Global Research

“Today, our Alliance is the strongest in history, guaranteeing the freedom of our almost one billion citizens, the security of our territory, and the protection of our values, including democracy, individual liberty, human rights, and the rule of law.” – Statement issued by the NATO Foreign Ministers, Washington D.C., 3rd-4th April 2019

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Formed in the years immediately following World War II, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), then comprised of Canada, the United States, and ten European powers, was presented to the world as a defensive pact, wherein an attack on one member is an attack on all. The Encyclopedia Britannica explains that NATO was established and conceived as “a counterweight to Soviet armies stationed in central and eastern Europe after World War II.”

Today, seventy years after its founding, the Soviet Union is no more. NATO has increased its military involvement in theatres around the world, including the former Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, the Mediterranean, and Libya. Many of these missions were framed as ‘humanitarian interventions’ or disaster relief as opposed to aggression.

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), NATO powers spent $900 billion USD in 2017 on militarism, accounting for 52 per cent of global military spending. These figures do not, however, account for U.S. spending on actual theatre wars, so-called ‘overseas contingency operations’ in addition to other military related expenditures.

In an article timed with the 70th anniversary commemorations, Professor Michel Chossudovsky’s outlines how, in fact, NATO is the military arm of a hegemonic project to impose an economic restructuring on targeted countries, making them and their resource base rife for exploitation by the Anglo-American capitalist class. He documents the organization’s role in recruiting and financing destabilizing elements in Kosovo, Libya ad Syria among other countries:

“NATO member states are harnessed into endorsing Washington’s imperial design of World conquest under the doctrine of collective security.”

As NATO foreign Ministers gather in Washington D.C. to toast their contributions to the ‘peace and security’ of the world, and draw up their plans for the next 70 years, the Global Research News Hour radio program attempts to probe this much more dissenting perspective on the role of NATO and the Euro-Atlantic powers generally, in global affairs.

In the first half hour, we hear from a man who literally wrote the book on NATO. Mahdi Nazemroaya explains how NATO was conceived to counter left movements in Europe as well as advance its geo-strategic aims on the Eurasian continent. He also explores the U.S.-centric economic imperatives being forged through this bellicose alliance. He also advances an opinion of the recent news that NATO member Turkey will purchase an anti-missile system from Russia rather than purchase the counterpart technology from NATO ally the United States.

In the second half hour, we look at the NATO anniversary in the context of a history of Western European imperialism and plunder. Andre Vltchek addresses how imperialism is advanced through not only guns and bombs, but by exploiting ethnic and religious differences. He also examines the pathological dimensions of empire and the distinctions between Western and Sino-Russian involvement in countries like Syria and Venezuela. He also provides his understanding of why the West commands the admiration of those within countries targeted for imperial domination.

Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya is an award-winning author and geopolitical analyst, author of The Globalization of NATO (Clarity Press) and a forthcoming book The War on Libya and the Re-Colonization of Africa. He is a Sociologist and Research Associate at the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), a contributor to the Strategic Culture Foundation (SCF) and a member of the Scientific Committee of Geopolitica, Italy.

Andre Vltchek is a philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He has covered wars and conflicts in dozens of countries. Three of his latest books are his tribute to “The Great October Socialist Revolution” a revolutionary novel “Aurora” and a bestselling work of political non-fiction: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire”. View his other books here. Watch Rwanda Gambit, his ground-breaking documentary about Rwanda and DRCongo and his film/dialogue with Noam Chomsky “On Western Terrorism”. Vltchek presently resides in East Asia and the Middle East, and continues to work around the world. He can be reached through his website and his Twitter.

(Global Research News Hour episode 255)

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The Global Research News Hour airs every Friday at 1pm CT on CKUW 95.9FM in Winnipeg. The programme is also podcast at globalresearch.ca . Excerpts of the show have begun airing on Rabble Radio and appear as podcasts at rabble.ca.

The Global Research News Hour now airs Fridays at 6pm PST, 8pm CST and 9pm EST on Alternative Current Radio (alternativecurrentradio.com)

Community Radio Stations carrying the Global Research News Hour:

CHLY 101.7fm in Nanaimo, B.C – Thursdays at 1pm PT

Boston College Radio WZBC 90.3FM NEWTONS  during the Truth and Justice Radio Programming slot -Sundays at 7am ET.

Port Perry Radio in Port Perry, Ontario –1  Thursdays at 1pm ET

Burnaby Radio Station CJSF out of Simon Fraser University. 90.1FM to most of Greater Vancouver, from Langley to Point Grey and from the North Shore to the US Border.

It is also available on 93.9 FM cable in the communities of SFU, Burnaby, New Westminister, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, Surrey and Delta, in British Columbia, Canada. – Tune in  at its new time – Wednesdays at 4pm PT.

Radio station CFUV 101.9FM based at the University of Victoria airs the Global Research News Hour every Sunday from 7 to 8am PT.

CORTES COMMUNITY RADIO CKTZ  89.5 out of Manson’s Landing, B.C airs the show Tuesday mornings at 10am Pacific time.

Cowichan Valley Community Radio CICV 98.7 FM serving the Cowichan Lake area of Vancouver Island, BC airs the program Thursdays at 6am pacific time.

Campus and community radio CFMH 107.3fm in  Saint John, N.B. airs the Global Research News Hour Fridays at 10am.

Caper Radio CJBU 107.3FM in Sydney, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia airs the Global Research News Hour starting Wednesday Morning from 8:00 to 9:00am. Find more details at www.caperradio.ca

RIOT RADIO, the visual radio station based out of Durham College in Oshawa, Ontario has begun airing the Global Research News Hour on an occasional basis. Tune in at dcstudentsinc.ca/services/riot-radio/

Radio Fanshawe: Fanshawe’s 106.9 The X (CIXX-FM) out of London, Ontario airs the Global Research News Hour Sundays at 6am with an encore at 4pm.

Los Angeles, California based Thepowerofvoices.com airs the Global Research News Hour every Monday from 6-7pm Pacific time. 

Notes

1. https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_165243.htm