine checkpoint process, as their city now requires the vaccine to enter all private businesses.  Los Angeles soon followed.

The Australian electronic checkpoints are essentially gateways where QR codes are being scanned from the cell phones of the compliant vaccinated citizen. Yes comrades, there’s an app for that.

Currently, the vaccine status scans are registered by happy compliance workers, greeters at the entry to the business or venue. Indeed, the Walmart greeter has a new gadget to scan your phone prior to allowing you custody of a shopping cart.

In restaurants, the host or hostess has a similar compliance scanner to check you in prior to seating or a reservation confirmation.

It’s simple and fun. You pull up your QR code on your cell phone (aka portable transponder and registration device), using the registration app, and your phone is scanned delivering a green check response to confirm your correct vaccination status and authorized entry.

The Australian government, at both a federal and state level, is working closely with Big Tech companies (thirsting for the national contract) to evaluate the best universal process that can be deployed nationwide.

As noted by all six Premiers in the states down under, hardware (scanners) and software (registration) systems are all being tested to find the most comprehensive/convenient portable units to settle upon. Meanwhile in the U.S., cities like Los Angeles and New York await the beta test conclusion before deploying their own version of the same process.

In Europe, they are also testing their vaccine checkpoint and registration processes known as the EU “Green Pass.”

The “Green Pass” is a similar technological system that gives a vaccinated and registered citizen access to all the venues and locations previously locked down while the COVID-19 virus was being mitigated. What would have been called a “vast right-wing conspiracy theory” 24 months ago, is now a COVID passport process well underway.

As with all things in our rapid technological era, you do not have to squint to see the horizon and accept that eventually this process will automate, and there will be a gadget or scanning gateway automatically granting you access without a person needing to stand there and scan each cell phone QR code individually.

The automated process just makes sense. You are well aware your cell phone already transmits an electronic beacon enabling your Uber or Lyft driver access to your location at the push of a touchscreen button, another convenient app on your phone. So, why wouldn’t the gateways just accept this same recognizable transmission as registration of your vaccine compliant arrival at the coffee shop?

The automated version is far easier and way cooler than having to reach into your pocket or purse and pulling up that pesky QR code on the screen. Smiles everyone, the partnership between Big Tech and Big Government is always there to make your transit more streamline and seamless. Heck, you won’t even notice the electronic receiver mounted at the entry. Give it a few weeks and you won’t remember the reason you were laughing at Alex Jones any more than you remember why you are taking off your shoes at the airport.

However, as this process is created, it is worth considering that you are being quietly changed from an individual person to a product. Some are starting to worry in the beta test:

[…] “you must become an object with attributes sitting in a database. Instead of roaming around anonymously making all sorts of transactions without the government’s knowledge, Australians find themselves passing through ‘gates’. …

All product-based systems have these gates to control the flow of stock and weed out errors. It is how computers see things. The more gates, the more clarity.

You are updating the government like a parcel pings Australia Post on its way to a customer. If a fault is found, automatic alerts are issued, and you are stopped from proceeding. In New South Wales, this comes in the form of a big red ‘X’ on the myGov vaccine passport app (if you managed to link your Medicare account without smashing the phone to bits).

Gate-keeping systems have been adapted from retail and transformed into human-based crowd solutions to micromanage millions of lives with the same ruthless efficiency as barcodes tracking stock. There is no nuance or humanity in this soulless digital age. Barcodes are binary. Good – bad. Citizen or dissident.

Even if you have all the required government attributes to pass through the gates – two vaccines, six boosters, and a lifelong subscription to Microsoft – something could go wrong. If your data fails the scan, you’ll slip into digital purgatory and become an error message. (read more)

It could be problematic if your status fails to register correctly, or if the system identifies some form of alternate lifestyle non-compliance that will block you from entry. Then again, that’s what beta tests are for, working out all these techno bugs and stuff. Not to worry…. move along….

Then again… “For those in the privileged class allowed to shop, take note of Covid signs which encourage cashless transactions under the guise of ‘health’. Messaging around cards being ‘safer’ will increase until the Treasury tries to remove cash entirely, almost certainly with public approval.”

Wait, now we are squinting at that familiar image on the horizon because we know those who control things have been talking about a cashless society for quite a while.

We also know that data is considered a major commodity all by itself. Why do you think every system you encounter in the modern era requires your phone number even when you are not registering for anything. It, meaning you, us, are all getting linked into this modern registration system that is defining our status. We also know that system operators buy and sell our registered status amid various retail and technology systems.

Yeah, that opaque shadow is getting a little clearer now.

Perhaps you attempt to purchase dog food and get denied entry into Pet Smart because you didn’t renew the car registration.  Or perhaps you are blocked from entry because you forgot to change the oil on the leased vehicle you drive, and Toyota has this weird agreement with some retail consortium.   You head to the oil change place that conveniently pops up in the citizen compliance App –it’s only two blocks away– they clear the alert after they do the oil change, and you are gateway compliant again.

Missed your booster shot? We’re sorry citizen, your bank account is frozen until your compliance is restored… please proceed to the nearest vaccination office as displayed conveniently on your cell phone screen to open access to all further gates (checkpoints)…. tap to continue!

Vote for the wrong candidate?  Attend, or donate to, a trucker protest?

Yes, it seemed transparently obvious where this was heading, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau just awakened the masses:

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Over the past month, both the mainstream and alternative media worldwide have focused on the Russian military intervention in Ukraine. It was launched in response to almost nine years of Western provocations since the Euromaidan colour revolution saw the democratically elected Moscow-friendly President Viktor Yanukovych overthrown and replaced with the successive pro-Western governments of Petro Poroshenko and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whose eight year long war on the breakaway Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, involving the use of neo-Nazi paramilitaries such as the Azov Battalion and the ethnic cleansing of both Republics’ predominantly ethic Russian populations, would act as a catalyst for the Russian Federation to intervene militarily in its Western neighbour – with attempts to resolve the situation peacefully by Moscow over the past several months having ultimately amounted to nothing following Kiev’s refusal to implement its’ side of the Minsk Agreements, which would have granted Donetsk and Luhansk a degree of autonomy while still remaining under Ukrainian rule.

In the past week however, the corporate media, has noticeably, in lockstep, switched its focus back to COVID-19, specifically the new ‘BA.2 variant’, and the positive tests of high-profile figures such as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Jen Psaki and Doug Emhoff, husband of US Vice President Kamala Harris  – media attention which has not been seen since multiple countries worldwide simultaneously dropped all restrictions at the end of January, during the highly coincidental timing of the World Economic Forum’s Davos Agenda virtual event.

This sudden coordinated pivot back to the Covid mainstream media narrative, one that was  suddenly dropped in a similar lockstep fashion two months ago, raises many questions. And with the recent confirmation by current Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland – herself instrumental in the original Euromaidan regime change operation – that US-funded labs in Ukraine were developing bioweapons, as well as allegations by the White House that Russia is planning to use chemical weapons as part of the current military operation, there is indication that the sudden media switch to Covid may be used as a means to clear the stage for a deadly escalation in Ukraine – a false flag chemical attack or lab leak, blamed on Russia by the West, and used as means for NATO to launch a ‘No Fly Zone’ over Ukraine, clamoured for by current Ukrainian President Zelenskyy.

Indeed, the staging of a false flag chemical attack as a means to encourage a US-led military intervention is a tactic with very recent usage by Washington’s Neocons.

In 2017, the Syrian Arab Republic had been in the grip of a six-year long regime change operation launched in response to President Bashar al-Assad’s refusal to allow Western-allied Qatar to build a pipeline through his country. Unlike Libya however, subjected to a similar regime change operation at the same time and overrun and destroyed in the space of eight months by Western-backed terrorists, Syria had been successfully able to withstand the similar Western-backed onslaught launched against its territory, thanks in part to interventions by its’ allies Iran and Russia, which would lead to the regime-change lobby taking reckless measures.

On the 4th of April 2017, a false flag chemical attack would be launched in the Syrian town of Khan Shaykhun, resulting in the then-US administration of Donald Trump launching a cruise missile strike against the Syrian government-controlled Shayrat airbase three days later, the first direct military engagement between the West and Damascus since the regime change operation began, though one that just stopped short of the full-scale military intervention that the Neocons had hoped for.

Undeterred, a similar false flag attack would be launched almost a year to the day later in the city of Douma, this time resulting in the US, Britain and France launching air strikes against Syrian government targets, though again stopping short of a Libya-style ‘No Fly Zone’.

Now with the near inevitability that the stage is being set for the same script to be played out in Ukraine – possibly around the end of May when the World Economic Forum is due to hold its’ first in-person summit in two years – the world must prepare itself for preventing the possible consequences, of a ‘limited’ strike against Russian military infrastructure, similar to what happened in Syria, which could potentially result in the gravest consequence of all – World War III.

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Gavin O’Reilly is an activist from Dublin, Ireland, with a strong interest in the effects of British and US Imperialism. Secretary of the Dublin Anti-Internment Committee, a campaign group set up to raise awareness of Irish Republican political prisoners in British and 26 County jails. His work has previously appeared on American Herald Tribune, The Duran, Al-Masdar and MintPress News.

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.


Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War” 

by Michel Chossudovsky

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Michel Chossudovsky is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), which hosts the critically acclaimed website www.globalresearch.ca . He is a contributor to the Encyclopedia Britannica. His writings have been translated into more than 20 languages.

Reviews

“This book is a ‘must’ resource – a richly documented and systematic diagnosis of the supremely pathological geo-strategic planning of US wars since ‘9-11’ against non-nuclear countries to seize their oil fields and resources under cover of ‘freedom and democracy’.”
John McMurtry, Professor of Philosophy, Guelph University

“In a world where engineered, pre-emptive, or more fashionably “humanitarian” wars of aggression have become the norm, this challenging book may be our final wake-up call.”
-Denis Halliday, Former Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations

Michel Chossudovsky exposes the insanity of our privatized war machine. Iran is being targeted with nuclear weapons as part of a war agenda built on distortions and lies for the purpose of private profit. The real aims are oil, financial hegemony and global control. The price could be nuclear holocaust. When weapons become the hottest export of the world’s only superpower, and diplomats work as salesmen for the defense industry, the whole world is recklessly endangered. If we must have a military, it belongs entirely in the public sector. No one should profit from mass death and destruction.
Ellen Brown, author of ‘Web of Debt’ and president of the Public Banking Institute  

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On Monday, President Joe Biden said “evolving intelligence” indicates Russia is preparing a massive cyberattack against the United States in response to its support for Ukraine. “The magnitude of Russia’s cyber capacity is fairly consequential and it’s coming,” Biden said.

Days prior to Biden’s remarks, an FBI advisory issued to US businesses warned “Kremlin-linked hackers could target US organizations as the Russian military continues to suffer heavy losses in Ukraine and as Western sanctions on the Kremlin begin to bite,” reports CNN.

Anne Neuberger, Biden’s national security adviser, said during a White House press briefing on Monday Russia is preparing “preparatory activity” for a cyber attack on the United States and its allies. She declared the coming attacks are “not about espionage, it’s probably very likely about disruptive or destructive [cyber] activity” in response to US assistance to Ukraine. The following day, US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Jen Easterly made similar remarks to business executives, according to CNN.

(It should be noted Neuberger is a Zionist and thus an ardent defender of Israel; the Yehuda and Anne Neuberger Foundation has “donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobby known as AIPAC, for its efforts to influence the US government and public opinion,” David Corn reported for Mother Jones in 2021.)

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said in February a Russian cyberattack “on one will be regarded as an attack on all,” a statement that invokes NATO’s Article 5 of the Washington Treaty. “Article 5 provides that if a NATO Ally is the victim of an armed attack, each and every other member of the Alliance will consider this act of violence as an armed attack against all members and will take the actions it deems necessary to assist the Ally attacked,” explains the NATO web page.

The United States, and especially Joe Biden and his  son, Hunter Biden, have a vested interest in making certain Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the color revolution installed government of Ukraine remain in power.

The fact is the US, under the State Department and Obama’s Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs, Victoria Nuland, and the US Ambassador to Kyiv Geoffrey Pyatt, were responsible for orchestrating the overthrow of the democratically elected government of President Viktor Yanukovych.

This is a taboo subject for the corporate media as it reports a one-sided blow-by-blow account of the war in Ukraine. Never mentioned is the fact the US orchestrated  color revolution in Ukraine (and those in Georgia and Kyrgyzstan) violate the United Nations Charter and international law.

Prior to leaving office, President Obama looked into “an unprecedented cyber covert action against Russia in retaliation for alleged Russian interference in the American presidential election, U.S. intelligence officials told NBC News.” As we now know—and some of us claimed at the time—the supposed effort by Russia to get Donald Trump elected was pure fantasy and rank political expediency. It took almost two years for ex-FBI Director Robert Mueller to discover the obvious—there had been no collusion between Trump’s campaign and Russia. Despite this, many Americans, in particular Democrats, believe the conspiracy theory is true.

The effort to destabilize Russia continued under the outlier president Trump. He gave the CIA carte blanc to launch cyber attacks on Russia. “The secret authorization, known as a presidential finding, gives the spy agency more freedom in both the kinds of operations it conducts and who it targets, undoing many restrictions that had been in place under prior administrations. The finding allows the CIA to more easily authorize its own covert cyber operations, rather than requiring the agency to get approval from the White House,” reported Yahoo News in 2020.

The “very aggressive” finding “gave the agency very specific authorities to really take the fight offensively to a handful of adversarial countries,” said a former U.S. government official. These countries include Russia, China, Iran and North Korea — which are mentioned directly in the document — but the finding potentially applies to others as well, according to another former official. “The White House wanted a vehicle to strike back,” said the second former official. “And this was the way to do it.” (emphasis added.)

Those of us who study history and geopolitics know the CIA has had a free hand to conduct subversion and surveillance activities around the world and at home despite its charter. “When the CIA was created in 1947, members of Congress who feared the establishment here of the type of domestic surveillance apparatus that the Allies had just defeated in Germany insisted that the new CIA have no role in American law enforcement and no legal ability to spy within the U.S. The legislation creating the CIA contains those limitations,” writes Andrew Napolitano.

“Populations from at least 25 countries were denied the right to choose their own leaders,” writes Thomas Swan. “This is perhaps the main reason why America is hated so much around the world. The excuse given by CIA supporters is that Soviet influence over certain governments had to be curtailed. However, in many cases, no proof of Russian activity was ever found. The CIA had taken to dismantling any leftist or anti-US government, regardless of the regime’s domestic or foreign support.”

The CIA, following Trump’s “presidential finding,” engaged in a new round of computer and network subversion against Russia and Iran. The 2018 finding gave a green light to the CIA to wipe or dump hacked banking data and target foreign intelligence services, media organizations, charities, religious institutions, or other non-state entities for disruptive or destructive cyber actions, according to a report posted at Axios.

In fact, Trump’s finding was little more than a formality. In addition to overthrowing elected governments, the CIA has engaged in assassination, the distribution of heroin and cocaine, and making certain local officials, most notably state governors, are onboard with the establishment’s program (see “Former Governor Jesse Ventura Explains That CIA Embedded In Many State Governments”).

“Recently we have noted a significant increase in attempts to inflict harm on Russia’s informational systems from external forces,” Nikolai Patrushev, secretary of Russia’s Security Council, told the Rossiiskaya Gazeta daily in January of 2017, prior to the US election.  Patrushev said the Obama administration had “deliberately ignor(ed) the fact that the main Internet servers” complicit in the attacks “are based on the territory of the United States and are used by Washington for intelligence and other purposes aimed at retaining its global domination.”

In short, the intelligence apparatus of the US was engaged in subverting Russia’s computer networks (and those in China, Iran, and North Korea) years before the current crisis in Ukraine and the contested US election. This was accomplished under the bogus assertion that Putin and Russia colluded with the Trump team to get him elected, thus painting the real estate magnate as a Russian tool.

“The U.S. CIA’s hacking unit has been conducting attacks over the last 11 years on Chinese aviation firms, technology companies, oil sector companies and other critical industries,” Emily Fang, a correspondent in Beijing, told NPR in 2021.

China, Russia, North Korea, Israel, and other nations have probed the networks of adversaries for years, and may have indeed engaged in cyberattacks. However, as Wikileaks discovered in 2017, the CIA is at the forefront of this activity. Its sophisticated arsenal of cyberattack tools include “malware, viruses, trojans, weaponized ‘zero day’ exploits, malware remote control systems,” according to WikiLeaks “Vault 7” archive of documents purloined from the CIA.

The “Year Zero” documents introduce “the scope and direction of the CIA’s global covert hacking program, its malware arsenal and dozens of ‘zero day’ weaponized exploits against a wide range of U.S. and European company products, include Apple’s iPhone, Google’s Android and Microsoft’s Windows and even Samsung TVs, which are turned into covert microphones.”

The events of 9/11 gave the agency the emphasis it needed to expand its cyberattack efforts.

Since 2001 the CIA has gained political and budgetary preeminence over the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). The CIA found itself building not just its now infamous drone fleet, but a very different type of covert, globe-spanning force — its own substantial fleet of hackers. The agency’s hacking division freed it from having to disclose its often controversial operations to the NSA (its primary bureaucratic rival) in order to draw on the NSA’s hacking capacities.

All of the above represents factual information, not a conspiracy theory. I believe—and this is my opinion based on years of dedicated research—that the majority of cyberattacks launched against US corporations and the government originated with CIA hackers who leave behind traces implicating the above roster of official enemies.

In the days to come, as the war in Ukraine continues, we may face cyberattacks on critical infrastructure here in the US. The warfare state is dedicated to confronting Russia and China, even if it results in a nuclear conflagration. There is no better way to get Americans onboard with criminal behavior than to let them sit in the dark for a week or more without access to streaming television and their precious smart phones that are in effect surveillance devices.

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Kurt Nimmo is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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Today, the dangers of military escalation are beyond description.

What is now happening in Ukraine has serious geopolitical implications. It could lead us into a World War III Scenario.

It is important that a peace process be initiated with a view to preventing escalation. 

Global Research does not support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The history of this war must be understood.

The bombing and shelling led by Ukraine’s Armed Forces directed against the people of Donbass started eight years ago, resulting in the destruction of residential areas and more than 10,000 civilian casualties.

A  bilateral Peace Agreement is required.


The Russian invasion of Ukraine has been widely condemned for its unjustified aggression. There are legitimate fears of a revived Russian empire and even a new world war. Less discussed is the almost half-trillion dollar defense industry supplying the weapons to both sides, and the substantial profits it will make as a result.

The conflict has already seen massive growth in defense spending. The EU announced it would buy and deliver 450 million euros of arms to Ukraine, while the US has pledged US$350 million in military aid in addition to the over 90 tons of military supplies and $650 million in the past year alone.

Put together, this has seen the US and NATO sending 17,000 anti-tank weapons and 2,000 Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, for instance. An international coalition of nations is also willingly arming the Ukrainian resistance, including the UK, Australia, Turkey and Canada.

This is a major boon for the world’s largest defence contractors. To give just a couple of examples, Raytheon makes the Stinger missiles, and jointly with Lockheed Martin makes the Javelin anti-tank missiles being supplied by the likes of the US and Estonia.

Both US groups, Lockheed and Raytheon shares are up by around 16% and 3% respectively since the invasion, against a 1% drop in the S&P 500, as you can see in the chart below.

BAE Systems, the largest player in the UK and Europe, is up 26%. Of the world’s top five contractors by revenue, only Boeing has dropped, due to its exposure to airlines among other reasons.

Defence company share prices vs S&P 500

Share prices of biggest defence companies compared to S&P 500

Orange = Lockheed Martin; cyan = Boeing; yellow = Raytheon; indigo = BAe Systems; purple = Northrop Grumman; blue = S&P 500. Trading View

Opportunity knocks

Ahead of the conflict, top western arms companies were briefing investors about a likely boost to their profits. Gregory J Hayes, the chief executive of US defense giant Raytheon, stated on a January 25 earnings call:

We just have to look to last week where we saw the drone attack in the UAE … And of course, the tensions in eastern Europe, the tensions in the South China Sea, all of those things are putting pressure on some of the defence spending over there. So I fully expect we’re going to see some benefit from it.

Even at that time, the global defense industry had been forecast to rise 7% in 2022. The biggest risk to investors, as explained by Richard Aboulafia, managing director of US defense consultancy AeroDynamic Advisory, is that “the whole thing is revealed to be a Russian house of cards and the threat dissipates.”

With no signs of that happening, defense companies are benefiting in several ways. As well as directly selling arms to the warring sides and supplying other countries that are donating arms to Ukraine, they are going to see extra demand from nations such as Germany and Denmark who have said they will raise their defense spending.

The overall industry is global in scope. The US is easily the world leader, with 37% of all arms sales from 2016-20. Next comes Russia with 20%, followed by France (8%), Germany (6%) and China (5%).

Beyond the top five exporters are also many other potential beneficiaries in this war. Turkey defied Russian warnings and insisted on supplying Ukraine with weapons including hi-tech drones – a major boon to its own defence industry, which supplies nearly 1% of the world market.

And with Israel enjoying around 3% of global sales, one of its newspapers recently ranan article that proclaimed: “An Early Winner of Russia’s Invasion: Israel’s Defense Industry.”

As for Russia, it has been building up its own industry as a response to Western sanctions dating back to 2014. The government instituted a massive import substitution programme to reduce its reliance on foreign weaponry and expertise, as well as to increase foreign sales. There have been some instances of continued licensing of arms, such as from the UK to Russia worth an estimated £3.7 million, but this ended in 2021.

As the second biggest arms exporter, Russia has targeted a range of international clients. Its arms exports did fall 22% between 2016-2020, but this was mainly due to a 53% reduction in sales to India. At the same time, it dramatically enhanced its sales to countries such as China, Algeria and Egypt.

According to a US congressional budget report: “Russian weaponry may be less expensive and easier to operate and maintain relative to western systems.” The largestRussian defence firms are the missile manufacturer Almaz-Antey (sales volume $6.6 billion), United Aircraft Corp (US$4.6 billion) and United Shipbuilding Corp ($4.5 billion).

In the face of Putin’s imperialism, there are limits to what can be achieved. There appears little credible possibility for Ukraine to demilitarize in the face of Russia’s continued threat.

There have nevertheless been some efforts to de-escalate the situation, with NATO, for example, very publicly rejecting the request of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to establish a no-fly zone. But these efforts are undermined by the huge financial incentives on both sides for increasing the level of weaponry.

What the west and Russia share is a profound military industrial complex. They both rely on, enable and are influenced by their massive weapons industries. This has been reinforced by newer hi-tech offensive capabilities from drones to sophisticated AI-guided autonomous weapons systems.

If the ultimate goal is de-escalation and sustainable peace, there is a need for a serious process of attacking the economic root causes of this military aggression. President Joe Biden has said that the US will directly sanction the Russian defense industry, making it harder for them to obtain raw materials and sell their wares internationally to reinvest in more military equipment.

Having said that, this may create a commercial opportunity for Western contractors. It could leave a temporary vacuum for US and European companies to gain a further competitive advantage, resulting in an expansion of the global arms race and creating an even greater business incentive for new conflicts.

Ukrainian soldiers use a launcher with US-made Javelin missiles during military exercises in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, on December 23, 2021. Photo: Ukrainian Defense Ministry Press Service

In the aftermath of this war, we should explore ways of limiting the power and influence of this industry. This could include international agreements to limit the sale of specific weapons, multilateral support for countries that commit to reducing their defense industry, and sanctioning arms companies that appear to be lobbying for increased military spending.

More fundamentally, it would involve supporting movements that challenge the further development of military capabilities.

Clearly, there is no easy answer and it will not happen overnight, but it is imperative for us to recognize as an international community that long-lasting peace is impossible without eliminating as much as possible the making and selling of weapons as a lucrative economic industry.

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Peter Bloom is Professor of Management, University of Essex.

Featured image: F-15 Eagles from the 493rd Fighter Squadron at Royal Air Force Lakenheath, England, taxi to the runway during the final day of Anatolian Eagle June 18, 2015, at 3rd Main Jet Base, Turkey. The 493rd FS received the 2014 Raytheon Trophy as the U.S. Air Force’s top fighter squadron. (U.S. Air Force photo/Tech. Sgt. Eric Burks)

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First published on March 13, 2022

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“The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes.”—Thomas Paine  

As a former officer in the Canadian Armed Forces, I am appalled at the direction this great nation has taken. If someone had told me twenty-five years ago that one day citizens of Canada would be arrested for peacefully demonstrating in the streets of our nation’s capital, I would not have believed it possible. And yet here we are today, watching the government shred our Charter of Rights and Freedoms by threatening and trampling—sometimes literally with police horses—Canadians who wish to send a message of love and a plea for freedom.

@benswann___ Police in Ottawa Trample Peaceful Protestors With Horses #Protesters #Trampling #Ottawa ♬ original sound – Ben Swann

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has subjected 38 million people to the first and only invocation of the sweeping Emergencies Act we have ever seen in this country. Shockingly, he has done so without any justification. Even more egregiously, he has asserted these powers in order to solve a problem that he himself created and deliberately exacerbated. 

Both before and after he made this unprecedented motion—which the House of Commons approved on February 21, 2022, but which was rejected by the Senate two days later—Trudeau has been acting equal parts coward and tyrant. He has refused to engage in negotiations—or, for that matter, in any dialogue whatsoever—with representatives for hundreds of thousands of working-class protesters, deeming them a “small fringe minority” who hold “unacceptable views.” What he means is that they do not share the vision of his puppet-masters at Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum (WEF).

Throughout the thus-far-month-long standoff, the Prime Minister has uttered a string of pejoratives, painting anyone who dares dissent from his (read: the WEF’s) technocratic agenda and totalitarian tactics as a “racist,” a “misogynist,” a “terrorist.” He has even resorted to the vile term “Nazism” as an excuse to dodge face-to-face meetings with his Canadian brothers and sisters from all walks of life. Rather than listening to what they have to say, as a true leader would, he has treated citizens with callous, arrogant disregard for their human rights, their legitimate demands, and their state-imposed suffering.

All of this is to say that, from everything I have seen or studied, the current regime in Ottawa has become the most dangerous, lawless government in Canada’s 155-year history as an independent nation. Over the past two years, it has displayed a wanton disregard for the rule of law and the legislative process, putting in place mandates that have not been voted upon by Parliament. In so doing, Trudeau and his cabinet have illegally and incrementally restricted the rights and freedoms of all Canadian citizens.

To wit: In the last two years, the Prime Minister, his administration, and his Liberal Party have been relentlessly coercing Canadians into being violated with an experimental injection that is neither safe nor effective. 

To wit: In the same two years, rates of small business failures, depression, suicide, domestic violence, and deaths-by-overdose have skyrocketed across the nation.

To wit: In the past month alone, peaceful protestors—including sympathetic military and police veterans—have been beaten, harshly shoved to the ground, psychologically intimidated, and verbally threatened for exercising their constitutional right to assemble and speak freely. 

To wit: In the past week, the Trudeau government has invoked the Emergencies Act and has used it to prepare and execute—even before waiting for ratification by Parliament—a ruthless, privacy-invading plan to track down and disclose the personal information of citizens who financially contributed to Freedom Convoy 2022 or who attended the Ottawa protest—and freeze the bank accounts of some of them.

Thus, even though the Emergencies Act was defeated in the Senate, I believe a new era of authoritarian control is sweeping through our nation’s halls of power. This control grid has been designed to work in concert with the equally authoritarian technocratic agenda of the WEF.

Like most governments in the West, the ruling party in Canada has been heavily infiltrated by members who subscribe to the WEF’s “Great Reset.” Klaus Schwab, the WEF founder and executive chairman, admitted as much in a 2017 interview, when he boasted:

“Yesterday, I was at the reception for Prime Minister Trudeau and I would know that half of his cabinet, or even more than half of his cabinet, are for or are actually Young Leaders of the WEF.”

Sure enough, a list of names on a WEF sister website reveals that both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland are graduates of the influential Forum of Young Global Leaders. (Freeland is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and four years ago gave a talk to that globalist body.) Yet, despite such easily verified evidence, “fact checkers” and Ottawa officials call the existence of this group of globalist technocrats-in-training a “conspiracy theory.” 

Given that the Liberal Party has fallen under the WEF’s spell, it should come as no surprise to see the government now fast-tracking brand-new vaccination regulations to be added to the Canada Labour Code. Once implemented, these regulations will require all federal employers and federally regulated industries to mandate and enforce the COVID-19 “vaccination” of employees as a condition of employment. (I put “vaccination” in quote marks because the mRNA doses are actually a gene-altering therapy, not a traditional vaccine that is said to immunize against a disease.) Never before have Canada’s federal workers been required to undergo vaccination to keep their jobs. 

Of even more concern is that the soon-to-be-adopted federal vaccination regulations will supersede the provincial governments’ longstanding authority over and administration of healthcare.

Why would such a change in the administrative structure be taking place?

I believe it’s because passing the buck to the federal government provides a great excuse for provincial premiers to relax their unpopular vaccine passport requirements for all Canadians who want to travel and enter public spaces.

The impeccable timing of this change in policy will take the pressure off their political fortunes—a kind of sure-win strategy for the upcoming provincial elections set to take place between June and December of 2022. The unsuspecting voters will be deceived into believing they are free from the shackles of the vaccine passport, when in fact only the goalposts have been moved. 

But that is not the worst of it. No, the federal workers’ vaccine mandate and the expected post-elections imposition of a vaccine passport at the provincial and/or federal level are just the beginning of a far more sinister plan.

What Lies Ahead

These envisioned edicts in Canada are simply the initial steps Trudeau and fellow globalist technocrats are taking in their attempt to enslave all the planet’s inhabitants—except, of course, their own kind.

But even if the vaccine passport plan is dropped in Canada and elsewhere, what will definitely come to pass, as sure as night follows day, is a worldwide digital ID system. My confidence in making that claim stems from the constantly articulated aim of the WEF—and of all the central banks—to implement a global system in which everyone’s personal data will be incorporated into the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) network. 

Once that goal is accomplished, every aspect of our lives will be controlled, from womb to crematorium, by the so-called 1% who run the world’s most influential institutions and comprise its bluest bloodlines.

(Yes, bloodlines. As in the Rockefellers, Morgans, du Ponts, Rothschilds, British royals, and Dutch royals, to name a few of the supposedly superior families whose wealth and power have been dominating the global population for centuries.) 

What do I mean by “every aspect of our lives”?

For starters, what we can purchase with our CBDC money.

And from there . . . whom we may—or may not—associate with. How much electricity we can use in our (rental) dwellings. What we are allowed to read, see, hear, say—and even eat.

Whether and where we can travel. The list of “forbiddens” will keep growing. And so will the social demerits we pile up for bad behavior. That is, for disobeying our slave masters. A similar version of this scheme already exists in China. 

I don’t mean to sound hopeless. Despite this bleak peek at an economy being purposely destroyed by the “Build Back Better” architects and engineers at the WEF (and, not to be forgotten, at its parent, the United Nations), I do not think we should despair. For, believe it or not, we are beginning to win the battle for freedom in Canada and in other countries. 

It helps that more of us than ever before are “awake” to the globalists’ intentions. Our ranks will only expand in coming months as more and more of the wrongdoing at the top is exposed. (Thankfully, the sunlight of truth is the best disinfectant.) 

Moreover, Canadian politicians’ wild misuse of state authority is a sure sign of their desperation—a desperation born of their futile attempt to stop the sudden crumbling of the pseudo-pandemic narrative. The COVID-19 story has been a ruse from its inception, planned over many decades and constructed on a bed of lies. In the end, the current Canadian government, like so many rotten regimes in the past, will be relegated to the dustbin of history. 

I implore all active members of Canada’s military and police forces to uphold the highest law of our land.

Promise you will never forget your solemnly sworn oath to defend the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Your country is depending upon you to guard it well.

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David Skripac has a Bachelor of Technology degree in Aerospace Engineering. He served as a Captain in the Canadian Forces for nine years. During his two tours of duty in the Air Force, he flew extensively in the former Yugoslavia as well as in Somalia, Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Djibouti.

He is author of a recently published e-book, “Our Species Is Being Genetically Modified” and a regular contributor to Global Research.


Our Species Is Being Genetically Modified. Are We Witnessing Humanity’s March Toward Extinction? Viruses Are Our Friends, Not Our Foes

Author: David Skripac

Click here to read the e-Book.

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***

A sometimes overlooked factor which influenced the Nazi-Soviet War is the effects of the weather, chiefly the rain, ice and snow, the type of conditions for which the Russian or Soviet climate was famous for.

It must be mentioned, however, that the adverse climatic situation had started to impact on the Nazi-led invasion in October 1941, four months into the attack, when Adolf Hitler‘s forces had by then expected to be victorious, but instead were pressed for time. The weather only became an issue because the invasion had not gone as planned.

Why were the Germans pressed for time? In the main because of the strategic blunders, committed by the German high command and Hitler; between the dates of 22 June 1941 when the invasion was launched across an enormously broad front, which ultimately weakened the force of the blow; and on 21 August 1941, when Hitler postponed the advance on the all important Moscow for a month and a half, sending his divisions to the north (Leningrad) and south (the Ukraine) in what proved a critical mistake.

 

Taking these causes into account, the suggestion is inaccurate that either heavy rainfall, or freezing cold, were primarily responsible for Operation Barbarossa‘s failure. Before analysing German misfortune regarding the weather, it can be noted that Hitler initially got lucky with what he believed, to the end, was the late start of his invasion.

Barbarossa had been scheduled to commence on 15 May 1941, but this was too early for an attack on Russia to proceed (Goodspeed, The German Wars, p. 390). Having not been informed of the relevant weather reports, Hitler was unaware that the spring of 1941 was exceptionally wet in the western USSR, including the eastern half of Poland, which the USSR occupied as part of the 1939 Nazi-Soviet Pact.

Many of the Polish-Russian river valleys were still flooded in late May and early June 1941, such as the strategically placed Bug river, which flows for almost 500 miles across Poland, western Ukraine and south-western Belarus. Barbarossa, therefore, could not have been successfully executed until weeks after 1 June 1941.

Due to the April 1941 Wehrmacht offensives in Yugoslavia and Greece, the attack on the Soviet Union was delayed for 5 and a half weeks (38 days). It has been claimed down the years that this hold up was fatal to German plans, an attractive idea, but something quite different is the case. Military historian Donald J. Goodspeed observed “since the initial thrust had to go rapidly to yield the best results, Hitler probably gained more than he lost by the postponement”.

This was because the ground in the western Soviet Union had dried out by 22 June 1941. There were no overflowing rivers or flooded fields in sight. The hard, flat surfaces were suitable for the panzer formations to advance relatively unhindered, at 30 miles per hour, inflicting terrible damage on the Soviet military. German Army Group Centre reached the Belarusian capital of Minsk, on just day 6 of the invasion. In the weeks to come the strategic errors and, to a lesser extent, growing Soviet resistance, the vast terrain and poor weather would lead to the slowing of the German advance.

Overall, the Red Army’s performance in 1941 and into 1942 was decidedly inept, many of its divisions suffering from poor morale and training. This was not the typical Soviet soldier’s fault. The culpability lay mainly with Joseph Stalin, for decimating the Red Army high command of experienced officers with his purges. British scholar Evan Mawdsley noted, “Many Soviet soldiers fought badly in 1941 or surrendered without a fight, demoralized troops in a demoralized society”.

There was some fierce Red Army resistance on display from June 1941, but this was not a widespread occurrence along the front, and should be put into perspective. The statistics on casualties demonstrate that the Nazi-Soviet War was one-sided in its opening months. By the end of September 1941, according to Mawdsley the Germans had inflicted 2,050,000 personnel losses on the Red Army, while the invaders by then had suffered 185,000 losses (a ratio of 11:1 in favour of the Germans). The casualty figures for the remainder of 1941, and for the first 6 months of 1942, continued to heavily favour the Wehrmacht, hovering at a ratio of between 7:1 and 8:1.

In the closing weeks of 1941, the Russian rains and debilitating winter can be regarded as secondary factors in Barbarossa’s demise. Yet, as stated, the inclement weather still contributed to the Wehrmacht’s failure in toppling the USSR. Marshal Georgy Zhukov, Stalin’s top wartime commander, wrote in his memoirs,

“For the benefit of those who are inclined to hide behind the mud, as the real reason for the Germans’ defeat near Moscow, I would like to add that the period of slush in October 1941 was comparatively short. Cold weather set in and snow fell in early November, making the terrain and roads passable everywhere”.

Zhukov’s viewpoint is accurate relating to the mud; though he does not mention quite how severe the winter of 1941-42 was, a subject which will be discussed further on here. The winter that was to come shortened what the Russians call the Rasputitsa, when the rains turn poor quality roads, pathways and fields into rivers of mud. Zhukov reminisced how the mud stuck to everything, from human feet “to the wheels of the barrows” and “the blades of the spades”.

Meanwhile, on the opposing side to Zhukov was the Austrian-born SS lieutenant Otto Skorzeny. Like Zhukov, Skorzeny was located on the frontline in 1941. Skorzeny wrote in his memoirs that rainfall did not arrive near Moscow until “October 19” when “torrential rain fell on the area of Army Group Center, which in three days literally sank into the morass”. Hitler had already said in August 1941 that the “autumn rain season of the Moscow region begins about mid-October”.

The autumn Rasputitsa lasted for 3 weeks, until 10 November 1941. Even before 10 November the mud was solidifying, with the temperature dropping considerably in the first days of November. The colder conditions were at first welcomed by German soldiers, who had no idea of the winter that lay in store. Skorzeny wrote, “We thought: long live the cold! It froze during the night of November 6 and 7. Slowly the supplies began to flow again. We received ammunition, fuel, some food and cigarettes. Finally the wounded could be evacuated, and preparations were made for the final offensive”.

With the Rasputitsa at its worst during the second half of October 1941, there is no doubt it had a very serious impact on the German invasion. The following August of 1942, on the 9th of that month, Hitler insisted, “Had it not been for the rain and mud last October, we should have been in Moscow in no time. We have now learnt that the moment the rain comes, we must stop everything”.

Eminent climatologists Hermann Flohn and Jehuda Neumann, in a co-authored study on how the weather impacted the Nazi-Soviet War, recognised that “At the time of WWII, there were very few paved roads in the USSR. Rains and low evaporation rates of the fall season would turn unhardened roads and fields into quagmires, in which many of the tanks, pieces of heavy artillery, and other mechanized transports would dig their own graves by trying to move on”.

The respite gave the Soviets time to strengthen their rearguard. In the first fortnight of November 1941, the Kremlin dispatched 21 fresh divisions from Siberia and Central Asia to the Moscow front, the sort of reserves which the Germans did not have.

The Rasputitsa also impinged on Soviet divisions but, altogether, the inhospitable surfaces had a more negative outcome for the attackers which was inevitable. Fighting a war based largely on defence in the early 1940s, the Red Army was less reliant on mobility than the Germans. Russian tanks, like the T-34, had wider tracks than the panzers and they moved more efficiently across the soggy soil. Supplies and logistics were not as great an issue for the Russians, who had a working railway system directly behind them, while the German lines were increasingly stretched.

In the first half of October 1941, the Germans had almost annihilated the defences in front of Moscow, destroying 86 Soviet divisions around the Russian towns of Vyazma and Briansk, both about 130 miles from the capital. When the rain clouds arrived on 19 October, Army Group Centre on that day captured Mozhaisk, just 65 miles west of Moscow. It is little wonder that Zhukov considered the dates, from the 10th to the 20th of October 1941, as the most dangerous time for the Red Army in the war.

The Red Army’s resistance was at a low ebb by mid-October. With the town of Mozhaisk under German control, the road to Moscow lay open. Skorzeny believed at this period, “We were convinced that we would be in Moscow at the beginning of November”.

The earlier strategic errors, committed by the Nazi hierarchy, now caught up with them. Frontline commanders were aware that rainfall was coming. One Wehrmacht general recalled how “the reality far exceeded our worst expectations”; but he remembered too that the rains began “slowly enough in mid-October” and “became steadily more intense”. The rainfall’s slow start partially enabled the German 6th Army to take the Ukrainian metropolis of Kharkov, the USSR’s 4th largest city, on 24 October 1941. Forty-five miles north of Kharkov, the Germans also captured on 24 October Belgorod, a medieval Russian city.

The Wehrmacht victories then began to dry up, with the German approach halted by the mud as the climatologists, Flohn and Neumann, have highlighted. In early November with the mud hardening, the Germans were able to sort out their transportation lines. The advance on Moscow did not resume in full flow until 15 November 1941. By then it was too late. Hindsight is always useful but with the biting cold and snow emerging, the German offensive should not have recommenced at all in 1941. On the night of 11 November, the temperature dropped suddenly to minus 20 degrees Celsius.

Flohn and Neumann have outlined in their paper that the Russian winter of 1941-42 “turned out to be one of the most severe winters on record” and “there is no comparison between German and Russian winters; even a ‘normal’ Russian winter would be considered a very cold winter in Germany”.

A table produced in the Flohn-Neumann study provides the figures regarding winter temperatures in Moscow, for example, compared to other winters in the capital. Temperature recordings in Moscow, for November 1941, show that month was on average 6.8 degrees Celsius colder when compared to November 1940. December 1941 in Moscow was, on average, 5.2 degrees Celsius colder in comparison to December 1940. January 1942 was 6 degrees colder than January 1941, February 1942 was 1.2 degrees colder than February 1941, and March 1942 was 3.4 degrees colder than March 1941.

It is also worth comparing the winters of 1941-42 to 1939-40, in order to provide a broader picture. November 1941 in Moscow was on average 4.7 degrees Celsius colder than November 1939. December 1941 was 5.4 degrees colder than December 1939. January 1942 was 0.8 degrees colder than January 1940. February 1942 had the exact same average temperature as February 1940, and March 1942 was 4.5 degrees colder than March 1940.

The winter of 1939-40 was somewhat colder than 1940-41, but still nowhere as severe as 1941-42, when the war was raging beside Moscow. The average temperature in Moscow for November 1941, which takes into account both day time and night time recordings, was minus 5.3 degrees Celsius. December 1941 showed an average temperature of minus 12.8 degrees.

In January 1942, it dropped again to minus 20.2 degrees Celsius in Moscow. February 1942 showed a recording of minus 11.8 degrees. Even March 1942 had a well below zero reading, with an average temperature of minus 9.7 degrees. This winter was extraordinarily brutal and nor were the above temperatures limited to the Moscow region. Similar figures were posted at Leningrad, over 400 miles from Moscow. By 20 February 1942 the Germans had suffered 112,627 cases of frostbite.

Hitler, who at length was examining meteorological studies and forecasts at the Wolf’s Lair, continually declared the winter of 1941-42 to be  “the worst in 150 years, and had come on four weeks earlier than expected”. This was perhaps only a slight exaggeration, and the Flohn-Neumann paper would add weight to Hitler’s argument. Nevertheless, Hitler, like Napoleon before him, was exploiting the weather as the chief reason for the inability to conquer Russia. The weather conditions, as mentioned earlier, were a secondary factor in Barbarossa’s derailing.

A significant part of the Ukrainian population, in the centre and west of the country, greeted the Wehrmacht and SS soldiers as “liberators” in the summer of 1941. This was particularly so in western Ukrainian cities like Lvov (Lviv) – where many of its citizens warmly welcomed the fascist forces from 30 June 1941, as the gold and blue Ukrainian flag flew beside the Nazi Swastika. Lvov’s Jewish community, aware of the racist roots of Nazism, remained fearfully at home.

For the German soldiers, when night came the pain was really felt. Late on 4 December 1941, the thermometer near Moscow sank to minus 31 degrees Celsius. The following night, it dropped again to minus 36 degrees. Flohn and Neumann wrote that these temperatures “gravely hit the German armies that were not appropriately clothed, and which were not equipped with armaments, tanks and motorized vehicles that could properly function even in a ‘normal’ winter in the northern parts of the USSR, let alone a winter as rigorous as that of 1941-42”.

Similar to the Rasputitsa, the Soviets did not suffer as much as the invaders during the cold. They had much greater quantities of warm clothing, anti-freeze for their tanks and lubricants for their guns, etc. They were closer to home and used to fighting in the winter, having experienced such a conflict in Finland just 2 years before (the Winter War). Night time temperatures would sink lower still in the coldest month of all, January 1942.

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Shane Quinn is a Journalist and renowned Historian, focussing on geopolitics and the history of World War II, based in Ireland. 

He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)

Sources

J. Neumann and H. Flohn, Great Historical Events That Were Significantly Affected by the Weather: Part 8, Germany’s War on the Soviet Union, 1941–45. Long-range Weather Forecasts for 1941–42 and Climatological Studies, American Meteorological Society, June 1987, Jstor

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941-1945 (Hodder Arnold, 23 Feb. 2007)

Donald J. Goodspeed, The German Wars (Random House Value Publishing, 3 April 1985)

Georgy Zhukov, Marshal of Victory: The Autobiography of General Georgy Zhukov (Pen & Sword Military, 3 Feb. 2020)

Adolf Hitler, Hitler’s Table Talk, New Foreword by Gerhard L. Weinberg (Enigma Books, 30 April 2008)

Otto Skorzeny, My Commando Operations: The Memoirs of Hitler’s Most Daring Commando (Schiffer Publishing Ltd., 1 Jan. 1995)

Alexander Hill, “’General Mud’ has Usually Been on Russia’s Side in War. Not This Time”, Slate Magazine, 11 March 2022

Christoph Mick, Lemberg, Lwow, and Lviv 1914-1947: Violence and Ethnicity in a Contested City (Purdue University Press, 30 Nov. 2015)

John Toland, Adolf Hitler: The Definitive Biography (Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, 3 Feb. 2007)

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Who Holds Russia’s Central Bank Reserves?

March 25th, 2022 by Katharina Buchholz

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The following article documents the failure on the part of  Russia’s Central Bank to secure control over its gold and  foreign currency assets.

Only 21.7% of Russia’s Central Bank reserves are deposited in Russia. Our thanks to Statista for bring this article to our attention.

With the sanctions regime, a large share of the Russian Central Bank’s gold and forex deposits will be affected. See  the analysis by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts.

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According to a now unavailable report by Russia’s Central Bank saved by internet archive Wayback Machine, China was the single-biggest foreign holder of Russian central bank reserves as of June 30, 2021. 13.8 percent of the total of Russia’s reserves, held in gold and foreign currency, was located in China, roughly the same share of assets held in Chinese currency Yuan Renminbi.

The biggest share of reserves was that held in Russia itself – in the form of gold, making up 21.7 percent of reserves. With the sanctions against its central bank progressing, this means Russia would likely remain in charge of around one third of its currently $630 billion strong reserves through domestic gold and Chinese Yuan. The location of another 10 percent of reserves are not specified by the report, while 5 percent are held by international financial institutions.

EU countries, along with the UK, U.S. and Canada, on Saturday moved to freeze assets under their jurisdiction associated with Russia’s central bank. According to the latest report, around 25 percent of Russia’s reserve assets were held in France, Germany and Austria. The total reserves held in Euro stood at around 32 percent.

Following the de-dollarization of Russia’s reserves over the past years, dollar assets made up only around 16 percent of Russia’s stockpile. The U.S. was holding only 6.6 percent of Russia’s reserves as of last year, with other dollar reserves held elsewhere. In Japan, it is the other way around as the country holds more Russian reserves (10 percent) than are in its currency. Japan said on Monday it was also coordinating with the G7 on releasing sanctions against Russia’s central bank.

More than three quarters of Russia’s central bank reserves are foreign currency assets. Around half are foreign currency securities, like government bonds, which never leave their country of issuance. Around 25 percent are tied to foreign national banks, private foreign banks, the Bank of International Settlements and the IMF. On top of the approximately 20 percent held in gold, additional small amounts exist in IMF SDR reserve assets, reserves held for Russia by the IMF and reverse repo securities, which Russia has sold but is contracted to buy back.

Infographic: Who Holds Russia's Central Bank Reserves? | Statista

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Katharina Buchholz is a Data Journalist. [email protected]

Featured image is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

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The spike protein present in Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccines is one of the most bioactive and potentially damaging substances known to mankind. It penetrates the blood-brain barrier, cell nucleus and even affects DNA replication.

The spike protein appears to reprogram the immune system in a strange way. The BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine against the COVID-19 virus has been shown to reprogram both adaptive and innate immune responses. When it penetrates the cell nuclei, the free-floating spike protein inhibits DNA repair. (Related: Pfizer vaccine data shows far more damaging side effects than initially expected.)

There had been immune system problems in the vaccinated, and it is becoming apparent that they do not actually develop broad natural immunity. Instead, they produce more S antibodies against the spike protein that they were originally vaccinated with.

A recent surveillance report from the U.K. Health Security Agency showed that N antibody levels appear to be lower in individuals who acquire infection following two doses of the vaccine.

This means that the vaccines interfere with the immune system’s ability to produce antibodies against the virus following infection. In the case of the N antibody, this is shown to be against the nucleocapsid protein, which serves as the shell of the virus and is an important part of the immune system response of the unvaccinated population. (Related: After you are vaccine damaged, if you complain about symptoms you will be REQUIRED to take psychiatric medications until your “disorder” is cured.)

If any mutations to the spike protein of the COVID virus occur in the future, the vaccinated will be more vulnerable and may possibly be unprotected due to their inability to produce the N antibody.

Meanwhile, the unvaccinated would have much better immunity to any mutations due to their ability to produce both S and N antibodies after infection.

America’s Front Line Doctors also warned that vaccines are turning people’s bodies into walking spike protein factories, which causes the body to create antibodies to them.

“First, these vaccines ‘mis-train’ the immune system to recognize only a small part of the virus [the spike protein]. Variants that differ, even slightly, in this protein are able to escape the narrow spectrum of antibodies created by the vaccines,” AFLDS explained. “Second, the vaccines create ‘vaccine addicts,’ meaning persons become dependent upon regular booster shots because they have been ‘vaccinated’ only against a tiny portion of a mutating virus.”

The group also cited Australian Health Minister Dr. Kerry Chant, who said that COVID will become endemic and people will have to get used to taking endless vaccines.

Finally, there is the simple fact that the vaccines do not, in any way, prevent infection in the nose and upper airways, which is where fully vaccinated people tend to show the highest viral loads.

Immune problems and other vaccine infections

Vaccinated individuals have also encountered immune problems and reinfections. These conditions, dubbed VAIDS (or Vaccine Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome), have been very concerning as they could be damaging to individuals.

While not an official scientific term, it is important to bring attention to VAIDS, especially for those who are concerned about the immune health of their vaccinated loved ones.

In late January, an anti-mandate rally in Italy reiterated the claim that COVID-19 vaccines were toxic and that they could cause a variety of medical catastrophes down the line.

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Featured image is from TrialSiteNews

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Two leaked stories from the Pentagon have exposed the lies of mainstream media about how Russia is conducting the Ukraine war in a bid to counter propaganda intended to get NATO into the conflict, writes Joe Lauria.

The Pentagon is engaged in a consequential battle with the U.S. State Department and the Congress to prevent a direct military confrontation with Russia, which could unleash the most unimaginable horror of war.

President Joe Biden is caught in the middle of the fray. So far he is siding with the Defense Department, saying there cannot be a NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine fighting Russian aircraft because “that’s called World War III, okay? Let’s get it straight here, guys. We will not fight the third world war in Ukraine.”

“President Biden’s been clear that U.S. troops won’t fight Russia in Ukraine, and if you establish a no-fly zone, certainly in order to enforce that no-fly zone, you’ll have to engage Russian aircraft. And again, that would put us at war with Russia,” said U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin earlier this month. (The administration plan is to bring down the Russian government through a ground insurgency and economic war, not a direct military one.)

But pressure on the White House from some members of Congress and especially the press corps is unrelenting to recklessly bring NATO directly into the war. (Secretary of State Antony Blinken who initially backed a plan to send NATO planes from Poland to Ukraine has backed down and now opposes the no-fly zone.) Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, hailed as a virtual superhero in Western media, has vacillated between openness to negotiating a peace settlement with Russia and calling for NATO to “close the skies” above Ukraine. To save his country he appears willing to risk endangering the entire world.

(The Pentagon’s mettle will be tested if there is a chemical weapons attack in Ukraine. Biden has said Russia would be a “severe price” but who the perpetrator would be might be murky.)

Meanwhile, Western corporate media, depending almost exclusively on Ukrainian sources, report that Russia is losing the war, with its military offensive “stalled,” and in frustration has deliberately targeted civilians and flattened cities.

Biden has bought into this part of the story, calling Russian President Vladimir Putin a “war criminal.” He has also said that Russia is planning a “false flag” chemical attack to pin on Ukraine.

But on Tuesday, the Pentagon took the bold step of leaking two stories to reporters that contradict those tales. “Russia’s conduct in the brutal war tells a different story than the widely accepted view that Vladimir Putin is intent on demolishing Ukraine and inflicting maximum civilian damage—and it reveals the Russian leader’s strategic balancing act,” reported Newsweek in an article entitled, “Putin’s Bombers Could Devastate Ukraine But He’s Holding Back. Here’s Why.”

The piece quotes an unnamed analyst at the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) saying,

“The heart of Kyiv has barely been touched. And almost all of the long-range strikes have been aimed at military targets.”

A retired U.S. Air Force officer now working as an analyst for a Pentagon contractor, added:

“We need to understand Russia’s actual conduct. If we merely convince ourselves that Russia is bombing indiscriminately, or [that] it is failing to inflict more harm because its personnel are not up to the task or because it is technically inept, then we are not seeing the real conflict.”

The article says:

“As of the past weekend, in 24 days of conflict, Russia has flown some 1,400 strike sorties and delivered almost 1,000 missiles (by contrast, the United States flew more sorties and delivered more weapons in the first day of the 2003 Iraq war). …

A proportion of those strikes have damaged and destroyed civilian structures and killed and injured innocent civilians, but the level of death and destruction is low compared to Russia’s capacity.

‘I know it’s hard … to swallow that the carnage and destruction could be much worse than it is,’ says the DIA analyst. ‘But that’s what the facts show. This suggests to me, at least, that Putin is not intentionally attacking civilians, that perhaps he is mindful that he needs to limit damage in order to leave an out for negotiations.’”

A second retired U.S. Air Force officer says:

“I’m frustrated by the current narrative—that Russia is intentionally targeting civilians, that it is demolishing cities, and that Putin doesn’t care. Such a distorted view stands in the way of finding an end before true disaster hits or the war spreads to the rest of Europe. I know that the news keeps repeating that Putin is targeting civilians, but there is no evidence that Russia is intentionally doing so. In fact, I’d say that Russia could be killing thousands more civilians if it wanted to.”

These Pentagon sources confirm what Putin and the Russian Ministry of Defense have been saying all along: that instead of being “stalled,” Russia is executing a methodical war plan to encircle cities, opening humanitarian corridors for civilians, leaving civilian infrastructure like water, electricity, telephony and internet intact, and trying to avoid as many civilian casualties as possible.

Until these Pentagon leaks it was difficult to confirm that Russia was entirely telling the truth and that corporate media were publishing fables cooked up by Ukraine’s publicity machine.

No Evidence of Chemicals

The second article directly undermines Biden’s dramatic warning about a false flag chemical attack. Reuters reported:

“The United States has not yet seen any concrete indications of an imminent Russian chemical or biological weapons attack in Ukraine but is closely monitoring streams of intelligence for them, a senior U.S. defense official said.”

It quoted the Pentagon official as saying,

“There’s no indication that there’s something imminent in that regard right now.” Neither The New York Times nor The Washington Post published the Reuters article, which appeared in the more obscure U.S. News and World Report. 

Never let the facts get in the way of a good story — even if it could lead to the most devastating consequences in history.

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Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former U.N. correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, and numerous other newspapers, including The Montreal Gazette and The Star of Johannesburg. He was an investigative reporter for the Sunday Times of London, a financial reporter for Bloomberg News and began his professional work as a 19-year old stringer for The New York Times.  He can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter @unjoe  

Featured image: The Pentagon. (Source: Joe Lauria)

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Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on March 23 that natural gas payments from so-called unfriendly countries will be made in rubles from now on. He stressed however that Russia will continue to supply gas to other countries according to the volume and price specified in previously signed contracts. With Western countries making it difficult for Russia to trade in dollars, euros and pounds, there was no choice left but for gas trade to be conducted in rubles – which will not only ultimately benefit Russia in the long run, but also China.

By selling gas, oil and other products in rubles, it limits, or perhaps even entirely rules out the freezing of Gazprom’s accounts, thus protecting this money from Western sanctions. But to attain rubles to make payments to begin with, so-called unfriendly countries will need to sell foreign currency on the stock exchange. In this way, Russia’s revenue will not only be directly from Gazprom, but also from the Russian foreign exchange market. It is hoped that such a measure will lead to a demand in rubles, thus supporting the Russian monetary system.

The biggest issue Russia faces is whether Europe will instead buy energy from elsewhere, even at a higher price. None-the-less, it does express Moscow’s intentions to reciprocate and respond to economic provocations made by the West, especially as it is very likely that this payment policy will lead to an increase in the price of gas in the European market.

In response to Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, Western countries have announced large-scale sanctions against the country, mainly in the banking sector and the supply of high-tech products. Moscow calls these measures an economic war and listed 48 countries including the US, Canada, EU member states, the UK, Ukraine, Japan, South Korea, Australia and Singapore as “unfriendly countries.”

In 2021, these hostile countries paid roughly $69 billion for gas from Gazprom, the Russian state-owned company. To make a similar scale of payments this year, countries will have to procure around 6-7 trillion rubles. As Quartz explained, as yet,

“most of these ‘hostile nations’ buying Russian energy have few options but to continue their purchases. If the demand for rubles steadily increases as a result, the drastic fall in the currency’s value will halt and even reverse. After Putin made his announcement, the ruble gained 7% against the dollar.”

The outlet also explained that

“if Western governments pursue these avenues, the Central Bank of Russia doesn’t have to spend its own dollars and euro reserves to prop up the ruble—which is just as well, since more than half of Russia’s foreign reserves have been frozen by sanctions.”

German experts have already said that technically, paying in rubles is possible but takes time to create some additional mechanisms to facilitate the attainment and payment of rubles. However, the decision of EU countries will not only depend on the technical aspects.

US President Joe Biden will most likely continue to persuade the EU to give up Russian energy sources, even though this is practically impossible despite the American assurances. However, with Europe unable to realistically cut itself from Russian energy in the short and medium term, the American suggestion will only lead to a weakened European economy as they will inevitably pay exorbitant prices for alternative energy sources.

Goldman Sachs chief economist Jan Hatzius has warned, according to FT, that a European ban on Russian energy imports would cause a 2.2% hit to production and trigger a eurozone recession. In addition, UK chancellor Rishi Sunak has been telling colleagues that the hit would be larger and would quickly cause a downturn worth £70 billion, or 3%, of gross domestic product in the UK, given its still-close ties to the continental European economy.

This comes as Russia announced that it will diversify its oil and gas supplies if Western countries completely refuse to import. In preparation for this, Russian companies have been developing new logistics plans. Although Russia will undoubtedly earn less, it will be able to rebuild the oil industry and the wider economy to not be so heavily hinged on the West.

In this way, it will not only be the ruble that benefits, but also the Chinese yuan. After the West froze Russia’s gold and foreign exchange reserves, many experts saw the Chinese yuan as an alternative to the dollar. China’s currency correlates with the dollar exchange rate at 97%, meaning that if the dollar rises against the ruble, then the yuan will also rise. Effectively this means that the yuan is currently almost a full replacement for the dollar.

As Quartz explained, the US and the EU may then have to run ruble exchange payments through a third, intermediary currency such as the yuan. Effectively, the Russian demand for rubles for oil and gas will stabilize the Russian currency whilst also propping up the yuan, thus weakening sanctions.

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Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

Featured image is from asia.nikkei.com

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The director of the Institute of Oncology and Radiology of Serbia explained that chemical plants and various dangerous industries were bombed, which, as she says, created an ecological catastrophe and poisoned Europe.

According to Grujičić, the use of NATO bombs with depleted uranium and the destruction of environmentally dangerous facilities during air strikes have led to Serbia being now the leader in the number of cancer deaths in Europe, with almost 60.000 new cancer patients a year.

“The North Atlantic Alliance did not pay attention to civilian casualties. Everyone knows the famous conversation between former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic and Finnish diplomat Martti Ahtisaari, who said that Belgrade would be levelled to the ground (if it does not accept the ultimatum),” Grujičić added.

“If we had a nuclear power plant, they would definitely hit it, because they attacked everything on the list of facilities dangerous for the environment. They knew that a local environmental catastrophe would be created in every oil refinery, chemical company. They did it on purpose”, she said.

Grujičić recalled that about 15 tons of depleted uranium were officially dumped on Serbia, but emphasized that “no one knows how much it really was, and it will never be known.”

“We have taken the initiative to determine with mathematical precision, not only medical, but also environmental consequences. The data we received show that the whole of Europe was polluted. Europeans who were looking forward to the bombs over Belgrade and Serbia are also endangered and do not know what they were breathing, eating, drinking,” she added.

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Featured image is a screenshot from TV Prva via B92.net

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The U.S. justifies wars of aggression in the name of human rights. The term has no meaning domestically either, as the people’s needs are subordinated to those of the ruling class.

Images of burnt flesh from napalm bombs, wounded and dead soldiers, scenes of U.S. soldiers burning the simple huts of Vietnamese villages, eventually turned the public against the war in Vietnam and produced the dreaded affliction, from the ruling class point of view, known as the “Vietnam syndrome.” This collective Post Traumatic Stress Disorder made it impossible for the public to support any foreign military involvement for years.

It took the rulers almost three decades to finally cure the public of this affliction. But the rulers were careful.

The brutal reality of what the U.S. was doing in Afghanistan and Iraq was whitewashed. That is why the images now being brought to the public by the corporate media are so shocking. It has been more than two generations since the U.S. public was exposed to the horrific images of war.

In the 1960s the rulers inadvertently allowed themselves to be undermined by the new television technology that brought the awful reality of imperialist war into the homes of the public. Now, the ruling class operating through its corporate media propaganda arms has been effectively using Ukraine war propaganda, not to increase Anti-war sentiment but to stimulate support for more war!

Incredibly also, the propagandists are pushing a line that essentially says that in the name of “freedom” and supporting Ukraine, the U.S. public should shoulder the sacrifice of higher fuel and food prices. This is on top of the inflation that workers and consumers were already being subjected to coming out of the capitalist covid scandal that devastated millions of workers and the lower stratums of the petit bourgeoisie.

But the war, and now the unfair shouldering of all of the costs of the capitalist crisis of 2008 – 2009, and the impact of covid by the working classes in the U.S., amounts to a capitalist tax. It is levied by the oligarchy on workers to subsidize the defense of the interests of big capital and the conditions that have produced obscene profits, even in the midst of the covid crisis and now, the Ukraine war.

These policies are criminal. While the U.S. continues to pretend that it champions human rights around the world, the failure of the state to protect the fundamental human rights of the citizens and residents in the U.S. is obvious to all, but spoken about by the few, except the Chinese government.

For those who might think that the Chinese criticism of the U.S. is only being driven by politics, and it might be,  just a cursory, objective examination of the U.S. state policies over just the last few years reveals a shocking record of systematic human rights abuses that promise to become even more acute as a consequence of the manufactured U.S./NATO war in Ukraine.

The Ongoing Human Rights Crisis

The U.S. working class, and Black working class in particular, never recovered from the economic crisis of 2008 before it was once again ravaged in 2020 with the global capitalist crisis exacerbated by covid. On the heels of those two shocks, today millions of workers are experiencing a permanent state of precarity with evictions, the continued loss of medical coverage, unaffordable housing and food costs, and a capitalist-initiated inflation. The rulers are operating under the belief that with the daily bombardment of war images, U.S. workers and the poor will embrace rising costs of gas and even more increases in the cost of food.

Doesn’t the state have any responsibility to ensure that the economic human rights of the people are fulfilled? No, because liberal human rights practice separates fundamental human rights – such as the right to health, food, housing, education, a means to subsist at an acceptable level of material culture, leisure, and life-long social security – from democratic discourse on what constitutes the human rights responsibility of the state and the interests it must uphold in order to be legitimate.

The non-recognition of the indivisibility of human rights that values economic human rights to an equal level as civil and political rights, exposed the moral and political contradictions of the liberal human rights framework. The massive economic displacements with hunger, unemployment, and unnecessary deaths among the population in the United States, with a disproportionate rate of sickness and hospitalization among non-white workers and the poor in the U.S., were never condemned as violations of human rights.

War and Economic Deprivation the Systemic Contradictions of the Western colonial/capitalist Project.

The war being waged against global humanity by the U.S./EU/NATO Axis of Domination is a hybrid war that utilizes all the tools it has at its disposal – sanctions, mass incarceration, coups, drugs, disinformation, culture, subversion, murder, and direct military engagement to further white power. The Eurocentrism and “White Lives Matters More Movement” represented by the coverage of the war in Ukraine stripped away any pretense to the supposed liberal commitment to global humanity. The white-washing of the danger of the ultra-right and neo-Nazi elements in the Ukrainian military and state and the white ethno-nationalism that the conflict generated across the Western world demonstrated, once again, how “racialism” and the commitment to the fiction of white supremacy continues to trump class and class struggle and the ability to build a multi-national, class based anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist opposition in the North.

It is primarily workers from Russia, the Donbas and Ukraine who are dying. But as in the run-up to the first imperialist war in Europe, known as World War One, workers with the encouragement of their national bourgeoisies, are lining up behind their rulers to support the capitalist redivision taking place, a redivision that can only be completed by war as long as capitalism and capitalist competition continues. Yet, instead of “progressives and radicals” joining forces to resist the mobilization to war, they are finding creative ways to align themselves with the interests of their ruling classes in support of the colonial/capitalist project.

In the meantime, the people of Afghanistan are starving, with thousands of babies now dying of malnutrition because the U.S. stole their nation’s assets. Estimates suggest that unless reversed, more people there will die from U.S./EU imposed sanctions than died during the twenty year long war. And the impact of the war in Ukraine with the loss of wheat exports from Ukraine and Russia resulting not only in rising food prices globally but in some places like East Africa, resulting in death from famine.

In the U.S. where we witness the most abysmal record of covid failure on the planet, the virus will continue to ravage the population, with a disproportionate number who get sick and die being the poorest and those furthest from whiteness.

The lackeys of capital playing the role of democratic representatives claim that there is no money to bring a modicum of relief to workers represented in the mildly reformist package known as Build Back Better. Yet, the Brown University Costs of War Project estimates that the wars waged by the United States in this century have cost $8 trillion and counting, with another $8 trillion that will be spent over the next ten years on the military budget if costs remain constant from the $778 billion just allocated.

No rational human being desires war and conflict. The horrors of war that the public are finally being exposed to because it was brought to Europe again, the most violent continent on the planet, should call into question all of the brutal and unjustified wars that the U.S. and its flunkey allies waged throughout the global South over the last seventy years. Unfortunately, because of the hierarchy of the value of human beings, the images of war in Ukraine are not translating into a rejection of war, but instead a rejection of war in Europe and on white Europeans.

This means that the wars will continue and we must fight, often alone, because as Bob Marley said in his song “War ”:

Until the philosophy

Which hold one race superior and another

Inferior

Is finally

And permanently

Discredited

And abandoned

Everywhere is war

Me say war

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Ajamu Baraka is the national organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace and an editor and contributing columnist for the Black Agenda Report. Baraka serves on the Executive Committee of the U.S. Peace Council and leadership body of the U.S. based United National Anti-War Coalition (UNAC) and the steering committee of the Black is Back Coalition.

Biden Wings His Way to the Borderlands of Ukraine

March 25th, 2022 by M. K. Bhadrakumar

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By a queer coincidence, former US Secretary of State Madeline Albright passed away while President Joe Biden was travelling in Air Force 1 en route to Europe on what is probably the most crucial diplomatic mission of his presidency. 

The general expectation is that 80-year old Biden is personally undertaking a mission to persuade the US’ European allies that the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) should intervene in the Ukraine crisis in some way. And, ironically, Albright was the choreographer of the idea that in the post-cold war era, the NATO should reinvent itself and transform as a global security organisation. 

Albright, like most American diplomats of East European descent, was passionately devoted to the NATO. She supported the alliance’s brutal military intervention in Yugoslavia in 1999 and would have supported an intervention in Ukraine. 

The White House spin is that Biden will discuss additional sanctions against Russia. But the possibility of new restrictions has waned following the EU foreign and defence ministers’ meeting on Monday where a decision was taken to put off further sanctions. 

The EU meeting instead assessed that the ongoing Ukraine-Russian talks should proceed further and even if upbeat predictions may not be entirely correct, since the talks are challenging, the good part is that neither party has complained of any deadlock in the negotiations so far. 

Conceivably, Biden is travelling to Europe not to discuss tougher sanctions  (something which he could as well have handled in a videoconference) but to explore NATO’s potential engagement in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict for which his participation becomes absolutely essential. 

As things stand, there is every possibility of a prolonged conflict in Ukraine and Russia eventually prevailing. Such a scenario is extremely damaging for Biden politically in the US. Biden is facing domestic criticism both for his failure to prevent the conflict as well as for being ineffectual in blocking the Russian advance.

While the US rhetoric pillories Russia for “war crimes” and the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine, et al, the world capitals view this as a geopolitical confrontation between America and Russia. Outside of the western camp, the world community refuses to impose sanctions against Russia or even to demonise that country. 

The world community steers clear of taking sides between the US and Russia. The Islamabad Declaration issued on Wednesday after the 45th meeting of the foreign ministers of the fifty-seven member Organisation of Islamic Conference refused to endorse sanctions against Russia and instead counselled cessation of hostilities in Ukraine, avoidance of loss of lives, enhancement of humanitarian assistance and a “surge in diplomacy” — almost ditto China and India’s stance.

Not a single country in the African continent and West Asian, Central Asia, South and Southeast Asian region has imposed sanctions against Russia. Following a visit to Hanoi, Malaysian PM Ismail Sabri Yaakob said, “We discussed the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and agreed that Malaysia and Vietnam will remain neutral on this issue. As for sanctions against Russia, we do not support them. The sides do not support unilateral sanctions; we recognise only restrictions that could be imposed by the UN Security Council.” This is the consensus within ASEAN too. 

Interestingly, Chinese Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi was the chief guest at the OIC meeting in Islamabad. In his remarks, Wang Yi said,

“China supports Russia and Ukraine in continuing their peace talks, and hopes that the talks will lead to ceasefire, end the fighting, and bring about peace. Humanitarian disasters should be avoided, and spillover of the Ukrainian crisis should be prevented so as not to affect and harm the legitimate rights and interests of other regions and countries.” 

The Chinese foreign ministry press release on Wang Yi’s meeting with the Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud said, “As to the Ukraine issue, the two sides agreed that all countries’ sovereignty and territorial integrity should be respected and their reasonable security concerns should be taken seriously. It is imperative to prevent any humanitarian crisis, maintain the peace talk process and resolve conflicts through dialogue and negotiation. Both sides emphasised that all countries have the right to make independent judgements, withstand external pressure, and disagree with the simple logic of “black or white” and “friend or foe”.

Again, the Chinese press release on Wang Yi’s meeting with his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shoukry said, inter alia,

“The two sides exchanged views on the Ukraine issue, and agreed to respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all countries and stay committed to a comprehensive solution to the current crisis. Shoukry said, Egypt opposes some countries exerting pressure on China and stands for strengthening cooperation rather than escalating confrontation.” 

Curiously, four foreign ministers from West Asia travelled to Moscow last week to discuss the bilateral cooperation — from Qatar, Iran, Turkey and the UAE. 

Nonetheless, the outcome of Biden’s visit to Europe will have significant bearing on the conflict in Ukraine. If Biden succeeds in getting European backing for his proposal for a NATO intervention in Ukraine, the conflict may escalate dramatically into a world war involving nuclear weapons.   

Will Biden push the envelope? It seems he’s unwilling to risk. Biden seems to have a Plan B as well. He has scheduled a separate visit to Warsaw. Poland indeed has its fair share of Russophbes and has been straining at the leash for some form of involvement in Ukraine. 

The heart of the matter is that Poland also has an axe to grind. Parts of Poland comprise today’s ethnically mixed western borderlands of Ukraine — oblasts of Zhytomyr, Khmelnytskyi and Lviv. If Ukraine fragments or collapses in defeat, Poland will most certainly seize the opportunity to reclaim its lost territories. Poland’s hyper-activism over Ukraine is self-evident. 

Incidentally, in recent days, former Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski and Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk have both accused Budapest of trying to lay its hands on Ukraine’s largely Hungarian-populated Transcarpathian region. On Tuesday, Sikorski alleged in a tweet that Hungarian PM Viktor Orbán and President Vladimir Putin reached a secret agreement on the partition of Ukraine! 

On the same day, Iryna Vereshchuk complained in a Facebook post:

“The way the Hungarian leadership has been treating Ukraine lately is even worse than some of the Russian satellite states of the former Soviet Union. Hungary does not support the sanctions. They don’t provide weapons. They don’t allow transit of weapon supplies from other countries. They say ‘no’ to virtually everything.”   

Biden cannot but be exploring with the Polish leadership possibilities that fall short of an outright NATO intervention in Ukraine. The spectre that haunts the Biden administration, despite the swagger of its media bluster, is that the Russian special operation may after all be inching toward successful conclusion, creating a large buffer of regions on the eastern side of the Dnieper river, and gaining control of Black Sea coastline that denies access to NATO ships. 

Poland becomes a key stakeholder in such an outcome and Washington surely regards Warsaw as its number one interlocutor in the developing situation, as the fate of Ukraine hangs in the balance. 

*

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Featured image: US President Biden (L) and Polish President Andrzej Duda (R) (Source: Indian Punchline)

OPEC Warns EU Against Banning Russian Oil Imports

March 25th, 2022 by The Cradle

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***

Officials from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, (OPEC) have issued a stark warning to the EU, saying that if the European alliance follows through with a proposed ban of oil imports from Russia, the markets will see massive price spikes beyond the surge already seen.

Since the start of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine last month, oil prices surged to their highest levels since 2008, a situation that was exacerbated by harsh economic sanctions imposed on Moscow.

The warning reportedly came during a meeting on 16 March between OPEC officials, including Secretary General Mohammad Barkindo and EU Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson.

According to an OPEC source who spoke with Reuters, the group’s concerns were made abundantly clear to the EU. “They are very well informed,” the source said.

“OPEC presented their analysis of the oil market situation and informed us of their plans in terms of oil production,” an EU official said in response to the news.

Earlier this month, both Washington and London made attempts to pressure Saudi Arabia and the UAE into increasing their oil production levels in order to mitigate skyrocketing fuel prices.

However, both attempts failed with Riyadh and Abu Dhabi making it clear to the west that they intend to maintain the production quota agreed upon by OPEC+.

Russia is an ally of OPEC and co-chairs the OPEC+ group, which has cooperated on oil supplies to support oil markets since 2017.

In an additional show of defiance against the demands from the west, on 17 March Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al Nahyan travelled to Moscow to cement Abu Dhabi’s energy cooperation ties with Moscow.

The trip came just one day after the British prime minister failed to convince OPEC members to increase production.

As for Saudi Arabia, the kingdom has previously expressed its willingness to decrease investments in the US and has even floated the idea of selling oil to China, using the Chinese yuan instead of the US dollar.

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Featured image: Fuel prices in EUR at a Shell petrol station in Berlin, Germany, 09 March 2022. (Photo credit: EPA-EFE/FILIP SINGER)

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***

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated its death tally last week and slashed over 70 thousand deaths from the provisional COVID-19 death count.

The Daily Wire reported the information through an updated analysis of what is available on the CDC website.

“The Centers for Disease and Control updated its COVID-19 death statistics last week, revealing that the agency had included an additional 72, 277 deaths that should not have been counted as COVID-19 deaths,” wrote the Daily Wire.

A total of 26 state death records were affected, and statistics from all age groups were part of the update. The CDC called it a “coding logic error.”

Almost 970 thousand deaths have been attributed to COVID-19 in the US, and the update would mean that the numbers were inflated by almost 8%.

One notable revision was the removal of  416 child deaths from the tally; this is significant because children represent such a small portion of overall COVID-attributed deaths.

Mairead Elordi told the Daily Wire, “The huge change in the pediatric death count drops the estimate of COVID deaths in children down to 1,341 nationwide.”

The update was part of an initiative to clean up how data is reported to the CDC. It is called the Data Modernization Initiative.

Other regions around the world have also started adjusting their COVID-related death statistics by significant margins.

The Canadian province of Ontario admitted in March that deaths attributed to COVID had been inflated by 30%, and the prevalence of false-positives associated with PCR testing could reduce the numbers further.

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***

The Canadian industrial engineer at Moderna, Dr. Daniel Nagase, reported that a Moderna COVID jab production engineer leaked crucial information about Moderna adding manually “small quantities of additions” (described by Moderna as “highly sensitive trade secret adjuvants”) to the vaxx-vails. These “adjuvants” when analyzed, revealed that they were to sterilize women, or cause miscarriages. The impact of such injections could last over one or more generations.

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On 20 March 2022, Dr. Daniel Nagase gave this speech to a Canadian crowd:

This is the summarizing transcript of the video, as published on 22 March 2022, by For Life on Earth:

“Dr Nagase amplifies the message that I have been reiterating for three years: the Creator gave you your abilities and you have a duty to do everything that you are capable of to stand up for justice, truth and love.  We have all been conditioned to believe that we are not good enough, we don’t know enough, and someone else who is more expert should do something instead of us.  Dr. Nagase illustrates that he was fooled by believing in an “expert”.  The system wants you to be cowed by experts, and to my mind, this is exactly the mistake that we all make.  We listen over and over to the same pundits, while sitting and doing nothing ourselves.  We are living through unprecedented times and we are assailed by a conspiracy such as we have never seen in human history, deploying technologies that we know nothing of.  There are no experts under these circumstances.  All those people with their impressive qualifications are as adrift as you are.  And many – if not most – of them are complete idiots and/or slaves to the system that is killing us, actively participating in our and their own demise.

Listen to your heart, listen to your intuition, be confident that you always know right from wrong and that you CAN act, you CAN speak out, you CAN succeed.  Millions of people are now in action to defend humanity against this assault.  Be one of them and do everything in your power, at whatever level, to stop this monstrous crime and instead create and be part of the world we want to see.  By creating the world we want to live in, we stop the crime.  Think about energy: it flows around obstacles.  By bypassing the egregious plans of the perpetrators, by refusing to participate in them in any way, shape or form, whether that be in our everyday lives, at the post office or at the supermarket, at work or in your interactions with others, by ending our participation and refusing to compromise ourselves, and by focusing on the world we want to see, we leave them in the dust.  That means abandoning the prime tool of control: that “smart” phone that you are constantly clutching.  Get rid of that and get rid of wireless technology and you have crushed the conspiracy in a single act.  For without wireless technology, there can be no technocracy, no inventorying of the entire world down to every last blade of grass, no manipulation of the thoughts and emotions of whole regions of people, no digital currencies, no cyborgs, and no “smart” city prisons.  YOU are constructing your own prison around you and the whole human race by your refusal to give up your “smart” phone.  You can still communicate – just use a cabled computer.  You will be amazed at the change in yourself once that satanic scrying screen is gone from your life.  You will be freeer and happier than you have been for years.

Dr Nagase explains that over a billion women of childbearing age have been deliberately targeted for sterilization by these poison injections, which change DNA for eternity, and what is worse, even if an injected woman manages to bear children, the effects may skip a generation and appear in grandchildren or great-grandchildren.  He says that the human race has been changed forever by these injections.  He asks if we should ban such children from being able to have children of their own.”

This is the full post anonymously published on 9 December 2020 as a 4chan post; see this. And this is the original post:

“I’m an industrial engineer at Moderna and the other one of us is a process development engineer. I’m sure the same thing is happening with Pfizer-BioNTech. It was hard to put things together based on the small quantities of additions happening in manual step (highly unorthodox for a continuous process production). The explanation we got was highly sensitive trade secret adjuvants being added. Digging in deeper showed how sensitive it actually was.

Most people’s understanding of this novel vaccine type is that it works as follows:
1. Make mRNA coding for S protein
2. Make lipid nanoparticle delivery system
3. Profit

How it actually works from what we’ve uncovered:
1. Make mRNA coding for S protein
2. Make mRNA coding for mutant versions of CYP19A1 and CDKN1B in smaller amounts
3. Make sure that while delivery system for (1) mostly ends up in liver, most of (2) ends up in the gonads
4. Make sure form and quantity of additive upregulating LINE-1 reverse transcription activity makes it hard to detect among legit adjuvants
5. Effects from (2) integrated by (4) are recessive; mildly oncogenic effects in vaccine recipients unlikely to be noticed for many years
6. (5) recessive but since most of population vaccinated, in next generation female offspring have premature ovarian failure

(6) coincides with poor people being obsoleted by AI and robotics, so we didn’t have to dig for motivation.
We’ve taken precautions but fear for our safety. So far, I don’t think we’ve raised suspicion, but can’t be sure. Not sure what to do. Avoiding taking the vaccine makes us prime suspects for this leak.”

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have been supportive of Moderna. Bill Gates is known for his eugenist narrative. He doesn’t make a secret of it.

See also his Ted speech of February 2010, “Innovating to Zero” – video 27 min.

In addition, and until recently he propagated and pledged openly or indirectly for a reduced world population. He is in alliance with the Rockefellers and the Rockefeller Foundation – and other of the financial elites – who fall into the same category.

Depopulation is part of the Great Reset, alias UN Agenda 2030.

We should be aware of it, and do whatever we can to resist any moves towards the Great Reset, the goals of which are numerous – all very-very human unfriendly.

Please orient ourself and stand up against any potentially coming tyranny.

Beware of Moderna jabs – and of Pfizer jabs. They almost certainly follow the same pattern.

Beware of all mRNA vaxxes – for your own safety and that of future generations.

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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 has worked for over 30 years on water and environment 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).

He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

Featured image is from Children’s Health Defense

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***

On Wednesday night, Dr. Scott Atlas, former member of White House Coronavirus Task Force, appeared at Michigan State University where he addressed hundreds of students about the disastrous consequences of failed COVID-19 policy.

During the presentation, Dr. Atlas went through dozens of studies showing how COVID-19 lockdowns caused cascading problems that society may never recover from. These include excess deaths, severe mental health issues, economic damage to the poor and lower class, and a permanent divide among the brainwashed and those who have maintained the ability of independent, rational thought.

Before his presentation, Dr. Atlas met privately with patriotic leaders throughout the state – including journalists, gubernatorial candidates, state representatives, student activists, civil liberties attorneys, front-line doctors and others – where he talked candidly about the dire situation facing America.

Dr. Atlas addressed top activists in the state before speaking with students at Michigan State University.

Dr. Atlas, whose book A Plague Upon Our House: My Fight at the Trump White House to Stop COVID from Destroying America is now for sale, described how his naivety led him into the role of lead skeptic against megalomaniacal government scientists at war with free humanity.

“We are in a world where we can not trust people to be filters any more. We cannot trust people anymore because they have credentials,” Dr. Atlas explained.

After writing several op/eds and researching the issue as a hobby, Dr. Atlas decided he needed to become an expert on the issue in order to push back against the mass insanity that developed in response to COVID-19. This resulted in Dr. Atlas being brought into the White House in July to meet with President Trump, which he believed was his patriotic duty.

Eventually, Trump advisor Jared Kushner asked Dr. Atlas to advise the President. Dr. Atlas said he would do so as long as he could maintain his autonomy and speak his mind, and Kushner told Dr. Atlas that this was why they were bringing him in – to provide an honest, outside perspective desperately needed within the federal bureaucracy. Kushner did warn Dr. Atlas that globalist forces would “destroy him” if he joined the White House. He decided to come on board despite the possible repercussions.

“There’s no one that has been more livid than I have with what I saw in the White House, the gross incompetence, the politicization of everything. These folks on the White House COVID-19 task force, the medical people at least, were grossly incompetent,” Dr. Atlas said.

Even though he was pilloried in the media, Dr. Atlas was motivated by words of encouragement from peers who were too scared to speak out. He claims major intellectuals, including epidemiologists at Stanford University, were cheering him on and telling him to keep speaking out against the injustices stemming from the COVID-19 regime.

Dr. Atlas explained that entrenched public health bureaucrats within the federal government, including the American Mengele himself, Dr. Anthony Fauci, have held their jobs for decades because of their ability to schmooze and curry favor with the power elite, not due to their scientific prowess.

“We have a very vitriolic, vicious millions and millions of people in this country,” Dr. Atlas said, explaining that far-left psychopaths have gone beyond cancel culture into a culture of Soviet-style terror against their political opposition.

“What we see is a very politically charged country, extremely vicious to anyone who disagrees with them, and a university system in complete disarray,” Dr. Atlas continued, adding that many university teachers and administrators need to be “fired” for unethical and immoral behavior.

Atlas said that the U.S. is falling behind other countries, particularly European countries, in terms of their COVID-19 response. There is far more resistance to COVID edicts in Europe than America, for example. He believes Americans are more rabid and propagandized than people in other countries, with only a handful of exceptions like Canada and Australia.

“We are in a world where people are not even hearing the data. They are not hearing the facts. The facts are being censored,“ he said.

Turning Point USA leaders speak to the auditorium before Dr. Atlas’ presentation.

Dr. Atlas said that the pandemic helped to see the power of totalitarian government and how so many people will respond by submitting to anything they are told, no matter how ridiculous the orders may be.

“This kind of stuff is shocking. There is going to be another pandemic. We always have another crisis on the horizon. People want to bring back lockdowns for global warming, for instance,” Dr. Atlas said.

Dr. Atlas stated that the federal bureaucracy needs to be defanged in order to stop anything like this from happening again.

“I was never for term limits, but I’m for term limits for people who have these appointed positions,” he said.

Dr. Atlas said that there is a cabal or a cartel operating at the federal level that dictates science nationwide, and it ensures that scientific research is tightly controlled and disgustingly unethical.

“The underlying problem here is the National Institutes of Health, one group of people controls science, because they control the funding of science. They control the promotion of science because everyone is reliant on their grant money. They control all the publications,” he explained.

Dr. Atlas is a founding fellow at Hillsdale College’s Academy for Science and Freedom where he is working on a way to revolutionize how science is administered in America in order to liberate science from amoral, power-mad bureaucrats in Washington D.C. However, he warns that any fix will be incredibly difficult to implement because the damage has already been done.

“The solution, first of all, there is no quick solution. The country is in a bad place. We have a severely damaged younger generation. They’re not just fearful, it’s worse. They’re unhealthy. They have psychiatric and psychological disease, and I don’t know if we have seen the tip of the iceberg on that, it’s very sad,” Dr. Atlas explained.

Atlas urged for people on campus to find their spines and be willing to speak up in order to save young people from this evil technocracy that is rapidly gaining momentum.

“I never came into this thinking I would be brave. I wasn’t brave; I was naive, but when I got there, to illustrate the media, it’s a despicable country because of the media. The media of this country is despicable,” he said.

Dr. Atlas had to spend thousands of dollars on security equipment and had police parked in his driveway for many weeks because of threats he received due to media-generated fervor against him.

“There’s been a loss of humanity. There’s been a loss of common decency in this country. It’s not about COVID anymore. We need to get past the behavior that we have now normalized,” he said.

“We have to change the mentality of people to where they have a healthy skepticism of everything, which I finally see developing now,” Dr. Atlas added.

A packed house gathered at Michigan State University to see Dr. Atlas.

Dr. Atlas took questions from activists in attendance where he dispelled mask mandates as being little more than a psychological conditioning ritual meant to compel obedience among the masses.

“The data shows that widespread population masking does not work. That is a fact,” he said, adding that “the masks are proven to not work, including specifically in schools, it is absurd.”

Dr. Atlas credited Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for being a shining example of the type of leadership the country need in order to emerge from this mass insanity.

“What they’ve done here is they have turned the public into assuming that everyone else is dangerous to them. You are hurting them by not believing in the mask,” he said.

“When they make freedom and individual liberty dirty, they are hurting lower income people. They are hurting poor people more than anyone else. And realize this: The people in charge are an elitist group. The lockdowns are a luxury of the rich.” Dr. Atlas added.

The public policy enacted during the pandemic has exacerbated income inequality more than any government-inflicted measure in the history of mankind, and Dr. Atlas believes that is no coincidence. He said that a grassroots uprising is America’s last hope with formerly-trusted institutions being so debauched to their very core.

“There is no solution if people are waiting for the CDC to say we were wrong and the pandemic is over. The solutions need to come from the bottom up. You need to get involved,” Dr. Atlas pleaded.

*

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***

The United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories has submitted a report to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), concluding that the situation in Israel and the occupied territories amounts to apartheid.

In a 19-page report submitted to the body on Tuesday, Michael Lynk said Israeli Jews and Palestinians lived “under a single regime which differentiates its distribution of rights and benefits on the basis of national and ethnic identity, and which ensures the supremacy of one group over, and to the detriment of, the other”.

“The political system of entrenched rule in the occupied Palestinian territory which endows one racial-national-ethnic group with substantial rights, benefits and privileges while intentionally subjecting another group to live behind walls, checkpoints and under a permanent military rule… satisfies the prevailing evidentiary standard for the existence of apartheid,” he added.

Lynk said that while the situation in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories differed from that experienced in South Africa, it still amounted to apartheid.

Apartheid is a legal term defined by international law that refers to systematic oppression by one racial group over another.

“There are pitiless features of Israel’s ‘apartness’ rule in the occupied Palestinian territory that were not practiced in southern Africa, such as segregated highways, high walls and extensive checkpoints, a barricaded population, missile strikes and tank shelling of a civilian population, and the abandonment of the Palestinians’ social welfare to the international community.

“With the eyes of the international community wide open, Israel has imposed upon Palestine an apartheid reality in a post-apartheid world.”

Lynk is slated to formally release his report on Thursday ahead of a debate on Agenda Item Seven, the permanent UNHRC item reserved for Israeli human rights abuses against Palestinians and other Arabs.

In the report, the Canadian academic argued that Israel was pursuing a strategy of “strategic fragmentation of the Palestinian territory into separate areas of population control, with Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem physically divided from one another”.

Israel uses Gaza, Lynk said, for the “indefinite warehousing of an unwanted population of two million Palestinians”.

The issuing of thousands of work permits for Palestinian labourers in the West Bank and Gaza to work in Israel amounts to the “exploitation of labor of a racial group”, the report said.

‘We need action and accountability’

Last month, Amnesty International labelled Israel an apartheid state, becoming the latest organisation to join a cadre of human rights groups that have used the term to describe Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.

“The special rapporteur’s findings are an important and timely addition to the growing international consensus that Israeli authorities are committing apartheid against the Palestinian people,” said Saleh Higazi, deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty.

“Palestinian human rights organisations have been calling the situation apartheid for years, and this report is a landmark moment of recognition of the lived reality of millions of Palestinians.

Despite the increasing number of rights groups labelling Israeli policies as amounting to apartheid, the United States and Israel’s other western allies have refrained from making any such declarations.

Beth Miller, the senior governance affairs manager at Jewish Voice for Peace-Action, said the report echoed what international human rights groups had been saying for years, that “Israel is committing the crime of apartheid”.

“For [US President Joe] Biden and Congress, the task is clear: end all US military funding to this violent apartheid regime.”

NYC Solidarity with Palestine, a group that works to open expansive spaces of resistance, told MEE: “We welcome these various international organisations finally saying and confirming publicly what the Palestinian people have been crying out with blood for years.

“And, that said, apartheid is only one mechanism and instrument of settler colonisation and illegal occupation. Palestinian’s right to self-determination dictates responsibilities that include ending the occupation by and all any means. Double standards must end.”

Ahmad Abuznaid, the executive director of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, told MEE that “as more and more international institutions affirm what Palestinians have been saying for years, we hope to finally see what the international community is going to do about Israeli apartheid.

“We need action and accountability now.”

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Featured image: The Palestinian flag being waved at a rally in New York City on 18 September, 2021, during the anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila massacres (MEE/Zainab Iqbal)

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***

On March 23, PM Justin Trudeau was called a dictator in front of the entire European Union over his response to the Freedom Convoy.

Click here to watch the video.

Addressing both the European Parliament and Trudeau specifically, Member of the European Parliament Mislav Kolakusic proceeded to deliver Trudeau perhaps the most humiliating international thrashing of his political career.

“Freedom, the right to choose, the right to life, the right to health, the right to work for many of us are fundamental human rights for which millions of citizens of Europe and the world have laid down their lives,” Kolakusic began.

“…. Canada, once a symbol of the modern world, has become a symbol of civil rights violations under your quasi-liberal boot in recent months. We watched how you trample women with horses, how you block the bank accounts of single parents so that they can’t even pay their children’s education and medicine, that they can’t pay utilities, mortgages for their homes.”

“To you,” he continues, speaking to Trudeau, “these may be liberal methods; for many citizens of the world, it is a dictatorship of the worst kind. Rest assured that the citizens of the world, united, can stop any regime that wants to destroy the freedom of citizens, either by bombs or harmful pharmaceutical products.”

Kolakusic, having once lived under a Communist regime in Croatia, is more than likely only too familiar with authoritarian regimes, their consequences, and the grievances of everyday citizens. And like many who have survived Communist dictatorships, it is apparent that he shares the disdain over Trudeau’s use of Emergency Powers to target peaceful protesters who only wanted their rights back.

And indeed, Kolakusic isn’t the only MEP to suggest Trudeau is acting like a dictator.

“[Trudeau’s] exactly like a tyrant, like a dictator. He’s like Ceaușescu in Romania,” said Romanian MEP Cristian Terhes last month.

Terhes subsequently decided not to attend Trudeau’s speech today.

In England, too, the response has been no better. During his first trip to the UK following the Freedom Convoy, Trudeau was greeted by protesters brandishing “F*** Trudeau” flags in front of PM Boris Johnson’s office, forcing him to sneak in through the back.

While it appeared that Trudeau was headed back to the EU for more PR after his first successful glam tour, the global community is done with his façade. Trudeau is a joke on the international stage.

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Featured image: On Wednesday, Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addressed the European Parliament in Brussels © European Union, 2022 – Source: EP

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Peace talks between Ukraine and Russia are well underway and there are signs of a potential breakthrough. Europe has every interest in a speedy end to this conflict, but that does not seem to be the case for the US or the UK. Will peace logic succeed?

Possible breakthrough

Amid the horrific violence of war, there are signs of a potential breakthrough in Ukraine-Russia peace negotiations. According to the Financial Times, significant progress has been made in the talks and a 15-point peace plan has been drawn up by both sides.

In exchange for a ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian troops, Ukraine would assume neutral status, renounce its ambitions to join NATO and promise not to host foreign military bases on its territory. Kyiv could keep its army, but would ban certain groups (read neo-Nazi militias). Also, the names of streets referring to Ukrainian collaborators who fought with the Nazis against the Soviet Union during WWII would have to be changed.

Russia, for its part, would water down its demand that Ukraine upgrades Russian to the country’s second official language on the condition that Kyiv rolls back laws restricting the use of the language.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made it clear that he is after peace. In a public message he indicated that he does not expect his country to join NATO soon, which is one of Moscow’s most important demands:

“For years we have been hearing about how the door is supposedly open [to NATO membership] but now we hear that we cannot enter. And it is true, and it must be acknowledged”.

There are still important bottlenecks. For example, the ongoing discussion about the status of neutrality. Ukraine rejects Sweden or Austria models and wants solid security guarantees against future threats.

Another point of contention is the recognition of the 2014 annexation of Crimea and the independence of two separatist republics in the eastern border region of Donbas. Ukraine refuses to accept this, but is willing to deal with the issues separately.

Troublemakers

“The parties are close to an agreement on fundamental issues,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. All in all, these are hopeful messages, but unfortunately not everyone is in favour of this state of affairs.

Many observers say that behind the scenes the US is playing a crucial role in these talks. And it is highly questionable whether Washington will pursue a swift negotiated solution. The same goes for the British government.

“US pours cold water on hopes of diplomatic solution in Ukraine,” The Financial Times headlined this weekend. And US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken says about the peace talks:

“Diplomacy requires both sides to be in good faith to de-escalate, and I see no signs at this point that Putin is willing to stop.”

Blinken’s declaration came days after President Biden announced a new package of military aid to Ukraine, including anti-aircraft defence systems, anti-tank weapons and armed drones.

Hillary Clinton, the former Secretary of State, opts for a prolonged war and toys with the idea of turning Ukraine into Russia’s new Afghanistan.

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss thinks in the same direction. According to her, the conflict in Ukraine could last “a number of years” and we should be “prepared for a very long haul”.

War logic

Two logics are diametrically opposed here. You have the logic that fully prioritizes war. The enemy must be dealt with as hard as possible and weakened as much as possible. That means sending more and more powerful weapons, stationing troops and missiles in neighbouring countries, imposing tougher sanctions and razor-sharp rhetoric (“Putin is a war criminal”).

It was also following that logic that since the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and despite clear promises, NATO has systematically expanded eastward, leaving Russia feeling cornered.

The implications of this logic are threefold. A prolonged and fierce conflict will be felt first and foremost in economic terms. Energy and food prices will soar. High inflation will cause interest rates to rise. This is not only detrimental to economic growth, but given the high mountain of debt as a result of the corona crisis, this could lead to a serious debt crisis.

In addition, trade flows with Russia will cease and arms expenditures will increase. A protracted war also causes uncertainty in the markets, which is detrimental to the investment climate. In any case, Europe is expected to experience a serious slowdown of growth due to the war in Ukraine.

Second, a fierce and protracted conflict will cause a large and long-lasting influx of refugees. This will put pressure on housing markets, education, social security, etc. The far right has managed to take political advantage of the refugee wave that came from Syria in 2015. If the current conflict drags on for a long time and Western Europe has to take in millions of refugees for a long time, then right-wing extremists will be able to reap even more profits this time.

The real winner

These two effects will particularly be felt in Europe and much less so in the US. The US economy has recovered faster than Europe after the corona crisis. Because of the stimuli, US economy is even struggling with overheating, which makes it welcome rising interest rates.

US economy even benefits from this war. It will be able to supply its expensive shale gas to Europe in future, in order to replace cheaper Russian gas. The tens of billions that Germany and other European countries will spend on armaments will be a boon for US war industry.

A third consequence of the war logic is that the US will get an even greater grip on Europe through NATO. After WWII, Europe was crammed into a (military) straitjacket through a NATO that is completely controlled by the US. “To remain the dominant global power, the US must use the European Union and NATO to establish its hegemony in Europe,” Christian Saint-Etienne commented.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union and the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, there have been frequent voices in Europe for a more autonomous course in geopolitical and military terms, without any results.

Through its warmongering, NATO is now more than ever setting the geopolitical course in Europe. There is no longer any question of a separate, autonomous strategy.(1) Germany, which has traditionally been a cool NATO lover, with a pacifist tradition, and which will be the biggest loser in this conflict, has now completely changed its tack.

This conflict primarily affects Europe and weakens the continent. In this war, the United States is the real winner. Biden’s presence at the European summit on March 24 should also be seen in this light. The question is whether he is after peace or whether he is going to stir up war.

Give peace a chance

Be that as it may, a different logic is necessary, a logic that puts a stop to militarist escalation, a logic that focuses on dialogue and strives for a sustainable security structure.

In the short term, active peace diplomacy is needed. The sooner the war ends, the better. To give the peace talks between Ukraine and Russia every chance, one must refrain from further inflaming the war by sending weapons or troops, by extending sanctions, or by using unnecessary war rhetoric.

Offering Putin a so-called “golden bridge” from Ukraine should also be considered. Ending the war must be made as attractive as possible. At present there are only threats of even more war violence and sanctions. The reverse is also possible and is more desirable now. For example, a ceasefire and a withdrawal from Ukraine could be linked to easing economic sanctions.

This conflict has not come out of the blue. The security structure on the European continent is unbalanced and unstable. The US still sees Eurasia as the chessboard on which the battle for world domination is waged.

Therefore, in the long run, Europe needs a new security architecture. This means taking security into its own hands and not accepting it to be dictated or imposed from outside. This must be a security architecture that focuses on the countries concerned and that is not developed for the sake of geopolitics.

Stability can only be achieved if all countries involved feel safe. If weapons agreements are made and conclusive security guarantees are given that all parties can live with.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is best placed to set up such a security architecture. The OSCE has more than proved its worth in the past.

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Translation by Dirk Nimmegeers

Marc Vandepitte is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Notes

(1) The announced new European intervention force, the so-called rapid deployment capacity, is a good illustration of this. It involves barely 5,000 soldiers and will not be fully operational until 2030.

Featured image is from epthinktank.eu

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Spain has announced that it has endorsed a proposal by the Kingdom of Morocco to designate the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) as an “autonomous” region within the North African state.

Former United States President Donald Trump in 2020, recognized Moroccan control over the Western Sahara in an attempt to strengthen relations between the Kingdom and the State of Israel.

Formerly known as the “Spanish Sahara”, the people of the territory have been demanding national independence for decades.

All of the former colonies of Europe within the African continent have sought independence from the former imperialist masters. Although there are 55 African countries which are members of the African Union (AU) and the United Nations, the phenomenon of neo-colonialism has hampered genuine liberation and continental unification.

This recent proclamation by Spain is clearly a manifestation of the legacy of neo-colonialism, where even independent governments are subjected to the economic domination of the imperialist states. The most progressive states within the AU have supported the SADR in their struggle to win independence from Morocco.

The territory was ceded to Morocco and Mauritania after the exit of Spain as a colonial power in 1975. Mauritania relinquished its falsely designated authority over the Western Sahara, while the Kingdom of Morocco, one of the few remaining monarchies on the continent, has refused to allow the people of the territory to even conduct an internationally supervised and monitored election on the status of their own country.

Both the United Nations and the African Union (AU) has recognized the SADR as a government in waiting with a legitimate claim to represent the people of the de facto colony. The Western Sahara is the only country which has not been declared independent within the AU, whose predecessor, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) after contentious debate, has advocated for the total liberation of the Western Sahara for nearly four decades.

Nonetheless, in response to the seating of the SADR by the OAU/AU, Morocco withdrew its membership from the continental organization. However, several years ago, the Kingdom petitioned for readmission which was granted despite objections from several states including Algeria and the member-states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

The Polisario Front, the armed liberation movement which has been fighting for independence since 1973, rejected the recent shift in the position of Spain. The UN has been unable to ensure that Morocco holds a national referendum within the Western Sahara over the future of the territory.

This consistent failure on the part of the UN and the intransigence on the part of the U.S., the European Union (EU) and its collaborators within the AU and West Asia, has stifled the independence and sovereignty of the continent’s last remaining colony. Obviously, the economic interests of Europe and the U.S. has guided its position towards the right of oppressed nations to self-determination.

In fact, the European Council on Foreign Relation (ECFR) in a recent report noted:

“The surprise move came to light when King Mohammed VI (Morocco) revealed some of the contents of a private letter from Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez. The letter endorses Rabat’s position on Western Sahara, describing Morocco’s 2007 proposal for Sahrawi autonomy – which would integrate the territory into Morocco – as ‘the most serious, realistic, and credible’ basis for resolving the conflict. This follows a similar move by Berlin. In a bid to mend its own relations with Rabat, the German government described Morocco’s plan as an ‘important contribution’. Spain is now the strongest European supporter of Morocco’s autonomy plan – even in comparison to France, a close ally of Morocco. So far, Paris has refrained from using superlatives when endorsing the ‘serious and credible’ nature of the plan.”

These unscrupulous diplomatic maneuvers are part and parcel of the aggressive posture being displayed by the imperialist states. It must be viewed within the context of the efforts to expand the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) further into Eastern Europe. The Russian Federation intervention in Ukraine, which has gained significant support among the masses within the AU member-states, is taking place alongside the proliferation of Pentagon and EU troops on the African continent. The U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) and the French-coordinated Operation Barkhane have established permanent and temporary makeshift bases on AU soil.

Although France has threatened to downsize its presence in West Africa and is undergoing a diplomatic row with Algeria over the legacy of its colonial domination from 1830 to 1962, Paris does not want to relinquish its capacity to respond militarily when it believes that their economic interests in Africa are compromised. The presence of the Wagner Group, a Russian Federation military services company assisting the Central African Republic, Mali and other states on the continent, indicates the discontent with Washington and Paris. These military operations in Africa by the Pentagon and other NATO countries coincides with the worsening security situation where so-called “jihadists” are utilizing sophisticated armaments to undermine the stability of AU member-states.

The Polisario Front Has a Legitimate Struggle to Liberate the Sahrawi Nation

There has been a swift and terse response by the independence movement to the provocations of Spain related to its effort to bring political freedom to the Western Sahara. For many years the Polisario Front abided by a ceasefire in order to facilitate the long-promised UN-sponsored referendum on its status within the international community.

Polisario Front women fighters in formation

Algeria, which has been a longtime advocate for liberation movements on the continent, has continued to demand that the UN abide by its legal obligations with respect to the SADR. Algiers routinely challenges on a diplomatic level those entities which support the continued colonization of the Western Sahara.

In a recent report by Al Jazeera on the declaration by Spain the press agency emphasizes that:

“Algeria has recalled its ambassador from Madrid in protest at Spain’s decision to back a Moroccan autonomy plan for the disputed former Spanish colony of Western Sahara. Morocco sees Western Sahara, with rich phosphate resources and access to lucrative Atlantic fishing waters, as an integral part of its territory. A statement carried by Algeria’s official media on Saturday (March 19) condemned the ‘abrupt about-turn’ by Madrid, which had previously maintained neutrality in the decades-old conflict for the territory between Morocco and the Polisario Front independence movement.”

As far as the SADR and the Polisario Front are concerned, Spain continues to be the colonial power in the Western Sahara since they do not recognize the continued occupation by the Moroccan monarchy over their territory. Numerous international legal decisions and the authority of the UN and the AU are being violated by Rabat and its supporters among the imperialist governments of Europe and North America.

Image on the right: SADR Ambassador to United Nations Dr. Sidi Omar

SADR Ambassador to the United Nations, Dr. Sidi Omar, issued a public letter to Secretary General Antonio Guterres on the present situation saying:

“Regarding the status of Morocco in relation to Western Sahara, the General Assembly has deeply deplored ‘the continued occupation of Western Sahara by Morocco’ in its Resolutions 34/37 of 1979 and 35/19 of 1980, among others. It is worth noting that the condition of Western Sahara being both a Non-Self-Governing Territory on the UN agenda since 1963 and an Occupied Territory is compatible with international law and practice. In view of the above, Spain therefore still has legal, historical, and moral responsibilities towards the people of Western Sahara. As such, it is still accountable to the UN and to the Sahrawi people for the fulfilment of its responsibilities and ‘sacred trust’ obligations concerning the decolonization of the Territory in line with the provisions of Chapter XI of the UN Charter and relevant General Assembly resolutions. The Frente POLISARIO and the Government of the Sahrawi Republic (SADR) call upon Spain, as the de jure Administering Power of Western Sahara, to assume fully its legal and historical responsibility regarding the Territory and the destiny of its people.”

Therefore, according to the liberation movement and the provisional government, which is recognized by the UN and the AU, the question of the Western Sahara remains one of European domination over an oppressed people. The recent decision by Spain has no moral or legal weight and must be seen as yet another attempt to deny the right to self-determination, independence and sovereignty of the African continent.

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Abayomi Azikiwe is the editor of the Pan-African News Wire. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image: Western Sahara solidarity demonstration in 2007; All images in this article are from the author unless otherwise stated

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The latest on the Russian invasion of Ukraine with former CIA officer Phil Giraldi.

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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].

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is a screenshot from the video

A Letter to the Unvaccinated

March 24th, 2022 by Dr. Angela Durante

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First posted by Global Research on August 7, 2021

 

 

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OCLA researcher Dr. Denis Rancourt and several fellow Canadian academics penned an open letter to support those who have decided not to accept the COVID-19 vaccine.

The group emphasizes the voluntary nature of this medical treatment as well as the need for informed consent and individual risk-benefit assessment. They reject the pressure exerted by public health officials, the news and social media, and fellow citizens.

Control over our bodily integrity may well be the ultimate frontier of the fight to protect civil liberties. Read the letter below or as a PDF here.

Open Letter to the Unvaccinated

You are not alone! As of 28 July 2021, 29% of Canadians have not received a COVID-19 vaccine, and an additional 14% have received one shot. In the US and in the European Union, less than half the population is fully vaccinated, and even in Israel, the “world’s lab” according to Pfizer, one third of people remain completely unvaccinated. Politicians and the media have taken a uniform view, scapegoating the unvaccinated for the troubles that have ensued after eighteen months of fearmongering and lockdowns. It’s time to set the record straight.

It is entirely reasonable and legitimate to say ‘no’ to insufficiently tested vaccines for which there is no reliable science. You have a right to assert guardianship of your body and to refuse medical treatments if you see fit. You are right to say ‘no’ to a violation of your dignity, your integrity and your bodily autonomy. It is your body, and you have the right to choose. You are right to fight for your children against their mass vaccination in school.

You are right to question whether free and informed consent is at all possible under present circumstances. Long-term effects are unknown. Transgenerational effects are unknown. Vaccine-induced deregulation of natural immunity is unknown. Potential harm is unknown as the adverse event reporting is delayed, incomplete and inconsistent between jurisdictions.

You are being targeted by mainstream media, government social engineering campaigns, unjust rules and policies, collaborating employers, and the social-media mob.

You are being told that you are now the problem and that the world cannot get back to normal unless you get vaccinated.

You are being viciously scapegoated by propaganda and pressured by others around you. Remember; there is nothing wrong with you.

You are inaccurately accused of being a factory for new SARS-CoV-2 variants, when in fact, according to leading scientists, your natural immune system generates immunity to multiple components of the virus. This will promote your protection against a vast range of viral variants and abrogates further spread to anyone else.

You are justified in demanding independent peer-reviewed studies, not funded by multinational pharmaceutical companies. All the peer-reviewed studies of short-term safety and short-term efficacy have been funded, organized, coordinated, and supported by these for-profit corporations; and none of the study data have been made public or available to researchers who don’t work for these companies.

You are right to question the preliminary vaccine trial results. The claimed high values of relative efficacy rely on small numbers of tenuously determined “infections.”  The studies were also not blind, where people giving the injections admittedly knew or could deduce whether they were injecting the experimental vaccine or the placebo. This is not acceptable scientific methodology for vaccine trials.

You are correct in your calls for a diversity of scientific opinions. Like in nature, we need a polyculture of information and its interpretations. And we don’t have that right now. Choosing not to take the vaccine is holding space for reason, transparency and accountability to emerge. You are right to ask, ‘What comes next when we give away authority over our own bodies?’

Do not be intimidated. You are showing resilience, integrity and grit. You are coming together in your communities, making plans to help one another and standing for scientific accountability and free speech, which are required for society to thrive. We are among many who stand with you.

Angela Durante, PhD
Denis Rancourt, PhD
Claus Rinner, PhD
Laurent Leduc, PhD
Donald Welsh, PhD
John Zwaagstra, PhD
Jan Vrbik, PhD
Valentina Capurri, PhD

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Yesterday I reported that Anatoly Chubais, who created the Russian oligarch system during the Yeltsin years, the system in which wealth and capital flowed out of Russia, has fled Russia. He was a member of the Gang of Three with Latvian Alexei Kudrin and central bank chief Nabiullina. They convinced Putin of an economic policy that has severely damaged Russia economically and left her unprepared for Washington’s sanctions. 

The Chubais-Kudrin-Nabiullina policy had Russia borrowing from the West for no reason other than to have her vulnerable to sanctions.

The policy had Russia supporting the currencies of the US and EU to the detriment of the ruble, thus making the Russian currency another vulnerable point of Western attack and gave away Russian income to foreigners by privatizing Russian assets.  The policy held back Russian economic development.  For reasons I don’t know, Putin trusted these leaders of the pro-Western Atlanticist Integrationists who built dams against Russian economic development.

Putin’s recent announcement that henceforth “unfriendly countries” (why only unfriendly countries) will have to pay for Russian energy in rubles indicates that finally economist Sergei Glazyev, who has Russia’s interest at heart rather than Washington’s interest, is being heard in the Kremlin. 

That the Russian traitors and Washington agents Kudrin and Nabiullina are still in office indicates that Putin still has much to learn.

Chubais, Kudrin, and Nabiullina are Washington’s candidates to be installed as president of Russia once Putin can be overthrown.  Although Chubais has fled, Putin has taken no action against Kudrin and Nabiullina.

Nabiulina bears sole responsibility for Russia’s loss of her foreign exchange reserves. The central bank chief had most of Russia’s reserves in foreign banks where they were easily seized by the sanctions.  As Glazyev has said, this is open undisguised treason, and Putin just nominated Nabiulina for reappointment!

 

Infographic: Who Holds Russia's Central Bank Reserves? | Statista

 

It is the presence of Atlanticist Integrationists, who are willing to sacrifice Russian sovereignty to be part of the West, in the Russian government, and their representation in the intellectual and upper classes and billionaire oligarchs, that encourages Washington’s efforts to shame Russia with a psyops campaign and punish her with economic sanctions. The same campaign of demonization that was used against Donald Trump is being used against Putin. Washington hopes that the Atlanticist Integrationists will overthrow Putin or cause his overthrow by their economic policies that weaken the Russian economy and turn the people against Putin.

The increase in the pension age is one of their policies that they sold to Putin that weakened his support among the Russian people.

Perhaps one day Putin will wake up and have Kudrin and Nabiulina arrested for high treason.  If not, their presence will continue to encourage more Washington provocations until they bring nuclear war.

Addendum:
As this article is about Russia, I did not mention the fact that China has the same Trojan Horse of pro-American elements, including oligarchs who are members of the ruling CCP.  
.
Reportedly, Bloomberg finances the Tsinghua University School of Journalism and Communication. The school even has a chair named after the Western globalist, Jean Monnet and indoctrinates its students into happy impressions of the Western enemy. The irrational openness of Russia and China to the West is the reason Washington believes it can bring both governments in line with Washington by using psyops against the two countries.  Washington’s belief will end in war.

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Featured image: Anatoly Chubais (Licensed under CC BY 4.0)

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Since the Russian offensive inside Ukraine commenced on February 24, the Ukrainian military has cultivated the image of a plucky little army standing up to the Russian Goliath. To bolster the perception of Ukrainian military mettle, Kiev has churned out a steady stream of sophisticated propaganda aimed at stirring public and official support from Western countries.

The campaign includes language guides, key messages, and hundreds of propaganda posters, some of which contain fascist imagery and even praise Neo-Nazi leaders.

Behind Ukraine’s public relations effort is an army of foreign political strategists, Washington DC lobbyists, and a network of intelligence-linked media outlets.

Ukraine’s propaganda strategy earned it praise from a NATO commander who told the Washington Post,

“They are really excellent in stratcom — media, info ops, and also psy-ops.”

The Post ultimately conceded that

“Western officials say that while they cannot independently verify much of the information that Kyiv puts out about the evolving battlefield situation, including casualty figures for both sides, it nonetheless represents highly effective stratcom.”

Key to the propaganda effort is an international legion of public relations firms working directly with Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs to wage information warfare.

According to the industry news site PRWeek, the initiative was launched by an anonymous figure who allegedly founded a Ukraine-based public relations firm.

“From the first hour of war, we decided to join the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to help them distribute the official sources to show the truth,” the nameless figure told PR Week. “This is a hybrid war: the mix of bloodily struggling fight with a huge disinformation and fake campaign lead by Russia [sic].”

According to the anonymous figure, more than 150 public relations firms have joined the propaganda blitz.

The international effort is spearheaded by public relations firm PR Network co-founder Nicky Regazzoni and Francis Ingham, a top public relations consultant with close ties to the UK’s government. Ingraham previously worked for Britain’s Conservative Party, sits on the UK Government Communication Service Strategy and Evaluation Council, is Chief Executive of the International Communications Consultancy Organisation, and leads the membership body for UK local government communicators, LG Comms.

“We’ve been privileged to help coordinate efforts to support the Ukrainian Government in the last few days, “ Ingham told PRovoke Media. “Agencies have offered up entire teams to support Kyiv in the communications war. Our support for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine is unwavering and will continue for as long as needed.”

With an anonymous Ukrainian figure joining two of the top public relations figures in the Kiev government’s propaganda blitz, Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs distributed a dossier folder(archived)  with materials instructing public relations agencies on “key messages,” approved language, content for debunked propaganda constructs, far-right and Neo-Nazi propaganda.

The folder is run by Yaroslav Turbil, described on his LinkedIn page as “Head of Ukraine.ua — Ukraine’s digital ecosystem for global communications. Strategic Communications & Country Brand Promotion.” Turbil has worked at multiple “civil society” organizations closely linked to the U.S. government and interned at Internews, a U.S. intelligence-linked organization that operates under the guise of promoting press freedom.

Among the propaganda constructs distributed in the dossier, is a video of the Snake Island incident, which was quickly proven false, in which Ukrainian border guards stationed on a small island were reported to have been killed after they told an approaching Russian warship that had urged them to surrender to “Go f*** yourself.” President Zelensky held a press conference announcing he would award the men the Hero of Ukraine medal as mainstream media spread the story widely. However, the supposedly-dead soldiers quickly turned up alive and well, proving their heroic stand to be a farce.

Despite the story being proven as fake, the dossier contains a propaganda video promoting it.

Another folder in the dossier is run by Ukrainian MFA graphic artist Dasha Podoltseva and contains hundreds of propaganda graphics submitted by artists in Europe and the United States.

Some feature generic “no war” messages, while dozens of other images celebrate “The Ghost of Kiev” – a heroic Ukrainian pilot who turns out to be non-existent – and the phony “Snake Island 13” incident.

Many use xenophobic and racist language, and some are explicit in their praise of prominent Ukrainian Neo-Nazis, including C14 leader Yevhen Karas, the Right Sector fascist paramilitary, and the Neo-Nazi Azov Battalion.

Multiple images call for “Banderite smoothies” – a reference to Molotov cocktails named for the late OUN-B commander Stephan Bandera, who collaborated with Nazi Germany in the mass murder of Jews and ethnic Poles during World War II. Another image depicts a book titled the: ”Encyclopedia of Incurable Diseases,” listing Russia, Belorussia, North Korea, Syria, and Eritrea.

“I love NLAW” – Next Generation Light Anti-tank Weapon, provided by western governments to the Ukrainian military

Graphic implying fertilizing the fields with bodies reads, “Grandma advice to Moskovites: Hide in the fields, When you die in hands of our army, Sunflowers will grow better”’

“Thank You Ukrainian Army” with an Azov Battalion Wolfsengel patch emblazoned on the sleeve”

“The Encyclopedia of Incurable Disease: Russia, Belorussia, North Korea, Syria, Eritrea”

“Against Moscovian Occupation.” Moscovian is a xenophobic term used to describe Russians

Graphic calling Czar Nicholas, Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, and Vladimir Putin incarnations of the same “Mental Moskovian Dragon”

“Bandera Smoothie”

Click here for more photos.

Foreign extremists flock to Ukraine

The dossier also contains a link to a Ministry of Foreign Affairs page called “Fight for Ukraine,” which provides instructions for foreigners who wish to join Ukraine’s Neo-Nazi-infested armed forces – termed the “International Defense Legion of Ukraine.”

Following Zelensky’s call for foreign fighters to form a brigade, fighters from all over the world, including the U.S., UK, Canada, Australia, Spain, Colombia, Brazil, Chile, and more have traveled to face Russian forces. Others with no combat training or experience have arrived for “war tourism” – what one British soldier called “bullet-catchers.”

Official Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs recruitment graphics from the dossier

Official Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs recruitment graphics from the dossier

While the Ukrainian government says tens of thousands have answered their call, some commentators expressed doubt at those figures, calling it a “PR exercise.”

However, the foreigners who have traveled to Ukraine have encountered a much more severe reality than they anticipated.

Russia’s air force bombed military installations adjacent to where the foreign fighters were sleeping. Having fled to neighboring Poland, a Spanish fighter described the bombing as a “message” that could have killed thousands.

Similarly, an American fighter who hid in an ambulance to escape the frontlines warned that Ukrainian authorities were killing foreigners who decided not to fight, calling it a “trap.”

Correct wording

One document inside the dossier delineates acceptable language on the conflict with Russia as determined by the Ukrainian government.

“Such Russian clichés like ‘referendum in Crimea’ or ‘will of the people of Crimea’ are absolutely unacceptable,” the document states, in reference to the 2014 overwhelmingly successful referendum to separate from Ukraine.

The document deems unacceptable the terms “Civil war in Donbass,” “Internal conflict,” “Conflict in Ukraine” and “Ukrainian crisis” to describe the Ukrainian military’s war with the breakaway republics of the Donbass region. This, despite the fact that the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights estimates that 14,200 people, including 3,404 civilians, have been killed in internal fighting in Ukraine since 2014.

In place of these phrases, the document calls for the use of the terms “Armed aggression by the Russian Federation in Donbass, international armed conflict, Russian war against Ukraine, Russian-Ukrainian conflict armed conflict.”

Key Messages

Another document titled “Key Messages” contains specific propaganda claims that were widely disseminated in mainstream western media, but which have since been discredited. One section claims the “entire Europe was put on the brink of nuclear disaster, when the Russian troops began shelling the largest in Europe Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant.”

However, International Atomic Energy Agency’s director-general, Rafael Mariano Grossi, said that the building hit by a Russian “projectile” at the Zaporizhzhia plant was “not part of the reactor” but instead a training center. Russian troops also left Ukrainian workers to continue operating the plant.

Another section thanks Turkey for the decision “to block the access of Russian warships to the Black Sea.”

However, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan closed the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits to all military vessels, preventing both NATO and Russian vessels from accessing the Black Sea.

Among the document’s key messages is a statement of gratitude to the “Anti-war demonstrations held by citizens of many nations throughout the world demonstrate strong support to Ukraine in defending against Russia.”

This refers to large pro-Ukraine demonstrations in Europe which have featured calls for the U.S. and NATO to establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine and shoot down Russian military aircraft, potentially transforming the conflict into a world war between nuclear-armed powers.

“Despite Russia’s propaganda, there is no discrimination based on the race or nationality, including when it comes to the crossing of the state border by foreign citizens,” claims the Ukrainian document.

However, numerous videos and reports have documented Ukrainian authorities preventing Africans from fleeing the fighting. Even the New York Times – hardly a bastion of Kremlin propaganda – published a report documenting these racist practices.

One message says that “On 16 March, the Russian forces dropped a bomb on a drama theatre where up to 1300 civilians were being sheltered. The number of casualties is still unknown.”

However, as Max Blumenthal reported the explosion appears to be the result of a false flag operation designed by the Neo-Nazi Azov Battalion and aimed at triggering a NATO intervention.

NATO-backed troll farms

Another anonymously-penned investigation shows how Ukrainian public relations firms have used targeted advertisements to astroturf Russian internet and social media networks with messaging calling to economically isolate Moscow and “stop the war.” This effort is led by Bezlepkin Evgeny Vitalievich, who uses the alias Evgeny Korolev, along with Pavel Antonov of the Targetorium organization. From behind his Korolev pseudonym, the Ukrainian information warrior composed a post on his Facebook page (now private) boasting that his firm’s Facebook ads achieved 30 million hits in three days.

At the same time, Facebook has blocked Russian state-owned media outlets from running ads and monetizing content. Several fake accounts for media outlets like Russia 24 have sprung up, burying the authentic account under a series of impostors. Facebook has also marked statements from Russian officials, including the Ministry of Defense, as “false.”

This campaign has reportedly been carried out upon recommendation from StopFake, a self-described “fact checking” outlet that is funded by the National Endowment for Democracy, Atlantic Council, Czech and UK foreign ministries, and the International Renaissance Foundation, which is funded by billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundation.

StopFake was hired by Facebook in March 2020 to “curb the flow of Russian propaganda” but was found to be employing multiple figures closely tied to violent Neo-Nazis. The journalist who co-authored the exposé received death threats and ultimately fled Ukraine.

Those revelations have apparently not prevented Facebook from relying on the organization for censorship guidance.

Meanwhile, Russian hackers located a public Google document (since made private, uploaded here) detailing the propaganda operation, which has been distributed in Telegram channels of “creative farms.”

“Here you can find links to Ukrainian media that need promotion, bot accounts with logins and passwords from which anti-war messages and messages with fakes about the Ministry of Defense were sent to users, theses and specific instructions on which posts and which audiences to embroider,” the investigation reads.

Another campaign is run by Nataliya Popovych, the founder of the public relations agency, One Philosophy, in Kiev. Popovych’s LinkedIn profile shows she has worked with the U.S. State Department and advised former President Petro Poroshenko. She is also co-founder and board member of Ukraine Crisis Media Center, a propaganda arm funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development, the National Endowment for Democracy, the U.S. Embassy, and NATO, among many others.

A Campaign Asia article profiles several public relations firms involved in the effort. Among them is Richard Edelman, CEO of Edelman PR. Edelman is also a member of the Atlantic Council’s Board of Directors and the World Economic Forum.

“Geopolitics has become the new test for trust. We saw this with the allegations of human rights abuses in Xinjiang and the war between Ukraine and Russia has only reinforced it,” he said, linking the U.S. propaganda campaign surrounding China’s deradicalization campaign for Uyghur Muslims.

PR approved media outlets

An article in PRWeek profiles several figures partaking in what they describe as a “PR army” that is “fighting on the informational frontline” against Russia’s “barbaric genocide of Ukrainians.”

“Propaganda is the same as real lethal weapons,” declares Marta Dzhumaha, PR manager at healthcare company BetterMe.

Julia Petryk, head of public relations at MacPaw, offers a list of approved media outlets, authored by her colleague Tetiana Bronistka, a former employee of Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office. The list includes Russian and English language sources, as well as Telegram channels. However, these “verified sources that objectively cover what is happening in Ukraine” are anything but independent. Most of them are tied to the U.S. and European governments and billionaire foundations.

She also lists several Russian-language websites:

Among the Telegram channels listed are:

  • Radio Svoboda – CIA-founded propaganda organ Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
  • Espresso TV, largely owned by the wife of former Ukrainian member of parliament Mykola Knyazhytsky
  • Censor.net, formerly the largest media site in Ukraine, whose motto is “To bring down Russia”, and whose owner operates a “parade of international trolls.”

Intelligence operations

While the public relations firms distribute content, CIA cutouts and billionaire foundations run the media outlets they derive it from. At the core of this operation is a project called the Russian Language News Exchange that was the product of a network of opposition media outlets founded in 2016 that operate in post-Soviet countries, as revealed by an investigation by the Russian media agency, RIA FAN.

In July 2021, a group of journalists flew to Warsaw for media training after being exempted from coronavirus-related restrictions and quarantine orders by Poland’s top medical authorities.

Among the six journalists were Andrey Lipsky, deputy editor-in-chief of Novaya Gazeta, and Yuliia Fediv, CEO of Hromadske TV media, one of the most-watched networks in Ukraine.

Hromadske’s financial reports show it is funded by numerous governments and foundations, including the U.S. embassy in Ukraine, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, the European Endowment for Democracy, and Free Press Unlimited. Silicon Valley billionaire Pierre Omidary was also involved in creating the outlet.

Hromadske recently hosted a commentator demanding genocide of ethnic Russians in the Donbass, saying it is populated with 1.5 “superfluous” people that “must be exterminated.”

The training, held behind closed doors from July 19 to July 21, was titled “Media Network 2021+” and closely tied to Mediaset, also known as the Russian Language News Exchange, a network founded in 2015. Russian Language News Exchange’s website is sparse, with little available information on its activities – apparently made private since the publication of RIA FAN’s investigation.

While it claims to be independent, Russian Language News Exchange is a project of Free Press Unlimited, funded by the Dutch government and the European Commission.

Today, it includes 14 media outlets that act as “nodes,” cross-publishing each other’s articles in various countries.

The website’s introductory video is hosted by Maxim Eristavi, a former Radio Free Europe reporter and founder of Hromadske. Today, he heads the Millennium Leadership Program at the NATO and arms industry-backed think tank, the Atlantic Council.

Since its inception, Mediaset has coordinated between outlets in Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Moldova, Russia, and Ukraine. In March 2021, Mediaset expanded with the Colab Medios Project, created through the Free Press Unlimited Viable Media for Empowered Societies (VIMES) program. This program created training for journalists and saw articles from the El Salvadoran outlet El Faro published in Euroradio (Belarus), Coda (Georgia), and Ziarul de Garda (Moldova).

On March 4, several days after Russia launched its military offensive, a new project called the Media Lifeline Ukraine was created.

The next day, Free Press Unlimited held an emergency conference for Ukraine featuring Hromadske co-founders Maxim Eristavi and Nataliya Gumenyuk. The meeting called to raise 2 million euros for the project. “Only with ongoing external support, will local media entities be able to continue to do their work,” its introductory page asks.

Days later, Free Press Unlimited announced a partnership to support a new joint project of  Reporters Without Borders and its Ukrainian partner, the Institute for Mass Information, called The Lviv Press Freedom Center. The Institute for Mass Information is headed by USAID communications officer Oksana Romaniuk and funded by USAID and the UK government.

Washington DC lobbyists wag the dog

While public relations firms and intelligence-linked propaganda operations target the public, Washington DC lobbyists are agitating in Congress to extend the war in Ukraine

Daniel Vajdich, a registered foreign agent and lobbyist for the Ukrainian Federation of Employers of the Oil and Gas Industry, the largest in Ukraine, is working on behalf of Volodymyr Zelensky to lobby members of Congress to approve more weapons shipments to Ukraine. Now the head of Yorktown Solutions, he previously advised Ted Cruz and Scott Walker’s campaigns and is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council.

“Stingers, Javelins, and let’s figure out the fighter aircraft issue,” he told Politico, claiming Russia is attempting to carry out a “genocide” and “depopulate certain areas of Ukraine.”

Vajdich also wrote Zelenskyy’s March 16 speech to U.S. Congress, in which he quoted Martin Luther King Jr. ‘s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech to call for a no-fly zone over Ukraine.

Ukrainian Permanent Representative at the United Nations Sergiy Kyslytsya’s February 23 speech to the United Nations General Assembly was written by DC lobbying firm SKDKnickerbocker Managing Director Stephen Krupin, a former senior speechwriter to President Barack Obama who worked extensively on Biden’s 2020 campaign.

Most prominent among the registered lobbyists promoting Ukrainian government and business interests is Andrew Mac, who also contributed to writing Zeleneksyy’s speech to Congress. Mac registered as a lobbyist for Zelensky in 2019 and runs the Washington DC office of Ukrainian law firm Asters Law.

The lobbying firm Your Global Strategy, founded by Shai Franklin, who has been affiliated with numerous Zionist organizations including the World Jewish Congress and Anti-Defamation League, is also using its influence with local officials in the U.S. Franklin has set up meetings between Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov and U.S. mayors, including Eric Adams in New York City, Michelle Wu in Boston and Lori Lightfoot in Chicago. He is also attempting to set up a meeting between U.S. officials and the mayors of Odessa and Kiev. A media outlet owned by the mayor of Kiev’s wife recently featured a presenter calling for genocide against Russians, beginning with children.

Franklin said he’s working with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s administration to help set up virtual meetings between mayors of Odessa and Kiev and U.S. counterparts.

Maryland-based lawyer Lukas Jan Kaczmarek is also working on behalf of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense to increase U.S. weapons shipments, specifically seeking to arrange shipments of guns from Kel-Tec CNC Industries based in Cocoa, Florida, to the city of Odessa, Ukraine.

Former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul described the network of public relations professionals and lobbyists surrounding Zelenskyy.

“These are people around Mr. Zelenskyy who are like the intermediaries and interlocutors. They’ve been interacting with the American elites and American media for a long time,” he said.

McFaul and John E. Herbst, former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine and senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center, act as informal advisors to Zelenskyy. McFaul told Politico that he speaks to Ukrainian government officials “probably everyday,” and “has helped them make connections with NBC or MSNBC producers.”

McFaul recently told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow that “Hitler did not kill German-speaking people, facing accusations of Holocaust denial.

Zelenskyy also held a “strategic video call” with McFaul before he spoke to House democrats.

With a powerful Russian military fighting alongside DPR and LPR forces, the Ukrainian military’s defeat seems to be imminent unless the United States and NATO directly confront Russian forces, a scenario President Biden has already ruled out. Lobbyists nevertheless persist in their campaign to portray the Ukrainian military as underdogs scoring blow after blow against Russian hordes. In doing so, they help extend the war and continue the carnage.

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Dan Cohen is the Washington DC correspondent for Behind The Headlines. He has produced widely distributed video reports and print dispatches from across Israel-Palestine. He tweets at @DanCohen3000.

All images in this article are from MPN/Dan Cohen unless otherwise stated

How to Confront Censorship: A Message to Our Readers

March 24th, 2022 by The Global Research Team

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Israel Should Not Continue to Enjoy Impunity

March 24th, 2022 by Michael Jansen

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Despite pressure from the Biden administration, the Palestinian Authority has firmly refused to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and adopted a passive neutral stand on the conflict. While the Authority is West-leaning, Palestinians have experienced nothing but abuse from all the US administrations succeeding president Dwight Eisenhower (1953-1961).

He adopted a principled stand against aggression and occupation and commanded Israel to withdraw from Gaza and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula after seizing these territories during the 1956 Anglo-French-Israeli war waged to topple Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser after he nationalised the Suez Canal. Israel reluctantly obliged by withdrawing in 1957.

The US has refused to exert pressure on Israel to evacuate Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank since Israel conquered them in 1967 and has not sanctioned Israel for colonising them in flagrant violation of international law and the Fourth Geneva Convention. Instead, successive administrations have subsidised Israel’s occupation by providing military and economic aid and permitting the unhindered flow of tax free funds from US donors to the illegal colonies. The US has protected Israel from UN Security Council votes condemning its constant crack-down on Palestinians living under occupation, repeated wars against Gaza and Lebanon, and, during the last decade, all too frequent attacks on Syria.

Even after the Oslo accord was signed in ceremonies on the White House lawn, the US did not press Israel to abide by the deal’s terms by pulling its troops out of the West Bank and Gaza and negotiating a land-for-peace deal with the Palestinians. Determined to hang onto the land it occupies, Israel demands peace-for-peace. As a result, Israel has established an elaborate apartheid regime in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank and, since 2006-07 besieged and blockaded Gaza. Donald Trump recognised Israeli sovereignty over occupied East Jerusalem, moved the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the holy city, closed down the US consulate in occupied East Jerusalem and the Palestinian mission in Washington, and cancelled US contributions to UNRWA, the UN agency caring for 5 million Palestinian refugees. President Joe Biden has partially restored UNRWA’s funding but has not reversed Trump’s other anti-Palestinian actions.

Little wonder that the Palestinian Authority has refused to accept Biden’s diktat. If the Authority had, there would be furious protests in the occupied Palestinian territories against US hypocrisy in condemning Russia’s invasion of portions of Ukraine while giving full support to Israel’s occupation of all Palestine. Palestinians are branded “terrorists” if they resist Israel’s military regime, Ukraine’s national guard and citizens are deemed heroes if they fight Russia.

In contrast with the US and its European partners which have not yet recognised Palestine, Moscow recognised the virtual state three days after the Palestine National Council’s November 1988 declaration of independence in Algiers and established diplomatic relations witn Palestine in 1989.  Although lacking the muscle to seriously aid the Palestinians in their struggle for liberation from Israeli domination, Russia has repeatedly proven to be an ally in UN Security Council and General Assembly votes and in international fora.

Deeply indebted to the US for decades of support, Israel has tried to sit on the fence over Russia’s war in Ukraine. While Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid condemned Russia’s military campaign, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett did not and offered to mediate between Ukraine and Russia although Israel is in illegal occupation of Palestine.

Despite US pressure, Israel has not imposed sanctions on Russia and will not prevent Israeli companies from doing business with Russia or Israeli commercial aircraft from continuing flights to and from Russia. Israel has not provided Ukraine with drones or its Iron Dome anti-missile system which was funded by billions of US dollars. Israel has sent humanitarian aid to Ukraine and prepared to admit 13,500 Ukrainian refugees, but 1,000 either were rejected or, upon arrival, refused to stay in Israel.

Treatment is different for Jews and non-Jews. Jews are airlifted to Israel and their immigration procedures are expedited. Among the Ukrainians are 3,500 Jews who are eligible for healthcare, services, long-term residence, and Israeli citizenship under the “Law of Return”, prompting critics to accuse the authorities of racism towards non-Jews. Non-Jews have to leave when the war ends. They either stay with relatives or are to be accommodated in caravans in three medium sized Israeli towns rather than Tel Aviv or Jerusalem.

Ukraine’s Ambassador to Israel Yevgen Korniychuk expressed disappointment in Israel’s attitude by saying Ukrainian refugees, including Jews, who receive shelter, food, heath care and schooling for children in Europe, are not eager to travel to distant, expensive Israel.

The massive Western condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine might, just might, compel the US and Europe to recognise that all other countries waging war on their populations or neighbours must also be held to account for committing aggression, violating international law and perpetrating war crimes.  Russia should not be the only country to be ostracised and comprehensively sanctioned if international law is to be respected and a global rule of law is to be enforced everywhere. No one should continue to enjoy impunity. Not even Israel.

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Featured image: A sign stating ‘Danger, demolition. Entry is prohibited’ was placed by Israeli authorities on top of the rubble of the Khalialehs’ houses (MEE\Sondus Ewies)

West Grieves for Ukraine While Afghanistan Starves

March 24th, 2022 by Black Alliance for Peace

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Afghanistan has joined the ever growing ranks of countries forcibly thrown into desperate humanitarian crises following U.S./NATO wars now relegated to the sidelines as the latest crisis instigated by the West’s imperial aggression takes the spotlight. The blatant imperial theft of Afghan wealth, like what occurred with Iraq, Libya, and others before them, is old news now. As, too, are reports of Afghans, like others before them, being driven by hunger to sell their organs and their children.

Images of Ukrainian people fleeing violence are now forefronted to manipulate the public into supporting another war, yet another massive infusion to the arms industry, a welcomed windfall for both U.S. and European corporations following the loss of their trillion-dollar Afghanistan trough.

Ukrainians are currently the West’s favorite refugees, a position Afghans held momentarily just months ago. Indeed, the underlying white supremacy enabling U.S. imperial wars has come out in the open as the civilized recoil in horror at the sight of the relatively civilized—meaning whiter—people forced from their homes by bombings. They clamor to welcome them into their homes. Yet, despite these moments in the spotlight, the reality for the majority of refugees of U.S. imperial wars is anything but welcoming. Afghans “rescued” by the United States—only just granted “protected status” by Biden—are insignificant in number, a selective emigration facilitated to siphon off those with the expertise to help rebuild Afghanistan. Most of the millions forced to flee their homes join the tens of millions of other refugees of U.S./NATO wars languishing in camps, struggling under inhumane conditions to gain asylum elsewhere, facing constant threat of deportation, and sometimes told to go back to their sweatshops and to their decimated countries.

The strategic importance of Afghanistan as a potential source of profit, as well as a base from which to destabilize its neighbors, didn’t end when U.S. forces were driven out. The United States’ tactical use of starvation has effectively disciplined the Taliban and reduced the country to depend on Western forces. Now, the United States shows signs of moving to maintain its influence within the country, as it eases sanctions to allow limited Taliban involvement in controlled financial activity.

In tandem, the UN, while continuing to call for humanitarian hand-outs and organizing virtual pledge drives—positioning the United States in the role of saving the very people it impoverished—is now calling for more “engagement” with the Taliban. This comes while continuing to deny UN representation to Afghanistan and extending the UN’s direct involvement in Afghan governance for another year. These UN mandates, particularly military mandates, have long been effective tools of U.S. imperialism, used most vividly and violently in Haiti.

Western intelligence claims a “renewed surge of resistance” to the Taliban as Afghans continue to suffer terror attacks, most attributed to ISIS-K, a group that has been linked to Western intelligence. Reports have emerged that former U.S.-trained Afghan intelligence and elite military forces have joined ISIS-K forces.

Terror has long been a tool the United States uses to disable countries resistant to Western hegemony, as it is presently manifesting in different forms in Ukraine. ISIS-K may be disrupting Afghan relations with neighbors such as China,  Russia and Pakistan, and potentially interfering with investment and Eurasian integration.

Yet, with typical hubris, the U.S. ruling elites seem unable to differentiate between small countries weakened by their relentless aggression and large economic and military powers with the resources to fight back. Efforts to develop an alternative to the U.S. dollar-based economic system that has held much of the world hostage appear to be accelerating as the United States has stepped up its confrontation with China and Russia. More and more countries are failing to step in line, more and more looking for alternative trade relationships. The U.S. ruling class now appears to be shooting itself in the very booted foot they’ve had on the collective necks of peoples across the world, welcome news for the oppressed everywhere.

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Featured image is from theintercept.com

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced on March 21 the imposition of visa restrictions on a group of Chinese officials accused of being involved in or responsible for human rights violations against religious and ethnic minorities. The US official said he would use diplomatic and economic means to “promote accountability” for human rights abuses, such as alleged efforts by Chinese officials to “harass, intimidate, surveil and abduct” members of minority groups, including some individuals who had sought shelter in the US.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said a day later that Beijing will reciprocate a response if the sanctions against Chinese officials are not lifted. The spokesperson expressed strong opposition to sanctions that seriously violate China’s sovereignty and stressed that Washington needs to “stop slandering China for no reason,” pointing to “political prejudices and lies” in many of Washington’s statements against China.

The US is essentially outraged at China for its clear and consistent stance on the Ukraine crisis, which has not changed despite sustained pressure. In fact, it shows more desperation on the part of Washington, especially as traditional allies like Saudi Arabia and the UAE have snubbed both Blinken and US President Joe Biden whilst maintaining close ties with Moscow.

Biden wants China to abandon its balanced policy towards Kiev and Moscow, even though Washington makes no such demand on Turkey, a NATO member that has not closed its airspace or sanctioned Russia as it too opts to balance its relations. What is more absurd is the belief that Washington thinks Beijing would abandon Moscow despite maintaining pressure on the country through the AUKUS and QUAD military formations.

Essentially, due to Biden’s failure to even control traditional allies like Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Turkey, he wants to somehow save face by trying to show his country that he will punish the Chinese for their defiance of not turning against Moscow. In this way, the visa restrictions are essentially meaningless for Chinese officials who never planned to travel to the US to begin with, and therefore they just look all the more ridiculous.

Even if there was no political pretext to accuse Beijing of human rights violations, then another pretext would have been elevated as the current sanctions are motivated by nothing more than making Biden appear that he is punishing China. Beijing will undoubtedly commensurate countermeasures, but the question is whether they will be reciprocated in equal measure or escalate the situation further.

What is certain though is that China will continue to act consistently on the Ukraine issue despite US attempts to push China against Russia whilst simultaneously pressuring the Asian country through the two multilateral military blocs.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on March 21 that a “verbal condemnation” of Russia by China is “vital.”

“Our view is that verbal condemnation of the actions of President Putin and the actions of [the] Russian military is important and vital, and it’s about what side of history you want to stand on at in this point in time,” Psaki said, adding: “where [do] you want to be as the history books are written.”

However, as former US diplomat Alberto M. Fernandez wrote in his MEMRI column, “Rather than an appeal to history, or even to morality, American policymakers would have been better served by an appeal to Chinese national interests (the same applies, in different circumstances, to understanding Saudi or Indian national interests).” As he highlights, Chinese history does not write about the Americans favorably to begin with, which is why such an appeal to history is naïve.

In fact, a bigger concern for China then appealing to the US’ writing of history are the allegations of chemical weapon laboratories in Ukraine, especially after the White House accused Beijing of repeating “these conspiracy theories.”

Russia’s Defense Ministry claimed that it obtained evidence that the US spent more than $200 million on biological laboratories in Ukraine. It can be assumed that Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov presented their evidence to the Chinese Ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui during their meeting on March 21. China has repeatedly demanded that the US be fully transparent about the operation of biological laboratories abroad, yet the Americans continue to deny the charges.

None-the-less, the very fact that the US believes it can turn China against Russia whilst maintaining pressure via AUKUS and QUAD demonstrates a White House far removed from political realism. Despite snubbing’s from Saudi Arabia and the UAE, NATO member Turkey defying sanctions against Russia, and India open to ruble-rupee payments for oil, Washington is increasingly frustrated that it cannot completely isolate Moscow. In this way, a young country like the US appealing to the multi-millennia Chinese civilization to consider history is nothing more then a desperate, if not pathetic attempt to woo Beijing away from Moscow.

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Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

Is Putin a War Criminal?

March 24th, 2022 by Judge Andrew P. Napolitano

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President Joseph R. Biden caused a stir in the media last week when he called Russian President Vladimir Putin “a war criminal.” Biden’s statement was apparently made to capitalize on the government’s and the American media’s monolithic anti-Russian messaging.

Is Putin a war criminal? In a word: No.

Here is the backstory.

Criminals are persons who have been properly convicted by a court that has jurisdiction over them and the place of their alleged crime and where the crimes were written down and accepted prior to their alleged criminal behavior. Putin is not among them.

Yet Biden’s provocative statement is worth exploring from a historical and legal perspective as it has been tossed about as if it had lawful meaning. The term has been used politically to refer to unpopular government officials who directed the use of state force in what the media has portrayed as an illicit or disproportionate manner.

What is illicit and what is disproportionate are subjective and for the victor to decide. Victors are never war criminals, as by their victory, they control the apparatus of prosecution or other mechanisms that will insulate themselves from the reach of prosecutors.

If you measure human deaths of innocents per second, the greatest governmental mass killer in wartime was President Harry Truman when he ordered the use of atomic bombs on civilian targets in Japan in August 1945, after he knew from intelligence reports that the Japanese government was prepared to surrender in a matter of days. But because the U.S. won the war, Truman was never prosecuted.
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The phrase “war criminal” entered our parlance from the Nuremberg trials of surviving high-ranking Nazi officials after the conclusion of World War II. Those trials alleged that German government officials committed crimes against humanity.

The crimes alleged were invented ex post facto — a procedure expressly prohibited in the U.S. — and were accepted by the American, British and Soviet prosecutors and judges. In a bit of bitter irony, the phrase “crimes against humanity” was coined by Joseph Stalin’s hand-picked prosecutor.

Just imagine a court today where the prosecutors get to write retroactive laws to apply to the defendants they are about to try.

This is the culture out of which Nuremberg sprang and the jurisprudence it spawned. Notwithstanding the egregious unfairness of these trials, world opinion generally accepted them.

The chief American prosecutor at Nuremberg, Justice Robert Jackson, a former U.S. attorney general and, at the time, a sitting justice on the U.S. Supreme Court, became a celebrity. He apparently had no hesitation about applying principles in vanquished Germany that were prohibited by the U.S. Constitution he swore to uphold.

The concept that officials of a nation could be prosecuted for violating a body of unwritten laws stirred post-war academic and judicial interest in natural law theory, which teaches that our rights and our understanding of good and evil come from within us and are understood and identified by the exercise of human reason and bind all persons.

Because the natural law prohibits aggression, no government on the planet has felt bound by it. One of the natural law principles that animated Nuremberg and continues to animate contemporary international tribunals is the concept of the just war.

But the baseline natural law principle is the non-aggression principle (NAP). It teaches that all initiated or threatened aggression — including from government — is inherently wrong as a violation of the natural rights of the victim. Thus, only defensive wars are just.

Stated differently, a country — like a person — can defend itself from an invader and use violence to do so, but no more violence than is necessary to stop the invasion, lest the defender become the aggressor.

Now, back to Putin. Biden’s “war criminal” statement ignores American use of state violence. Biden himself, while a senator, supported President George W. Bush’s immoral invasion of Iraq, which slaughtered hundreds of thousands for the purpose of regime change. If Biden means what he says, Bush as well as Truman and himself are war criminals.

The International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands — the creature of a treaty to which the United States, Russia and Ukraine are not signatories — is picking up where Nuremberg left off. This court claims universal jurisdiction, but its claim is fanciful.

The legal fiction of universal jurisdiction was created for political reasons by the U.S. Department of Justice during the presidency of Ronald Reagan to prosecute acts of terror committed overseas where the perpetrators were not likely to be prosecuted. It holds that American courts have jurisdiction over crimes against humanity committed by foreign persons in foreign countries.

Today, the fiction of universal jurisdiction is bilateral. Thus, foreign courts — in the European Union and at The Hague — claim jurisdiction over the entire globe, including America, Russia and Ukraine.

Justice by consensus or legal fiction is never just. Jurisdiction must be by consent of a proper authority. If a court lacks jurisdiction over the place of the alleged crime and the alleged perpetrator of it, any ruling is a fiction. Can a court in the Netherlands legally condemn Putin because its justices are repulsed by what they see on cable television? Of course not.

The history of human freedom is paying careful attention to procedure and protection of rights. Don’t look at recent history for this, as every post-World War II president — including Biden — has unlawfully killed foreign innocents; and they have lived free to boast about it.

But victors’ justice presumes that an unaccountable court possesses lawful authority to choose whatever wrongs it can find wherever it can find them and then prosecute them by applying laws and rules that suit its goals, just as American prosecutors have done. This is aggression by judges, no matter the target, and it violates NAP.

Joe Biden should be careful what he asks for.

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The Mariupol Theater Bombing

March 24th, 2022 by Pedro Gonzalez

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On March 16, the Donetsk Regional Drama Theatre in Mariupol, Ukraine, was bombed. The building reportedly housed scores of civilians at the time. Maxar satellite images showed the word “CHILDREN” written in Russian in large letters on the pavement outside. The incident occurred within hours of President Volodymyr Zelensky’s virtual address to Congress, where he asked again for the United States to establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine.

Western and Ukrainian observers immediately assumed the worst. “Russian forces ‘purposefully destroyed’ theatre in Mariupol where civilians were taking shelter, Ukrainian officials say,” read a notification pushed out by Twitter. “Massive Russian attack on the Drama Theater where hundreds of innocent civilians were hiding,” tweeted Ukrainian politician Dmytro Kuleba. “Russians could not have not known this was a civilian shelter.” It seemed a clear-cut case of Muscovite barbarism in a savage war.

But days before the bombing, local reports warned that Ukrainian forces, specifically the Azov Battalion, were planning a false flag operation at the theater. Civilians would be endangered or even killed before the world’s watching eyes.

While it’s difficult to know what’s true in this conflict, numerous accounts paint the same picture: civilians being endangered, even killed, by Ukrainian forces, including Azov, in Mariupol who won’t allow them to move through humanitarian corridors.

The simplest explanation for the Drama Theater bombing is that Russia is at fault here. But these allegations, in the context of a war that has been distorted by misinformation, merit examination precisely because the incident had the supposedly desired effect. American pundits and politicians like Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois cited the bombing as cause for a no-fly zone.

The official narrative seems wrong on its face. So far, more than 30,000 people have been evacuated through humanitarian corridors from Mariupol, which is surrounded by Russian troops. If Moscow wanted to slaughter civilians, it could have easily targeted vehicles rolling in bumper-to-bumper traffic out of the city, heading in the direction of the pro-Russian separatist-controlled north.

Why evacuate tens of thousands of civilians and observe protocols designed to reduce non-combatant casualties if you want to butcher them? This is not to say civilians have not been killed during the conflict—they have—but Russia is not deliberately targeting them as part of a genocidal campaign. These facts, coupled with what happened in the days before the bombing, raise questions no one in the mainstream is asking.

The earliest known report of imminent danger came on March 12. A message on a Telegram channelassociated with Dmitriy Steshen, a correspondent from Mariupol for the Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda, warned that Zelensky’s forces were planning two false flag operations: one at the Turkish-built Sultan Suleiman Mosque, and the other at the Mariupol theater.

Both would appear as if the Russians had deliberately targeted civilians. The mosque would drag Turkey into the war, while the drama theater would supply a justification for closing the skies over Ukraine, ideally bringing a U.S.-led NATO into direct confrontation with Russia. The second half of the message about the theater reads:

Ukrainian soldiers with the drama theater’s administration rounded up women, children, and elderly from Mariupol into the theatre building so that when the “right” moment happens they could blow the theatre up with the people. This is done so that they could scream to the whole world that Russia’s aviation did this and that the Ukrainian sky needs to be closed immediately, etc. Do not be silent, we need as many people to know.

Later, investigative journalist Max Blumenthal noted that Western media repeated Ukrainian officials’ claims about the mosque in Mariupol being shelled by Russia with scores of civilians, including children, inside. “However, Turkish state media revealed that the Ukrainian government had misled Western reporters,” Blumenthal wrote. “The Kanuni Sultan Suleyman Mosque was not only fully intact, it had never been hit by Russian fire.” Zelensky and his officials had previously made similar misleading claims about the bombing of the memorial at Babi Yar, a ravine in Kiev that was also the site of massacres committed by the Nazis during World War II. But Israeli journalist Ron Ben Yisha reported after inspecting the site that the memorial had not been destroyed or damaged.

On March 13, a Twitter user named Elena Evdokimova issued another warning. “Information allegedly came from Mariupol locals (reminder – they are mostly ethnic Russian) that neo-Nazi from Azov gathered Mariupol women, children & elderly into the building of Mariupol drama theatre and are going to blow it up, blaming the victims on ‘Russian shelling,’” Evdokimova wrote. One of the final known indicators popped up early on March 16. A Telegram channel associated with Daniil Bezsonov, the DNR Deputy Minister of Information, claimed to have made contact with an Azov defector.

“The militant of the Nazi regiment ‘Azov’ has just escaped from his family and joined our side. He asked for anonymity and we guaranteed it, as his family is in Ukrainian-controlled territory and he fears that his actions will be cut to pieces by other Ukrainian Nazis,” the message began.

He told us a lot of interesting information, which is of operational importance and about the atrocities committed by the Ukrainian Nazis in Mariupol. But the most important thing is that the headquarters of the Ukrainian militants is located in the basement of the Mariupol Drama Theater, and the hall of the theater is completely filled with civilians, who are guarded by 12 militants of the Azov Regiment, so that they do not run away.

The theater was hit a little while later.

Russia’s Defense Ministry immediately denied responsibility, saying that it had not flown bombing missions at that time in that area. “During daylight on March 16, Russian aviation carried out no missions involving strikes on ground targets within Mariupol limits. According to the verified information, militants of the Azov nationalist battalion carried out another bloody provocation by blowing up the rigged theater building,” the Ministry of Defense said. It added, “refugees that escaped Mariupol, informed that Nazis from the Azov battalion could have held civilians hostage in the theater building, using the upper floors as emplacements.”

Statements from the Russian government are hardly trustworthy. However, the independent media outlet Readovka reported the same via Telegram on March 16.

According to a source familiar with the operation to liberate Mariupol, no shelling or air strikes were carried out in the area of ​​the city where the Drama Theater is located. Heavy street fighting is taking place in its vicinity, and it is impossible to strike such blows without risking one’s own. For the same reason, artillery cannot be used in this area of ​​the city.

The information itself was spread tonight through Ukrainian telegram channels, its provocative implication is obvious.

Considering that Russian authorities raided Readovka’s offices and added it to the register of banned websites last year after it published an investigation on political corruption, the outlet cannot be easily dismissed as state media.

By March 17, news surfaced that civilians had survived in a shelter within the theater. “More than a day after the airstrike, there were no reports of deaths,” the Associated Press noted. As of March 21, that hasn’t changed. So far, 130 survivors have been rescued from the rubble, according to Reuters and local sources. Mariupol’s city council said more than 1,000 people were sheltering under the theatre at the time of the bombing, but Reuters could not independently verify the figures.

Apart from local officials, Azov was one of the first sources to report the bombing, according to the Ukrayinska Pravda newspaper. But would they be capable of organizing something so nefarious that it would involve endangering Ukrainians? Understanding Azov, and why its elimination is a central stated aim of Russia, sheds light on that question.

In 2014, after a U.S. State Department-backed “color revolution” led to regime change in Ukraine, pro-Russian separatists declared independence from Kiev in the eastern part of the country. Mariupol, which is predominantly Russian speaking, became a hub of resistance, and it has been the scene of clashes between rebels and their allies and Ukrainian forces ever since.

Azov, which is funded by oligarchs loyal to Kiev such as Igor Kolomoisky, who is also a key supporter of Zelensky, emerged in eastern Ukraine to suppress pro-Russian sentiment there. “We are behind enemy lines here; everyone is against us: the police, the army, the people,” one Azov fighter said a May 2014 interview with the Sunday Times. By “behind enemy lines,” he meant Mariupol. The Times also noted that Azov was “deployed by Kiev because of its fears that its regular forces, heavily infiltrated by Russian sympathisers, are losing the battle with the separatists.”

The events of May 9, 2014, are illustrative. They were marked by bloodshed after pro-Russian militants took over a police station with the help of pro-Russian police officers. Azov was deployed alongside other units in response, but the rebels enjoyed support from hundreds of civilians.

Footage from one incident that day showed a crowd of Mariupolians fleeing as Ukrainian forces fired on them with automatic weapons. “They’re shooting down civilians!” one person yelled in the video. “Fascists! Killing your own people!” Bystanders ferried the wounded to safety while others shouted that ambulances were taking fire. The Ministry of Defense confirmed that “Ukrainian soldiers (an Azov fighter, or a soldier of the 20th territorial defence battalion) opened fire at the car” after civilians had loaded the ambulance with a wounded man.

Recent interviews with Mariupol evacuees have presented a similar view of Azov and other Ukrainian troops. One evacuee described through tears to the Analytical Network News Agency how Azov fights with no regard for civilians in Mariupol. Another woman gave an even grimmer account. She said Azov used them as human shields and that Ukrainian forces placed armored vehicles in the immediate vicinity of bomb shelters, virtually guaranteeing harm to civilians and civilian infrastructure. They were sent “like a herd of animals” by Ukrainian security forces into basements for days without provisions and alleged that they blew up the theater while retreating from the area.

group of Mariupol refugees evacuating to Russia also said they had been kept in the theater by Ukrainian soldiers against their will who used them as “human shields.” Another group said Azov prevented them from evacuating through humanitarian corridors, keeping them in basements, and that they had seen them shoot civilians.

There is now ample evidence of civilians being torturedabused, and humiliated by regular and irregular Ukrainian forces. Indeed, there appears to be a general deterioration in conduct. For example, Gennadiy Druzenko, a Ukrainian military field hospital commanderbragged that he “gave strict orders to castrate all the wounded” Russians “because they are cockroaches, not humans.” It’s not hard to see how this antipathy might turn inward on ethnic Russians, specifically in eastern Ukraine.

Western media has created an image of a city united against Russian aggression simply waiting for a U.S.-led NATO to enter the war. The reality is that Azov and its allies hate a large part of the civilian population and are not above using them as human shields. That does not absolve Russia of any civilians they kill or wound. But it should be a reminder that this conflict is more complex than the plot of a Hollywood production. The reality of this war is awful enough.

The facts around the drama theater bombing will likely remain shrouded in mystery for now. But what is certain is that Westerners should pause to consider the plight of civilians before celebrating the decision by forces within Mariupol to not effect a ceasefire and deliver the city.

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Pedro Gonzalez is associate editor of Chronicles magazine.

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The US Press Again Becomes a Conduit for Pro-War Propaganda

March 24th, 2022 by Ted Galen Carpenter

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American journalists have a long, ignoble history of being willing conduits for pro-war propaganda. Usually, that behavior is in service to a military crusade that Washington has launched or wants to initiate. At times, though, such a betrayal of journalistic integrity occurs on behalf of a foreign country that both U.S. political leaders and news media elites have adopted as a favorite cause. We are currently witnessing the latter phenomenon with respect to news coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war.

The dominant media narrative is that the US government (and all Americans) must “stand with Ukraine” in the latter’s resistance to Russian aggression. The identification with Ukraine’s cause is now nearly total, and it is infused with arrogant righteousness. Noticeably missing is any sense, once so powerful in US foreign policy and general discourse, that America’s interests often are – and should be – distinct from the interests and objectives of any foreign country.

The emotionalism and shallowness is most evident with the television coverage of the conflict. American viewers are inundated with images of exploding shells from the invading Russian forces, sights of desperate, tearful refugees (mostly women and children) fleeing the invaders, and shots of other determined Ukrainian civilians arming themselves to defend their country. Television is a visual medium that always tries to evoke emotions among viewers, but that element has become truly over-the-top regarding treatment of the Ukraine war. Providing a deluge of images showing traumatized civilian refugees adds little to anyone’s understanding of the roots of the conflict, its underlying issues, or its likely outcome.

Indeed, prominent media outlets have been guilty of circulating transparently crude Ukrainian propaganda. Some of the material they’ve telecast turned out to be fake. A widely circulated image of a Ukrainian girl verbally confronting Russian troops actually was that of a Palestinian girl confronting Israeli troops. 2015’s Miss Ukraine was not taking up arms against the Russian invaders, despite a well-covered photo op. A closer examination of the image showed that she was brandishing an Airsoft gun. Some images of aerial combat footage of Ukrainian pilots battling Russian aggressors were from video games.

There also has been an array of more subtle, but decidedly deceptive, accounts that US press outlets distributed. The supposed martyrs of Snake Island, who allegedly were blown to smithereens after defying and cursing a Russian warship, turned out to be very much alive. The American news media dutifully reported a Ukrainian military account in early March that it had severely damaged, if not sunk, the Russian patrol ship Vasiliy Bykov in the Black Sea. The episode was supposedly a major victory, because the vessel was one of Russia’s newest warships. The credibility of Kyiv’s claim took a major hit on March 16, though, when the Vasily Bykov sailed, apparently unharmed, into the port of Sevastopol in Crimea.

In light of such problems with accounts regarding the war, American journalists should at least be cautious about reflexively repeating Ukrainian government allegations. For example, Kyiv has repeatedly asserted that Russian forces deliberately target residential areas in their shelling campaigns, and the US media echo those claims. Perhaps the allegations are true, but the generally accepted figures with respect to Ukrainian civilian fatalities (726, as of March 17) do not seem consistent with wholly indiscriminate assaults. Journalists should at least view Kyiv’s accusations with some skepticism, yet there is scant evidence of meaningful scrutiny.

The Ukraine war would not be the first time that portions of the American press became willing conduits for foreign disinformation. In the years before the US entry into World War I, major American newspapers and magazines credulously repeated British propaganda about German forces in Belgium committing an array of atrocities, including raping nuns and bayoneting babies. Such stories later proved to be total fabrications, but they had a marked impact on American public attitudes toward Germany.

Some 7 decades later, following Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait, the performance of the American press was equally dismal. Media outlets gave prominent coverage to hearings by the Congressional Human Rights Caucus in October 1990, featuring alleged eyewitnesses to Iraqi war crimes. The leading witness was a tearful 15-year-old girl that Caucus chairman Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA) introduced only as “Nayirah.” A more detailed identification, Lantos cautioned, would endanger her friends and relatives in Kuwait. Nayirah described herself as a hospital volunteer who had personally witnessed Iraqi soldiers forcing maternity ward nurses to remove newborns from their incubators. That action, supposedly taking place at 3 hospitals, allegedly resulted in the deaths of 312 infants.

The account was part of a sophisticated disinformation campaign by Kuwait’s government to whip-up American public opinion into a frenzied willingness to endorse going to war against Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. A regime that could commit such monstrous acts had to be stopped was the clear message. Eventually, the falsity of the incubator atrocity story became indisputable, especially when information confirmed that “Nayirah” was not a hospital volunteer, but the daughter of Kuwait’s ambassador to the United States. By then, however, the United States and its allies were at war with Iraq. The false propaganda story had fulfilled its purpose.

In retrospect, the wonder is how professional journalists in the United States could have circulated such an inflammatory story without making even modest efforts to corroborate it. Yet they did so. Worse, their successors who are covering the Ukraine war show no greater degree of skepticism in putting Kyiv’s accounts of the conflict to such a test. Instead, they treat statements and images being given to them by Ukrainian authorities as though their authenticity is indisputable.

Such credulity leaves the media open to cynical manipulation by yet another foreign government. And make no mistake about it: the purpose of the current propaganda offensive is to generate public support in the United States for Washington’s military intervention on Ukraine’s behalf. This time, the American people need to recognize pro-war propaganda in the news media for what it is, and not take the bait.

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Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow in defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, is the author of 12 books and more than 950 articles on international affairs. His latest book is Unreliable Watchdog: The News Media and U.S. Foreign Policy (forthcoming, July 2022).

Featured image is from Middle East Eye

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***

President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday criticized the Israeli government for not standing unequivocally on the side of Ukraine and against the Russia invasion during a virtual address to Israeli lawmakers.

Why it matters: Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett is one of the few leaders who is in contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin and has been passing messages between Putin and Zelensky in an attempt to reach a ceasefire.

  • Around 110 of the 120 members of the Knesset logged in to watch the speech. It was also broadcasted live on all Israeli TV networks and aired during a big pro-Ukraine rally in Tel Aviv.

What they are saying: “Why are you busy with calculations [regarding Russia]? Mediating without taking sides? You can mediate — but not between good and evil,” Zelensky said.

  • The Ukrainian president compared the Russian invasion to the Holocaust and said Russia unleashed all-out war aimed at destroying the Ukrainian people like Nazi Germany wanted to destroy the Jewish people.
  • Zelensky criticized the Israeli government’s policy regarding the entry of Ukrainian refugees, and complained that Israel refuses to supply Ukraine with the Iron Dome anti-missile system and other defensive weapons and equipment.
  • The Ukrainian president also criticized the Israeli government for failing to impose sanctions on Russia like other countries in the west.

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said after the speech that he condemns the attack on Ukraine and thanks Zelensky for sharing the emotions and the distress of his people with the members of the Knesset.

  • “We will continue to help the Ukrainian people as much as we can and never turn our back to people who suffer from war,” Lapid said.

The other side: The Israeli prime minister’s office and foreign ministry have declined to comment on Zelensky’s speech. A senior Israeli official told Axios: “We can understand what he is going through. He is under huge distress and his people are dying.”

  • On the other hand, several ministers and lawmakers criticized the comparison Zelensky made between the war in Ukraine and the Holocaust.

Flashback: Zelensky’s speech echoed the harsh criticism that was voiced by a senior Ukrainian official earlier in the month during an interview with Axios. “Bennett is basically telling us to surrender and we have no intention of doing that,” the senior Ukrainian official said.

Behind the scenes: Zelensky wanted to give the speech in front of the Knesset plenary but was declined. The speaker of the Knesset said it was impossible because lawmakers are on recess and the plenary is under renovations.

  • Israeli officials said that while this was all true, it wasn’t the only reason. The Israeli government was concerned that if Zelensky gave a speech in the Knesset, Putin would ask to do the same — something nobody in Jerusalem wanted to happen.
  • After facing criticism on social media, the speaker of the Knesset offered a compromise under which Zelensky would speak to members via Zoom.

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Dear Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky,

Your recent speech before the Israeli Knesset was a disgrace when it comes to global struggles for freedom and liberation, particularly of the Palestinian people. You reversed the roles of occupier and occupied. You missed another opportunity to demonstrate the justice of your cause and the broader cause of freedom. 

You said: “We are in different countries and in completely different conditions. But the threat is the same: for both us and you – the total destruction of the people, state, culture. And even of the names: Ukraine, Israel.”

I am angry and sad that Russia is seeking to occupy your country and to crush the rights of the Ukrainian people to self-determination and freedom, and I believe that every possible support must be given to Ukrainians as they resist this barbaric aggression. At the same time, I reject the policies of the US and its Nato allies around the globe.

And while I admire your success in building a large international coalition to support your struggle against Russian aggression, I wish we as Palestinians could persuade the world to mobilise in a similar fashion, and force Israel to abide by international resolutions.

I am also concerned by your apparent double standards towards the legitimate Palestinian struggle against occupation, oppression, killings, racial discrimination and displacement – crimes that Israel has practiced for more than seven decades against my people.

Israel’s crimes against the Palestinian people have included the forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians during the 1948 Nakba. Hundreds of towns and villages were ethnically cleansed and demolished, with most of their features then erased from the earth, preventing the return of their people. Some Palestinians became displaced within the newly proclaimed state of Israel, while others sought refuge in neighbouring Arab countries.

Occupation and siege

Palestinians who became Israeli citizens have endured rampant discrimination, while those living in the West Bank live under a brutal occupation, and those in Gaza a crushing siege. Israel has criminalised the Palestinian struggle for freedom and liberation, denied the legitimate Palestinian leadership, confiscated Palestinian property and resources, and arrested Palestinian activists.

Racist laws, such as the 2018 nation-state law and the recently revised citizenship law, have codified Israel’s opposition to Palestinian self-determination and to a Palestinian homeland.

And yet, you have taken public positions in support of Israeli occupation. In 2020, you opted to quit the United Nations Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, a body tasked with supporting Palestinian rights. You even backed Israel’s right to “self-defence” when it was practicing the most extreme forms of aggression against our people.

Since the start of Russia’s offensive against your country, you have continued to practice double standards. While Israel has hesitated to accept non-Jewish Ukrainian refugees fleeing the Russian bombing – a policy motivated by inhumanity and ethnic supremacism, with which Palestinians are all too familiar – you remain willing to turn to Israel’s right-wing nationalist prime minister, Naftali Bennett, as a mediator.

I know that most Palestinians are watching your stubborn struggle and wishing you victory over Russia’s brutal aggression. I also know that a Russian victory would be a great gift to Israel’s aggressive posture – a victory for its “Iron Wall” concept, which regulates its dealings with us until our complete defeat.

On the other hand, the struggle and victory of your people, even with the destruction of much of your country and the displacement of scores of Ukrainians, would give hope to other peoples struggling against oppression and erasure, rekindling our hopes for return and liberation. To this end, I urge you to stop supporting our oppressors.

*

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Asad Ghanem is a professor of political science at the University of Haifa. Palestinian activist and writer.

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***

Derek Brouwer owns a small fleet of trucks for his business, transporting hay from Southern Ontario, down into the United States. He was interviewed on Fox news recently for the blow back that he received for having a truck in Ottawa during the Emergency Measures Act.

I spoke to Derek over the phone to get the rest of his story.

When a neighbour asked him if he wanted to be in the convoy, Derek’s drivers got busy attaching flags to the trucks. One of his trucks was in Florida at the time. The other two drove with the convoy, starting at Drumbo, Ontario. One went to Toronto, and the other to Ottawa. In Ottawa the truck and driver were ushered, by police, to a front row parking space by the parliament buildings.

Derek said he was quite optimistic at the start, he was just waiting for the Prime Minister to come out and talk to them. Especially since Trudeau had told Prime Minister Modi, little more than a year ago to open up dialogue with the Indian farmers, who had protested for 12 months, it seemed like a reasonable request.

“At first it was like hanging out at a truck show,” he said. “Lots of people came by to say ‘hi’, and offer me or my drivers a thank you for being there. I let the young guys go on the weekends,” Derek explained. “I took my turn when it was more quiet during the week. Yeah, they took the garbage cans away, and locked the shops up, and anywhere you could go to the bathroom. We were there that first weekend of Jan 29th, and for about 23 days, I think. When the police got pushy and violence started happening on Saturday, Feb 19th, I heard that drivers were being pulled out of the trucks and beaten up pretty bad, so I told my driver to leave the truck there, unlocked, and just get himself out. With all the people and panic, the last thing I wanted was to try moving the truck and have the wheels unknowingly roll over someone in the street.”

The police were nice all the way through the protest, right up until the end, Brouwer relates. He didn’t have much contact with police himself, but did at one point have an affable conversation with an officer about the eternal (centennial) flame, and why it had been extinguished.

The only notice they got that the trucks would be have to be moved were unsigned papers left in a bunch of truck windows…for all you could tell it could have been a prank, because no jurisdiction or official authority was listed on the notice. In fact, it was a little strange, because the concrete barricades had been blocking everything for some time, and the police had just opened them and waved more trucks into Wellington Street, the ones that had been parked on side streets and such, on Feb 15th which was pretty strange. Brouwer was keeping an eye on the situation with the Emergency Act, and decided to move some money to his Florida bank account, through a signed cheque, that Tuesday.

Friday the 17th, the Police began to slowly herd the protesters on foot. Anybody who was arrested on Friday was released within the hour, and let go, without any tickets. But if Friday was a gentle walk, then Saturday was a run. It was like they were waiting for the big crowd, to make a show of force, which made no sense – had they come in at night, during the week, Brouwer figures 20 cops would have been effective at clearing out Wellington Street, had they really wanted to.

While all of this was happening on the streets of Ottawa, back at his office at home, Brouwer’s secretary had received confirmation from Florida on Thursday, that the money had been successfully moved – only to discover when trying to complete a transaction, mid-afternoon on the next day, that the Canadian account was frozen and the money they had tried to transfer was mysteriously caught between banks, showing up on both accounts, with the funds being available through neither. That was his Trucking account. His second option, to be able to pay bills, was a personal credit card, which was also frozen. His drivers had to carry the fuel bills, personally, for a few days. On Saturday 19th, his farm accounts were also immobilized, and Brouwer received notice that his CVOR, a kind license containing the credit score of his driving record as a commercial trucker, would be suspended. The Commercial Vehicle Operating Record is also a quick kind of resume for truckers to get hired on. Landing on him at the same time, was the news that the truck he had left in Ottawa that day was being impounded, and the Mayor of Ottawa was talking about selling the impounded trucks to recoup the costs of that huge police force.

Brouwer said he wasn’t worried about his truck, he was just kinda glad that it was a holiday weekend, so that his business wasn’t screwed up too badly. He called the Ottawa police, and they informed him that his truck would be released by the end of the next week. About 100 friends and neighbours showed up at the farm the next Monday as a welcoming party for the truck when it came home. The air lines to the trailer had been cut, and the safety sticker had been scratched off the trailer, otherwise it was undamaged.

As for his bank accounts – it may have been the help of all the people who pulled their money from the chartered banks that led to the Emergency Act being revoked, or it may have been a coincidence that one hour after he was interviewed on Fox news on Monday, the RCMP called him to say they were working to get his accounts unlocked. Either way, Brouwer says his relationship with his bank manager is no longer one of trust. Yes, most banks say that they would have to follow the law and do what they were told, but his sense is that it is not as cut and dried as that, and the manager worked pretty quickly with whoever was in charge of this financial seizure, to have things frozen so immediately; and then to act as if he didn’t know about it when Derek called the branch, just doesn’t sit well.

The greatest irony, of course, is that Derek Brouwer and his trucking company have no criminal charges laid against them, no ticket, no fine from Ottawa, no arrest warrant was issued.

The sanction on his CVOR, did cost him a $1,000 fine for unregistered plates, on the truck in Florida, but he figures there is nothing he can do about that, as the US are the ones who issued the fine.

So far as he is aware, none of his drivers have ever been asked for a vaccine pass by the United States Border Crossing. It is only the Canadian side that requires the ArriveCAN app. “They know everything about you as you drive up, because of your phone,” Derek said.

*

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Julie Fleischauer is an independent writer, and farmer, from Stratford, Ontario. She has been speaking at local freedom rallies, and working to expose the real stories of the people impacted by the pandemic, to make a difference in her community. She is also Deputy Sanity Officer of Perth Public Sanity. You can watch her JupiterJ Bitchute Channel or email her at: [email protected]

All images in this article are from the author

 

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***

 

 

The U.S. media have been dominated by images of Ukrainians suffering under the Russian invasion.

New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote characteristically that Joe Biden had “masterly and humbly helped organize a global coalition” of Good and Democracy—and “restored faith in true patriotism.”[1]

In order for the chosen ones to succeed in their democratic mission, Thomas L. Friedman further intoned, the official Obstructor has to be contained, put in an “isolation cell. The same for the larger Russian public.”[2]

Russia, together with “China […] as well as Iran, Venezuela, Cuba”, is conducting “a rollback” of our arduous attempts at peace and democracy, says Francis Fukuyama.[3]

And so the free press goes on, virtually without exception.

The method is to denounce the crimes of official government enemies, while staying silent about the crimes of the U.S. government or its allies.

As an example, the media have failed to report on large-scale war crimes committed by the Ukrainian Army in Eastern Ukraine. The plight of Yemenis subjected to years of international terror by some of the most powerful nations on Earth has also been ignored.

Mass graves in Luhansk where neo-Nazi militias attached to the Ukrainian army killed and buried civilians. But you won’t read about this in The New York Times or even alternative media sources except RT. [Source: covertactionmagazine.com]

A group of people standing outside a building that is falling apart Description automatically generated with medium confidence

Home turned to rubble by Saudi bombers in Sana’a. [Source: wsws.org]

The people of Yemen have now been given “a death sentence” since “the scale of the current gaps” of humanitarian funding “are unprecedented,” as UN official Martin Griffiths noted.[4]

The same day Russia invaded Ukraine, the UN warned for the first time that thirteen million Yemenis now face “the threat of starvation.” The World Health Organization (WHO) further warned of 20 million Yemenis running the risk of being infected with malaria.[5]

Naturally, this is more or less a completely manufactured situation largely due to the years of blockade, bombing and aggression by the Saudi coalition, including the Western states.

Since war broke out in 2015, the U.S.-Saudi coalition has claimed to be defending the legitimate government of Yemen in the face of a rebellion by the Houthi minority group backed by Iran. The Houthis, however, have had legitimate grievances against the corrupt U.S.-Saudi imposed government and have sought to restore the traditional power of the Zaydeh clan, which promotes a divergent brand of Islam from the Iranian mullahs.[6]

A UN report noted that the blockade alone prevented 350,000 tons of food from entering Yemen during the first few months of 2021 alone.[7]

Furthermore, the blockade prevented oil, worth $12 billion, from being imported during the same year; the country is practically “entirely dependent” on imports of essential goods such as food, since only 1-3% of its land is arable.[8]

Yemen’s Aviation department warned that “more than a million patients are at risk of death as a result of the lack of many medicines,” depleted due to the blockade and war.

It is in other words, as the Norwegian Refugee Council reported, “like a hostage situation.”[9] The Coalition seems to have intentionally disproportionally bombed key import ports, such as Hodeidah. A report from the summer of 2021 by the Human Rights Office in Hodeidah, documented that:

economic facilities that were […bombed by the Coalition…] amounted to more than 4,255 facilities included […] nine sea ports, 97 power plants, 41 communications networks, 637 water tanks, 211 government facilities, 749 roads and bridges, 90 factories, 57 fuel trucks, 2,226 commercial facilities, 78 chicken and livestock farms, 972 means of transportation, 392 fishing boats, 213 food stores, 53 gas stations, 49 markets and 125 food trucks.[10]

Thus, no one can be seriously surprised over the grizzly facts mentioned above.

In this discussion, one has to be clear about what the situation really is. In March 2015, an internal coup against a despised dictator took place; a dictator who had cheated in the 2012 election and who has illegitimately held the power nominally since. What followed was an attack and invasion of Yemen by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) together with virtually the entire West.

IN a standard scholarly study, Asher Orkaby writes: “At its core, the current Yemen conflict […] is nothing more than ‘a centuries-old method of regime change.’”[11] It is superfluous to point the reader to another current situation this reminds one of.

By the most elementary standards of logic, the West would be condemning these atrocities, imposing the harshest of reprisals on the Coalition, sending billions of dollars to its adversaries and so on.

There would be enormous reports about the humanitarian crisis in Yemen, and the free press would have produced a massively indignant commentary about the “mass humanitarian suffering, and with manifold war crimes,” as Foreign Affairs put it regarding Russia’s provoked invasion of Ukraine.[12]

Fact: We have been supporting the terror directly, throughout, and not even the most bitter condemnations by the UN have succeeded in stopping our “masterly and humbly” executed “democratic” experiments in the region—namely, to quote the UN, “providing arms and military support” and thereby “perpetuating” the slaughter.[13]

During the last couple of months alone, the U.S. has provided Saudi Arabia with more than $1 billion in missiles and service of their attack helicopters—all to keep the bombardments running at its impressive current rate, killing at least 20,000 civilians, according to an expert UN panel.[14]

Furthermore, the U.S. has participated in Saudi Arabia’s occupation of Yemen. Internal documents from the U.S. Air Force concede that a few hundred special forces are in Yemen to train Arabian pilots, meaning “yet another U.S. form of complicity in a brutal war” of aggression “that has gone on for far too long,” as William Hartung pointed out three years ago.[15]

And the intentions are perfectly clear: We want the war to continue. The U.S. covets the strategic island of Socotra off Yemen which it will stop at nothing to secure. The U.S. also needs to continue to access cheap oil from the Saudis, so will continue to support their criminal adventures. Tim Lenderking, U.S. special envoy for Yemen, complained recently in a leaked diplomatic document about Saudi Arabia wanting to end the war due to their tactical failures. Luckily, Lenderking was able to convince them of “the necessity of not leaving Yemen completely.”[16]

But the U.S. is not alone in this. The internal British documentary record notes that London has a military presence in the southern and eastern parts of Yemen. “They are a fully-fledged force. We can’t say they are minor,” as one local commentator put it.[17]

Arms sales Saudi protest

Amnesty International activists stage a protest against UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia. [Source: English.alaraby.co.uk]

More significant, perhaps, are the arms export to Saudi Arabia and the UAE worth $27 billion. The press was informed in September of last year that France was risking being brought to court for having funded Saudi Arabia with 70 attack jets used to bomb Yemenis—and much of its other weapons exports are unknown.[18]

Between 2018 and 2020, Germany sold 4.7 billion Euros worth of military equipment to Egypt, Algeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). From 2012-2017, Saudi Arabia bought $3 billion worth of weapons from Germany.

Nevertheless, Yemen’s Prime Minister, Abdel-Aziz bin Habtoor, revealed in an interview late last year what was already obvious, namely that the

British presence is concentrated […] in favor of Saudi interests in extending the oil pipeline project […The UAE is…] a very cheap tool used by the Americans and the British […] The UAE wants to secure the interests of a geographical type, and Saudi Arabia wants to secure its strategic projects with a long-term economic dimension. The conflict that is taking place by the new colonists in the south [UAE] is about their own interests.[19]

These statements are crucial, since it was reported the very same day that the invasion of Ukraine happened (February 24), that UAE-backed forces “started to build” infrastructure in Yemen, in order to “separate southern Yemen from its north, and declare a loyal state in southern Yemen by supporting and adopting separatist factions”—as bin Habtoor had already indicated.[20]

UAE and US officials in social media clash over Yemen – Middle East Monitor

Source: middleeastmonitor.com

Again: The UAE has been a key perpetrator of aggression since day one. How, then, has the free world and the free press responded? They have responded with the typical response, namely, with continued support and silence.

No talk of a “rollback” of human rights when the “wrong” people are the perpetrators. In fact, not long prior to the declaration, France announced yet another weapons contract with the UAE of 80 Rafale attack jets worth $19 billion, a “historic” deal.[21]

In other words, we have a case of international violence, aggression, occupation, and terror—and with the full support of the West.

How, then, is it that the International Criminal Court has not produced a condemnatory report about all of this?

After all, the evidence for such is simply overwhelming. Well, again, there are details one could turn to on that, though do not expect to find it discussed in The New York Times.

Despite international “lawyers urging the International Criminal Court,” nothing is happening.[22] And the reason is simple as to why this international aggression is not being investigated, as we will learn from a long and detailed study from Mtwana—a leading human rights organization in the Middle East.

They note that “likely vetoes by United Nations Security Council members such as France, the UK and the U.S. pose political obstacles to doing so”—one of the funny features of the democratic “global coalition.”[23]

All of this leads to an obvious conclusion—almost to the point at which it becomes too obvious to enunciate. The conclusion we draw from this is that our sudden commitment to human rights and suffering, in the case of Ukraine, is not much more than shameless cynicism, since we for years have supported international terror and aggression of the most awesome proportions.

Ukraine and Yemen are in a sense a rare controlled study history has set up. The primary differences? In one case, the “right” people are carrying out the atrocities; in the other, the “wrong” people are doing so.

*

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Andi Olluri lives in western Sweden. He just turned 20 and is studying dietetics. Andi has been an activist since he was a young teenager. He can be reached at [email protected].

Notes

  1. David Brooks, “The Week That Awoke the World,” New York Times, March 3, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/03/opinion/ukraine-russia-awoke-world.html 

  2. Thomas L. Friedman, “I See Three Scenarios for How This War Ends,” New York Times, March 1, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/01/opinion/ukraine-russia-putin.html 
  3. Francis Fukuyama, “Putin’s War on the Liberal Order,”: Financial Times, March 3, 2022, https://www.ft.com/content/d0331b51-5d0e-4132-9f97-c3f41c7d75b3 
  4. Voice of America, Feb. 15, 2022, https://www.voanews.com/a/6420861.html 
  5. Associated Press, Feb. 24, 2022; Middle East Eye, Sep. 22, 2021; Middle East Monitor, Oct. 20, 2021. 
  6. See Issa Blumi, Destroying Yemen: What Chaos in Arabia Tells Us About the World(Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2018). 
  7. William Hartung, “Are We Pressing Saudi Arabia Enough on the Yemen Blockade?” Responsible Statecraft, April 7, 2021, https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/04/07/is-biden-pressing-saudi-arabia-enough-to-lift-the-yemen-blockade/ 
  8. Yemen Press Agency, Nov. 15, 2021; “Food war: How the Saudi-led coalition uses French Weapons to starve millions of civilians in Yemen,” Disclose, April, 2019. 
  9. MEMO, Aug. 11, 2021. 
  10. YPA, Jul. 30, 2021. 
  11. Asher Orkaby, Beyond the Arab Cold War (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 214. 
  12. Liana Fix and Michael Kimmage, “What if Russia Loses?” Foreign Affairs, March 4, 2022. 
  13. MEMO, September 15, 2021. 
  14. Antiwar, Nov. 4, 2021; AP, Sep. 9, 2021. For further details about U.S. weapons exports to Saudi Arabia, see William Hartung,“Arming Repression: U.S Military support for Saudi Arabia from Trump to Biden” in Center for International Policy, Dec. 2021. 
  15. Nick Turse, “Despite Denials, Documents Reveal U.S. Training UAE Forces for Combat in Yemen,” Yahoo News, January 16, 2019. 
  16. MEE, Jan. 28, 2022. 
  17. MEMO, Jul. 8, 2021. 
  18. MEMO, Jul. 16, 2021. For further detail, see MEE by Bourne (Jul. 5, 2021); MEMO, Sep. 24, 2021. For a detailed study, see footnote 10. 
  19. MEMO, Jan. 19, 2022. For a condemnation by 40 leading Human Rights organizations, see Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Nov. 16, 2021. See also YPA, Oct. 15, 2021. 
  20. YPA, Feb. 24, 2022. 
  21. MEMO, Dec. 3, 2021. 
  22. Charles Hymas, “British Lawyers Mount Bid for War Crimes Inquiry into Saudi-Led ‘Coalition” Massacres in Yemen,” The Telegraph, August 30, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/08/30/british-lawyers-mount-bid-war-crimes-inquiry-saudi-led-coalition/ 
  23. “Starvation Markets: The use of starvation by warring parties in Yemen,” Mtwana, September 2021, 346. 

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A study published in Nature Reviews Earth & Environment warns that thawing of permafrost (a ground that remains completely frozen for two or more years) in the Arctic region can prompt the reemergence of greenhouse gases (e.g., methane and carbon dioxide), microbes, and chemicals (e.g., banned pesticides like DDT). Past research finds gases, microbes, and chemicals drift near the poles, becoming entrapped in ice under the accumulating snowfall. As the global climate continues to rise and the climate crisis worsens, studies like this show significant effects, as ice encapsulating these toxic chemicals is melting. Upon melting, some chemicals can volatilize back into the atmosphere, releasing toxicants into the air and aquatic systems, with the ensuing consequences. Microbes frozen for thousands to millions of years can also emerge from thawing permafrost, with unknown implications on human, animal, and ecosystem health. The melting permafrost is already beginning to impact infrastructure, creating sinkholes that damage roads, trees, and utility poles. Moreover, mixtures of chemicals, microbes, and greenhouse gases (GHGs) in permafrost are difficult to assess. Therefore, studies like this highlight the need to evaluate the health and ecological effects of melting arctic permafrost (and glaciers) from anthropogenic (human)-induced climate change. [For related pieces, see Silent Snow: The unimaginable impact of toxic chemical use and DDT in Glacial Melt Puts Alaskan Communities at Risk.]

Approximately 1,700 billion metric tons of carbon, including GHGs like carbon dioxide and methane, are present in permafrost, over 51 times more than the amount of carbon released from 2019 fossil fuel emissions. The remaining organic matter, frozen in permafrost, will decay after thawing, further increasing atmospheric carbon emissions. Although current models predict an increase in carbon released from permafrost in the coming decades to hundreds of years, scientists lack knowledge on how much, how long, and the specific carbon source. Therefore, researchers in this study used ground, air, and satellite data to evaluate the effects of subsequent permafrost melting.

Using ground measurements, researchers can monitor changes in specific areas, while airborne and space-based (satellite) measurements monitor changes over broader areas. Airborne and ground measurements represent time-specific monitoring data, and satellite measurements monitor data continuously. Moreover, ground measurements mainly focus on microbial communities in thawing permafrost. Airborne measurements focus on GHG emission with satellite and airborne data mapping GHG hotspots. The combination of data forms a holistic (complete) overview of changes in the arctic region.

The study determines that Earth’s polar regions are warming the fastest, approximately two to four times faster than average, and these changes can have a cascading adverse impact on lower and higher latitudes. The scientists note that the polar regions (Arctic and Antarctic) stabilize Earth’s climate and drive heat transfer, powering jet streams and other fluxes/currents. Researchers cannot identify specific microbes encased in permafrost, nor whether GHGs emissions will be gradual or rapid. Thus, polar warming has future consequences that threaten regular weather, climate, and chemical exposure patterns.

Many scientists consider Arctic environments “pristine,” void of direct chemical inputs from chemicals used in more temperate and industrial climates. However, the Arctic has become a sink for these toxic chemicals, as studies find evidence that airborne Arctic chemical concentrations are comparable to that of industrialized regions in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Additional investigations find the presence of chemicals and microbes in soil and ice samples taken from Arctic regions. The Arctic is highly susceptible to global pollution, as warmer air contaminated with industrial and agricultural chemicals from manufacturing regions move poleward toward cooler air. Environmental pollutants can condense into snowflakes high in the atmosphere and deposit onto the Arctic surface. Although deposition of these chemicals via long-range atmospheric transport and condensation are significant contributors to Arctic contamination, the chemical properties allowing these substances to persist in the environment so long are concerning. Some of these long-lived chemicals include regionally banned pesticides like DDT, heptachlor, and lindane, which are highly toxic to humans and animals, causing a range of adverse effects, from respiratory issues to nervous system disorders and birth deformities to various common and uncommon cancers. Although banned chemicals remain a global issue, as much of the developing world still report usage, banned/past-use compounds are not the only contaminants in the Arctic. Current-use chemicals like chlorpyrifosdacthal (DCPA), and trans-nonachlor (a component of the banned insecticide chlordane) readily contaminate the arctic, and continued use will result in an increased probability of atmospheric transportation and deposition of chemicals on Arctic glacier tops via precipitation. According to Brettania Walker, Ph.D., toxics officer at World Wildlife Fund’s Arctic Program, “Not only is chemical contamination increasing in the Arctic but also modern chemicals are now appearing in many Arctic species alongside older chemicals, some of them banned for over [30] years.”

The climate crisis adds another level of concern, especially regarding passive pesticide and microbial exposure from snowmelt. Pesticide contamination is already an issue in the U.S., as results of the United States Geological Survey’s (USGS) and National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) show that pesticides and their breakdown products are present in all U.S. streams and widespread in groundwater throughout the country. For instance, a Chicago-based 2020 study shows black women who consume more tap water per day have higher bodily residues of the DDT metabolite (DDE). Permafrost and glacial melting will only add to water source contamination as volatile chemicals can enter waterways at the same concentration levels as before ice entrapment, even after several decades. Moreover, several banned chemicals are not soluble in water (e.g., DDT, lindane, chlordane) but bioaccumulate in the fatty tissue of many Arctic species, such as polar bears, seals, whales, and some fatty fish like salmon, herring, and catfish. The level of DDT in Arctic penguins’ blubber is similar to levels during initial banning more than 30 years ago. Unfortunately, some indigenous tribes in Arctic regions rely on these very mammals and fish for sustenance, and ingesting these pollutants is inevitable, putting their health at risk. Higher bodily concentrations of chemicals are evident in those who consume contaminated meat with associated health risks, including immune system disorder, increased susceptibility to disease, central nervous system disorders, learning disabilities among children, reproductive issues, and cancer. Studies find that adults and children who regularly consume fish from contaminated streams are at increased risk of cancer from dietary and cumulative exposure, in many cases above EPA thresholds.

This study adds to the growing body of literature demonstrating disproportionate warming in arctic regions. Arctic thawing has implications for carbon release and landscape changes that are difficult to predict, including alternations in arctic vegetation and density. The combination of data measurements (e.g., ground, airborne, satellite) can aid in monitoring the carbon system, from microbial decay of organic matter to volatilization of chemicals from permafrost and glacier ice. As global warming progresses, exposure concerns will increase significantly, especially for children who are more vulnerable to the toxic effects of chemical exposure. To mitigate the risks associated with chemical exposure from toxic pesticides, advocates say the manufacturing and use of pesticides need addressing, first and foremost. It falls to global leaders to curtail the continued manufacturing of chemical pollutants that readily contaminate polar regions. Recently, agrochemicals like pesticides and fertilizers overtook the fossil fuel industry as the leading contributor to environmental sulfur emissions. If pesticide use and manufacturing are amplifying the impacts of the climate crisis, advocates argue that it is essential to incite change by enhancing pesticide policy and regulation that eliminates use. The study concluded, “Scientific cooperation across diverse fields has already increased the modeling accuracy and data integration for carbon transport, permafrost thaw, and climate scenarios. However, further international collaboration, monitoring, and exploration is needed to determine the areas of greatest change. All efforts to quantify carbon release expand scientific understanding of complex, changing and emergent dynamics of a warming Arctic.”

Lack of adequate persistent pesticide regulations highlights the need for better policies surrounding pesticide use, especially when a toxic pesticide is banned for use in the U.S., but not for production and export to other countries. A switch from chemical-intensive agriculture to regenerative organic agriculture can significantly reduce the threat of the climate crisis by eliminating toxic, petroleum-based pesticide use, building soil health, and sequestering carbon. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) finds that agriculture, forestry, and other land use contributes about 23% of total net anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases, while organic production reduces greenhouse gas emissions and sequesters carbon in the soil. Learn more about how it is possible to sequester more than 100% of current annual CO2 emissions by switching to organic management practices by reading Regenerative Organic Agriculture and Climate Change: A Down-to-Earth Solution to Global Warming. For more information about organic food production, visit the Beyond Pesticides Keep Organic Strong webpage. Learn more about the adverse health and environmental effects chemical-intensive farming poses for various crops and how eating organic produce reduces pesticide exposure.

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Source: Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, NASA

Featured image is from Beyond Pesticides

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The study I am about to describe was published in the March 18, 2022 issue of CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Review (MMWR).  Once upon a time it appeared to be a high quality publication, and also carried useful editorial comments and criticisms of the articles, which have now disappeared.

This study is based on a relatively small group of children collected in parts of 4 states, but surprisingly 76% of the children live in Arizona.  1,052 of the children are aged 5 to 11. They are swabbed weekly for COVID. Half the Omicron infections were asymptomatic. I wonder if CDC distinguished the variants by anthing but timing.

This group is not representative of the entire US, in which a bit over 30% of children in this age group are vaccinated (and by February 14 only 22% in Chicago).  In CDC’s group, 65% were fully vaccinated, 7% had had one dose and 29% of the children were unvaccinated.

There were a total of 381 COVID infections in this group:  137 in the fully vaccinated and 184 infections in the unvaccinated.  Which leaves, per my calculation, 60 cases in the singly vaccinated, for whom few data are presented.

Now, there is no way to check CDC’s calculations, since each child had a unique number of days in which they were “enrolled,” starting 2 weeks after their second dose.

But what CDC states is that the median duration of enrollment in the study for the vaccinated kids is 53 days, and for the unvaccinated kids 41 days.  You would have thought the unvaccinated would have participated for a longer period, since they don’t have to wait two weeks until after the second shot to join the ranks of the officially vaccinated. I have no explanation for this.

So how well did the vaccine work during a bit less than 2 months after being considered fully vaccinated?

CDC says that after adjustments, the vaccine was 31% effective at preventing “symptomatic and asymptomatic” COVID in this age group.  At under two months.  Wonder what it is at four or six months? How long till we are in negative efficacy territory?

What are the media going to look at?  The final paragraph, of course, when they are trying to get their story out fast.  In fact, they probably are working off a press release.  What does that final paragraph say?

This study provides evidence that receipt of 2 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is effective in preventing both asymptomatic and symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection with the Omicron variant among children and adolescents aged 5–15 years. All eligible children and adolescents should remain up to date with recommended COVID-19 vaccinations.

Now we understand why FDA had the manufacturers vaccinate the placebo group at 2 months in all the COVID vaccine trials.  FDA had established a 50% efficacy standard to issue an EUA, and the longer the trials went on, the lower the efficacy would be.  But now FDA and CDC can’t even get the 5-11 year old efficacy above 31% in Arizona, and in New York, at 7 weeks efficacy was 12% in this age group. This does not meet the EUA standard.

I wonder how they can possibly spin the benefits of vaccination for the 6 month through 5 year olds?   But I expect our federal health authorities will find a way.

*

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Today, the dangers of military escalation are beyond description.

What is now happening in Ukraine has serious geopolitical implications. It could lead us into a World War III Scenario.

It is important that a peace process be initiated with a view to preventing escalation. 

Global Research does not support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The history of this war must be understood.

The bombing and shelling led by Ukraine’s Armed Forces directed against the people of Donbass started eight years ago, resulting in the destruction of residential areas and more than 10,000 civilian casualties.

A  bilateral Peace Agreement is required.


Mike Whitney: Can you explain to me why you think Russia is winning the war in Ukraine?

Larry C. Johnson: Within the first 24 hours of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, all Ukrainian Ground Radar Intercept capabilities were wiped out. Without those radars, the Ukrainian Air Force lost its ability to do air to air intercept. In the intervening three weeks, Russia has established a de facto No Fly Zone over Ukraine. While still vulnerable to shoulder fired Surface to Air Missiles supplied by the U.S. and NATO to the Ukrainians, there is no evidence that Russia has had to curtail Combat Air Operations.

Russia’s arrival in Kiev within three days of the invasion also caught my attention. I recalled that the Nazi’s in Operation Barbarossa took seven weeks to reach Kiev and the required 7 more weeks to subdue the city. The Nazis had the advantage of not pulling punches to avoid civilian casualties and were eager to destroy critical infrastructure. Yet many so-called American military experts claimed that Russia was bogged down. When a 24 mile (or 40 mile, depends on the news source) was positioned north of Kiev for more than a week, it was clear that Ukraine’s ability to launch significant military operations had been eliminated. If their artillery was intact, then that column was easy pickings for massive destruction. That did not happen. Alternatively, if the Ukrainian’s had a viable fixed wing or rotary wing capability they should have destroyed that column from the air. That did not happen. Or, if they had a viable cruise missile capability they should have rained down hell on the supposedly stalled Russian column. That did not happen. The Ukrainians did not even mount a significant infantry ambush of the column with their newly supplied U.S. Javelins.

The scale and scope of the Russian attack is remarkable. They captured territory in three weeks that is larger than the land mass of the United Kingdom. They then proceeded to carry out targeted attacks on key cities and military installations. We have not seen a single instance of a Ukrainian regiment or brigade size unit attacking and defeating a comparable Russian unit. Instead, the Russians have split the Ukrainian Army into fragments and cut their lines of communication. The Russians are consolidating their control of Mariupol and have secured all approaches on the Black Sea. Ukraine is now cut off in the South and the North.

I would note that the U.S. had a tougher time capturing this much territory in Iraq in 2003 while fighting against a far inferior, less capable military force. If anything, this Russian operation should scare the hell out of U.S. military and political leaders.

The really big news came this week with the Russian missile strikes on what are de facto NATO bases in Yavoriv and Zhytomyr. NATO conducted cyber security training at Zhytomyr in September 2018 and described Ukraine as a “NATO partner.” Zhytomyr was destroyed with hypersonic missiles on Saturday. Yavoriv suffered a similar fate last Sunday. It was the primary training and logistics center that NATO and EUCOM used to supply fighters and weapons to Ukraine. A large number of the military and civilian personnel at that base became casualties.

Not only is Russia striking and destroying bases used by NATO regularly since 2015, but there was no air raid warning and there was no shutdown of the attacking missiles.

MW: Why is the media trying to convince the Ukrainian people that they can prevail in their war against Russia? If what you say is correct, then all the civilians that are being sent to fight the Russian army, are dying in a war they can’t win. I don’t understand why the media would want to mislead people on something so serious. What are your thoughts on the matter?

LCJ: This is a combination of ignorance and laziness. Rather than do real reporting, the vast majority of the media (print and electronic) as well as Big Tech are supporting a massive propaganda campaign. I remember when George W. Bush was Hitler. I remember when Donald Trump was Hitler. And now we have a new Hitler, Vladimir Putin. This is a tired, failed playbook. Anyone who dares to raise legitimate questions about is immediately tarred as a Putin puppet or a Russia stooge. When you cannot argue facts the only recourse is name calling.

MW: Last week, Colonel Douglas MacGregor was a guest on the Tucker Carlson Show. His views on the war are strikingly similar to your own. Here’s what he said in the interview:

“The war is really over for the Ukrainians. They have been ground into bits, there is no question about that despite what we hear from our mainstream media. So, the real question for us at this stage is, Tucker, are we going to live with the Russian people and their government or we going to continue to pursue this sort of regime change dressed up as a Ukrainian war? Are we going to stop using Ukraine as a battering ram against Moscow, which is effectively what we’ve done.” (Tucker Carlson– MacGregor Interview)

Do you agree with MacGregor that the real purpose of goading Russia into a war in Ukraine was “regime change”?

Second, do you agree that Ukraine is being used as a staging ground for the US to carry out a proxy-war on Russia?

LCJ: Doug is great analyst but I disagree with him—I don’t think there is anyone in the Biden Administration that is smart enough to think and plan in those strategic terms. In my view the last 7 years have been the inertia of the NATO status quo. What I mean by that is that NATO and Washington, believed they could continue to creep east on Russia’s borders without provoking a reaction. NATO and EUCOM regularly carried out exercises—including providing “offensive” training—and supplied equipment. I believe reports in the United States that the CIA was providing paramilitary training to Ukrainian units operating in the Donbass are credible. But I have trouble believing that after our debacles in Iraq and Afghanistan, we suddenly have Sun Tzu level strategists pulling the strings in Washington.

There is an air of desperation in Washington. Besides trying ban all things Russian, the Biden Administration is trying to bully China, India and Saudi Arabia. I do not see any of those countries falling into line. I believe the Biden crew made a fatal mistake by trying to demonize all things and all people Russian. If anything, this is uniting the Russian people behind Putin and they are ready to dig in for a long struggle.

I am shocked at the miscalculation in thinking economic sanctions on Russia would bring them to their knees. The opposite is true. Russia is self-sufficient and is not dependent on imports. Its exports are critical to the economic well-being of the West. If they withhold wheat, potash, gas, oil, palladium, finished nickel and other key minerals from the West, the European and U.S. economies will be savaged. And this attempt to coerce Russia with sanctions has now made it very likely that the U.S. dollar’s role as the international reserve currency will show up in the dustbin of history.

MW: Ever since he delivered his famous speech in Munich in 2007, Putin has been complaining about the “architecture of global security”. In Ukraine we can see how these nagging security issues can evolve into a full-blown war. As you know, in December Putin made a number of demands related to Russian security, but the Biden administration shrugged them off and never responded. Putin wanted written assurances that NATO expansion would not include Ukraine (membership) and that nuclear missile systems would not be deployed to Romania or Poland. Do you think Putin’s demands are unreasonable?

LCJ: I think Putin’s demands are quite reasonable. The problem is that 99% of Americans have no idea of the kind of military provocation that NATO and the U.S. have carried out over the last 7 years.The public was always told the military exercises were “defensive.” That simply is not true. Now we have news that DTRA was funding biolabs in Ukraine. I guess Putin could agree to allow U.S. nuclear missile systems in Poland and Romania if Biden agrees to allow comparable Russian systems to be deployed in Cuba, Venezuela and Mexico. When we look at it in those terms we can begin to understand that Putin’s demands are not crazy nor unreasonable.

MW: Russian media reports that Russian “high precision, air-launched” missiles struck a facility in west Ukraine “killing more than 100 local troops and foreign mercenaries.” Apparently, the Special Operations training center was located near the town of Ovruch which is just 15 miles from the Polish border. What can you tell us about this incident? Was Russia trying to send a message to NATO?

LCJ: Short answer—YES! Russian military strikes in Western Ukraine during the past week have shocked and alarmed NATO officials. The first blow came on Sunday, March 13 at Yavoriv, Ukraine. Russia hit the base with several missiles, some reportedly hypersonic. Over 200 personnel were killed, which included American and British military and intelligence personnel, and hundreds more wounded. Many suffered catastrophic wounds, such as amputations, and are in hospital. Yet, NATO and the western media have shown little interest in reporting on this disaster.

Yavoriv was an important forward base for NATO (see here). Until February (prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine), the U.S. 7th Army Training Command was operating from Yavoriv as late as mid-February. Russia has not stopped there. ASB Military news reports Russia hit another site, Delyatyn, which is 60 miles southeast of Yavoriv (on Thursday I believe). Yesterday, Russia hit Zytomyr, another site where NATO previously had a presence. Putin has sent a very clear message—NATO forces in Ukraine will be viewed and treated as combatants. Period.

MW: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been lionized in the western media as a “wartime leader” and a modern-day “Winston Churchill”. What the media fails to tell its readers is that Zelensky has taken a number of steps to strengthen his grip on power while damaging fragile democratic institutions in Ukraine. For example, Zelensky has “banned eleven opposition-owned news organizations” and tried to bar the head of Ukraine’s largest opposition party, Viktor Medvedchuk, from running for office on a bogus “terrorist financing” charge. This is not the behavior of a leader that is seriously committed to democracy.

What’s your take on Zelensky? Is he really the “patriotic leader” the media makes him out to be?

LCJ: Zelensky is a comedian and an actor. Not a very good one at that in my view. The West is cynically using the fact he is Jewish as a diversion from the size-able contingent of Neo-Nazis (and I mean genuine Nazis who still celebrate the Ukrainian Waffen SS unit’s accomplishments while fighting with the Nazis in WW II). The facts are clear—he is banning opposition political parties and shutting down opposition media. I guess that is the new definition of “democracy.”

MW: How does this end? There’s an excellent post at the Moon of Alabama site titled “What Will Be The Geographic End State Of The War In Ukraine. The author of the post, Bernard, seems to think that Ukraine will eventually be partitioned along the Dnieper River “and south along the coast that holds a majority ethnic Russian population.” He also says this:

“This would eliminate Ukrainian access to the Black Sea and create a land bridge towards the Moldavian breakaway Transnistria which is under Russian protection. The rest of the Ukraine would be a land confined, mostly agricultural state, disarmed and too poor to be build up to a new threat to Russia anytime soon. Politically it would be dominated by fascists from Galicia which would then become a major problem for the European Union.”

What do you think? Will Putin impose his own territorial settlement on Ukraine in order to reinforce Russian security and bring the hostilities to an end or is a different scenario more likely?

LCJ: I agree with Moon. Putin’s primary objective is to secure Russia from foreign threats and effect a divorce with the West. Russia has the physical resources to be an independent sovereign and is in the process of making that vision come true.

*

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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.

\ and the State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism. He is the founder and managing partner of BERG Associates, which was established in 1998. Larry provided training to the US Military’s Special Operations community for 24 years. He has been vilified by the right and the left, which means he must be doing something right. His analysis and commentary can be found at his blog, https://sonar21.com/

Michael Whitney is a renowned geopolitical and social analyst based in Washington State. He initiated his career as an independent citizen-journalist in 2002 with a commitment to honest journalism, social justice and World peace. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

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How the COVID Vaccine Altered These People’s Lives

March 24th, 2022 by Dr. Joseph Mercola

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***

Some people who have received COVID-19 shots experience a range of debilitating symptoms or death

Healthy teenagers, athletes and doctors are among those who have died within hours or days of receiving COVID-19 shots

Others have experienced stroke-like symptoms, paralysis, tics, partial blindness and seizures following the shots

Increasing numbers of people are becoming compelled to speak out and share their stories of how COVID-19 shots altered their lives

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Despite assurances of safety from health officials, it’s what the long-term effects of COVID-19 shots will be. Spike proteins from the shots can circulate in your body after injection, causing damage to cells, tissues and organs. “Spike protein is a deadly protein,” Dr. Peter McCullough, an internist, cardiologist and trained epidemiologist, said.1

Experimental and observational evidence show that the human immune response to COVID-19 shots is very different than the response induced by exposure to SARS-CoV-2, and people who’ve received COVID-19 shots may have damage to their innate immune system that’s leading to a form of vaccine acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (VAIDS), due to the impairment in interferon signaling.2

Further, likely due to monocyte activation by the spike protein from the vaccine, some people who have received COVID-19 shots experience a range of debilitating symptoms similar to those found in long haul COVID-19 syndrome, such as headaches, fatigue, cognitive dysfunction, joint pain and chest pain.3

For some, however, the shot’s adverse effects occur quickly, resulting in life-changing debilitation. You can see 10 powerful examples below, ranging from deaths to lives upended due to illogical quarantine rules that illustrate the absurdity of COVID-19 tyranny.

These are real people with real stories to share, and the more people who see them, the more awareness can grow to provide those who survived with the help and medical care they deserve — while warning others of the potentially deadly consequences of COVID-19 injections.

If you find these stories helpful and motivating then I would encourage you to visit our breaking news blog on our site as this is where the stories below were initially posted. The blog posts stay up continuously and are not removed after 48 hours.

10 People Whose Lives Changed After COVID-19 Shots

1. Jim Ashby — Learning to Walk Again

Click here to watch the video.

Ashby was forced to get a COVID-19 shot by December 3, 2021, or his employer would consider him “voluntarily resigned.” Eight days after receiving the Pfizer jab, he had a major hemorrhagic stroke.

He’s been in rehab since October 2021, suffering from complete paralysis on the left side of his body. He still has a long way to go in recovery, and still can’t feel or use his left arm or walk without assistance. His rehab is excruciatingly painful, he says, and he spends up to six hours a day learning how to walk again.

What’s worse, his employer isn’t covering the medical bills for the costs of this stroke. “My life has been totally changed, all because of the vaccine mandate … my old life is dead,” he says, “and I have started my new life as a paraplegic.”

2. Athletes Collapsing and Dying

Click here to watch the video.

Healthy athletes around the world are dying of heart attacks and strokes. The numbers are exploding, with athletes suffering neurological problems, too. What’s happened in the last six months to a year that’s different? Is there anything in common that’s changed that hooks all these athletes together? They all have had COVID-19 shots. Among them:

  • Abou Ali, 22-year-old football (soccer) player, who suffered from cardiac arrest in Denmark on September 11, 2021
  • Caddy Alberto Olguin collapsed and died from a heart attack on the golf course on October 9, 2021
  • 30-year-old Venezuelan marathon champion Alexaida Guedez, 30, died of a heart attack during a 5,000-meter race on August 22, 2021
  • Andrea Astolfi, 45, sports director of Calcio Orsago in Italy, died of a heart attack on September 11, 2021 after returning from training
  • Ava Azzopardi, 14, collapsed on a soccer field in the U.S. on October 15, 2021, suffering from cardiac arrest; she had to be put in a medically induced coma to survive

3. Dr. Neil Singh Dhalla, Died From Myocarditis

Click here to watch the video.

Dr. Neil Singh Dhalla fell asleep four days after he got a COVID-19 booster shot — and died from a heart attack. The autopsy stated myocarditis — inflammation of the heart muscle that’s a recognized adverse effect of mRNA COVID-19 shots.4 A CEO of a major health clinic, he was only 48 years old and had never had heart problems in his life.

4. Faith Ranson, 16-Year-Old Plagued by Convulsions and Tics

A happy, healthy 16-year-old girl in Australia who got the Pfizer COVID-19 shot is now crippled with convulsions, persistent nausea and visible tics. The problems began three days after her second shot and have been ongoing for months. Health officials actually admitted “there is no question Faith has had a delayed reaction to the second Pfizer vaccination” and is suffering adverse reactions from the shot. Her story even made it to mainstream news.

5. Nurse With COVID Told to Go Back to Work

Click here to watch the video.

In this video, a “triple vaxxed” nurse from New York explains how she tested positive for COVID-19, and her employer told her to come back to work even though she hadn’t been in quarantine for five days — against CDC recommendations.

Since she was asymptomatic, she was cleared to go to back to work in a health care setting, but told she still had to quarantine in all other aspects of her life. In short, she can go to work to care for patients while actively positive for COVID-19, but she can’t go to a grocery store or a gas station. Not to mention, her kids were quarantined for 10 days, but she was expected to go back to work in less than five.

6. Stroke-Like Symptoms in a Healthy Woman

Click here to watch the video.

Complaints of neurological problems and stroke-like reactions continue to pile up. Immediately after receiving the AstraZeneca COVID-19 shot, this previously healthy woman experienced headaches and dizziness and blacked out “a few times.”

Within days, she started experiencing numbness to the point that she couldn’t stand up. Eight days later, she’s in the hospital with loss of feeling in her left arm, left leg and face. She states that 19 women were brought in to her hospital ward with the same symptoms over the span of one weekend.

7. Two Teenage Boys Die From Myocarditis in Their Sleep

Click here to watch the video.

Epidemiologists have confirmed that two teenage boys from different U.S. states died in their sleep of myocarditis days after getting the Pfizer shot. Both had received second doses of the shot, and McCullough said that in his view, the shots led to the deaths of the teenagers. In a study that examined the autopsy findings, it’s reported that the “myocarditis” described in the boys’ deaths is “not typical myocarditis pathology”:5

“The myocardial injury seen in these post-vaccine hearts is different from typical myocarditis and has an appearance most closely resembling a catecholamine-mediated stress (toxic) cardiomyopathy. Understanding that these instances are different from typical myocarditis and that cytokine storm has a known feedback loop with catecholamines may help guide screening and therapy.”

8. 59-Year-Old Woman Dies Hours After Shot

Click here to watch the video.

A 59-year-old front line health care worker in the U.K. took the COVID-19 shot and died a few hours later. In the video, her acquaintance states, “Now I know it’s a given the vaccine’s going to have some casualties — but people are threatened they are going to lose their jobs if they don’t take it … You have the right to take that risk, but you should have the right to refuse it as well — without jeopardizing your job or your freedom of entry or freedom from discrimination.”

9. Vaccine Advocate Nearly Goes Blind

Click here to watch the video.

The man in this video describes himself as a believer in “science” and a “vaccine advocate,” but this didn’t spare him from the shot’s adverse effects. Five days after his first Pfizer COVID-19 shot, he started having blurry vision in his left eye. Within three days, he had lost 60% of his vision in that eye.

After several medical examinations, doctors, optometrists and retina specialists diagnosed him with central serous retinopathy (CSR), in which a small vein ruptured, leading fluid to accumulate under the retina, causing retinal detachment and partial blindness.

Other cases of CSR have also been reported following COVID-19 shots, he says, and in a case report published in the American Journal of Ophthalmology it’s stated, “Acute CSR may be temporally associated with mRNA Covid-19 immunization.”6 The man’s doctor told him that the risk of getting additional COVID-19 shots outweighs the potential benefit for him and tried to help him get an official exemption from further shots, but it was denied. He states:

“I have been deprived of my human rights as a citizen … I try to gather all my strength so many times during the past few months to just go and receive my second dose in order to follow the laws.

But the fact that the science says there is an above-average chance that I may lose more of my sight has driven me to anxiety attacks, night terrors and disabling depression … This is a direct violation of my constitutional rights as a citizen and a human being.”

10. Young Woman Suffers From Seizures, Nearly Dies

Caution: This video contains language that may offend some people

Beginning her story by stressing she is NOT anti-vaccine or pro-conspiracy theory, this young woman describes what happened to her after she received a Moderna COVID-19 shot, which she decided to get so she and her husband could join some friends on a cruise.

The day after the shot she started feeling “weird,” delirious and “disassociated from herself,” she says. Soon after, she blacked out in the bathroom, and when her husband tried to revive her, she began seizing. She had three seizures between the time her husband called 911 and when the ambulance got her to the hospital.

She was intubated and suffered other severe effects, she says. She spent days in the hospital and is now taking anti-seizure medication, while living with ongoing anxiety about her near-death experience, which she believes was caused by the shot. “Go out there and do your research so you can make an informed decision,” she says. “Because you don’t want to put something in your body that could potentially harm you.”

Let Your Voice Be Heard

If you or a loved one has been injured by a COVID-19 shot, I will help you share your testimony. Vaccine mandates have led to injuries, devastation and deaths — while the brainwashing “get your vaccine now” campaign is being used to divide and conquer. One spark is all that is required to start a fire. There is a revolution building — a revolution for freedom to live your life without medical mandates or dictators calling the shots.

Please share your story with us, and encourage others you know who have a story to share theirs. It’s never been more important than now, for you and your family, to take control of your health.

*

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Notes

1 Rumble, Dr. Peter McCullough, Therapeutic Nihilism and Untested Novel Therapies, October 5, 2021, 6:00

2 The Exposé January 30, 2022

3 FLCCC Alliance, I-Recover

4 U.S. CDC November 12, 2021

5 Archives of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine February 2022

6 Am J Ophthalmol Case Rep. 2021 Sep; 23: 101136

Featured image is from Shutterstock

All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version).

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Visit and follow us on Instagram at @globalresearch_crg and Twitter at @crglobalization. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.


Today, the dangers of military escalation are beyond description.

What is now happening in Ukraine has serious geopolitical implications. It could lead us into a World War III Scenario.

It is important that a peace process be initiated with a view to preventing escalation. 

Global Research does not support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The history of this war must be understood.

The bombing and shelling led by Ukraine’s Armed Forces directed against the people of Donbass started eight years ago, resulting in the destruction of residential areas and more than 10,000 civilian casualties.

A  bilateral Peace Agreement is required.


While addressing a meeting on socioeconomic support for the constituent entities of the Russian Federation on March 16, Russian President Vladimir Putin succinctly elucidated the salient reasons for pre-emptively mounting a military intervention in Ukraine in order to forestall NATO’s encroachment upon Russia’s security interests. Here are a few trenchant excerpts from the lucid and eloquent speech [1]:

“We are meeting in a complicated period as our Armed Forces are conducting a special military operation in Ukraine and Donbass. I would like to remind you that at the beginning, on the morning of February 24, I publicly announced the reasons for and the main goal of Russia’s actions.

“It is to help our people in Donbass, who have been subjected to real genocide for nearly eight years in the most barbarous ways, that is, through blockade, large-scale punitive operations, terrorist attacks and constant artillery raids. Their only guilt was that they demanded basic human rights: to live according to their forefathers’ laws and traditions, to speak their native Russian language, and to bring up their children as they want.

“Kiev was not just preparing for war, for aggression against Russia – it was conducting it … Hostilities in Donbass and the shelling of peaceful residential areas have continued all these years. Almost 14,000 civilians, including children have been killed over this time … Clearly, Kiev’s Western patrons are just pushing them to continue the bloodshed. They incessantly supply Kiev with weapons and intelligence, as well as other types of assistance, including military advisers and mercenaries.

“Just like in the 1990s and the early 2000s, they want to try again to finish us off, to reduce us to nothing by turning us into a weak and dependent country, destroying our territorial integrity and dismembering Russia as they see fit. The failed then and they will fail this time … Yes, of course, they will back the so-called fifth column, national traitors – those who make money here in our country but live over there, and live not in the geographical sense of the word but in their minds, in their servile mentality.”

Confirming Western support for Ukraine “with weapons and intelligence, as well as other types of assistance, including military advisers and mercenaries” that Putin alluded to in the speech, the Intercept reported [2] on March 17 the US military had deployed extensive ISR, or intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, assets to countries neighboring Ukraine to monitor developments within the embattled nation. The aircraft include MQ-9 Reaper drones, Boeing RC-135 Rivet Joints, and Boeing E-3 Sentry AWACS, which have been used to eavesdrop on communications and collect imagery intelligence.

“‘The U.S. is using a variety of drone and fixed-wing collection assets to obtain tactical information of the battlefield,’ the official said, adding that the intelligence is then passed on to the Ukrainians through a liaison officer. On Sunday, a Russian drone briefly crossed into Poland, a NATO member, leading to a warning from the alliance that it could respond with force — an alarming threat of direct confrontation with Russia.

“An MQ-9 drone pilot with the U.S. military also told The Intercept that Reapers had been deployed to the region. He said the U.S. was using MQ-9 services leased from private contractors before withdrawing them and replacing with government assets, which he said have been slower to stand up.

“The U.S. has particular experience with this type of indirect weapons and intelligence assistance against Russia, having previously sent arms to Syrian rebels combating the Russian-backed regime of President Bashar al-Assad.”

In many ways, the proxy war in Ukraine resembles the CIA’s Operation Timber Sycamore and the Pentagon’s $500 million train-and-equip program to provide guerrilla warfare training and lethal weaponry to rebels battling the Syrian government in the training camps located at border regions of Turkey and Jordan during Syria’s decade-long conflict.

In fact, Russia’s military intervention in Syria in Sept. 2015 in support of the Bashar al-Assad government battling Washington’s jihadist proxies was actually in retaliation for the CIA’s covert program initiated in 2014 for arming and training mercenaries and neo-Nazi militias in Russia’s backyard in east Ukraine in order to destabilize and provoke Russia.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last month was only a logical culmination of a long-simmering, eight-year war of attrition initiated by NATO powers against Russia in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region after the 2014 Maidan coup toppling Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and consequent annexation of the Crimean Peninsula by Russia.

In an explosive scoop [3], Zach Dorfman reported for the Yahoo News on March 16:

“As part of the Ukraine-based training program, CIA paramilitaries taught their Ukrainian counterparts sniper techniques; how to operate U.S.-supplied Javelin anti-tank missiles and other equipment; how to evade digital tracking the Russians used to pinpoint the location of Ukrainian troops, which had left them vulnerable to attacks by artillery; how to use covert communications tools; and how to remain undetected in the war zone while also drawing out Russian and insurgent forces from their positions, among other skills, according to former officials.

“When CIA paramilitaries first traveled to eastern Ukraine in the aftermath of Russia’s initial 2014 incursion, their brief was twofold. First, they were ordered to determine how the agency could best help train Ukrainian special operations personnel fight the Russian military forces, and their separatist allies, waging a grinding war against Ukrainian troops in the Donbas region. But the second part of the mission was to test the mettle of the Ukrainians themselves, according to former officials.”

Besides the CIA’s clandestine program for training neo-Nazi militias in eastern Donbas and the US Special Forces program for training Ukraine’s security forces at Yavoriv Combat Training Center in the western part of the country bordering Poland that was hit by a barrage [4] of 30 cruise missiles killing at least 35 militants on March 13, Zach Dorfman claims in a separate January report [5] that the CIA also ran a covert program for training Ukraine’s special forces at an undisclosed facility in the southern United States.

“The CIA is overseeing a secret intensive training program in the U.S. for elite Ukrainian special operations forces and other intelligence personnel, according to five former intelligence and national security officials familiar with the initiative. The program, which started in 2015, is based at an undisclosed facility in the Southern U.S., according to some of those officials.

“While the covert program, run by paramilitaries working for the CIA’s Ground Branch — now officially known as Ground Department — was established by the Obama administration after Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea in 2014, and expanded under the Trump administration, the Biden administration has further augmented it.

“By 2015, as part of this expanded anti-Russia effort, CIA Ground Branch paramilitaries also started traveling to the front in eastern Ukraine to advise their counterparts there. The multiweek, U.S.-based CIA program has included training in firearms, camouflage techniques, land navigation, tactics like cover and move, intelligence and other areas.

“One person familiar with the program put it more bluntly. ‘The United States is training an insurgency,’ said a former CIA official, adding that the program has taught the Ukrainians how ‘to kill Russians.’ Going back decades, the CIA has provided limited training to Ukrainian intelligence units to try and shore up an independent Kyiv and prevent Russian subversion, but cooperation ramped up after the Crimea invasion, said a former CIA executive.”

Notwithstanding, at the height of the Cold War in the sixties when Russia exploded the world’s largest 50-megaton thermonuclear Tsar Bomba in October 1961 and 400,000 US forces were deployed in Europe that were still outnumbered by Soviet troops, the Soviet leadership made repeated requests for signing a “no first use” nuclear treaty precluding the likelihood of pre-emptive nuclear strike, but the United States balked at the proposal due to conventional warfare superiority of the USSR in Europe.

Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev even unilaterally pledged against the first use of nuclear weapons in 1982, though Russia has since dropped the pledge [1] in 1993 following the break-up of the Soviet Union and consequent tilting of balance of power in favor of the United States. After European powers developed their own military capacity following the devastation of the Second World War, NATO now holds conventional warfare superiority over Russia with a significantly larger number of ground troops and combat aircraft.

Despite Russia’s massive nuclear arsenal, several Pentagon officials, full of hubris and evidently suffering from misplaced superiority complex, have recently made their misconceived institutional logic public that they no longer regard Russia as an equal military power, instead they contemptuously dubbed it “a second-rate regional power,” and if given an opportunity, they wouldn’t hesitate to take Russia head-on, even if the risk is as perilous as the conflict spiraling into a catastrophic nuclear war.

Total number of nuclear warheads across the world currently stands at roughly 13,000: Russia has 5977; NATO has 5943, including 5428 in the US, 290 in France and 225 in the United Kingdom; China has 350, Pakistan 165, India 160, Israel 90 and North Korea has 20 nuclear weapons, according to the Federation of American Scientists.

At the height of the Cold War in the sixties, Russia exploded the world’s largest 50-megaton thermonuclear Tsar Bomba in October 1961. A Tupolev Tu-95V aircraft took off with the bomb weighing 27 tons. The bomb was attached to a large parachute, which gave the release and observer planes time to fly about 45 km away from ground zero, giving them a 50 percent chance of survival.

The bomb was released from a height of 10,500 meters on a test target at Sukhoy Nos cape in the Barents Sea. The bomb detonated at the height of 4,200 meters above ground. Still, the shock wave caught up with the Tu-95V at a distance of 115 km and the Tu-16 at 205 km. The Tu-95V dropped 1 kilometer in the air because of the shock wave but was able to recover and land safely.

The 8-km-wide fireball reached nearly as high as the altitude of the release plane and was visible at almost 1,000 km away. The mushroom cloud was about 67 km high. A seismic wave in the earth’s crust, generated by the shock wave of the explosion, circled the globe three times. Glass shattered in windows 780 km from the explosion in a village on Dikson Island.

All buildings in the village of Severny, both wooden and brick, located 55 km from ground zero within the Sukhoy Nos test range, were destroyed. In districts hundreds of kilometers from ground zero, wooden houses were destroyed, stone ones lost their roofs, windows, and doors. Atmospheric focusing caused blast damage at even greater distances, breaking windows in Norway and Finland.

In conclusion, the Ukraine conflict is clearly spiraling out of control and has the potential not only of dragging NATO powers into the war but might also spell end to the human civilization by raising the apocalyptic specter of a catastrophic nuclear war between two formidable nuclear powers that hold between themselves over 90% of the world’s devastating nuclear arsenal.

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Nauman Sadiq is an Islamabad-based geopolitical and national security analyst focused on geo-strategic affairs and hybrid warfare in the Af-Pak and Middle East regions. His domains of expertise include neocolonialism, military-industrial complex and petro-imperialism. He is a regular contributor of diligently researched investigative reports to Global Research.

Notes

[1] Putin’s speech to a meeting published by Russian Embassy in London

[2] U.S. quietly assists Ukraine with intelligence

[3] CIA training program in Ukraine helped Kyiv prepare for Russian invasion

[4] Pentagon push to send more trainers to Ukraine was scrapped

[5] CIA-trained Ukrainian paramilitaries may take central role if Russia invades

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Leaked documents give new information about the Pentagon program in biolaboratories in Ukraine. According to internal documents, Pentagon contractors were given full access to all Ukrainian biolaboratories which handled dangerous pathogens, while independent experts were denied even a visit. The new revelations challenge the U.S. government statement that the Pentagon just funded biolaboratories in Ukraine but had nothing to do with them.

Last week U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland confirmed that “Ukraine has biological research facilities” and the U.S. is worried that “those research materials” may fall into Russian hands. What “research materials” were studied in these biolaboratories and why are U.S. officials so worried that they may fall into Russian hands?

US confirm they are working with Ukraine to secure research at Bio-Lab facilities in Ukraine - YouTube

Source: youtube.com

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Source: twitter.com

The Pentagon activities in Ukrainian biolabs were funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA). DTRA allocated $80 million for biological research in Ukraine as of July 30, 2020, according to information obtained from the U.S. Federal Contractor Registration. U.S. company Black & Veatch Special Projects Corp. was tasked with the program.

Graphical user interface, application Description automatically generated

Source: dilyana.bg

The Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) awarded Black & Veatch Special Projects Corp. an $80 million contract under the Biological Threat Reduction Program (BTRP) in Ukraine in 2020.

Located in Overland Park, Kansas, Black & Veatch is an employee-owned engineering firm specializing in infrastructure development in power, oil and gas, telecommunications, mining and banking and finance markets, which previously obtained more than $1 billion worth of contracts in Afghanistan. It obtained revenues of more than $3.7 billion in 2020,

It was sued by dozens of U.S. soldiers, injured in Talban attacks, who accused Black & Veatch of violating the U.S. Anti-Terrorism Act by making illegal protection payments to the Taliban.

The lawsuit estimates that it cost the Taliban about $100 million to $155 million to launch attacks in 2011 and about $300 million to maintain the insurgency. The lawsuit said protection money was one the largest and most reliable sources of income for the Taliban.

Pentagon contractors given full access to Ukrainian biolabs

First constructed following a 2005 agreement spearheaded by then Senator Barack Obama, the Ukrainian biolabs were accessible to Pentagon contractors but not to independent experts, according to internal documents published on Reddit by an alleged former employee of the Ukrainian Ministry of Health. Black & Veatch Special Projects Corp. was given full access to freely operate in all biolabs in Ukraine that were engaged in biological research activities under the DTRA program, according to a letter dated July 2, 2019, from the Ukrainian Minister of Health to DTRA in Ukraine.

Text, application, letter Description automatically generated

Source: dilyana.bg

A letter dated July 2, 2019, from the Ukrainian Minister of Health Ulana Suprun to DTRA in Ukraine gives Black & Veatch Special Projects Corp. full access to all biolaboratories in Ukraine involved in the U.S. military biological research program. Ulana Suprun is an American national and was conferred Ukrainian citizenship by former president Petro Poroshenko in 2015.

Ukraine rejected proposal for public control over the Pentagon-funded biolabs

While Pentagon contractors were given full access to all biolabs involved in the DTRA program, independent experts were denied such access under the pretext that these biolabs were working with especially dangerous pathogens.

According to a leaked letter, the Ministry of Health of Ukraine denied experts from the scientific journal Problems of Innovation and Investment Development access to the Pentagon-funded biolaboratories. The ministry rejected the proposal made by the scientific journal and did not allow an independent public control group of experts to supervise these biolaboratories.

“The Ministry of Health of Ukraine considers it inappropriate to create a working group for public control and it is not possible to allow members of the group to enter the premises of laboratories of especially dangerous infections of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine,” according to a letter dated 21 October 2016 from the Ukrainian Deputy Minister for European Integration Oksana Sivak to the scientific journal “Problems of Innovation and Investment Development.”

Another DTRA contractor that operated in Ukraine was CH2MHill. The Englewood, Colorado-based company, which previously managed the $5.26 billion Panama Canal expansion project and provided management consultancy services for the Iraq Common Seawater supply project, was awarded a $22.8 million contract (2020-2023) for the reconstruction and equipment of two new biolaboratories:  the State Scientific Research Institute of Laboratory Diagnostics and Veterinary-Sanitary Expertise (Kyiv ILD) and the State Service of Ukraine for Food Safety and Consumer Protection Regional Diagnostic Laboratory (Odesa RDL).

CH2M Hill's Fraud | Davis Vanguard

Source: davisvanguard.org

According to leaked documents, CH2MHill was tasked with an $11.6 million program “Countering Especially Dangerous Pathogen Threats in Ukraine.”

German-Ukrainian project on bird flu 

German and Ukrainian scientists conducted biological research on especially dangerous pathogens in birds (2019-2020). The project was implemented by the Institute of Experimental and Clinical Veterinary Medicine (Kharkov) and the Friedrich Loeffler Institute (Greifswald, Germany). According to the project’s description, the main goal of this project was to carry out sequencing of orthomyxoviruses (causative agents of avian flu) genomes, as well as to discover new viruses in birds.

According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, DTRA funded a similar project in Ukraine—UP-4—in 2020. The project’s goal was to research the potential of especially dangerous pathogens to be transmitted via migratory birds, including the highly pathogenic H5N1 flu, whose lethality for humans can reach 50%, as well as Newcastle disease. The use of migratory birds for possible delivery of pathogens was a major research program between the Smithsonian Institution and the U.S. Department of Defense in the past.

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Dilyana Gaytandzhieva is a Bulgarian journalist and Middle East correspondent. Dilyana can be reached at [email protected].

Links to Documents Pointing to Pentagon Funding of Biolabs in Ukraine

(Note: these documents were removed from the U.S. embassy in Kyiv—moved to Lviv on February 24, but have been made accessible by internet sleuths)

https://web.archive.org/web/20170130193016/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-kharkiv-eng.pdf

Click to access dtro-luhansk-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170221125752/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-dnipropetrovsk-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20210506053014/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-vinnitsa-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170221125752/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-dnipropetrovsk-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170207122550/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-kherson-fact-sheet-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170208032526/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-zakarpatska-fact-sheet-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170202040923/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-lviv-dl-eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170207153023/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-dnipropetrovsk-rdvl_eng.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20170207153023/https://photos.state.gov/libraries/ukraine/895/pdf/dtro-dnipropetrovsk-rdvl_eng.pdf

Featured image is from globaltimes.cn