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Antonio Guterres disgraces the office he holds, appointed to serve US-led Western interests. 

He consistently fails to observe UN Charter principles he’s sworn to uphold – notably preserving and protecting human rights, supporting world peace and stability, denouncing wars of aggression, and respecting fundamental international laws.

He one-sidedly supports Western and Israeli interests, failing to do anything to help long-suffering Palestinians, notably beleaguered Gazans.

In response to bloody Friday, Israel mass-murdering 17 Palestinians, wounding over 1,400 others, at least 20 with life-threatening injuries, preemptive Israeli aggression by any standard, Guterres failed to denounce what happened.

He failed to demand Israel be held accountable for a bloody day of Nuremberg-level high crimes.

Instead through his spokesperson, he expressed hollow deep concern, disgracefully calling for an independent investigation into what’s self-evident.

Any so-called probe into Friday’s violence will be obstructed and whitewashed by Israel, a worthless undertaking.

Guterres’ call “to refrain from any act that could lead to further casualties and in particular any measures that could place civilians in harm’s way” ignored reality.

Palestinians throughout the Territories are in harm’s way every day, brutalized by a merciless occupier, gunned down in cold blood, arrested and detained on any pretext, brutalized in captivity, denied internationally guaranteed human and civil rights.

Since taking office in January 2017, Guterres failed to condemn Western and Israeli high crimes, failed to demand long-ignored accountability, failed to support victims of their naked aggression.

He absurdly called for “revitalizing the (no-peace) peace process” – dead-on-arrival each time initiated, notably since Trump’s Jerusalem declaration, driving a stake through the heart of conflict resolution, making it less attainable than earlier.

While Palestinians were being massacred on Friday, ignoring it  while ongoing, Guterres tweeted his “best wishes to all those celebrating Passover around the world. Chag Same’ach (joyous festival)!”

On Friday, the Adalah Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights issued a statement condemning Israeli violence, saying:

“The Israeli military’s use of 100 snipers against unarmed Palestinian civilian protesters in the Gaza Strip is illegal.”

“(L)ive gunfire on unarmed civilians constitutes a brutal violation of the international legal obligation to distinguish between civilians and combatants.”

“Israel is obligated to act in accordance with international law,” adding:

It “demand(s) that (Israelis) responsible for the killings be brought to justice.”

Adalah and the Mezan Center for Human Rights demanded the IDF “remove all social media posts, threatening participants in (Friday’s) Gaza march that they will be military targets, and also remove social media posts threatening the civilian population in Gaza.”

On Thursday, ahead of Friday demonstrations, B’Tselem issued a statement, saying the following:

“…Israeli officials have repeatedly threatened to respond with lethal force.”

“Completely ignoring the humanitarian disaster in Gaza and Israel’s responsibility for it, they are couching the planned protest in terms of a security risk, framing the demonstrators as terrorists and referring to Gaza as a ‘combat zone.’ “

“Fragments of information reported by the media indicate that: soldiers will be ordered to shoot anyone coming within 300 meters of the fence; snipers will fire at anyone touching it; live fire will be used also in circumstances which are non-life-threatening.”

“In other words: shoot-to-kill unarmed Palestinians taking part in these demonstrations” threatening no one,” adding:

Israel “made Gaza a huge prison, yet forbids the prisoners even to protest against (their misery), on pain of death.”

Guterres should have issued a strong statement similar to the above remarks.

Instead, he sided with Israeli mass-murder by failing to condemn it, calling only for a meaningless investigation, accomplishing nothing for brutalized Palestinians if undertaken.

VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected].

My newest book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization

The West is doing everything to fabricate a cause of war against or to isolate Russia further internationally. So far, ‘Novichok’ rests on rumors.

The affair was made up the British and the French intelligence agencies without having presented any evidence. The term ‘Novichok’ was used to sound Russian, in fact, this nerve agent is known internationally as A-234.

Instead, the Western alliance presents this case as a foregone conclusion. And the Western fawning media agitate as cheerleaders, having specialized in producing fake news a long time ago.

Many countries are producing this kind of nerve gas, among them a British company close to the town Salisbury, where the incident happened. What about the U.S., Israel, Uzbekistan, France, and the Brits themselves? Israel has a vast stockpile of biochemical weapons and does not allow internal inspections. To believe the British story, told by Theresa May or even Boris Johnson, is like thinking into Easter bunny.

So far, the Brits have been refusing any requests by Russia to take part in solving of this case. Why? As the public got told, Yulia Skripal, the daughter of double agent Sergei Skripal, is on the road to recovery. Both are still Russian citizens. Russia has been denied to care about its citizens. When can Yulia Skripal testify, does the British intelligence tell her what to say publically? Perhaps she can even ‘prove’ that President Putin himself committed the attack!!!

The Russian Embassy in London sent the following questions to the Foreign Ministry for clarification:

“1. Why has Russia been denied the right of consular access to the two Russian citizens, who came to harm on British territory?

2. What specific antidotes and in what form were the victims injected with? How did such antidotes come into the possession of British doctors at the scene of the incident?

3. On what grounds was France involved in technical cooperation in the investigation of the incident, in which Russian citizens were injured?

4. Did the UK notify the OPCW (Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons) of France’s involvement in the investigation of the Salisbury incident?

5. What does France have to do with the incident, involving two Russian citizens in the UK?

6. What rules of UK procedural legislation allow for the involvement of a foreign state in an internal investigation?

7. What evidence was handed over to France to be studied and for the investigation to be conducted?

8. Were the French experts present during the sampling of biomaterial from Sergei and Yulia Skripal?

9. Was the study of biomaterials from Sergei and Yulia Skripal conducted by the French experts and, if so, in which specific laboratories?

10. Does the UK have the materials involved in the investigation carried out by France?

11. Have the results of the French investigation been presented to the OPCW Technical Secretariat?

12. Based on what attributes were the alleged “Russian origin” of the substance used in Salisbury established?

13. Does the UK have control samples of the chemical warfare agent, which British representatives refer to as “Novichok”?

14. Have the samples of a chemical warfare agent of the same type as “Novichok” (in accordance with British terminology) or its analogs been developed in the UK?”

A similar list of questions was sent to the French foreign ministry by the Russian embassy in Paris. Russia wanted to know on what grounds France was involved in this case. How come that France got a sample of this nerve gas? Or do the French produce this gas themselves? The so-called free Western media do not ask these questions. Instead, they repeat the unfounded allegation by the Brits against Russia, which is so faring fact-free.

How credible is the West, after having staged several incidents that led to wars.

Such as Pearl Harbor (Franklin D. Roosevelt knew about it in advance), the Gulf of Tonkin affair, Operation Northwood, operation ‘Gladio’ where NATO countries maintained secret armies to commit terrorist attacks and put the blame on the left. The infamous incubator affair, where Saddam’s so-called henchmen trough new-born out of the incubators. But it doesn’t end here, the staging of the attack against Iraq by Colin Powell’s infamous speech before the UN about alleged Iraqi WMDs and the fabricated dossier of the Brits under Tony Blair.

The latest fabrication concerns the US elections. The so-called Russian collusion in the American electoral process was initiated under the Obama administration and puffed up after Hillary Clinton lost. Without the Deep State and the remains of the criminal Obama people in the administration, this engineering could have never taken place in a properly functioning democracy.

The real problems are not the crooks in the different Western administrations but the media.

They have been hammering the fake news home to the minds of the people to believe it as reality.

Without having presented any evidence in the so-called Russian collusion affair into the American elections nor the alleged Russian nerve gas attack against Skripal and his daughter, the media have established rumors as facts. That’s how Western ‘free’ media operate, and Western ‘democracy’ is functioning. For both, the future looks bleak.

Ludwig Watzal is a frequent contributor to Global Research

The Trump administration has quietly named Susan Combs — an outspoken foe of endangered species and a climate change denier — as acting assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks. She now oversees the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the endangered species it protects.

“Putting Combs in charge of the Fish and Wildlife Service is like appointing an arsonist as the town fire marshal,” said Stephanie Kurose, endangered species specialist at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Combs will only work to strip away critical protections for our most vulnerable animals, not protect them. As long as her industry pals make a profit, she won’t think twice about letting a species go extinct.”

As a former Texas state comptroller, Combs wrested control of the state’s endangered species program from the Department of Parks and Wildlife to her office, which managed state fiscal and tax matters, not biology. She used her authority to oppose any Endangered Species Act protections, often teaming with the oil and gas industry.

Combs was nominated in 2017 to be the U.S. Department of the Interior’s assistant secretary for policy, management and budget, where she would have controlled the purse strings over the entire department, including the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Her nomination was approved on a party line vote in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. However, the full Senate did not take up her nomination and sent it back to the White House at the end of 2017. In 2018, the Trump administration re-nominated Combs to the same position. More than 70 conservation organizations sent a letter to the Senate opposing her nomination.

Combs is the third political appointee named as “acting” assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks since Trump took office. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke appointed Aurelia Skipwith, a former Monsanto employee, to the role in April 2017. Then in January, Zinke appointed Jason Larrabee, the former chief of staff for Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Calif.), to the position.

The Federal Vacancies Reform Act limits which political appointees can serve in an acting capacity in particular Senate-confirmed offices to a period of up to 210 days, and only for a limited time after a new president is sworn in. Once 300 days or more have passed since a position becomes vacant, the ability to appoint acting officials is severely limited. To date, Trump has not named a person for the Senate to confirm in the assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks job.

“Trump’s dereliction of duty to even offer names for key officials for the Department of the Interior is damaging our nation’s natural heritage,” said Kurose. “It has allowed a parade of unqualified political cronies to occupy the highest levels of the Interior Department and cause even more harm behind closed doors.”

In addition, Whitman states that in the 1930s the United States, as the Nazis frequently noted, stood at the forefront of race-based lawmaking. American immigration and naturalization law, in the shape of series of laws culminating in the Immigration Act of 1924, which conditioned entry in the United States on race-based tables of “national origins.” It was America’s race-based immigration law that Hitler praised in Mein kampf. Furthermore,

American racism in the 21st century

The most powerful military forces of NATO have engaged in a pre-war blame game against Russia.  The official story is that Mr. Putin personally ordered the death of a former British spy (Sergei Skripal) and his daughter by poisoning them with Novichok, a Russian nerve agent.

Detectives in the U.K. have allegedly identified a high concentration of Novichok poison on the front door of the victims. At the same time, they are reporting that the condition of Mrs. Yulia Skripal -the daughter- is improving however she is not able to talk to investigators yet.

Beyond this story, they have not shown any verifiable evidence or a meaningful motive why Russia would be behind this horrible act. However, they all are in agreement that it is “highly likely” that Russia has committed this crime since nobody else could possibly do such thing!  In other words, their evidence lies in a mountain of accusations!Of course, the corrupt media tirelessly rushed in putting all kinds of old stories with the new footage (some which look like scenes from Sci-Fi movies) to prove that Russia is guilty. CNN (the number one warmonger among news channels in the U.S.) believes they have already established a strong “case” against Russia just by saying Russia, Russia, Russia, every few minutes 24/7!

Obviously the immediate result of this game was the expelling of diplomats from all sides.

Now the question on everybody’s mind is what is next?

What is the end game?

While the leaders of the Western “democracies” are proudly patting each other’s back in their anti-Russian campaign, they are perplexed in how to go forward!

This show of unity among some NATO members against Russia has different economic consequences for different members.

This unevenness makes unity among major countries in the west shaky and short-lived.

Germany is already questioning the U.K./U.S. regarding concrete evidence that Moscow has been behind the nerve toxin attack in the city of Salisbury. Meantime, the U.S. leadership is entangled with their own unique set of problems that makes a clear foreign policy impossible and the circling of the wagons impractical.

The logical result of the U.S./U.K. anti-Russian campaign is a military conflict.

The 1% in the U.S. and U.K. are well aware of the rise of working people who are demanding change (this fact is also true in Russia). People are tired of decades of “War on Terror” and certainly are not ready for a major nuclear war against any country. The tangible danger of the anti-Russian campaign is the attack against Freedom of Speech. In the U.S. we are witnessing how the specter of censorship is creeping up against all Americans who are discussing the possibilities of a better system to solve our fatal social, economic and environmental problems.

Today those who speak against war and tell the truth are targeted and will be the victims of unfounded government accusations.

The recent decision of the government of Ecuador to cut off the WikiLeaks editor, Julian Assange’s access to the outside world and his visitation right at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London; is an ALARMING SIGN for all free thinkers.

Peace activists and democratic-minded people around the world should unite and organize against the censorship and war regardless of their ideology.

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The United Nations is held in contempt, by Israel, as Resolution 2334 of the UNSC is rejected: Trump and May actively supporting the criminal conduct of the Netanyahu government whose military action flagrantly violates international law and the express provisions of the Balfour Declaration in addition to flouting the Fourth Geneva Convention on Human Rights.

Security Council Resolution 2334, of 23 December 2016, demands the removal of all illegal settlers from the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights and although the state of Israel has an inalienable right to exist, it is prohibited from carrying out the ethnic cleansing of five million Muslim and Christian Arabs who are the majority indigenous people of the region.

War in the Middle East is now seen as inevitable as Trump puts North Korea on hold; appoints his war cabinet, and the Pentagon readies the USAF military machine to attack Iran and Lebanon, in collaboration with Israeli forces and the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.  The US 5th Fleet is understood to be on high alert of preparedness for deployment to the Gulf, and the 6th Fleet to the Eastern Mediterranean.

Global peace has never before been in such danger from nuclear war than now. Billions of people in over 190 countries worldwide are at risk from American-Israeli currently planned aggression and combined military action in defiance of the will – and to the danger, of both the UN and the European Union.

Hans Stehling (penname) is a frequent contributor to Global Research

Talk surrounding US President Donald Trump’s move to appoint John Bolton as his new National Security Advisor has focused on Bolton’s role in promoting the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and the profound contrast his appointment signifies in light of President Trump’s 2016 campaign promises to “drain the swamp.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W197RF0sp8k

However, Bolton’s appointment carries with it greater implications both to those apparently criticizing him as well as those attempting to promote him. Bolton has – for years – lobbied for a terrorist organization guilty of kidnapping and killing both US service members as well as US civilian contractors, along with an untold number of Iranian civilians and politicians in a campaign of terror that has stretched over several decades and continues today.Worst of all, the terrorist organization Bolton lobbied for was literally listed on the US State Department’sForeign Terrorist Organizations list during his lobbying activities – in direct violation of US counter-terrorism laws. That organization – Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) and its political front, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) – has since been delisted as of 2012. However, the organization was delisted not because it has fully given up armed terrorism, but because the US has planned since at least as early as 2009 – according to Washington’s own policy papers – to use MEK as armed proxies against the nation of Iran.MEK are Terrorists, Even According to Their US Sponsors

Despite claims by a growing army of MEK advocates spanning various social media platforms, MEK is without doubt a dangerous terrorist organization. Even those seeking to sponsor MEK as a militant proxy against Iran have admitted as much.

In the 2009 Brookings Institution policy paper, “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran,” US policymakers openly admitted MEK’s candidacy as a US proxy (emphasis added):

Perhaps the most prominent (and certainly the most controversial) opposition group that has attracted attention as a potential U.S. proxy is the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran), the political movement established by the MEK (Mujahedin-e Khalq). Critics believe the group to be undemocratic and unpopular, and indeed anti-American.

In contrast, the group’s champions contend that the movement’s long-standing opposition to the Iranian regime and record of successful attacks on and intelligence-gathering operations against the regime make it worthy of U.S. support. They also argue that the group is no longer anti-American and question the merit of earlier accusations. Raymond Tanter, one of the group’s supporters in the United States, contends that the MEK and the NCRI are allies for regime change in Tehran and also act as a useful proxy for gathering intelligence. The MEK’s greatest intelligence coup was the provision of intelligence in 2002 that led to the discovery of a secret site in Iran for enriching uranium. 

Brookings policymakers also openly acknowledged that MEK was without doubt a terrorist organization (emphasis added):

Despite its defenders’ claims, the MEK remains on the U.S. government list of foreign terrorist organizations. In the 1970s, the group killed three U.S. officers and three civilian contractors in Iran. During the 1979-1980 hostage crisis, the group praised the decision to take America hostages and Elaine Sciolino reported that while group leaders publicly condemned the 9/11 attacks, within the group celebrations were widespread.

Undeniably, the group has conducted terrorist attacks—often excused by the MEK’s advocates because they are directed against the Iranian government. For example, in 1981, the group bombed the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party, which was then the clerical leadership’s main political organization, killing an estimated 70 senior officials. More recently, the group has claimed credit for over a dozen mortar attacks, assassinations, and other assaults on Iranian civilian and military targets between 1998 and 2001. At the very least, to work more closely with the group (at least in an overt manner), Washington would need to remove it from the list of foreign terrorist organizations.”

It should be noted that Brookings’ mention of MEK was made under a chapter titled, “INSPIRING AN INSURGENCY Supporting Iranian Minority and Opposition Groups,” indicating that groups being considered for US sponsorship would undoubtedly be armed and carry out a campaign of violence – if not terrorism, then the full-scale military operations similar US-sponsored militant groups have been carrying out in Syria.

Brookings recommendation that MEK be removed“from the list of foreign terrorist organizations”would eventually be fully realized by 2012 – spearheaded by lobbyists led by prominent US politicians and policymakers including US National Security Advisor John Bolton.

MEK’s Decades of Terrorism and its Future Terrorism

MEK has carried out decades of brutal terrorist attacks, assassinations, and espionage against the Iranian government and its people, as well as targeting Americans including the attempted kidnapping of US Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II, the attempted assassination of USAF Brigadier General Harold Price, the successful assassination of Lieutenant Colonel Louis Lee Hawkins, the double assassinations of Colonel Paul Shaffer and Lieutenant Colonel Jack Turner, and the successful ambush and killing of American Rockwell International employees William Cottrell, Donald Smith, and Robert Krongard.

Admissions to the deaths of the Rockwell International employees can be found within a 2011 report written by former US State Department and Department of Defense official Lincoln Bloomfield Jr. on behalf of another lobbying firm – Akin Gump – in an attempt to dismiss concerns over MEK’s violent past and how it connects to its current campaign of armed terror.

The report would state:

The State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2009 document says that the MEK killed the deputy chief of the US Military Mission in Tehran in 1973, two members of the US Military Assistance Advisory Group in 1975, and two employees of Rockwell International in 1976, and that it claimed responsibility for killing an American Texaco executive in 1979. 

MEK’s violent past of armed terrorism, coupled with admissions by the US that it seeks to use MEK as an armed proxy against Iran calls into question the US State Department’s decision

Regarding that decision,  the US State Department’s 2012 statement titled, “Delisting of the Mujahedin-e Khalq” would claim:

With today’s actions, the Department does not overlook or forget the MEK’s past acts of terrorism, including its involvement in the killing of U.S. citizens in Iran in the 1970s and an attack on U.S. soil in 1992. The Department also has serious concerns about the MEK as an organization, particularly with regard to allegations of abuse committed against its own members.

The Secretary’s decision today took into account the MEK’s public renunciation of violence, the absence of confirmed acts of terrorism by the MEK for more than a decade, and their cooperation in the peaceful closure of Camp Ashraf, their historic paramilitary base.

The US State Department admits that the organization carried out terrorism in the past and continues today with abuses toward its own members. And as US policymakers within the pages of Brookings papers admit, the entire campaign aimed at delisting MEK in the first place was to legitimize the organization’s use as a militant proxy against Iran – a role that will most certainly violate MEK’s supposed“renunciation of violence” and contravene the grounds upon which MEK was delisted as a terrorist organization by the US State Department in the first place.

John Bolton’s Advocacy of Terrorists

Considering the undeniable terrorist nature of MEK past, present, and Washington’s own admitted plans for its terrorist future, the troubling nature of John Bolton’s advocacy for the group comes into full focus. This is particularly so within the context of Bolton’s new role as National Security Advisor.

Bolton’s role in lobbying for MEK and NCIR has been promoted most prominently by his own supporters among the US media. Right-leaning CNS – for example – in an article titled, “Senior US, Saudi Figures Call for Tehran Regime to be Overthrown,” would admit:

Bolton, who has attended the annual NCRI event for a decade, cited Iran’s military intervention in Syria, in maneuvering in Iraq, and its support for Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists and for Houthi militia in Yemen.

The same article would note however, that:

Supporters view the NCRI and affiliated People’s Mujahedeen Organization of Iran (MEK) as a viable opposition to the clerical rulers in Tehran, and praise it for exposing the regime’s covert nuclear programs. 

Detractors view with suspicion its history of support for the regime of Saddam Hussein, and what critics have described as cult-like behavior. 

The MEK was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. until 2012, when the Obama administration delisted it, citing a renunciation of violence and “the absence of confirmed acts of terrorism by the MEK for more than a decade.”

Foreign Policy would also expose Bolton’s lobbying efforts. In FP’s 2011 article titled, “MEK rally planned for Friday at State Department,” it would include mention of a full-paged ad taken out in the Washington Post. The ad included a letter to then US President Barack Obama which stated:

We are writing to you with urgency to underline the need for an immediate decision to remove Iran’s opposition group the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) from the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO). 

The 2011 adwas signed by John Bolton along with other prominent US politicians including Howard Dean, Rudy Guiliani, and Tom Ridge.

Since MEK has only been removed from the US State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organizations list since 2012, CNS, Foreign Policy, and the lobbying efforts of Bolton himself serves as evidence that Bolton provided support and lobbying services to what was a listed terrorist organization in blatant violation of18 U.S. Code § 2339A – providing material support to terrorists.

Bolton’s speeches openly supporting MEK prior to 2012 are easily found online. One published in 2010 features Bolton speaking in Paris openly advocating not only the US removing MEK from its Foreign Terrorist Organizations list, but also lobbying for US support to be provided to MEK and others in what he called the “Iranian opposition.” Since the 2012 delisting, Bolton has continued attending MEK events and advocating both support for MEK and openly calling for the US-led overthrow of the Iranian government.

While some have attempted to defend Bolton and others lobbying for MEK claiming that MEK could not have been removed from the State Department’s list even if it was no longer a threat to the US without the aid of lobbying – it should be remembered that the job of adding or removing terrorist organizations from the State Department’s list is the responsibility of the Bureau of Counterterrorism in the State Department – not political lobbyists.

The State Department itself notes on its website that:

The Bureau of Counterterrorism in the State Department (CT) continually monitors the activities of terrorist groups active around the world to identify potential targets for designation. When reviewing potential targets, CT looks not only at the actual terrorist attacks that a group has carried out, but also at whether the group has engaged in planning and preparations for possible future acts of terrorism or retains the capability and intent to carry out such acts.

Clearly – however – the presence of immense lobbying campaigns like those led by Bolton on behalf of MEK indicates that the State Department’s list is dictated by political motivations, money, and lobbying, not independent analysis provided by US security and intelligence professionals either in the US State Department or elsewhere within the US government.

Furthermore, it is clear by the US State Department’s own criteria that MEK is still very much a foreign terrorist organization. According to its own criteria, any organization that is even planning or preparing for possible future acts of terrorism, must be included on the list. US policymakers and even John Bolton himself have openly stated that MEK will be used as an armed proxy against Iran.

A Terrorist Collaborator Advising on US National Security

A National Security Advisor openly guilty of violating US anti-terrorism laws having provided material support to a US State Department-listed foreign terrorist organization for years illustrates just how profoundly compromised US institutions are and reflects an agenda that not only exclusively serves special interests – but does so at the cost of the American people’s actual security.

The position of National Security Advisor – officially known as “the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs” – is describedby the US White House’s official website as part of the National Security Councilas follows: 

The National Security Council (NSC) is the President’s principal forum for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and cabinet officials. Since its inception under President Truman, the Council’s function has been to advise and assist the President on national security and foreign policies. The Council also serves as the President’s principal arm for coordinating these policies among various government agencies.

A National Security Council that includes lobbyists representing terrorist organizations with American blood on their hands constitutes not only a dire threat to actual US national security, but global security as well.

MEK terrorists backed by a nation possessing nuclear weapons and a history of provoking wars through fabricated evidence and staged incidents ensures that America’s foreign policy will continue to pursue destructive wars abroad at the cost of US treasure and blood and the resources and lives of nations the US sets its industrialized military aggression upon.

John Bolton – however – is not the architect of the policy he has advocated for well over a decade. He is simply fulfilling what US policymakers themselves have meted out in the pages of US policy papers for just as long. These policymakers – in turn – are funded by American arms manufacturers, energy conglomerates, financial institutions, and other immense corporate-financier special interests.

The Brookings Institution whose 2009 paper, “Which Path to Persia?” spelled out verbatim the steps Bolton has since undertaken with his lobbying efforts, has a long list of such corporate-financier interests underwriting and directing its work.

Understanding that efforts to remove MEK from the US State Department’s  Foreign Terrorist Organizations list and prepare them for their role as armed proxies against Iran transcended the administrations of George Bush, Barack Obama, and now Donald Trump exposes the continuity of agenda – regardless of who occupies the White House or US Congress – advanced by these unelected corporate-financier interests.

While exposing John Bolton’s complicity in the material support of egregious terrorists and his efforts to use them as armed proxies against Iran in a war he has attempted to promote and instigate for years is important, it is equally important to expose, confront, isolate, and extinguish the influence of the corporate-financier interests that have underwritten and directed Bolton’s efforts and the efforts of countless others working to drag the United States, its allies, and the rest of the planet into another destructive conflict.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook” where this article was first published.

Tony Cartalucci is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

It is not news that Venezuela is being ostracized in any conceivable form short of an actual military invasion, although threats to that effect have also been made by the US government. Other governments and institutions like the Organization of American States have joined in what appears to be a contest for who-is-who in ganging up against Venezuela.

What is news is that the new threat comes from the International Labour Organization (ILO) with headquarters based in Geneva, Switzerland. The organization reported on March 21: “ILO Governing Body decides to appoint Commission of Inquiry for Venezuela.” [1]

Coincidentally, in what appears to be a “subtle” message to the ILO, last March 28 the traditionally neutral government of Switzerland has also joined the roll of sanctioning countries against Venezuelan institutions and senior officials. “Those on the sanctions list include former National Assembly President Diosdado Cabello, Interior Minister Nestor Reverol and Chief Justice Maikel Moreno. The Swiss sanctions include banning the sale or export to Venezuela of arms and goods.” [2]

The ILO inquiry “refers to the non-observance of ILO Conventions No. 26 (Minimum Wage-Fixing Machinery Convention, 1928), No. 87 (Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948) and No. 144 (Tripartite Consultation (International Labour Standards), 1976).”

But here is what would make Karl Marx rise from his grave and shout again “Workers of all lands, unite!” as inscribed on his tombstone. The complaint “alleges lack of consultation with FEDECAMARAS on laws that affect the labour and economic interests of the employers, and the adoption of numerous increases to the minimum wage without consultation with employer and worker representatives.”

It goes further to state,

“The [ILO] Governing Body has discussed this complaint six times since 2015 and had asked the Government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela on several occasions to take measures to put an end to the alleged interference, aggression and stigmatization directed against FEDECAMARAS, its affiliated organizations and its leaders.”

Fedecamaras is the Venezuelan Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Production (Federación de Cámaras y Asociaciones de Comercio y Producción de Venezuela) that represents the interests of Venezuelan business and corporations. That is a legitimate role in a country where the private sector still has a strong presence, which is fully recognized by a government that is otherwise labeled as “socialist”, “communist”, “authoritarian”, or “dictatorial”.

However, Fedecamaras had more ambitious interests than trade and commerce for its “affiliated organizations” when former Fedecámaras president Pedro Carmona became de facto president of Venezuela for 47 hours during the failed coup against the government of president Hugo Chavez in April 2002.

Since its founding in 1919, the ILO has opened 12 Commissions of Inquiry. Of those, only 3 involved Latin American countries: Chile (1975) during the early days of the Pinochet regime repression; the Dominican Republic (1983) related to the employment of workers from Haiti; and Nicaragua (1987). Interestingly, the inquiry about Nicaragua refers exactly to the same issues as Venezuela today keeping in mind that in 1987 Daniel Ortega of the Sandinista Liberation Front was president.

The specific violations investigated in Nicaragua were “murder, physical aggression, and torture” among others. But the ILO has remained silent at the slaughter of more than 2,800 labour leaders and union members since 1986 in Colombia. The danger for union leaders continues to this day. “As a result of attacks on unions and other pressures, the percentage of unionized workers in Colombia has dropped from 15 percent 20 years ago to about 4 percent today.” [3]

What is striking in the case of Venezuela is that those same corporations that claim “aggression and stigmatization directed against FEDECAMARAS, its affiliated organizations and its leaders,” are believed to be responsible for lobbying for economic sanctions, hoarding of goods, creating an induced inflationary process through parallel manipulated exchange rate, all of which is undermining the purchasing power of the Venezuelan working class. [4]

Let us remember that critics are wrongly calling the manufactured economic crisis in Venezuela a “humanitarian crisis.” If that were the case, why would the Venezuelan government urgent intervention, by increasing the minimum wage level to protect the most vulnerable population, be considered inappropriate? Paradoxically, the main drivers of the economic crisis maintain that they were not consulted, and claim to be the victims of a labour transgression.

The Canadian government absurdly issued a news release stating that the “Maduro regime robs its people of their fundamental democratic and human rights, and denies them assistance to meet basic humanitarian needs.” In gross contradiction, it further supports the ILO inquiry “to examine allegations that the Maduro regime failed to comply with international labour conventions on … setting of minimum wages.” [5]

This may be a rare case where a government increase of the minimum wage is considered an offense because it affects “the labour and economic interests of the employers”. The real crime, however, is being committed by applying sanctions against Venezuela. Alfred de Zayas, a UN independent expert for the promotion of an international democratic and equitable order, stated, “it is time” for Venezuela to ask the International Criminal Court “for an investigation into the crimes against humanity committed by the United States for imposing sanctions against it.” [6]

Notes

[1] http://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_622567/lang–en/index.htm
[2] https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/13744
[3] https://pulitzercenter.org/projects/south-america-colombia-labor-union-human-rights-judicial-government-corruption-paramilitary-drug-violence-education
[4] https://mronline.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/THE-VISIBLE-HAND-OF-THE-MARKET.-ECONOMIC-WARFARE-IN-VENEZUELA.-PASQUALINA-CURCIO-C.pdf
[5] https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/news/2018/03/statement-by-foreign-affairs-minister-and-minister-of-employment-workforce-development-and-labour-on-the-establishment-of-a-commission-of-inquiry-f.html
[6] https://venezuelanalysis.com/ANALYSIS/13745

March 2018  marks the 19th anniversary of  NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia

This article by David Orchard who relentlessly led Canada’s antiwar movement against NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia was published as a widely distributed leaflet and on the Internet on April 26, 1999.

**

For over a month Canada has been bombing Yugoslavia. Without a parliamentary resolution, without a declaration of war and without a shred of legality Canadian war planes are attacking the nation that stood at the forefront of the fight against both Hitler’s Nazis and Mussolini’s fascists during World War II.

The Nuremberg trial ruled that “to initiate a war of aggression… is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime.” Yet this is precisely what Canada and its NATO allies have done.

The Canadian government said it was bombing to force the Yugoslavian government to sign the Rambouillet “agreement” — an ultimatum which provided for NATO’s occupation of Yugoslavia. Yet article 52 of the 1980 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, to which Canada is a signatory, states that any treaty procured by force or the threat of force, is null and void. The bombardment of Yugoslavia is a flagrant violation of the UN charter, which prohibits the use of force against a sovereign state which has not committed aggression on another state; of NATO’s own charter and of international law on a number of other fronts. NATO is dropping internationally outlawed cluster bombs and using missiles hardened with depleted uranium which vapourize upon impact releasing deadly radioactive fall-out which will, as in Iraq where similar weapons were used, leave a legacy of agony in Yugoslavia for decades to come.

Canada’s government said it was bombing to prevent a humanitarian crisis, genocide and “ethnic cleansing.” The unvarnished truth is that the bombing has increased the humanitarian crisis a thousandfold and knowledgeable observers have repeatedly stated that what was going on in Kosovo before the bombing began cannot be called genocide. In a recent article, “The fatal flaws underlying NATO’s intervention in Yugoslavia,” Lt. General Satish Nambiar, former commander of the United Nations forces in Yugoslavia, writes that he “did not witness any genocide beyond killings and massacres on all sides that are typical of such conflict conditions.”

He points out that over 800,000 Serbs were driven out of Croatia and the Muslim-Croat Federation without a word of complaint from the west. Canadian Roland Keith, a former field office director of the Kosovo Verification Mission, recently returned, reported that “the clear majority” of the violence he saw in Kosovo was instigated by the Kosovo Liberation Army, and that “there was no ethnic cleansing going on that I witnessed and certainly no genocide.” The total deaths on all sides in Kosovo prior to the bombing was 2000. Yet now, in one of the defining moments of our century, NATO has launched a massive around-the-clock air bombardment on behalf of a shadowy, armed Kosovo secessionist movement seeking to break up what remains of Yugoslavia.

For Canada to be bombing in favour of the breakup of a sister multi-ethnic state defies comprehension. In Iraq, our government said it was bombing to maintain the territorial integrity of Kuwait. Here, it is openly bombing to dismember a country, a founding member of both the UN and the Non-Aligned Movement and Canada’s staunch ally in both world wars.

The lesson NATO is teaching the world is that from now on the only sovereign nations are those capable of defending themselves with nuclear weapons. All others apparently can be bombed and now also, it appears, blockaded — another flagrantly unlawful act by NATO.

Who exactly has ordered Canada into war? Do unelected generals at NATO now determine Canada’s foreign policy, including decisions of war and peace? It is clear our Parliament does not. In a crowning abdication of responsibility, Mr. Chrétien has declared that whatever the NATO “team” decides about a ground war, Canada will go along.

Our government, through Mr. Axworthy, tells us this is a “humanitarian bombing mission.” In fact, it is a campaign of terror. Over 4000 bombing sorties, plus hundreds of cruise missiles, have struck Yugoslavia, a country one-fifth the size of Saskatchewan. Over one hundred schools and churches, including monasteries dating back to the 12th century, have been hit; as well as power stations, chemical plants (releasing toxic clouds over Belgrade and polluting the Danube), water and sewage facilities, factories, including the Yugo car plant, trains, train stations and apartment buildings; the result is untold suffering, a human and environmental catastrophe. NATO doesn’t like Yugoslavian media coverage of the damage on the ground, so it bombed the television station in Belgrade incinerating twelve young journalists, burying another eighteen, perhaps more, alive under tons of rubble.

This is not a war. It is the slaughter of a tiny, virtually defenceless nation by a vigilante gang-up of western powers. “Massive bombing,” in General Nambiar’s words, “intended to terrorize Serbia into submission.”

President Clinton told his shocked nation after the Colorado school killings that we must teach our youth to solve conflicts with words, not weapons. And who will teach NATO’s adults this lesson now that the rule of law has been thrown onto the ash heap of history?

*

This article was published as a widely distributed leaflet and on the Internet on April 26, 1999.

David Orchard is the author of The Fight for Canada – Four Centuries of Resistance to American Expansionism. He  ran twice for the leadership of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. He was convenor in 1999 of the Ad Hoc Committee to Stop Canada’s Participation in the War on Yugoslavia.  He farms in Borden, SK and can be reached  at [email protected].

Late Friday, Security Council members met in emergency session – in response to Israeli violence in Gaza.

Nearly all SC members called on both sides to show restraint, ignoring Israeli mass murder, the session lasting a scant 66 minutes – from 7:42 – 8:48PM, accomplishing nothing for long-suffering Palestinians, especially besieged and attacked Gazans.

According to UN Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affair Taye-Brook Zerihoun, Israeli forces attacked peaceful Palestinian demonstrators with live fire, adding:

“The developments in Gaza today are again a painful reminder of the consequences of a missing peace between Israel and Palestine and the need to step up our efforts in support of a peaceful resolution of the conflict.”

UN special coordinator for the (no-peace) Middle East Peace Process Nikolay Mladenov explained Palestinians called on everyone to exercise restraint and avoid violence, adding:

“There is fear the situation might deteriorate in the coming days.  We will continue to underline that civilians, in particular children, not be targeted and that all actors refrain from putting children at risk.”

So-called “actors” are Israelis, not Palestinians, flouting core international laws and standards. Urging them to “exercise maximum restraint” is meaningless without holding them accountable for murder, other forms of violence, and oppression of a beleaguered people.

Representing the Trump administration at Friday’s SC session, deputy political coordinator Walter Miller disgracefully blamed Gazans, not Israel for Friday’s violence, saying:

“Bad actors who use protests as a cover to incite violence endanger innocent lives.”

Russian deputy UN envoy Vladimir Safronkov shamefully urged both sides to show restraint – ignoring premeditated Israeli mass murder, continuing a decade-long pattern, perhaps much more to come through mid-May.

Bolivian envy Pedro Luis Inchauste Jordan alone among SC members condemned Israeli violence, blaming 70 years of conflict and 50 years of occupation.

Permanent observer of the State of Palestin Riyad Mansour attended the session, demanding an immediate halt to Israeli slaughter, along with holding its officials accountable for what happened, adding:

The SC “must take a stance and condemn the massacre while providing protection for the Palestinian people, (acting with) a sense of repugnance and urgency.”

“There is nothing more repulsive than a massacre of unarmed defenseless people, including women and children.”

“We call on the Council to swiftly uphold its Charter duties and the integrity and authority of its resolutions in light of the violations and provocations against the rights and legitimate national aspirations of the Palestinian people.”

The world body and member states have done nothing to relieve Palestinian suffering, nothing to hold Israel accountable for high crimes of war, against humanity and slow-motion genocide, nothing to end over half a century of illegal occupation harshness.

US support for the Jewish state lets its rogue officials get away with mass murder and much more.

Palestinians have been victimized for decades, no relief in prospect for a long-suffering people because the world community doesn’t give a damn about their rights and welfare.

VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected].

My newest book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

(stephenlendman.org – Home – Stephen Lendman)

Throughout its sordid history, Israel turned the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and especially Gaza into free-fire zones – killing, injuring, maiming, and otherwise brutalizing Palestinians with impunity.

The world community doesn’t care about Palestinian lives and welfare – doing nothing to stop Israeli occupation harshness, nothing to hold its officials accountable for Nuremberg-level high crimes, nothing to protect the rights and welfare of millions of tyrannized Palestinians.

March 30, 2018 will long be remembered as bloody Friday – the horrific toll through 8:00PM local time included 17 Palestinians murdered by Israeli snipers and tank fire, another 1,416 wounded, mostly by live fire, including use of expanding (dumdum) bullets, designed to cause maximum internal injuries – according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

The toll should shock the conscience of everyone. At least 20 wounded Palestinians suffered life-threatening injuries, the death toll virtually certain to rise.

Israeli viciousness came in response to day one of a 45-day nonviolent “Great March of Return” – in Gaza and elsewhere in Occupied Palestine.

Israeli soldiers attacked nonviolent Palestinian demonstrators near Ramallah with live fire, rubber-coated steel bullets and toxic tear gas – numerous injuries reported.

In Bassem/Nariman/Ahed Tamimi’s home Nabi Saleh village, dozens of demonstrators were attacked the same way.

Other towns and villages across the West Bank were assaulted by Israeli viciousness.

Perhaps the Friday horror will continue throughout the 45-day period. A Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) press release said the following:

“This huge number of victims proves that the Israeli forces continue to commit further crimes and use of excessive force against Palestinian civilians in disregard for their lives upon an official political decision.”

“PCHR emphasizes that before occurrence of demonstrations -previously declared by the organizers as peaceful demonstrations only calling for implementation of United Nations Resolution 194 and raising only Palestinian and UN flags – the Israeli forces sent threatening letters to intimidate the organizers and Gaza Strip residents in addition to deploying snipers and dog sniffer units along the borders with Gaza as declared by the spokesperson of the Israeli Army on his Facebook page.”

“The spokesperson also threatened that ‘if needed, we will respond in the center of the Gaza Strip against those behind these violent protests,’ hinting about committing crimes of extra-judicial killings (assassinations).”

PCHR blamed international community silence for Friday’s bloodbath and countless others like it since the creation of the Jewish state.

On Friday, state-sponsored violence was preemptively unleashed on nonviolent Palestinian demonstrators threatening no one.

A separate article explained the following:

Friday demonstrations commemorated the 42nd anniversary of Land Day since 1976 in response to Israel’s announced intention to steal thousands of dunums of Palestinian land for settlement construction.

On March 30, 1976, Israeli police lethally shot six Arab citizens, protesting peacefully against theft of Palestinian land.

Since then, annual Palestinian protests commemorate that fateful day throughout the territories and in Israel.

The current Palestinian “Great March of Return” will continue through mid-May Nakba Day.

How much more Israeli violence will occur between now and then? How much more bloodshed?

How many more Palestinians die, be injured or maimed for life? How much Israeli-inflicted Palestinian suffering is too much?

How great a price must Palestinians pay to be free at last from Israeli occupation viciousness?

A Final Comment

The late Palestinian scholar/activist Edward Said (1935 – 2003) once said “(w)hat George Bush knows about Palestine can be engraved on the head of a pin.”

The same goes for Obama, Trump and most congressional members.

Commenting shortly before his September 2003 death, Said ridiculed Bush’s touting of “American” values, explaining:

“What Arabs, Muslims, and Europeans more and more see is a country that flouts international law. It tears up some treaties and refuses to sign others. It thinks of itself above and exceptional in all things.”

The same criticism applies to Israel, operating extrajudicially, embracing the false notion of Jews as “God’s chosen people,” claiming exclusive right to historic Palestine, stealing the land dunum by dunum, the so-called peace process the greatest hoax in modern times.

Said called it “a repackaging of the Israeli occupation.” He cited “the absence of (strong leader-led) initiative (as) our greatest enemy.”

So is US-led Western support for Israel, Washington partnering in its high crimes, providing billions of dollars annually, used for militarism, aggression and repression.

Palestinians are largely on their own, prevented from living free on their own land in their own country by a ruthless occupier.

Resistance remains their only option – struggling one day to be free at last.

VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected].

My newest book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

“The existent, the body, disappears. We live within a spectacle of empty clothes and unworn masks….Nobodies and no Necessity – for Necessity is the condition of the existent. It is what makes reality real.” – John Berger, “Steps Toward a Small Theory of the Visible”

“The real body. To be real, it must be bodily; and to be a body is to be eaten. The humiliation in incarnation; to become bread. To be eaten: to be consumed by sorrow, sickness, and death. – Norman O. Brown, Love’s Body

“If Marx were functioning today he would have been hard put to avoid saying that imaginary sex is the opiate of the people.” – John Ralston Saul, Voltaire’s Bastards

Why are so many Americans indifferent to the savage slaughter of millions of people around the world carried out by their own government under a long string of presidents?

Why were they stone-cold silent during eight years of Obama’s many wars and drone killings of which he boasted? Why are they silent in the face of the Trump administration’s continuation and expansion of those wars and its push for a nuclear war with Russia? Why this incestuous turning in and away from the bloody havoc their government keeps inflicting on the world?

And why all this denial while focusing on the pornographic media spectacles of Stormy Daniels (the porn queen turned “Adult Film Actress”), Monica Lewinsky, and a host of others paraded before the cameras to distract and entertain a population of spectators?

I, like many people, wonder why. What follows is an attempt at an answer, with the focus of my thinking being primarily on middle to upper class Americans, for the poor and working classes have a hard enough time making ends meet and keeping alive themselves, since they are the victims of a domestic war waged by the same heartless ruling class that kills so many overseas.

For when people lose touch with the physicality of life and embrace spectral images, mediated reality, and abstractions as real, they have stepped into a totally nihilistic world. A disembodied world. When this is joined to a narcissistic self-preoccupation with one’s own well-being and comfort, indifference to the suffering of others becomes the norm. This is the world of unreality populated today by so many Americans, who have grown progressively indifferent to the slaughter by their own government of people throughout the world – heaps of millions of dead bodies, blood, and body-parts everywhere. In “Song in the Blood” the French poet Jacques Prévert says:

There are great puddles of blood on the world
where’s it going all this spilled blood….
murder’s blood…war’s blood
misery’s blood…
and the blood of men tortured in prison….
Where’s it going all this spilled blood
the earth that turns and turns and turns
with its great streams of blood.

To the bodiless bloodless insouciant ones, however, the blood of “others” is invisible. It is our lives that matter. What is being done to these “others” is of little consequence because it is experienced as an abstraction – unreal – as if it weren’t happening, even as it is. And in a twist of fate straight from Greek tragedy, those who embrace this delusion are in denial of the very real possibility that they too will be “disappeared” by a nuclear war being provoked in their names. Having turned their backs on nature and the corporeal reality of all living beings, having denied the passion play that is life on earth for all people, having denied that there are limits to American hubris and the West’s clearly insane and nihilistic push for nuclear war with Russia, they will pleasure themselves “until the atom too bursts into flames,” as Albert Camus warned (right), “and history ends in the triumph of reason and the death agony of the species.”

In an incisive article, “It is Us,” John Steppling recently asked a series of Tolstoyan questions about the ruling class (and by extension most Americans): “What does the ruling class want?” he asked. How much money do these people need? Is it power they are after with their mad quest to gobble up the world and slaughter as they go? Power for what? For more money? Why are they provoking a nuclear war with Russia? Are they simply crazy? Don’t they know they too will die? And what about all those affluent liberals and conservatives, the narcissistic bourgeoisie, the average person, are they all suicidal?

I believe they think in their delusional way that the coachman will pass them by. They are living in the unreality that has overtaken so much of the Western world. They believe they will pass. No failure for them. They won’t die. They will “pass on.” They are different, special, they live in a fantasy of bodiless abstractions, even as they work on their bodies to go on and on, exercise and diet, pill after pill, supplements, dreams of running marathons at 98, body parts replaced as they do yoga poses to dreamy ethereal music in the safe surround of a warless environment where bombs and missiles are for the others in bloody bodies over there far away. The pornography of war out of sight and thought; the screening of pornographic titillation in everyone’s face.

It is generally assumed that the United States is a materialist society where the voluptuous life of bodily existence is affirmed and celebrated. Big breasts and bigger butts, skinny jeans and streaming sex scandals to the contrary, I think this is not true. American society has joined its Puritan tradition to instrumental reasoning and its go-go-get-it-done practicality to create a culture where the human body has become, like everything and everyone else, a thing to be manipulated – an instrument to be masturbated, a thing to be pampered, paraded, and presented in a society of looking-glass selves. Selfies in flight from others and human encounters where care and communion of consciousness lead one to love the world as one’s body and to feel compassion for others far away in other lands who are being slaughtered by our guns and bombs. And to say No, not in my name, not over my dead body.

To burst the bubble of the self. W. H. Auden put it this way in the poem Are You There?

Whatever view we hold, it must be shown
Why every lover has a wish to make
Some other kind of otherness his own:
Perhaps, in fact, we never are alone.

Yet Americans pursue loneliness as if their mirror images were the world. Or the things they so avidly buy reflect who they are: interior decorating for the soul. Souls divorced from their instrumental bodies. With packaged and commodified consciousnesses, so many “interact with products” these days, as they pursue constantly retreating phantoms; the social narcissism of images falling in love with their own images and reaching out to embrace their shadows.

This is as far from eroticism as one can get, if one grasps the true meaning of Eros, the god of love, life, joy, and becoming, whose growth was stunted until his mother Aphrodite was oracularly told that “Love cannot grow without Passion.” And passion is a reaching out for others, not for oneself, or one’s phantom image. The brilliant psychologist Rollo May summed up our situation by saying that when “eros has lost passion,” it has become “insipid, childish, and banal.” And when the cult of technique and technology becomes a social addiction, feeling, passion, and individual identity is blotted out and, “mirabile dictu, we discover that the myth [of Eros] proclaims exactly what we have seen happening in our own day, eros, then, even loses interest in sex.” Except on screens.

Once the human body becomes an object of narcissistic preoccupation – its maintenance, presentation, coddling, etc. – it has become an instrument to be used, as do other people. The body remains but the human disappears, and the remaining “instrumental” body is “disembodied.” Once the human body is reduced to a machine and human intercourse in its multiple meanings is accepted as a “mediated reality” through so-called smart devices, we know that the era of humanoids has arrived, as Howard Beale so famously announced in the film Network over forty years ago. Smart phones for dumb people; always in touch but never touching.

To be human is to be embodied, incarnated, to love and suffer passionately, body and soul. Sexual passion and tenderness in the service of life, not death. Eros, not Thanatos. Passion for a suffering world and victims everywhere. I think one important reason why so many Americans have turned their backs as their government crucifies the rest of the world is because they have lost their bodies not their minds, and in exchanging shadows on the wall for flesh and blood they have abandoned the world and embraced the unreality of things that a capitalist, consumer society proffers in lieu of life. And as so many great thinkers (Coleridge, Swift, Brown, et al) have pointed out, to try to rise above the body is ironically to equate the body with excrement. Norman O. Brown writes, “Thus the morbid attempt to get away from the body can only result in a morbid fascination in the death of the body.” From this flows the narcissistic focus on self-preservation and the spending of one’s life energies on the acquiring of dead things rather than the carefree letting go of one’s love and care into the whole world that is crying out for redemption from an orgy of violence.

Of course, the paradox of the disappearance of the living body into spectral images and things is the departure of the soul as well, the embodied soul. And a soulless country is a place where reality no longer exists and one can, for example, view Michelangelo’s Pietà and think, “What an amazing sculpture, how did he do it?” but fail to feel heartache and rage that so many mothers across this planet are now weeping and cradling the crushed and crucified bodies of their children, victims of American weapons of war. Our weapons. Our wars.

When will we dead awaken?

By now the West – the US, Canada, Australia and the super-puppets of Europe, overall more than 25 countries – has expelled more than 130 Russian diplomats. All as punishment for Russia’s alleged nerve gas poisoning of a former Russian / MI6 double-agent, Sergei Skripal (66) and his daughter Yulia (33), who was visiting her father from Moscow.

Sergei Skripal lived in the UK for the last seven years, ever since President Putin lifted his prison sentence in 2010 in a spy swap with the UK. The pair, father and daughter, was allegedly discovered on 4 March slumped on a park bench in Salisbury, England, not far from Sergei’s home. Apparently traces of the same nerve agent were found at the Skripal home’s door. 

Russia in the meantime has started in a tit-for-tat move expelling western diplomats – in a first round 60, plus closing the US Consulate in St. Petersburg. According to Mr. Lavrov, more will most likely follow. – There will be an exodus and a counter-exodus of diplomats, west-east and east-west. It looks like a Kindergarten at play – but is of course a blatant provocation by the west on Russia and a continuation of the vilification of President Putin – especially after he has just been reelected with an overwhelming majority of over 76%. It’s a provocation with zero substance, to further justify an escalating NATO aggression against Russia. The war-bells are ringing – for a lie, an abject farce, visible to a child. Only the blind, those puppets, because out of fear or out of stupidity, who do not want to see – are supporting this new US instigated, UK executed drive against Russia.

The nerve gas, called Novichok, had been produced by the Soviet Union in the 1970s, but was subsequently banned and destroyed under international supervision. The ‘inventor’ of Novichok lives apparently in the US. Mr. Putin said, if the military-grade Novichok would have been used, the only form the USSR ever produced, there would have been no survivors.

What hardly anybody talks about is that the secretive UK Defense (War) Ministry’s laboratory of Porton Down, is but 13 km away from where father and daughter were allegedly found unconscious on a park bench. Porton Down is a highly sophisticated chemical and biological weapons lab that entertains contracts with the Pentagon of more than US$ 70 million for carrying out “experiments”, including on humans and animals. Porton Down has the capacity to produce Novichok.

See the full story on Porton Down, by Bulgarian investigative journalist, Dilyana Gaytandzhieva –

https://southfront.org/salisbury-nerve-agent-attack-reveals-70-million-pentagon-program-porton/ .

At this point there is no prove – other than what the police reported – that Sergei and Yulia Skripal were found on that dubious park bench. There are no civil witnesses. The UK government does not disclose where the two are treated, what their current health status is. Only on the repeated insistence of Mr. Lavrov that according to an agreement between the UK and Russia (the USSR) in the 1960s, both countries have the right to inquire and investigate about the wellbeing of their respective citizens, an official statement on 29 March from the UK said that Yulia is doing better and is on her way to recovery, while her father is still in critical but stable conditions (The Guardian, 29 March 2018). Is it true? – What if one or both recover and have enough memory of the events to go public?

What if the two have indeed been poisoned at Sergei’s home, or abducted and brought to the Porton Down laboratory to be infected with the nerve gas and then later dumped to the park bench? Why does the UK not disclose any ‘evidence’ they apparently have against Russia? – No details of where the two are being treated? – No visits allowed. Russia’s offer to collaborate in the investigation is laughed off and refused. Is this a well-orchestrated MI6 / CIA false flag, followed by outrageous lambasting by the UK’s highest leadership against Russia and her newly re-elected President Putin?

This criminal propaganda event is so full of lies, false accusations and deceit, pulling along more than 25 (so far) western nations to condemn and sanction Russia in unison for something Russia has with absolute certainty not committed. Just apply logic – a tough challenge, I know, these days for the dumb-folded west – but logic would tell a child that there is no sense, absolutely no sense, for Russia to carry out such an evil act. So, the usual question is: cui bono – who benefits? – And the answer is also crystal clear: Profiting from this sham are the war-mongering US / NATO and their miserable vassal-allies – spineless for years – following lies, their governments are fully aware of the lies, of the untruth Russia is accused of.

Adding injury to insult is Ecuador’s new President, Lenin Moreno, who a few days ago has shut up Julian Assange, Wikileaks editor, who is in political asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since July 2012. Under Moreno’s gag-order, Assange is no longer allowed to communicate with anybody in any form and shape and cannot receive visitors. The official reason for Moreno – who has clearly become a traitor on his people – is that Assange tweeted a protest against the arrest in Germany of Catalonian ex-leader, Carles Puigdemont. Moreno has condemned Assange to a sort of isolation prison in the Ecuadorian Embassy. Who gave Moreno orders to do so? – Well, I leave the guessing up to you. In any case Moreno has become a prostitute as are most of the western world “leaders”.

The real reason is most likely Assange’s strong critique of the UK government, especially PM Teresa May and her Foreign and Defense Ministers, for their vitriolic and unjustified accusations and slandering of Russia and particularly of President Putin in the Skripal poison case. Assange cannot leave the embassy for fear of being arrested and extradited to the US, where he may face torture and worse, possibly the death penalty.

Diplomatic Relations

Let’s take this a step further. Diplomatic relations between the west and Russia have totally fallen apart. The doors are closed. Russia doesn’t need the west. But the west, especially Europe, badly needs and will every day more need Russia, a close ally and trading partner for hundreds of years. The west, eventually abandoned and every day more enslaved by Washington with weaponized refugees, with false flag terror attacks, leading to increased militarization, to oppression and censorship, privatization of public goods and infrastructure – Greece is but an example – and strangulation by Wall Street private banking and troika (IMF, European Central Bank, European Commission) imposed debt, the west will beg Russia to open her doors and show them her kindness – the kindness and openness Russia has been demonstrating to the west over the past almost 20 years, despite flagrant western abuse and demonization no end.

The western Anglo-Zionist-led empire will collapse. It’s a mere question of time but collapse it will. Today, not only a few, but all western “leaders” (sic) know that they are committing suicide by teaming up with destructive Washington – and this against the will of the majority of the European people. – Yet, they push a long this path of auto-destruction. Why? – Have they been personally threatened, or else lavishly rewarded if they follow the dictate of deep state-led White House and Pentagon?

The day may come when the west will knock desperately at Russia’s door – please talk to us, we need you. But this may happen only if they have not let themselves be pulled into the abyss of annihilation by Washington. Their stupidity may just do that – another few lies, accusing Russia of crimes against humanity she didn’t commit and prompting a war, an all-destructive nuclear war. The pretext could be another false flag Syrian sarin attack on “her own people”, wrongly blaming Bashar al-Assad; or a missile landing in Israel, blaming Iran with the same no-proof propaganda fervor applied by the UK in the Sergei and Yulia Skripal case; or North Korea – in the course of negotiations between Trump and Kim Jong-un next month (April), the US / west launches a false flag missile, for example, from Guam, that lands in Japan, destroying infrastructure and killing people, blaming it immediately on DPRK, without any evidence whatsoever, but with a rigorous campaign UK-style, to the point that nobody dares to contradict the obvious lie.

What if the current UK virulent and violent Russia slandering campaign is but a dry-run for much worse to come? – By now the mental state of western society is at the level of Hitler’s Propaganda Minister, Goebbels’, statement – “Let me control the media, and I will turn any Nation into a herd of Pigs”. Yes, that’s what the west has become, a herd of pigs.

Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a water resources and environmental specialist. He worked for over 30 years with the World Bank and the World Health Organization around the world in the fields of environment and water. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for Global Research; ICH; RT; Sputnik; PressTV; The 21^st Century; TeleSUR; The Vineyard of The Saker Blog; and other internet sites. He is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe. He is also a co-author of The World Order and Revolution! – Essays from the Resistance.

Is this the next shoe to drop? Will the Trump administration follow suit, officials of both countries pressuring others to impose a similar ban?

Theresa May reportedly is considering a UK ban on Russian sovereign debt, escalated economic war if imposed, perhaps further illegal sanctions on Russian individuals and entities at the same time.

According to Harvard Society of Fellows research fellow Emile Simpson, “Russia can borrow in EU and US capital markets despite western sanctions and then can support the sanctioned Kremlin-linked banks and energy companies that can no longer do so.”

UK parliament’s foreign affairs select committee chairman Tom Tugendhat called for closing a loophole, letting Russian banks sell eurobonds to finance the country’s sovereign debt, saying:

“One of the ways that people are getting their money out of this country is by allowing Russian sovereign debt to be sold in the UK, and that debt to be used to reimburse Russians, in a way, to bring back their money onshore, in Moscow terms…We are…enabling those bond auctions, those debt auctions.”

Critics of the proposal say Russia will go elsewhere to sell its bonds, notably China.

A US Treasury study of the issue opposed sanctioning Russian debt, fearing a negative effect on financial markets.

Last December, Russia’s Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said talks with China were held on selling yuan bonds worth $1 billion in 2018, perhaps the first offering of more to come.

Deputy Finance Minister Vladimir Kolychev said Beijing expressed interest in the idea.

Separately, Russian Direct Investment Fund head Dirill Dmitriev explained Vladimir Putin supported the idea of creating an investment vehicle in yuan.

A Sino/Russia investment fund already made 19 investments, things going smoothly.

Last July, the Russian Direct Investment Fund and China Development Bank established a joint 68 billion yuan ($10 billion) investment fund as part of Beijing’s “One Belt, One Road” initiative.

Both countries may also cooperate in establishing payment systems, linking Russia’s system with China’s.

Moscow’s over dependence on the West harms its political and economic security.

Paul Craig Roberts earlier explained “by accepting foreign capital and exposing the ruble to currency speculation, Washington made sure that the US could destabalize Russia with capital outflows and assaults on the ruble’s exchange value,” adding:

“Only a government unfamiliar with the neoconservative aim of US world hegemony would have exposed its economic system to such foreign manipulation.”

PCR’s current advice: “…Russia should turn her back, but not her eyes, on the West, stop responding to false charges, evict all Western embassies and every other kind of presence including Western investment, and focus on relations with China and the East.”

Moscow should have followed this advice years ago – instead of letting the country be entrapped in a US-led Western financial straightjacket, the sooner freed from it the better for its economy and security.

Foolishly believing East/West normalization is possible one day is a strategy of reckless economic, financial and political endangerment.

Washington, Britain and their imperial allies are sworn enemies of Moscow. Mass expulsions of Russian diplomats alone prove it.

Nothing suggests a positive change in Western policy ahead, things likely to worsen, not improve.

It bears repeating what’s important to stress. Russia’s future is East, not West.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.

In mid-March, GOP House and Senate members called on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to appoint a special prosecutor to work jointly with Justice Department inspector general Michael Horowitz in investigating alleged FBI and DOJ Trump/Russia probe abuses.

House Judiciary chairman Bob Goodlatte and House Oversight chairman Trey Gowdy wrote  Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, accusing the DOJ and FBI of failing to provide the FISA court with information about the Hillary/DNC-financed Trump-smearing Christopher Steele doggy dossier.

GOP Senators Grassley, Graham and Tillis also called for appointing a special counsel to investigate these alleged abuses.

The DOJ inspector general has no prosecutorial authority. The US Office of Special Counsel (OSC) is an investigative/prosecutorial federal agency.

When called on, it’s authorized to probe alleged prohibited practices by current or former federal officials, empowered to prosecute if warranted by credible evidence.

The OSC lacks jurisdiction to investigate or prosecute CIA, NSA and other US intelligence community staff.

On Thursday, AG Sessions declined to appoint a special counsel to investigate alleged Trump/Russia probe DOJ and FBI abuses, saying:

“To justify such an appointment, the Attorney General would need to conclude that the public interest would be served by removing a large degree of responsibility for the matter from the Department of Justice.”

Instead, he named Obama-appointed US Attorney for the District of Utah John Huber to lead an investigation into alleged abuses explained above.

Once completed, Sessions said he’d decide whether appointing a special counsel in warranted.

Earlier Trump tweeted: “Why is AG Jeff Sessions asking the Inspector General to investigate potentially massive FISA abuse.”

“Will take forever, has no prosecutorial power and already late with reports on Comey etc. Isn’t the IG an Obama guy? Why not use Justice Department lawyers? DISGRACEFUL!”

Newly released documents obtained by congressional members show Obama officials cooked up dubious claims, alleging Trump team/Russia 2016 presidential election collusion.

Since surfacing in 2016, not a shred of credible evidence supports them. Unverified allegations and accusations persist, unjustifiably justifying the appointment of Robert Mueller as special counsel last year.

Since last May, he’s conducted a colossal sham Russiagate witch-hunt investigation, continuing endlessly despite finding no evidence of electoral process collusion or interference.

Newly released information shows FBI, CIA, and undemocratic Dems used unverified “evidence” to claim Trump team/Russia 2016 presidential election collusion.

Key officials involved in the scheme included Obama’s chief of staff Denis McDonough, his CIA head John Brennan (the plot’s likely architect), former undemocratic Dem Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, former Deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe, former FBI director James Comey, Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, and likely others.

Is it smoking gun evidence enough to expose and end the witch-hunt Russiagate probe?

Don’t bet on it!

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.

Is Facebook Listening through Your Smartphone Microphone? Whistleblower Says Yes

By True Publica, March 29 2018

A couple of years ago I had a pair of sunglasses stolen from my car when I forgot to take them with me when the car was being serviced. I complained to the garage and indignantly reported this important event to my wife. Spookily, the following day I started receiving ads in my Facebook feed for where I could buy exactly the same pair of sunglasses.

Monetary Policy, Money Supply and The Bank of Canada

By Professor John Ryan, March 29 2018

Few people understand the Canadian government’s relationship with the Bank of Canada or the nature of the Bank’s original raison d’être. Back in 2011 a lawsuit had been filed in the Federal Court by the Committee on Monetary and Economic Reform against the Government of Canada and the Bank of Canada.

UK Fusion Doctrine: Britain’s USA Patriot Act

By Stephen Lendman, March 29 2018

Britain’s Fusion Doctrine didn’t suddenly emerge in the wake of the March 4 Skripal incident. These initiatives take considerable time and debate to draft. It had to have been prepared well in advance of the state-sponsored Skripal incident, justifying what’s clearly unjustifiable.

The Twilight of the Empire Age: Whose World Will It Be? Why America Isn’t Great Anymore

By Amir Nour, March 30 2018

If today’s world is really inexorably moving from the tutelage of the sole superpower—America—and no other great power is willing or able to step in to lead it, then whose world will it be? And, most importantly, how can this sui generis “global village” best attend to and manage not only rising transnational threats and challenges, but opportunities as well?

France’s Political Landscape: Trade Unions and Left Parties Confront Macron’s Attacks on Rail Services and Jobs

By Dick Nichols, March 29 2018

France is once again on the brink of an all-out industrial war – and its outcome could transform the country’s political landscape. The showdown is over the plans that President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Edouard Philippe have for the state-owned National Railway Company (SNCF), which have been described by Le Monde as “the biggest change for the SNCF since its founding in 1937.”

March for Eight Billion Lives. “US Wars and Domestic Gun Violence are Intertwined.” Interview with Riva Enteen

By Ann Garrison, March 30 2018

Organizers of the upcoming Women’s March on the Pentagon are calling on the Democratic Party-sponsored Women’s March and March for Our Lives to expand their message to include the eight billion lives on the planet, all of which are imperiled by US weapons and wars. I spoke to Riva Enteen, a former National Lawyers Guild Program Director and a member of the steering committee for the October Women’s March on the Pentagon.

Last week the Donald’s incipient trade war got Wall Street’s nerves jangling, but that wasn’t the half of what’s coming.

To wit, Trump has now essentially formed a War Cabinet and signed a Horribus spending bill that is a warrant for fiscal meltdown. Indeed, the two essentially comprise a self-fueling doom loop which means Washington’s descent into fiscal catastrophe is well-nigh unstoppable; it’s all over except for the screaming in the bond pits.

That is, Trump’s new War Cabinet of John Bolton, Mike Pompeo, Gina Haspel and Mad Dog Mattis is arguably the most interventionist, militarist, confrontationist and bellicose national security team ever assembled by a sitting President. We cannot think of a single country that has even looked cross-eyed at Washington in recent years where one or all four of them has not threatened to drone, bomb, invade or decapitate its current ruling regime.

That means Imperial Washington’s rampant War Fever owing to the Dem-left declaration of war on Russia and Putin is now about to be drastically intensified by the complete victory of the neocon-right in the Trump Administration. The result will be sharpened confrontation, if not actual outbreak of hostilities, across the full spectrum of adversaries—Iran, Russia, China, Syria and North Korea—-and an escalating tempo of military operations and procurement to implement the policy.

At the same time, the Donald’s pathetic Fake Veto maneuver on Friday cemented the special interest lobbies’ absolute control over domestic appropriations. Of course, Chuckles Schumer and Nancy Pelosi crowed loudly about the $63 billion annual domestic spending increase they got in return for the Donald’s $80 billion defense add-on, but the victory was not partisan; it belonged to the Swamp creatures who suckle the politicians of both parties and own the appropriations committees lock, stock and barrel.

To be sure, upon folding at mid-day from his four-hour’s earlier veto tweet, the Donald promised “never again”, but his reason for signing the most wasteful, pork-ridden appropriations bill of this century tells you all you need to know. To wit,

“There are a lot of things I’m unhappy about in this bill. There are a lot of things that we shouldn’t have had in this bill, but we were in a sense forced if we want to build our military,” Trump said. “I said to Congress, I will never sign another bill like this again.”

Au contraire. As long as he lasts in office, the Donald will be signing budget busters far worse than this one because the aggressive foreign policies of his War Cabinet will drive the pace of national security spending dramatically higher than the record $695 billion he signed into law last week; and these “must have” increases for pay, operations, ammo, spare parts, training, readiness and weapons replacement/augmentation will not get through the Congress until the bipartisan porkers have had their fill on the domestic side.

Your editor experienced long ago the toxic fiscal equation which arises when hawks and militarists take control of foreign policy and the defense budget. What you get is a “guns and butter” log-rolling dynamic as defense advocates on the spending committees buy the votes of colleagues whose snouts have penetrated deeply into the domestic pork barrel or whose paymasters inhabit the vast expanse of the health, education and social welfare complex.

That’s what stopped cold the Gipper’s short-lived attack on Big Government after 1981, and why the hawk-dominated GOP has been such a dismal failure on the fiscal front ever since.

But the Trumpite/GOP has brought guns and butter log-rolling to a whole new level of fiscal profligacy. And the overwhelming share of the blame for the resulting Horribus appropriations bill—which will raise spending by $143 billion this year and $2.4 trillion over the next decade—rests squarely with the incumbent member of Trump’s new War Cabinet, SecDef James Mattis.

Not only does his brazen bellicosity and demented militarism rival that of the other three members of Trump’s new War Cabinet, but Mattis also spent a 40 year career sucking the hind teats of the Warfare State, where he apparently never met a military budget that was big enough.

That is to say, Mattis is not remotely the “warrior monk” or “military intellectual” the fawning mainstream press makes him out to be. He’s actually a gung-ho bull-in-the-china-shop who defines his mission as complete obliteration of any foe who comes along; and which is to be accomplished by the assembly of overwhelming military capabilities and firepower.

Stated differently, the quotes below are not the expressions of a subtle mind. They reflect the mindset of the bombastic militarist who should have never, ever been let near the top post at the Pentagon, and who is the architect of the Donald’s hideously bloated defense budget and new long-term strategic plan for unaffordable, insensible global military dominance:

“The first time you blow someone away is not an insignificant event. That said, there are some assholes in the world that just need to be shot…..I come in peace. I didn’t bring artillery. But I’m pleading with you, with tears in my eyes: If you fuck with me, I’ll kill you all.’

Unlike most of the American generals who have been waging and loosing pointless wars over the last half century while cheerfully checking the boxes on the way to their post-retirement bonanzas, Mattis never got over it. He blitzed the enemy as an assault battalion commander in the first Gulf War, brought carnage to the Pashtun villages of southern Afghanistan and obliterated Fallujah (Iraq) twice—without ever noticing that he was not winning any wars, but just dispensing random high-tech violence at huge cost in blood (theirs), treasure (ours) and blowback (throughout the Muslim world).

Indeed, Mattis’ apparent lesson was that America needed massive military dominance to pacify an uncooperative world, and the Donald fell for it hook, line and sinker.

Yet in today’s world, America has no industrial state enemies remotely capable of and/or motivated to threaten the homeland. Indeed, the only real homeland defense we need is our nuclear retaliatory force of land-based ICBMs, sea-based Trident missiles and DOD’s 5,000 active and standby nuclear warheads—all of which were bought and paid for long ago.

That is, America doesn’t need no stinkin’ defense build-up, and could slash what it’s already spending by $250 billion per year without harming national security in the slightest.

That is also to say, neither Russia nor China is about to invade the American homeland with conventional forces because neither has even 5% of the necessary air-lift, sea-lift and power projection capacity that would be needed—even if they were ruled by lunatics, which they most assuredly are not.

Likewise, Russia and China are not suicidal enough to launch a first nuclear strike or attempt nuclear blackmail.

And beyond that, the even more dispositive point is that the very thought of hostile action against the American homeland would amount to an economic death warrant for either power.

That’s because in the case of the Red Ponzi, the Donald is absolutely right about its massive trade imbalance. China’s $510 billion per year of exports to the US do not represent free and fair trade in the historic sense: They are an absolute freak of economic nature stemming from the massive central bank money printing spree of the last 25-years and the egregious mercantilism that Beijing has instituted to exploit it and to build the greatest credit-fueled house of cards in human history.

Accordingly, if China were to threaten the US militarily, the resulting embargo on Chinese goods would cause its economy to plunge into a thundering collapse within six months: To wit, America’s spacious closets are already stuffed full of enough junk from China—including every variety of Apple device—to last for years, while China’s debt-ridden production chain on the margin survives hand-to-mouth on export orders.

And as for Russia, pulleese!

Its entire GDP of $1.5 trillion is less than that of the New York metro area, and only 8% of the US economy as a whole. The very idea that it’s a military threat to America is just flat out ludicrous; and that is in no way changed by Putin’s recent hints that Russia has developed a new class of non-ballistic strategic weapons that are not vulnerable to US ABM defenses.

But of course!

It was the US and John Bolton specifically during his stint as head of arms control at the Bush State Department that caused the expiration of Nixon’s ABM treaty. And in light of the subsequent drive toward a US missile defense system, what does another power that wishes to preserve the credibility and efficacy of its nuclear deterrent or retaliatory strike capability do?

Why, it finds a way around the ABMs to insure that no adversary is tempted to launch a pre-emptive first strike while secure from retaliation in a protective ABM cocoon. That’s exactly what the old MAD playbooks recommend, and what Russia, apparently, actually did.

So why does Mattis want $700 billion per year of force structure, readiness and massive weapons upgrades this year, which is just a down payment on an embedded defense bow-wave that will quickly rise towards $1 trillion annually?

A good part of the answer is sheer economic ignorance. Mattis along with the career national security apparatchiks who now comprise the Donald’s new War Cabinet are making the same mistake as their cold war forebears did about the old Soviet Union.

The latter was always destined to collapse under the weight of command and control centralization and ersatz socialism; it was only a matter of funding a strategic deterrent and waiting out the collapse that finally came, and swiftly, too.

There was never any need for the massive conventional forces that were kept in being during the Cold War, and especially not the huge Reagan build-up. The latter essentially funded an expeditionary armada designed for invasion and occupation—an unneeded capability that eventually led to the follies of Washington’s serial military interventions in the Middle East.

That is even truer today. ISIS was a short-lived menace that arose from Washington’s interventions in Iraq and Syria, and has now been largely extinguished by its mortal 13-century old Shiite enemy: That is, the Shiite coalition of the Iraqi government in Baghdad, Iran, the Assad regime in Syria and the Hezbollah fighters of Lebanon.

There is nothing else from that region that threatens the safety and security of the citizens of Lincoln NE or Springfield MA, and most especially not the Iranians and their Shiite allies. The Iranians never had a nuclear weapons program, even by the lights of the 17-agency NIEs (national intelligence estimates) from 2007 onwards, and they have now precluded the possibility by agreeing to the Obama nuke deal.

The fact is, Iran is not a terrorist state—even if its theocracy falls far short of democratic ideals, and even if its leaders do fulminate against the Great Satan in Washington.

After all, during the past 65 years Washington has attacked the Iranian people by installing a brutal, larcenous puppet regime under the Shah from 1953-1979; siding with Iraq when the latter invaded Iran during the 1980s; and by demonizing and attempting to destabilize it ever since.

The entire case against Iran has been concocted by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and the coalition of right-wing parties upon which his rule depends. They claim the Tehran regime is an existential threat to Israel’s survival, but that’s ridiculous when they have upwards of 100 nukes and the Iranians have none, and when the Israeli air force has the capacity to turn Iran’s limited attack forces into a smoldering heap of twisted metal on a moment’s notice.

The Israeli claim that Hezbollah is a lethal Iranian dagger pointed at its survival is equally upside down. In fact, Israel’s repeated brutal occupations of the Shiite regions of southern Lebanon is what brought Hezbollah into existence, and at length has made it the largest political party in this religiously fractured country.

In that context, the main reason Iran supplies Hezbollah with arms is to deter a US/Israel attack; and also because like any other sovereign nation it is allowed to have a foreign policy, including one based on shared confessional ties.

We remonstrate on these matters because when it comes to Iran the Donald’s new War Cabinet is a wholly owned subsidiary of Bibi Netanyahu. Bolton and Pompeo are absolutely rabid in their desire to make war on Iran, and Mad Dog Mattis is not far behind.

Yet it cannot be stated strongly enough: Iran proposes no military threat to the American homeland whatsoever; it has never been involved in a terrorist incident or even plot against America or Europe for that matter; and its religious and political quarrel with the Saudis is absolutely none of Washington’s business.

As we have frequently observed, it really doesn’t matter who controls the vast hydrocarbon deposits surrounding the Persian Gulf—-Sunni or Shiite, dictators or democrats, Arabs or Persians. That’s because they all desperately need the revenue. And if oil prices should temporarily spike due to local wars or political upheaval, the cure for high prices is the global free market, not the US fifth fleet.

The truth of the matter is that a unilateral US military attack on Iran would be tantamount to a war crime—as the Nuremberg trials defined “wars of aggression”. And that is why the Donald’s mindless and groundless conviction that the Iran nuclear accord is the worst deal ever made by the US government is so pregnant with danger.

To a person, his new War Cabinet will be in the business of scratching and clawing the Donald’s itch. Their modus operandi will be to sabotage the greatest breakthrough for world peace in decades on May 12 when the next certification of Iranian compliance arrives.

Once the nuclear deal is ash-canned, in turn, the War Cabinet will revive their historically false claims that the Iranian’s are on the verge of gaining nuclear weapons. That’s even if they merely restart their enrichment plant at Natanz, which they would have every right to do in the event of Washington’s unilateral abrogation.

From there the war drums would start beating loudly in Imperial Washington for a pre-emptive attack to stop them—a speciously Nuremburg compliant attack, as it were.

Regardless of how this scenario plays out in concrete detail and time frame, one thing is certain. A rising crescendo of tensions and confrontations with all of the War Cabinet’s targets—-Iran, Syria, Russia, China and North Korea—is fast coming down the pike. And that means an even larger burst in defense spending is not far behind.

All the while, of course, the Freedom Caucus stumbles around helping to slash tax revenues to 16.6% of GDP—the lowest level since the late 1940s—even as it welcomes the Donald’s War Cabinet and kvetches about soaring entitlements and the Horribus appropriations bill that a good portion of its membership acquiesced to.

And they are the purported fiscal good guys!

Yes, it is a doom loop and there is not a chance in the hot place of avoiding the fast arriving bond market “yield shock” that will make mincemeat out of today’s incorrigible dip buyers.

A US judge in New York on Wednesday rejected Saudi Arabia’s request to dismiss lawsuits accusing it of helping in the 9/11 attacks.

The cases are based on the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (Jasta), a 2016 law that provides an exemption to the legal principle of sovereign immunity, allowing families of the victims to take foreign governments to court.

The families point to the fact that the majority of the hijackers were Saudi citizens, and claim that Saudi officials and institutions “aided and abetted” the attackers in the years leading up to the 9/11 attacks, according to court documents.

US District Judge George Daniels in Manhattan said the plaintiffs’ allegations “narrowly articulate a reasonable basis” for him to assert jurisdiction under Jasta.

Still, Daniels dismissed claims against two Saudi banks and a Saudi construction company for allegedly providing material support to al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden to carry out the attacks, saying he lacked jurisdiction.

The Saudi government has long denied involvement in the attacks in which hijacked planes crashed into New York’s World Trade Center, the Pentagon outside Washington, DC and a Pennsylvania field. Almost 3,000 people died.

Riyadh and its Gulf allies had strongly opposed Jasta, which was initially vetoed by then-President Barack Obama. The US Senate overturned the veto by overwhelmingly adopting the legislation.

Critics of the law say it is politically motivated and an infringement on the sovereignty of foreign nations.

Wednesday’s ruling comes during Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s visit to the US. President Donald Trump heaped praise on the Saudi royal during a meeting at the White House last week.

Jim Kreindler, a lawyer for about 850 victims’ families in the case against the Saudi government, said his clients are watching bin Salman’s visit to Washington carefully.

He added that they are “aware of the many US-Saudi issues at play,” including the possible listing of Saudi state oil giant Aramco on the New York Stock Exchange, a potential nuclear deal and further arms sales.

“It remains to be seen whether he is going to take a step in accepting Saudi accountability for 9/11,” Kreindler told MEE earlier this month.

Kreindler told Reuters on Wednesday he is “delighted” that the judge dismissed Saudi Arabia’s motion.

“We have been pressing to proceed with the case and conduct discovery from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, so that the full story can come to light, and expose the Saudi role in the 9/11 attacks,” he added.

New research (February 20, 2018) in Nature Communications found that in the 168 years that have passed since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the world’s oceans have risen a total of about 8 inches. The study also found that for every five years we avoid our obligations under the Paris Agreement and delay on reining-in our greenhouse gas emissions, the world can expect another 8 inches of sea level rise.

To put this finding in perspective, that means that for every five years we continue business as usual, sea levels will rise as much as they rose in the entire past 168 years. “This is the same amount we have experienced… since the beginning of the fossil fuel economy,” the study’s principal investigator, Matthias Mengel of Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, told Agence France Presse.

Consequently, the trajectory of emissions in the next few decades will shape our coastlines in the centuries to come.

This finding is in line with research published recently in Science Advances, which predicts that most wetlands along the west coast of the United States will be submerged by rising ocean waters by the end of this century. “Pacific coast tidal wetlands are at imminent risk of submergence with projected rates of rapid [sea level rise],” the authors concluded.

Even more disturbing, these estimates are very likely to be on the low side—although exactly just how low is still open to debate.

There is evidence that the current rate of sea level rise from the melting Antarctic ice sheet may be twice what had previously been estimated, said Tim Naish, director of the Antarctic Research Center at New Zealand’s Victoria University of Wellington, at the Pacific Climate Change Convention in Wellington. “We may have underestimated the Antarctic contribution by 1 meter (3.3 feet) by the end of the century. So, add another meter to the one meter we’re already predicting for global sea level,” he said. That’s nearly seven feet total, with the water levels accelerating in that direction.

Meanwhile, even greater rates theoretically could be occurring, with some outlying sea-level rise estimates projecting one meter of sea-level rise for every five years’ delay—though these estimates are far from the median. But just because some estimates lie at the far edge of the scale, that does not mean they can’t happen. (And if they do turn out to be correct, their impact could be devastating.)

The take-away from all these facts and figures? “Large ice loss seems possible even under modest warming in line with the Paris Agreement. A sea level rise of up to 3 meters [nearly 10 feet] by 2300 cannot be ruled out,” said Mengel, citing just the more moderate estimates that lie close to the median. That would put parts, if not all, of some low-lying nations and almost the entire state of Florida—home to Mar-a-Lago, the “winter White House” of President Trump—under water.

Kim Jong-un’s visit reveals much about the tactics that will be used in the negotiations between the Korean leader and the American president; it also consolidates a historical relationship between Pyongyang and Beijing

The recent meeting in Beijing between the two supreme leaders of DPRK and China has captured global attention. The summit remained secret throughout its duration, revealed by the Chinese leader only when the visit had ended and the Korean leader was on his way back home. Rumours of the encounter continued to be denied by the Chinese foreign minister right up to Tuesday. The denials had a lot to do with the fact that a positive outcome for the meeting, this being the first one, could not be guaranteed. The final statements, the relaxed atmosphere, the many images displaying mutual smiles and acknowledgement reveal that the two leaders of the Chinese and Korean Communist parties are on the same page. Despite wishful thinking from the US, which interpreted the lack of meetings in previous years as a change in Chinese attitudes towards North Korea, the meeting highlighted positive impressions by Xi Jinping about the developments on the peninsula as well as confirmed the strategic thinking of Kim Jong-un.

Kim Jong-Un’s strategy deserves particular attention. The ability to deter aggression from the United States and South Korea existed well before Pyongyang’s development of a nuclear deterrent, thanks to the enormous number of artillery guns it has directed towards Seoul. A possible conflict would have caused millions of deaths, destroyed the American forces on the peninsula (the American bases would have been the first to be eliminated, really only being there to serve as a tripwire), and upset the alliance with Seoul, which would have borne an unacceptable toll. Kim Jong-un and his father had already secured a powerful enough deterrent to ward off aggression against their country. The strategy behind developing nuclear weapons becomes more clear following the just-concluded meeting with Xi Jinping.

Kim Jong-un’s willingness to meet Donald Trump in bilateral talks, and the possibility that Pyongyang will give up its nuclear arsenal, stand out. The meeting with Xi Jinping in all likelihood focused on the demands to be made to Trump: the removal of the North American presence in the south of the country is something on which China and DPRK are in strong agreement. The desired outcome for Beijing and Pyongyang (but also for Moscow) would see Washington remove its forces from South Korea in exchange for opening up North Korea’s sites to international inspections. China and Russia would be happy to see the US threat to their nuclear deterrence removed (even if, with the latest hypersonic weapons revealed by Putin, the problem does not seem to arise). This would also bring great advantages to Seoul, which could embark on a rapprochement with the North, starting with a possible reunification of the peninsula; and under the economic and energetic aegis of Russia and China, the peninsula could be included in the One Belt One Road (OBOR), as well as as benefitting from Moscow’s gas.

Of course this scenario clashes with the recent appointments of Mike Pompeo and John Bolton to the top of the American administration, confirmed by the threat of dissolving the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) reached with Iran, undoing a deal reached through the efforts of multiple countries. The consequences would be significant, with the United State coming across as an unreliable state in international relations.

This aspect for Pyongyang, Beijing, Moscow and even Seoul counts up to a certain point. The extraordinary diplomatic message that Kim Jong-un and Xi Jinping have sent to allies and adversaries alike is that to allow for peace and the possibility of reunification for the Korean peninsula, Kim is apparently willing to renounce his nuclear weapons, his most important deterrent. But interestingly, North Korea has always been able to rely on its formidable conventional deterrent to guarantee its security anyway. For the survival of Kim and his circle, thousands upon thousands of artillery pieces aimed at Seoul are enough to keep any potential aggressor at bay. Another obvious consideration is that any use by Kim of his nuclear weapons against the United States or its allies would result in the total annihilation of the DPRK. So the question remains: if North Korea has always guaranteed its survival through its conventional deterrence, why has it developed a nuclear deterrent as well on top of this? The most logical answer is so as to bring the United States to the negotiating table.

Pyongyang’s stroke of diplomatic and strategic genius lies in getting the United States to abandon the Korean peninsula in exchange for North Korea renouncing its nuclear arsenal. This hypothesis puts Kim Jong-un on the positive side of the negotiations, coming across as a reasonable and serious negotiating partner willing to find a way to guarantee peace on the whole peninsula. If Kim Jong-un is willing to give up what apparently, until yesterday, seemed impossible in the interests of reaching an agreement to ensure the survival of the two Koreas, then Pyongyang is presenting itself as Seoul’s guarantor of peace. The message Moon Jae-in could receive from the negotiations is that an “enemy” like North Korea is willing to give up its most significant weapon, while the Americans march in with the likes of Bolton and Pompeo, ready to slam their fists on the negotiating table by refusing to make any concessions.

While Kim Jong-un has every intention of placing any blame for a failure of negotiations on the American side, and seems to have all the reasons ready in place to do so, the meeting between Kim Jong-un and Xi Jinping seems aimed at laying the groundwork to break the alliance between Seoul and Washington. We can already imagine the scene, with Pyongyang ready to renounce its nuclear weapons, Seoul ready to enter into dialogue about the reunification of the country, China and Russia happy with the denuclearization of the North, and above all, the elimination of the prospects of a terrible war on the peninsula. In this climate, Washington would be left completely isolated in refusing to entertain any prospect of abandoning the peninsula. Thanks to its less-than-perfect relations with its European allies, and its intention to annul the Iranian JCPOA, Washington would leave itself looking like it is neither able to keep its promises nor willing to pursue any credible diplomatic path.

The reality is that an overall agreement between North Korea and the United States is practically impossible for one fundamental reason: the United States uses the excuse of having to protect South Korea to maintain a permanent presence on the peninsula for the purposes of containing China and Russia, both through missile defense and by maintaining a military presence near their borders. For this reason, while Moscow and Beijing have multiple reasons for seeking an agreement between Pyongyang and Washington, both are aware that the US has no intentions of abandoning its presence in South Korea. The meeting between Kim Jong-un and Trump is a well-designed trap prepared by Moscow, Beijing and Pyongyang, maybe over many months or even years. The most realistic objectives are to further isolate Washington in the region, to bring Beijing and Seoul closer together, and to drive a wedge between Seoul and Washington. Moscow would use the failure of these negotiations to earn more leverage with its European partners, all eager to see a solution to the Korean crisis. Furthermore, Moscow could increase its opportunity to enter the energy market in South Korea as a result of Seoul diversifying its energy sources. Beijing has every intention of avoiding a war on the peninsula, which would be disastrous in many respects, not only humanitarian but also in the possibility of Washington camping on China’s border as a result of destroying the DPRK.

South Korea’s Moon Jae-in looks on anxiously, ready to reach an agreement with the North. The mastery of Sino-Korean diplomacy has created a win-win situation for Pyongyang, with Washington’s eventual failure in the negotiations having negative reverberations with her allies in region. This is probably the reason why many in the US administration greeted Trump’s decision to accept talks with Kim negatively.

Accepting to engage in talks signals a preparedness to negotiate. But as we can anticipate, the unwillingness of the Americans to accede to North Korean demands to abandon the peninsula doom the talks. At the same time, Pyongyang’s offer to give up its nuclear weapons will leave Washington bearing responsibility for the failure of the talks if there is no commensurable response. For this reason, Trump has ingeniously decided to bring in two warmongers like Pompeo and Bolton, intending to scare Kim into a negotiating position more favorable to Washington, a strategy he intends to also pursue in relation to Iran.

The truth is that American diplomacy has no room for maneuver with Korea; and since war is unthinkable, it is not even a real threat. This leaves Trump with a lot of bluster and a bunch of snarling hawks in tow, but with Pyongyang and Beijing left holding the aces, as will become clear in the coming weeks when all the cards are laid on the negotiating table.

The Israeli military has sent more than 100 snipers to the Gaza border in preparation for a planned mass Palestinian demonstration near the frontier of the besieged enclave, Israel’s top general said on Wednesday.

Organisers hope thousands in Gaza will answer their call to flock, starting on Friday, to tent cities in five locations along the occupied border in a six-week protest for a right of return of Palestinian refugees to what is now Israel.

Citing security concerns, the Israeli military enforces a “no go” zone for Palestinians on land in Gaza adjacent to Israel’s border fence.

Lieutenant-General Gadi Eizenkot, the military’s chief of staff, told the Yedioth Ahronoth daily that the military would not allow “mass infiltration” or tolerate damage to the barrier during the protests.

“We have deployed more than 100 sharpshooters who were called up from all of the military’s units, primarily from the special forces,” Eizenkot said in the interview.

“If lives are in jeopardy, there is permission to open fire.

“We won’t allow mass infiltration into Israel and to damage the fence, and certainly not to reach the communities.”

In response to frequent Palestinian protests along the Gaza border Israeli soldiers have used tear gas, rubber bullets and live ammunition against demonstrators whom the military said hurled rocks or petrol bombs at them.

Organisers said the protest is supported by several Palestinian factions, including Gaza’s dominant Hamas movement, which has ruled the strip since Israel imposed an economic blockade in 2007.

Israeli cabinet minister Tzachi Hanegbi, speaking on Israel Radio, said Hamas had avoided direct conflict with Israel since the end of the 2014 Gaza war.

But he said that pressure Hamas was now feeling from Israel’s destruction of some of its network of attack tunnels near the border, coupled with harsh economic conditions in Gaza, were “a formula for rising tension”.

The start of the demonstration was symbolically linked to what Palestinians call “Land Day”, which commemorates the six Arab citizens of Israel killed by Israeli security forces in demonstrations in 1976 over land confiscations.

The week-long Jewish holiday of Passover, when Israel heightens security, also begins on Friday.

The Palestinian protest is due to end on 15 May, the anniversary of the “Nakba” or “Catastrophe”, and the forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in the conflict which led to the declaration of Israel in 1948.

Palestinians have long demanded that as many as five million of their compatriots be granted the right to return. Israel refuses to grant this condition.

As expected, the response was tit-for-tat – 60 US diplomats expelled, as well as closure of Washington’s St. Petersburg consulate, along with a mirror response to staff deported by other countries.

Days earlier, Moscow expelled 23 UK diplomats, responding in kind to British March 14 expulsions.

Separately on Thursday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova minced no words, saying “(w)e realize the strength of…London and Washington…pressure…and we don’t have any doubts (that) they synchronized their actions in the NATO and EU formats” – forcing their allies to act in unison with them, adding:

“We do understand how inhumane that pressure was, as they exploited the principles of solidarity and implementation of a unified foreign policy course.”

“London and Washington are the beneficiaries of (the Skripal incident) and the expulsion of diplomats that followed it.”

In responding to unacceptable US/UK actions, Russia didn’t go far enough, showing weakness, not strength, leaving itself vulnerable to further hostile measures likely coming, possibly more extreme than already, a slippery slope toward possible nuclear war.

The only language Washington and Britain understand is force. Russia has lots of options.

Straightaway it should have expelled US and UK ambassadors, along with most of their diplomatic staff, permitting only a barebones presence in the country to remain.

It should demand illegal US occupation of Syrian territory end, along with its terror-bombing halted, massacring civilians, destroying vital infrastructure on the phony pretext of combatting ISIS Washington created and supports.

As long as an illegal US presence in Syria remains, along with Pentagon-led aggression and support for anti-government terrorists, conflict resolution will remain unattainable. Endless war will continue, perhaps for another seven years or longer.

Diplomacy with Washington is futile, accomplishing nothing, encouraging greater US hostility, including endless aggression in Syria.

Russia should warn Washington and Britain, strongly stating it no longer will tolerate their unacceptable actions – against Moscow, Syria, its people, sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Washington and Britain are bullies, targeting nations unable to match their military strength.

Russia is another story entirely, its super-weapons unmatched by any other countries.

Is it enough to give Washington and Britain pause about attacking its heartland?

Are both countries unlikely to strike a nation able to give as much or more than it takes in direct confrontation?

Street bullies prefer unfair fights favoring them. Are Washington and Britain similar – likely to back off for now at least, taking time to re-strategize, knowing Russian military might if unleashed can turn their cities to irradiated rubble?

These are unanswered questions, crucial ones. The risk of nuclear war remains uncomfortably high – by accident or design.

Washington’s rage for global dominance likely assures an eventual showdown.

It’s to Russia’s advantage to risk a minor confrontation rather than a possible nuclear one, devastating all parties involved, maybe humanity with it.

Giving bullies a black eye or bloody nose most often gets them to back off. The same strategy can work with nations – whether true for Washington and Britain an unknown.

Since the atom was split, America never attacked a nation of equal military strength, notably not a nuclear armed one.

Russia wants world peace and stability, not war. Perhaps the only way to achieve it is by refusing to be pushed around any longer – making reasonable demands, insisting they be complied with, intending tough punishment otherwise.

Believing today’s storm will pass, rapprochement with the West one day possible is banking on what never was and won’t be ahead as long as Washington wants global dominance pursued by transforming all sovereign independent countries into subservient vassal states – especially Russia and China.

That’s what a Sino/Russia alliance must prioritize to stop.

The strategy I favor is high-risk. Responding weakly to hostile actions threatening their security, amounting to appeasement or close to it, I believe is higher risk.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.

Organizers of the upcoming Women’s March on the Pentagon are calling on the Democratic Party-sponsored Women’s March and March for Our Lives to expand their message to include the eight billion lives on the planet, all of which are imperiled by US weapons and wars. I spoke to Riva Enteen, a former National Lawyers Guild Program Director and a member of the steering committee for the October Women’s March on the Pentagon.

Ann Garrison: Riva, how would you like to see the March for Our Lives message expanded?

Riva Enteen: We must expand the message in two ways. First, we must acknowledge that US wars and domestic gun violence are intertwined. Our military budget is obscene, and the majority of Democrats voted with Republicans to give both Trump and the Pentagon more money than they asked for this year. Three Republican Senators joined the five Democratic Senators who voted against the $700 billion 2018 military budget. This has normalized carrying and using guns, which now include military-grade weapons on our streets.

Secondly, we have to be concerned with all lives, from Florida’s Stoneman Douglas High School to Yemen. The US military is by far the largest arms dealer in the world, and it’s common knowledge that much of its weaponry ends up with those that our government calls “terrorists” and claims to be fighting. The US calls the terrorists it arms “rebels,” as in Syria, or “friends and allies,” as in Israel and Saudi Arabia. Gun control should begin at the Pentagon.

The endless “War on Terror” emerged after 9-11, which became the excuse for war as a constant, not an aberration. Until we rein in the US’s determination to exert hegemony over the whole world, we will continue to see blood spilled here while, at the same time, our missiles rain down on innocents in the name of specious “humanitarian intervention” and stopping terrorism. There is an irony to the US invoking the term “humanitarian intervention,” as it publicly abandons and scorns international law, bombing civilians and even hospitals.

AG: I counted ninety geographically distinct manifestations of the Democratic Party promoting their participation in the March for Our Lives, and all the march and voter registration logos and banners were blue. Your thoughts on that?

RE: The Democratic Party contained the message and excluded the call for peace, just as they did with the two Women’s Marches. It is counter-intuitive that a women’s march and a students’ march wouldn’t talk about peace, with the US at war in at least seven countries and no end in sight. But the Democrats, who promoted the Women’s Marches and the March for Our Lives, are a pro-war party. Peace is not on their agenda. War is a bi-partisan policy because, according to Wall Street, war is good for business, and that’s who controls our government.

At the beginning of his second term, after the December 14, 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, Obama said that he would address gun control and sounded convincing. A year earlier, in 2011 he had bragged, “In fact, my administration has not curtailed the rights of gun owners—it has expanded them, including allowing people to carry their guns in national parks and wildlife refuges.”

Attempts to limit the size of gun magazines, expand background checks of gun buyers, and ban gun sales to buyers on terrorism watch lists all failed to pass under Obama, when he had a Democratic House and Senate, from January 2009 to January 2013, and when he had a Democratic Senate, from January 2013 to January 2017.

Stand-your-ground laws, which George Zimmerman successfully used in his defense for killing unarmed Trayvon Martin, have expanded to more states, even though Obama lamented that if he had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.

AG: The March for Our Lives and the Women’s Marches have enormous corporate and celebrity support as well as the Democratic Party’s. They’re able to hire all kinds of staff to work full time on networking and turning out their huge crowds. Can you imagine getting any of that kind of support for the October Women’s March on the Pentagon?

RE: Of course we imagine getting support from all peace-loving people. Unfortunately, most corporations benefit from war so they would not support the cause of peace. We do believe there are celebrities who will step up to the plate and do the right thing, because the stakes are so high. This march commemorates the 1967 March on the Pentagon, which included celebrities such as Norman Mailer getting arrested.

AG: The Pentagon now admittedly has more money than it can figure out how to spend, so its surplus weapons go to militarize the police who are most aggressive in Black and Brown neighborhoods. Anything you’d like to say about that?

RE: Military grade weapons have no place in domestic neighborhoods, not in the hands of police officers, veterans with PTSD, or civilians. People from other countries are shocked at what we allow on our streets. The normalization of killing includes domestic massacres perpetrated with these military-grade weapons.

As to police killings in Black and Brown neighborhoods, it remains open season, just as it did under Obama, even when Black Lives Matter was at its strongest. I guess we can hope a precedent was set by South Carolina cop Michael Slager’s second degree murder conviction for shooting Walter Scott— an unarmed Black man—in the back.

AG: Some March for Our Lives supporters are likely to get defensive and ask whether you’re refusing to support their cause. What would you say to them?

RE: Of course we support the cause of protecting lives, but there is an exceptionalism to believing it only applies to American lives and especially white lives. In a promotional video that Democracy Now played repeatedly during their broadcast of the Washington, DC March for Our Lives, former US soldiers said that they’d learned how to put assault rifles to good purpose in US wars, but didn’t want them aimed at US citizens.

Isn’t it time to stop aiming those guns—and our missiles, fighter jets, and drones—at the rest of the world? My mother was a member of Women Strike for Peace, founded in 1961 with the slogan “Stop the Arms Race, Not the Human Race,” and that has never been more true.

Women, the givers of life, are confronting the Pentagon in Washington, DC, October 20-21. We hope that all peace-loving people will consider this a chance to make a stand for peace. There will be local antiwar actions springing up, as they did during Occupy, so keep your ear to the ground, and watch for updates on our website and our Facebook page.

Riva Enteen is a former Program Director of the [US] National Lawyer’s Guild, and a current member of the steering committee for the Women’s March on the Pentagon, who lives in South Lake Tahoe. She was also chair of the first KPFA Local Station Board. She can be reached at [email protected].

“We can bomb the world to pieces, but we can’t bomb it into peace”

-Michael Franti^[2]

David and Goliath in an upside-down world

President Donald Trump doesn’t seem to share Georges Clemenceau’s view that “war is too serious a matter to be left to the military”. All the more so, perhaps, since the French statesman is also said to have coined the acerbic comment “America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to decadence without the usual interval of civilization”.

Indeed, shortly after his inauguration as the 45^th President of the United States, in January 2017, the American President bestowed additional authority upon the Pentagon and the CIA. In so doing, he yielded to the military’s pressure in the hope that this will help it defeat the so-called Islamic State more speedily and confront its other enemies more efficiently.

Trump’s decision quickly translated into a dramatic increase in drone strikes in Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Somalia—countries against which the U.S. is not officially engaged in a war—and only exacerbated the terribly bungled “War on Terror”. Unsurprisingly, it took Trump only seven months to surpass the number of civilian deaths that occurred during Obama’s entire eight-year presidency, according to non-profit monitoring group Airwars.^[3]Another set of documents supplied by a whistleblower and published by The Intercept^[4] in 2015, revealed the inner workings of this program in Afghanistan and concluded that these drone strikes caused the deaths of unintended targets nearly nine out of ten times. Heather Linebaugh, a US Army analyst who worked for this program, provided a damning testimony in this regard.^[5]

Moreover, on 13 April 2017, the U.S. Air Force dropped America’s most powerful non-nuclear bomb in its arsenal, nicknamed the “Mother of all bombs” (MOAB), on an ISIS cave complex situated in the Afghan Province of Nangarhar, a remote area bordering Pakistan.

While President Trump called the strike “another very, very successful mission”, Afghanistan’s former President and American ally, Hamid Karzai, declared “this is not the war on terror but the inhuman and most brutal misuse of our country as testing ground for new and dangerous weapons”. Also reacting to this bombing, two-time presidential candidate and Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Dennis Kucinich, asked “How, after a campaign where he repeatedly questioned America’s adventures in Iraq and Libya—including warning President Obama not to strike Syria after an alleged government use of poison gas—did President Trump get trapped in these wars? How, after questioning the workings of the Pentagon and the CIA, and being the victim of government leaks, does he permit leaks and disinformation to take us to the brink of war?” Kucinich then warned that “the bombing is accelerating in country after country and the death toll of innocent civilians continues to rise and while the resentment against America continues to grow, and unless we soon reverse course, forces will be unleashed globally which will be irretrievable”.^[6]

It is worth noting that this super bomb was used against one of the smallest militias the U.S. faces anywhere in the world. In effect, ISIS-Khorasan is estimated to count 700 fighters in Afghanistan, compared to 8,500 U.S. and 180,000 Afghan troops on the ground in this country today. Similarly, before combating this new foe, 430,000 Afghan and coalition troops have been unable to subdue their older common enemy, the Taliban, whose force was barely one twelfth as big; not to mention, of course, the immense mismatch between the opponents in terms of firepower and technology at their respective command.

And so, after 16 years of American presence in Afghanistan, the “graveyard of empires”, and nine months after Trump’s inauguration, the New York Times announced on its front page, “soon, American Embassy employees in Kabul will no longer take a Chinook helicopter ride to cross the street to a military base less than 100 yards outside the present Green Zone security district”^[7] ; a stark acknowledgement that even the city’s most highly-protected core zones have become too difficult to defend from Taliban attacks.

In fact, numerous careful studies of al-Qaeda and its different offspring, including ISIS, have shown that the United States and its allies are blindly following these terrorist organizations’ worldview and game plan. As is clearly stated, chiefly in a book attributed to Abu Bakr Naji entitled “Management of Savagery: The most Critical Stage Through Which the Islamic Nation Will Pass”, the goal is to “draw the West as deeply and actively as possible into the quagmire” and to “perpetually engage and enervate the United states and the West in a series of prolonged overseas ventures” in which they will undermine their own societies, expend their resources, and increase the level of violence, setting off a dynamic that William Roe Polk—an American specialist of high repute in Middle Eastern and insurgency history among others— has reviewed in length in one of his books.^[8] Polk reveals a pattern that has been replicated over and over throughout recent history. That is, invaders are naturally disliked by the invaded population, who disobey them, at the start in small ways, eliciting a forceful response on the part of the invader, which in turn increases opposition and popular support for resistance. The ensuing cycle of violence then escalates until the invading forces are obliged either to withdraw, or to resort to methods and means that amount to genocide in order to gain their ends.

This dynamic of extreme violence in which the U.S. and its allies have found themselves fully trapped has indeed entailed particularly high costs. Scott Atran, a well-known specialist on terrorist organizations, has calculated that “the 9/11 attacks cost between $400,000 and $500,000 to execute, whereas the military and security response by the U.S. and its allies is in the order of 10 million times that figure”. Atran drew the obvious conclusion that “on a strictly cost-benefit basis, this violent movement has been wildly successful, beyond even Bin laden’s original imagination, and is increasingly so. Herein lies the full measure of Jujitsu-style asymmetric warfare. After all, who could claim that we are better off than before, or that the overall danger is declining?” This record, he advises, “should inspire a radical change in our counter-strategies”.

Why America isn’t great anymore

The United States’ posture in the world is not what it used to be not so long ago. Its long-lasting political meddling and military adventures in the Arab and Muslim world, and its blind support for Israel^[9] have done it no favors. Much the contrary, they have certainly contributed, in no small measure, to deal irrevocable damage to the United States post-Cold War global primacy as well.

As former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Chas W. Freeman Jr., recounted in 2014, “A while back, the United States set out to reconfigure the Middle East. The result is that the region and our position in it are both in shambles (…) If we are at all honest, we must admit that the deplorable state of affairs in the Middle East is a product not only of the dynamics of the region but also of a lapse in our capacity to think and act strategically”.^[10] For Freeman, this situation stems from the essential fact that the U.S. answered the end of the bipolar order with a mixture of denial, strategic incoherence, and inconstancy. And “false American assumptions and unrealistic U.S. objectives have therefore helped create the current mess in the Middle East”.

More recently^[11], Chas Freeman reiterated his views by stating that “these fruitless and counterproductive wars have so far cost the United States at least $5.6 trillion (…) We have paid for our lurching to widening warfare in the Muslim world with a combination of borrowed money and disinvestment in domestic physical and human infrastructure. The result is not just the imposition of a crushing burden of debt^[12] on our posterity, but lost growth and declining U.S. economic competitiveness”. Furthermore, he lamented, Americans have become accustomed to life under surveillance and in an endless state of apprehension about acts of terrorism. Such an unusual condition has predictably eroded their liberties, aggrandized the presidency, reinforced “cowardly herd instincts in Congress”, and helped to impoverish the US middle-class “while enriching the military-industrial complex”. These, he concluded, are “structural alterations to the American republic and way of life that will affect both for decades”.

According to Philip Alston^[13], the United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, “the American Dream is rapidly becoming the American Illusion”, and “instead of realizing its founders’ admirable commitments, today’s United States has proved itself to be exceptional in far more problematic ways that are shockingly at odds with its immense wealth and its founding commitment to human rights”. These are some of the main findings Mr. Alston released in December 2017, after a two-week fact-finding mission to the U.S. His final report will be available in Spring 2018 and will be presented to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva in June 2018.

Nobody explained this state of affairs more elegantly than a fictional character in an HBO television series called “The Newsroom”. In the opening sequence, a TV news anchor finds himself on a journalism panel. And when a student in the audience asks, “Can you say why America is the greatest country in the world?” the anchor snaps “America isn’t the greatest country” and goes on to deliver a speech about why. He tells the student “just in case you accidentally wander into a voting one day, there are some things you should know. One of them is: there’s absolutely no evidence to support the statement that we’re the greatest country in the world. We’re 7^th in literacy, 27^th in math, 22^nd in science, 49^th in life expectancy, 178^th in infant mortality, 3^rd in median household income, number 4 in labor force and number 4 in exports. We lead the world in only three categories: number of incarcerated citizens per capita, number of adults who believe angels are real and defense spending, where we spend more than the next 26 countries combined, 25 of whom are allies. Now, none of this is the fault of a 20 year-old college student, but you, nonetheless, are, without a doubt, a member of the worst period generation period ever periods”.

And after pausing for a while, the news anchor adds “It sure used to be. We stood up for what was right. We fought for moral reasons. We passed laws, struck down laws, for moral reasons. We waged wars on poverty, not on poor people. We sacrificed, we cared about our neighbors, we put our money where our mouths were and we never beat our chest. We built great, big things, made ungodly technological advances, explored the universe, cured diseases and we cultivated the world’s greatest artists and the world’s greatest economy. We reached for the stars, acted like men. We aspired to intelligence, we didn’t belittle it. It didn’t make us feel inferior. We didn’t identify ourselves by who we voted for in the last election and we didn’t scare so easy. We were able to be all these things and do all these things because we were informed… by great men, men who were revered. First step in solving any problem is recognizing there is one. America is not the greatest country in the world anymore”.^[15]

So much so that a WIN/Gallup International survey conducted in 65 countries found that for the 66,000 people polled, “The United States is the greatest threat to world peace”.^[16]

The Pentagon answers the age-old question “Is America in decline?”

Ever since Ibn Khaldun, the great Arab historiographer and historian^[17]—acknowledged as the forerunner of the modern disciplines of historiography, sociology, economics, and demography—laid the foundations for its study, the rise and fall of civilizations, empires, and nations, has been a favorite theme among past and contemporary historians. And just as human beings, nations too have life-cycles, passing from youth to maturity to old age and death. So far, there has been no exception to this rule.

U.S. Secretary of State Dean Gooderham Acheson was known to have played an essential part in writing the Truman Doctrine whose stated purpose was to counter Soviet geopolitical expansion during the Cold War. The Doctrine then became the foundation of U.S. foreign policy, and led to the establishment, on 4 April 1949, of NATO, a military alliance that is still in effect today with 29 member states. Acheson is also known for having said in 1962 that “Great Britain has lost an Empire and has not yet found a role”.

Perhaps the same can be said today of the United States in light of the Trump administration’s incoherent, if not chaotic foreign policy. Paradoxically, the use of the slogan “Make America great again” during the 2016 presidential campaign only reinforces this claim, since the phrase—which has been regularly used by both Republican and Democrat politicians following its first coinage by Ronald Reagan in 1980—is a distant cousin of the “Make Britain Great Again” slogan which dates back to the 19th century, when it was used by the British Conservative politician Disraeli. Clearly, both the old British version and its modern American equivalent refer to the notion of a lost “greatness”, or one to regain.

According to The American Conservative ^[18], since the early 2000’s there has been an ongoing conversation among scholars, policymakers, and members of the broader American foreign policy establishment about whether U.S. power is in decline. But the question actually extends back to the 1980s, with the publication of Yale historian Paul Kennedy’s The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers and other important books on the subject by scholars David Calleo and Robert Gilpin. Even though the controversy surrounding decline dissipated when the Soviet Union imploded and Japan’s economic bubble burst, it “remained dormant through the ‘unipolar moment’ of the 1990s but was rekindled with China’s rapid great-power emergence in the early 2000’s”, and the resulting shift of world geopolitical and economic power from West to East.

If we are to believe French historian Pierre Melandri^[19], however, the issue of American decline started well before the publication of Paul Kennedy’s immensely successful book in 1987, the very year when, for the first time since 1917, the U.S. lost its status as the largest creditor nation in the world. As early as 1973, he indicated, a Japanese Prime Minister had already diagnosed such a process of decline when he observed that “the United States is no longer the Sun surrounded by planets, it is one planet among others”.

Back in 2002, Andrew J. Bacevich concluded his book^[20], written in the aftermath of 9/11, with a fundamental observation. He said that the question that urgently demanded attention and that Americans can longer afford to dodge is not whether the United States has become an imperial power, but what sort of empire they intend theirs to be. Because for policymakers to persist in pretending otherwise, that is “to indulge in myths of American innocence or fantasies about unlocking the secrets of history” is to increase the likelihood that the answers they come up with will be wrong. That way “lies not just the demise of the American empire but great danger for what used to be known as the American republic”.

In 2011, a blogger by the name of Danios^[21] reproduced a year-by-year timeline of America’s wars, which revealed that since the United States was founded in 1776, it has been at war during 214 out of her 235 calendar years of existence.  In other words, there were only 21 calendar years in which the U.S. did not wage any wars, and the only time the U.S. went five years without war (1935-40) was during the isolationist period of the Great Depression!

Away from the blogosphere, an editorial of The New York Times^[22] asserted that the United States has been at war continuously since the attacks of 9/11 and now has just over 240,000 active-duty and reserve troops in at least 172 countries and territories. It concluded that

“Senators who balk at paying for health care and the basic diplomatic missions of the State Department approved a $700 billion defense budget for 2017-18, far more than Mr. Trump even requested. Whether this largess will continue is unclear. But the larger question involves the American public and how many new military adventures, if any, it is prepared to tolerate”.

In the same vein, Richard N. Haas, the president of the Council of Foreign Relations—often described as the U.S. most influential foreign policy think tank—argued in his best-selling book^[23] that the rules, the policies, and institutions that have guided the world since World War II have largely run their course in a world “in disarray” which the U.S. is unable to shape in its image and interests. Haas thinks that the U.S. remains the greatest country in such a world, but its foreign policy has at times made matters worse—both by what America has done and by what is has failed to do.

A similar advice, or rather warning, has been given by no other powerful American conservative voice than Robert Kagan. In a Brookings article^[24], he affirmed that “the liberal world order established in the aftermath of World War II may be coming to an end, challenged by forces both without and within”. He concluded by saying that

“if the next president governs as he ran, which is to say if he pursues a course designed to secure only America’s narrow interests; focuses chiefly on international terrorism—the least of the challenges to the present world order (…) then the collapse of the world order, with all that entails, may not be far off”.

Most significantly, in June 2017, a Pentagon study^[25] was released and caused rivers of ink to flow, both in the U.S. and overseas. It is worth noting that the commissioning and preparation of this report began in June 2016, six months before the end of the Obama administration, and was completed in April 2017, four months into the Trump administration. It required and involved extensive consultations with officials across the Pentagon and a handful of American think-tanks of a somewhat neoconservative persuasion.

Among the report’s most stunning conclusions are : “the status quo that was hatched and nurtured by US strategists after World War II and has for decades been the principal ‘beat’ for DoD is not merely fraying but may, in fact, be collapsing. Consequently, the United States’ role in and approach to the world may be fundamentally changing as well”; the “volatile restructuring of international security affairs appears increasingly inhospitable to unchallenged American leadership”. Another important conclusion is that the report’s authors agree with the pronouncement of British Prime Minister Theresa May in her speech in Philadelphia^[26], six days after the inauguration of Donald Trump: “The days of Britain and America intervening in sovereign countries in an attempt to remake the world in our own image are over (…) the UK will only intervene where there are British national interests”.

This extraordinary report seems to have sounded the death knell of the US-led dubious “coalitions of the willing”, ushering in an irreversible post-imperium era.

After empire: towards a collective grand strategy of “Great Convergence”?

If we are to be realistic, there’s no way we can deny the facts, the whys and the wherefores of our fast-changing world. Old and new global empires are no more, youthful nations are rising, and ordinary people are getting more and more empowered.

But how did this unprecedented reality come into being? How is it that once-powerful states, institutions, corporations, interest groups, and political parties and leaders are finding it increasingly harder to defend their redoubts, let alone impose their agendas? And if today’s world is really inexorably moving from the tutelage of the sole superpower—America—and no other great power is willing or able to step in to lead it, then whose world will it be? And, most importantly, how can this sui generis “global village” best attend to and manage not only rising transnational threats and challenges, but opportunities as well?

Joseph Nye wrote a comprehensive analysis^[27] about power and its exercise during the last five centuries and up to a recent past. He pointed out that the traditional markers of power have so far been understood as the edge gained by great empires and nations, thanks principally to such factors as control of colonies, trade and finance, larger populations, primacy in Industrial Revolution and mastery of sea lanes, conventional and nuclear weapons, and numbers of men under arms. But the global information age of the 21st century, he says, is quickly rendering these measures obsolete, hence remapping power relationships. Two main power shifts are occurring: a power transition among states, and a power diffusion away from all states to nonstate actors. Nye concluded his study by affirming that the United States will need a strategy to cope with the “rise of the rest”—among both state and nonstate actors. It will need “a smart power strategy and narrative that stress alliances, institutions, and networks that are responsive to the new context of global information age. In short, for success in the twenty-first century, the United States will need to rediscover how to be a smart power”.

Delving deeper in the changing nature of power in this century, Moisés Naím^[28] observes that power is losing its value, since it has become “easier to get, harder to use and easier to lose”. It no longer buys as much as it did in the past, and battles to get it are yielding diminishing returns. As a result, power is spreading, and long-established, big players are increasingly being challenged by newer and smaller ones. It is shifting “from brawn to brains, from north to south and west to east, from old corporate behemoths to agile start-ups, from entrenched dictators to people in town squares and cyberspace”. In reality, Naím insists, power is decaying. One of the most convincing arguments he gives to demonstrate how the exercise of power has changed is in the realm of armed conflicts. Adapting a Churchillian turn of phrase, Naím says that “never in the field of human conflict have so few had the potential to do so much to so many at so little cost”. Thus, the “micropowers, while seldom winning are making life harder for the megaplayers”, by denying them “victory” in the increasing number of asymmetric conflicts, also known as fourth-generation wars.

For his part, challenging the view shared by most Western strategists—who recognize that the dominance of the West is on the wane, but are nonetheless confident that its founding ideas, such as democracy, capitalism, and secular nationalism, will continue to spread, ensuring that the Western order will outlast its primacy—Charles Kupchan^[29] argues that the world is headed for political and ideological diversity. Whereby, emerging powers will “neither defer to the West’s lead nor converge toward the Western way”. The reason for such a claim is that “the ascent of the West was the product of social and economic conditions unique to Europe and the United States”. And as other nations rise, Kupchan further explains, they are “following their own paths to modernity and embracing their own conceptions of domestic and international order”. He then draws the conclusion that the Western order will not be displaced by a new great power or dominant political model, nor will the 21st century belong to America, China, Asia, or anyone else. It will be “no one’s world (and) for the first time in history, an interdependent world will be without a center of gravity or global guardian”. This situation will require a strategy for striking a historic bargain between the West and the rising rest by “fashioning a new consensus on issues of legitimacy, sovereignty, and governance”.

Kupchan’s perspective is widely shared by Kishore Mahbubani, a much-respected Singaporean writer, professor and diplomat. In one of his books^[30], he asserts that we are becoming more integrated and interconnected, and thus “the potential for a peaceful new global civilization is evolving before our eyes almost unnoticed”. Yet, he argues that challenges remain, and a number of major geopolitical fault lines remain to be resolved. For that to materialize, Mahbubani is of the opinion that: policymakers all over the world must change their preconceptions and accept that we live in one world; national interests must be balanced with global interests; the U.S. and Europe must cede some power (including within the IMF, the World Bank, and the UN Security Council); China and India, Africa and the Islamic world must be integrated; and the world order must be reconstructed.

For those and many other eminent authors and commentators, the “international community” has no better and wiser choice than to embark on a life-saving journey from “empire to community”. This is what Amitai Etzioni^[31] advocated, arguing that a “clash of civilizations” can be avoided, and that the new world order need not look America. Because, he contends, “Eastern values, including spirituality and moderate Islam, have a legitimate place in the evolving global public philosophy”.

Also addressing this issue in a lecture^[32], Prof. Edward Said observed that

“the truly weakest part of the clash of cultures and civilizations thesis is the rigid separation assumed between them despite the overwhelming evidence that today’s world is, in fact, a world of mixtures, of migrations and of crossings over, of boundaries traversed. One of the major crises affecting countries like France, Britain and the U.S. has been brought about by the realization, now dawning everywhere, that no culture or society is purely one thing. Sizeable minorities, North Africans in France, the African Caribbean, and Indian populations in Britain, Asian and African elements in this country (i.e. America), dispute the idea that civilization, that prided themselves on being homogeneous can continue to do so. There are no insulated cultures or civilizations. Any attempt made to separate them into the watertight compartments alleged by Huntington and his ilk does damage to their variety, their diversity, their sheer complexity of elements, their radical hybridity. The more insistent we are on the separation of the cultures, the more inaccurate we are about ourselves and about others. The notion of an exclusionary civilization is to my way of thinking an impossible one”.

Prof. Said then asked what he considered as the “real question”, that is “whether in the end we want to work for civilizations that are separate or whether we should be taking the more integrative but perhaps more difficult path which is to try to see them as making one vast whole, whose exact contours are impossible for any person to grasp, but whose certain existence we can intuit and feel and study”. He concluded his lecture by quoting some lines by the great poet, author and politician from Martinique Aimé Césaire “the work of man is only just beginning and it remains to conquer all the violence entrenched in the recesses of our passion and no race possess the monopoly of beauty, of intelligence, of force, and there’s a place for all at the rendez-vous of victory”.

This is precisely the main topic that we shall address in a forthcoming analysis.

This article was originally published on The Saker

Notes:

1. Algerian researcher in international relations, author of the book “L’Orient et l’Occident à l’heure d’un nouveau Sykes-Picot” (“The Orient and the Occident in time of a new Sykes-Picot”), Editions Alem El Afkar, Algiers, 2014: downloadable free of charge, by clicking on the following links:http://algerienetwork.com/blog/lorient-et-loccident-a-lheure-dun-nouveau-sykes-picot-par-amir-nour/ (French)
http://algerienetwork.com/blog/العالم-العربي-على-موعد-مع-سايكس-بيكو-ج/ (Arabic) ↑

2. From Michael Franti & Spearhead’s song “Bomb the World”: http://youtu.be/ICL-40nkOPA ↑

3. Read Newsweek’s article: http://www.newsweek.com/trump-has-already-killed-more-civilians-obama-us-fight-against-isis-653564 ↑

4. Read The Intercept’s “The Drone Papers”: http://theintercept.com/drone-papers/ ↑

5. Heather Linebaugh, “I worked on the US drone program. The public should know what really goes on”, The Guardian, 29 Dec. 2013:  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/29/drones-us-military ↑

6. Read the opinion entitled “Dennis Kucinich: The ‘Mother of All Bombs’ is actually the mother of all warmongering”, Fox News, 14 April, 2017. ↑

7. Rod Nordland, “U.S. Expands Kabul Security Zone, Digging In For Next Decade”, The NYT, 16 Sept., 2017. ↑

8. William R. Polk, “Violent politics: A history of Insurgency, Terrorism, and Guerilla War, From the American Revolution to Iraq”, Harper Perennial, 2008. ↑

9. Besides UN General Assembly vote (128 in favor, 9 against, 35 abstentions) considering Donald Trump‘s declaration of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital “null and void” (read The Guardian’s article https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/21/united-nations-un-vote-donald-trump-jerusalem-israel), a Gallup International Association (GIA) opinion poll, conducted in December 2017 in 24 countries, revealed a widespread disagreement with the US President’s decision: more than two in three (71%) disagree with the proposal (59% strongly). Commenting on this survey, GIA’s President Kancho Stoychev said: “It’s rare for an opinion survey to register such unanimity on a single issue which indicates a deep pain among the Muslim world from the Middle East to Far Asia.  But the overall reaction to the Trump decision is also predominantly negative in Europe. It seems that decades of trust in the balancing role of US diplomacy are evaporating.” ↑

10. See “Obama’s Foreign Policy and the Future of the Middle East”, 21 July 2014. ↑

11. Chas W. Freeman, “The Middle East in the New World Disorder”, 11 December, 2017. ↑

12. As of November 2017, the outstanding U.S. public debt stood at around $20.59 trillion. The U.S. ranked first in the world. ↑

13. Read http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=22546&LangID=E ↑

14. To read the Platform: http://www.presidency.uscb.edu/edu/ws/?pid=29587.Home ↑

15. Watch the video entitled “A Great Speech About Why America Isn’t Great Anymore”:https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=share&v=q49NOyJ8fNA&app=desktop ↑

16. Read in the New York Post, 5 January 2014. ↑

17. British historian Arnold J. Toynbee called Ibn khaldun’s “Muqaddimah” or “Prolegomena” (Introduction)—which covers world history of humanity up to the author’s time, and addresses the question of why nations rise to power and what causes their decline— “a philosophy of history which is undoubtedly the greatest work of its kind that has ever yet been created by any mind in any time or place.” [Source: Encyclopædia Britannica, 15th ed., vol. 9, p. 148]. ↑

18. Christopher Layne, “Is the United States in Decline?”, The American Conservative, August 8, 2017.↑

19. Pierre Melandri, “La fin de l’empire américain?” (The end of the American Empire ?), in “La fin des empires” (The end of Empires), sous la direction de Patrice Guenniffey & Thierry Lentz, Le Figaro Histoire/Perrin, Paris, 2016. ↑

20. Andrew J. Bacevich, “American Empire: The Realities and the Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy”, Harvard University Press, 2002. ↑

21. See “America Has Been At War 93% of the Time”: http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/02/america-war-93-time-222-239-years-since-1776.html ↑

22. Read “America’s Forever Wars”, The New York Times, October 22, 2017. ↑

23. Richard Haas, “A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order”, Penguin Press, 2017. See: https://www.cfr.org/book/world-disarray ↑

24. Robert Kagan, “The Twilight of the Liberal World Order”, Brookings, January 24, 2017. ↑

25. Read “At Our Own Peril : DoD Risk Assessment in a Post-Primacy World”: https://ssi.armywarcollege.edu/pubs/display.cfm?pubID=1358 ↑

26. Read the official transcript of the speech on https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/prime-ministers-speech-to-the-republican-party-conference-2017, 26 January, 2017. ↑

27. Joseph S. Nye, “The Future of Power”, PublicAffairs, New York, 2011. ↑

28. Moisés Naím , “The End of Power”, Basic Books, New York, 2013. ↑

29. Charles A. Kupchan, “No One’s World: The West, the Rising Rest and the Coming Global Turn”, Oxford University Books, 2012. ↑

30. Kishore Mahbubani, “The Great Convergence: Asia, the West, and the Logic of One World”, PublicAffairs, 2013. ↑

31. Amitai Etzioni, “From Empire to Community”, Pelgrave Macmillan, 2004. ↑

32. Edward Said, “ The Myth of ‘The Clash of Civilizations’ ”, Media Education Foundation, 1999; To read the transcript: http://www.mediaed.org/transcripts/Edward-Said-The-Myth-of-Clash-Civilizations-Transcript.pdf ↑

This program was originally broadcast January 12^th 2018.

Please note, Cuban Parliamentarian Juan Carlos Rodriguez Diaz is touring Canadian cities until April 5^th to talk about elections and democracy in modern day Cuba.

Review details of the visit here.

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For more than half a century, the United States government, under both Democratic and Republican presidents, presented what could only be described as a campaign of terror against the population of Cuba.

The Cuban people, under the Revolutionary leadership of Fidel Castro Ruz, had overthrown the regime U.S. Proxy Battista. With popular support, the Castro-led government ushered in reforms that improved the conditions of the people, investing in health care, education, social security, and infrastructure.

The government survived the U.S. backed ‘Bay of Pigs’ invasion as well as the ‘Mongoose operation‘ offensives. An embargo was placed on the country, crippling its ability to trade with the U.S. And its partners.

When the U.S.S.R collapsed in the early ’90s, Cuba’s economic development was severely compromised. Then, on December 17 2014, a remarkable announcement: the U.S. And Cuba would re-establish diplomatic relations and move toward normalizing that relationship. As part of this re-visioning of Cuba-U.S. Relations, President Obama agreed to release the remaining Cuban Five!

There seemed to be cause for celebration. Withstanding everything that the Empire had to throw at Cuba, the U.S. seemed to have waved the white flag, and embarked on a new path on the world stage.

Except that new path turns out to be merely a different route to the same destination. Or so believes Arnold August. The author and long-time Cuba scholar believes that Obama’s charm offensive from ’17D’ right up to the end of his presidency a year ago, was far from a declaration of surrender. It signalled a new assault, albeit with a different character.

In his most recent book, Cuba-US relations: Obama and Beyond, August holds that the U.S. under Obama has adopted a ‘Trojan Horse’ strategy. Essentially, by gaining diplomatic and economic access to the country, the U.S. President is hoping to identify, co-opt, and corrupt elements of the society, and use them as instruments to undermine the Revolution.

August elaborates on the U.S. Change of strategy in the first part of the program.

In the second half, Professor Michel Chossudovsky examines one specific element of Cuban Society: The Intelligentsia. Professor Chossudovsky identities the ways by which U.S. aligned Non-Governmental organizations and foundations are sponsoring a sophisticated insurgency on the minds of the Cuban leaders of tomorrow. He also opens up about a personal encounter he had with this diabolical scheme, when he responded to a conference invitation to Cuba in the fall of 2015.

Arnold August has an M.A. in political science from McGill University, in Montreal, Quebec. An accomplished author, he is the author of the recent book, Cuba-US Relations: Obama and Beyond.

Professor Michel Chossudovsky is Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization and Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Ottawa. A visiting professor to several institutions around the world, he has authored more than 800 scholarly articles and 11 books, including his most recent: The Globalization of War: Washington’s Long War on Humanity (2015). 

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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 atrabble.ca.

Community Radio Stations carrying the Global Research News Hour:

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

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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.

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The appointment of the notorious warmonger John Bolton as National Security Advisor is the latest move in reorganizing the Trump inner circle as a war cabinet. The Bolton announcement came just days after the naming of Central Intelligence Agency director Mike Pompeo as Secretary of State replacing Rex Tillerson, and Pompeo’s replacement at the CIA by Gina Haspel. Both Pompeo and Haspel are advocates of torture, and Haspel personally supervised torture at a CIA secret site in Thailand, later destroying the video tapes documenting waterboarding and other abuse of prisoners kidnapped and brought there.

Bolton is the sworn enemy of all progressive and independent governments and movements in the world. He is especially well-known for his virulent and abiding campaign for launching new wars against Iran and North Korea. Less-known is his contempt for working people, illustrated by his call to dismantle all domestic social programs, “root and branch.”

As an Assistant Secretary of State under President George W. Bush, Bolton was asked in 2002 what administration policy was toward North Korea. Bolton responded by placing a book titled “The End of North Korea” on a table next to the reporter, saying, “That is our policy.”

Bolton has a long history of advocating the most belligerent policies toward Russia and earlier the Soviet Union.  He has called Russia’s alleged “meddling” in the U.S. election “a casus belli, a true act of war, and one Washington will never tolerate,” a statement that highlights what a menacing character Bolton is. A U.S.-Russia war would be one between the leading nuclear weapons states and would have the potential of destroying life on the planet, a consequence that doesn’t faze Bolton–just the opposite.

“The next step in the bilateral relationship with Russia,” he recently wrote, “is for this administration to abrogate the New START Treaty,” a nuclear arms reduction agreement between Russia and the U.S. in 2010.

A gung-ho supporter of the Iraq War, Bolton advocated that it be followed by similar regime-change wars against Syria and Iran, as well as North Korea. Bolton worked closely with Israeli intelligence to fabricate  a falsified “weapons-of-mass-destruction” justification for an assault on Iran after the occupation of Iraq, which top Bush officials had predicted would be a “cakewalk.” It was anything but, and it was the fierce resistance in Iraq that was the key factor in preventing a new war on Iran at that time.

Bolton, like Trump and Pompeo, wants to overturn the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, signed in 2015 by the five permanent members of the UN  Security Council, Germany and Iran. It called for severe limitations on Iran’s nuclear program for 15 years in exchange for an end to the harsh sanction that were strangling Iran’s economy.  According to the International Atomic Energy Agency which conducts on-going inspections, Iran has met all the requirements of the agreement.

But Bolton calls the JCPOA agreement “the worst act of appeasement in American history,” and said, “The only thing that will stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons is regime change in Tehran.” While the JCPOA negotiations were underway, Bolton authored a New York Times op-ed headlined, “To Stop Iran’s Bomb, Bomb Iran.”

It is expected that Trump will pull the U.S. out of the JCPOA in May 2018, heightening the threat of a new war in the Middle East.

On February 28, when he undoubtedly already knew that Trump was preparing to appoint him, Bolton published a piece in the Wall Street Journal under the headline, “The Legal Case for Striking North Korea First.” The op-ed reads, “It is perfectly legitimate for the United States to respond to the current ‘necessity’ posed by North Korea’s nuclear weapons by striking first.” In fact, of course such an attack would be a war crime of the highest order.

While Trump surprised many by announcing that he would meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un, by May of this year, a recent Bolton interview with a Washington DC radio station raised serious questions about whether the negotiations will actually take place.

“I think this session between the leaders will be a fairly brief session where Trump says, ‘Tell me you have begun total denuclearization, because we’re not going to have protracted negotiations. You can tell me right now or we’ll start thinking of something else.’”

Such a contemptuous approach would not be “negotiations” at all, and would of course be rejected by the North Korean leaders. Clearly, this is what Bolton want to see happen, as underlined by another recent statement: “The only way to resolve the North Korean problem is to change the regime.”

The most extreme Zionists in both Israel and the U.S. are celebrating the Bolton appointment. Bolton has expressed undying support for the apartheid Israeli state and complete disdain for the Palestinian people and their right to self-determination. He has advocated what he calls the “three-state solution,” turning over remnants of the West Bank that Israel doesn’t want to annex to Jordan, and Gaza to Egypt.

The elevation of Bolton, Pompeo and Haspel can only be seen as a turn in the direction of new war and intensification of the seven wars the U.S. is already engaged in. Now is the time to intensify the resistance.

After returning from China where he had a successful meeting with President Xi Jinping, the DPRK’s head of state Kim Jong-un is set to hold his first face-to-face meeting with his South Korean counterpart Moon Jae-in. This will only be the third time in history heads of state from North and South Korea have held such a meeting. The summit will take place in Panmunjom, the “truce village” which is divided between the two Korean states.

On the third of March, following the completion of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games in which athletes from both states marched under a Korean Unity Flag, a high level delegation of Moon Jae-in’s cabinet travelled to Pyongyang where it later emerged they confirmed Kim Jong-un’s willingness to hold direct talks with the US President.

Moon and Kim have previous held phone conversations, but the meeting on the 27th will be the first time they have met. During the Olympics, Kim Jong-un’s sister Kim Yo-jong represented the country’s leader. It was there that she handed Moon Jae-in a handwritten invitation to Pyongyang from her brother.

The 27 April meeting looks to further cement plans for long term cooperation between the two Korean states. It is thought that both leaders will discuss Korean denuclearisation as well as the DPRK’s concerns regarding provocative US military exercises on Korean soil and the delivery of American made weapons, particularly the THAAD missile system to the South.

China will also be an important factor during the meeting, in spite of only establishing relations with Seoul in 1992. Today, China and South Korea are key trading partners, while under Moon Jae-in, relations with Beijing have reached an all-time high. It is thought that in October of 2017, Moon spoke with the Chinese government regarding Beijing’s concerns over the presence of US made THAAD missiles on the Korean peninsula.

Donald Trump’s back and forth trade disputes with South Korea has only worked to force South Korea to consider its economic future and necessarily pivot its attention to partnerships with both China, Russia and ASEAN due to the unpredictability of Trump’s trade policies, even among long standing allies. As China is the biggest victim of Trump’s aggressive protectionism, there is every chance that some of the warmth the Chinese President showered on his DPRK counterpart was partly motivated by China’s disgust at the US disregard for a stable commitment to free trade under the current administration in Washington.

As I wrote yesterday, with the two Korean states, China and Russia largely on the same page, the US will be the odd-man-out if it is not willing to embrace the peace agenda at the forthcoming Kim-Trump summit. The full report can be read below:

DPRK (North Korea) Leader Kim Jong-un has concluded a three day visit to China where he held talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of The People. This was Kim Jong-un’s first visit abroad since becoming his nation’s head of state in 2011.

Comparing Socialism With Chinese Characteristics For A New Era With Modern Juche  

Xi Jinping offered warm words comparing the economic and social strides China has taken according to Xi Jinping Thought with the DPRK’s generally under-reported economic expansion, infrastructural boom and social improvements made under the leadership of Kim Jong-un. In spite of sanctions the DPRK economy has widely expanded in recent years.

According to the official Chinese report of the meeting, Xi Jinping proposed the following four steps to further enhance bilateral relations:

“Firstly, continue giving play to the guiding role of high-level exchanges. High-level exchanges have always played the most important guiding and promoting role in the history of China-DPRK relations. Under the new circumstances, I am willing to keep frequent contacts with Comrade Chairman through various forms such as exchange of visits, and sending special envoys and letters to each other.

Secondly, make full play of the time-tested valuable practices of strategic communication. It is the splendid tradition of the two parties to have frequent in-depth exchange of views on major issues. Both sides should maximize the important role of party-to-party exchanges, promote exchanges and cooperation between the two countries in various areas, and strengthen communication and mutual trust.

Thirdly, actively advance peaceful development. Socialism with Chinese characteristics has entered a new era, and the DPRK’s socialist construction has also ushered in a new historical period. We are ready to make joint efforts with the DPRK side, conform to the trend of the times, hold high the banner of peace, development, cooperation and mutual benefit, continuously improve the wellbeing of the two peoples, and make positive contribution to regional peace, stability and development.

Fourthly, cement the popular will foundation for China-DPRK friendship. The two sides should, through various forms, enhance people-to-people exchanges, consolidate the foundation of popular will for bilateral friendly relations, especially enhance youth exchanges, inherit and carry forward the fine tradition of China-DPRK friendship”.

While all of the points indicate that a Beijing-Pyongyang relationship that had been somewhat frosty in recent years has now openly thawed, the third point is the most crucial for the region in the long term. In drawing a parallel between the recent achievements of both countries, Xi Jinping is indicating the opportunity for further economic inter-connectivity between the DPRK and China is open and that Xi looks forward to establishing the principles of peace through prosperity as the basis for enhanced ties with the DPRK. This will also help pave the way for four-way economic integration between Russia, the two Koreas and China, in line with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposals in autumn of 2017.

China to Insure Regional Peace 

The warm words Xi has offered the DPRK and Kim personally, mean that China has recognised the DPRK’s outreach to South Korea and its stated desire to denuclearise as a guarantee of positive diplomatic developments in the region that will inevitably lead China to become a powerful insurer of peace for its smaller neighbour. In this sense, while talks between Donald Trump and Kim Jon-un are set to happen very soon, China has already made it clear that so long as the DPRK pursues its cooperative stance, Beijing will insure the safety and security of the DPRK. While this wasn’t stated explicitly, it was inferred beyond doubt.

Regarding these developments, Xi stated,

“Both Comrade Chairman and I have personally experienced and witnessed the development of China-DPRK relationship.

…This is a strategic choice and the only right choice both sides have made based on history and reality, the international and regional structure and the general situation of China-DPRK ties. This should not and will not change because of any single event at a particular time.

We are willing to work together with DPRK comrades, remain true to our original aspiration and jointly move forward, to promote long-term healthy and stable development of China-DPRK relations, benefit the two countries and two peoples, and make new contribution to regional peace, stability and development”.

The Chinese President further stated,

“We have noticed that Comrade Chairman has led the WPK and the people of the DPRK in taking a series of active measures and scoring achievements in developing economy and improving people’s wellbeing in recent years. The Chinese side expects political stability, economic development and people’s happiness in the DPRK, and supports the WPK, led by Comrade Chairman, in leading the people of the DPRK to advance along the path of socialism, as well as the endeavors by comrades of the DPRK in developing economy and improving people’s livelihood”.

Kim’s Pledge for Peace 

According to the official report of the meeting,

“Kim said, since the 18th CPC National Congress, the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at the core has, with tremendous political courage and a strong sense of responsibility, developed new thinking and new ideas, put them into action, and solved many tough problems that were never resolved and accomplished many big things that were long on the agenda but never got done. These achievements fully proved that the lines of the CPC are correct lines that accord with the national conditions. In particular, Comrade General Secretary has put forward the requirements that the Party should exercise effective self-supervision and practice strict self-governance in every respect, which has contributed greatly to Party building and realized the overall Party leadership over all work. At present, the WPK is also intensifying its efforts in fighting against arrogance, bureaucracy and corruption.

Kim said he sincerely hoped that China will continuously make new great achievements in the course of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects and a great modern socialist country”.

Regarding denuclearisation, Kim is quoted as saying,

“It is our consistent stand to be committed to denuclearization on the peninsula, in accordance with the will of late President Kim Il Sung and late General Secretary Kim Jong Il. The issue of denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula can be resolved, if south Korea and the United States respond to our efforts with goodwill, create an atmosphere of peace and stability while taking progressive and synchronous measures for the realization of peace”.

A Framework the US Cannot Change 

The Kim-Xi summit is further proof that of all the powers with a self-described or self-evident interest in the Korean peninsula, it is the US which now stands as the odd man out. South Korean President Moon Jae-in remains committed to further dialogue and cooperation with the DPRK, while China and Russia have always worked to bring about the kind of developments in the region which are now occurring.

The US side has been sending mixed message regarding the forthcoming Kim-Trump summit. While Donald Trump has personally spoken positively of the meeting, other US officials have been less charitable in their descriptions of a monumental endeavour in the name of peace.

Ultimately, a lasting peace agreement, including and especially one that would formally end the Korean War, will only come about if the US guarantees that it will de-militarise its own presence on the Korean peninsula and refrain from sanctioning or provoking the DPRK in exchange for denuclearistion.

With China fully on board the peace process as confirmed in the Kim-Xi summit, the US will sooner or later have to realise that in negotiating with the DPRK, the US will also be negotiating as part of a situation in which China is the ultimate king-maker, not only because of its power and geographical proximity to Korea, but because China has vested interests in peace and inter-connectivity with both Korean states that it will not want molested by an incomplete or failed deal from the US side.

Conclusion 

Where just months ago, it appeared that the dominoes of war were perfectly lined up and that the US might well flick them first, now everything required for a lasting win-win peace is in place. All it will take is the US coming into negotiations with the DPRK, with genuine intentions and a realisation that while the US is a major player on the Korean issue, it ultimately must give way to China’s leadership.

Rising political tensions between Russia and the West could cause an energy crisis for Europe, which continues to be heavily reliant on Moscow for its energy resources, leaving the sector vulnerable to increasingly tense standoff between the Kremlin and the West.

Russia supplies Europe with a third of its gas, and has sent three of the six liquefied natural gas shipments Britain has imported since early January.

Moscow has consistently flexed its energy muscle as a tactic from its geopolitical arsenal, threatening the UK and wider Europe with an energy shortage, due to the continents reliance on Russia for its sources of power.

While Russia increasingly turn to Asia for its oil and gas exports, this market would not replace that of Europe, due to the need to undercut the coast of cheap coal power that is abundant in countries such as China and Vietnam – if the West was to sever ties with Putin’s energy.

The extent of British LNG imports from Russia has highlighted the dependence of its energy supply on foreign countries, which has left the UK energy sector struggling to meet demand.

Earlier this month, the UK’s “war on coal” was reported as being responsible for leaving the country unable to meet winter energy needs, with an announcement from the National Grid that Britain would not have enough gas to meet demand during the cold snap that swept across the nation.

Principles of both differ, their aims are similar.

The USA Patriot Act – aka Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act – purportedly aimed to combat Islamic terrorism Washington created and supports worldwide.

Increased military spending followed. So did endless wars of aggression in multiple theaters, along with eroding homeland freedoms.

The 9/11 mother of all false flags unleashed state-sponsored, media supported, mass hysteria – the pretext for waging war on humanity at home and abroad.

The Patriot Act was written long before 9/11, on the shelf to be introduced and enacted into law weeks after that fateful day.

Britain’s Fusion Doctrine didn’t suddenly emerge in the wake of the March 4 Skripal incident. These initiatives take considerable time and debate to draft.

It had to have been prepared well in advance of the state-sponsored Skripal incident, justifying what’s clearly unjustifiable.

It’s a doctrine targeting Russia most of all – along with Iran, North Korea, and Islamic terrorism (which Britain supports covertly along with US-dominated NATO).

Targeted countries, ISIS and other terrorist groups pose no threat to Britain, America or other Western nations. Claiming otherwise is part of escalating US/UK propaganda war – often preceding events turning hot.

Almost certainly on the shelf like the USA Patriot Act, the Fusion Doctrine was rolled out in the wake of the UK-staged false flag Skripal incident.

Russia had nothing to do with it. State-sponsored, mass media supported, hysteria claims what’s clearly a bald-faced lie.

The doctrine escalates UK political war on Moscow more than already – a hugely dangerous slippery slope, a road to possible nuclear war if the madness doesn’t stop.

Purportedly aiming to crack down on anything called “misinformation” or fake news, it’s a virtual declaration of war on independent media, speech and academic freedoms, threatening all other rights free societies cherish.

It’s part of Britain’s National Security Strategy, as well as its Strategic Defense and Security Review at a time the nation’s only enemies and threats are invented to justice an unjustifiably hostile agenda demanding condemnation, not support.

PM Theresa May refuses to release alleged evidence of Russian responsibility for the Skripal incident – because none exists.

Just like there’s no evidence of Russian US or EU election meddling, none supporting the phony accusation of Russian aggression in Ukraine, along with no Kremlin involvement in downing Malaysian airlines MH17.

Falsely blaming Russia for the Skripal incident escalated US/UK-led Western Russophobia to a greater, more dangerous level.

Vladimir Putin acknowledged dismal Kremlin relations with Washington and London, saying they’ve “gone into a freeze,” adding “this is not our fault.”

Moscow hasn’t responded so far.

Anything less than showing strength and unwillingness to put up with hostile Western treatment any longer will show weakness – encouraging further assaults on its sovereignty.

US, UK, NATO political and economic war on Russia risks heading things toward direct confrontation – the threat of catastrophic nuclear war.

Escalating Russophobic rage makes the unthinkable possible, notably with Trump’s hardened war cabinet.

Things are recklessly heading into the abyss of no return if strong countermeasures aren’t taken by Moscow.

It’s crucial for Putin to lead through resolve and strength because leadership for peace over war in the West doesn’t exist.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.

Its introduction poses the first ever challenge to petro-dollar dominance.

China is the world’s largest oil importing/consuming nation. Gold-backed petro-yuan futures trading began Monday on the Shanghai International Energy Exchange, part of the Shanghai Futures Exchange – letting Chinese and foreign traders buy oil in yuan instead of dollars.

For the first time, petro-yuan trading challenges the Wall Street/London-dominated oil petro-dollar futures market longer-term.

According to OilPrice.com, Monday trading in Shanghai began “with a bang,” demand high “with 15.4 million barrels of crude for delivery in September” transacted in two-and-a-half hours, the length of first-day trading.

US-sanctioned nations Russia, Iran and Venezuela can benefit by avoiding oil trading in dollars.

Russia and China already conduct bilateral trade in their national currencies. Last September, Venezuela began selling oil contracts in euros. Now it can trade in yuan as well.

Over time, US sanctions could be neutralized, its attempt to dominate other nations economically and financially weakened, perhaps bypassed by targeted countries, avoiding dollar trade entirely.

Oil analyst Li Li said China-introduced petro-yuan futures contacts “is an innovative way to fill in the void of a voice representing buyers in Asia. With this launch, the market will pay more attention to China’s demand story.”

It’s shaking up the oil futures market. According to financial analyst Hayden Briscoe, “(t)his is the single biggest change in capital markets, maybe of all time” – enhancing oil trading in yuan at the expense of the dollar.

Economist Carl Weinberg believes Beijing will likely “compel” Saudi Arabia to abandon the petrodollar for the yuan in oil sales to China – a move he said will likely push the oil market in the same direction, a major development if he’s right.

In 2016, Russia’s St. Petersburg exchange began Urals oil futures trading in rubles. Moscow and Beijing promote bilateral trade in their national currencies.

Russia is China’s largest supplier of crude, facilitated by two Sino/Russian oil pipelines. The second one began operating in January.

At least 19 foreign brokers registered to trade oil contracts on the Shanghai exchange, more likely to follow, increasing volume – at the expense of dominant dollar oil trading.

Hedge fund manager Adam Levinson called the petro-yuan a “huge story,” increasing the importance of the Chinese currency in commodity trading.

Post-WW II, dollar transactions dominated international trade – because it’s a freely convertible liquid currency.

Nations trading more in their national currencies, along with the petro-yuan’s introduction, could prove a game-changer longer-term.

For now, the dollar as the world’s reserve currency remains dominant.

Competition from the yuan and other currencies could considerably weaken its dominance in the years ahead.

Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.

As it tries to strike an agreement with the US to avert a trade war that economists fear could destabilize global markets, China has an ace up its sleeve that it’s just about ready to play: The Communist Party last year implemented a ban on imports of recyclable material that is provoking a mild panic in the US.

The reason? The US relies on China to “import” much of its bulk recyclable waste. But last July, in an effort to battle the “illegal foreign garbage” influx into China, the country’s Ministry of Environmental Protection notified the World Trade Organization that it plans to ban imports of 24 types of solid waste materials, including soda bottles, mixed paper, recycled steel and newsprint.

Despite the threat to implement the ban by the end of the year, the document stated that the “proposed date of adoption” is “to be determined.”

But by moving ahead with the decision, China risks creating serious problems for the global recycling industry, something that would probably have the greatest impact on the US by essentially forcing it to make difficult choices about how it process its solid waste, including – most notably – how and where it is stored.

According to Reuters, which was the first western media outlet to report on the decision, the US Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries said at the time that the ban would devastate an industry that supported 155,000 jobs and had exported scrap worth $5.6 billion to China in 2016.

“China’s import restrictions on recycled commodities have caused a fundamental disruption in global supply chains for scrap materials, directing them away from productive reuse and toward disposal,” a US representative told the meeting, according to a trade official in Geneva.

The United States recognized China’s environmental concerns but Beijing’s approach seemed to be having the opposite effect to what was intended, and its rules had changed far too quickly for industry to adjust, the U.S. representative told the meeting.

The US also accused China of violating its obligations under the WTO framework.

China seemed to be breaching its WTO obligations by treating domestic and foreign waste differently and employing an overly trade-restrictive policy, the U.S. official said.

“We request that China immediately halt implementation and revise these measures in a manner consistent with existing international standards for trade in scrap materials, which provide a global framework for transparent and environmentally sound trade in recycled commodities.”

Washington’s demand came a day after President Trump ordered the US trade rep to levy tariffs on at least $50 billion of Chinese imports. Although the USTR was given 15 days by Trump to propose a list of Chinese products that would be targeted, China’s commerce ministry had already threatened to take legal action against the US through the WTO. The country is also contemplating targeting 128 American products through an imposition of harsh import tariffs – though earlier today officials from both countries privately confirmed to the Wall Street Journal and other media organizations that a deal could soon be reached.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry also made clear that it has the means to fight a potentially devastating trade war with the US but urged Washington to reconsider its aggressive economic policy. Beijing warned that “the American consumers and enterprises will bear the brunt” of a trade war with China.

According to RT, China is by far the biggest importer of US recyclables. Banning US junk imports will have a catastrophic impact on the US labor market and will drive up waste management costs. The Chinese representative at the meeting in Geneva on Friday agreed to relay the US’s concerns to Beijing, though the envoy still noted that, ultimately, individual countries are responsible for their own waste.

“In any given year, approximately one-third of the scrap recycled in the United States is prepared for shipment to the export market, and China is the recycling industry’s largest customer,” ISRI President Robin Wiener told China Daily earlier. “This includes more than $1.9 billion in scrap paper and $495 million in scrap plastics. A ban on imports of scrap commodities into China would be catastrophic to the recycling industry.”

If the world’s No. 2 economy closes off its waste-management market, recycling centers across the US would be faced with a hard choice. They can either hire a much more expensive workforce which would raise prices for their services, require households to sort their own waste, or be forced to use more landfills across all fifty US states.

Of course, there’s a third option: Find new foreign buyers for its bulk waste. But doing so would be incredibly fraught because there’s no single buyer – or even group of buyers – that could adequately make up for China’s heft.

Regardless of what happens, one thing is for certain: While China likely won’t be able to force concessions on major issues like America’s complaints about China’s methods for siphoning off foreign IP, the garbage issue could loom large in the closed-door discussions currently taking place to strike a more equitable trade deal that would appeal both Trump and his factory-town base.

The Arabia Foundation appeared in spring 2016, seemingly out of nowhere, as a Saudi-focused think tank with “ties to Riyadh,” but vaguely independent of the regime. Or at least independent enough so that media wouldn’t represent it as an extension of the kingdom. But the past few weeks have clearly shown it to be little more than a PR outlet for de facto Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman and his sprawling, opaque business interests.

After multiple requests by FAIR for its donors, the Arabia Foundation refused to give any, other than its founder, Saudi investment banker Ali Shihabi. It insists it doesn’t take money from “the Saudi government,” but instead is backed by unnamed private Saudi citizens.

The distinction between private citizens and the “government” in the hereditary monarchy of Saudi Arabia is notoriously blurry, but one connection is worth noting: The registered agent and legal counsel of the Arabia Foundation, Eric L. Lewis, represented the Saudi government and related “charities” in the lawsuit brought by families of 9/11 victims over the Saudi royal family’s role in the September 11 attacks. The website of Lewis’ law firm, Lewis, Baach, Kaufmann and Middlemiss, boasts it has “extensive experience representing and advising foreign sovereigns, including the governments of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Egypt.”

Image: A Saudi government spokesperson couldn’t have said it better (Washington Post, 5/31/17).

The New York Times (11/30/18) has described the group as “close to the Saudi government,” while the Washington Post’s Ishaan Tharoor (11/6/17) noted it had “close ties to the kingdom.”  That doesn’t stop the Post opinion section from running multiple op-eds from Arabia Foundation figures (5/31/17, 12/20/17, 1/4/18, 1/22/18). In most press appearances, the group is simply identified as “a Washington-based think tank.” Absent documented evidence of who exactly funds the group, why should media not assume—based on its connections to the government and cartoonishly pro–bin Salman line—that the Arabia Foundation is a front group for the government?

In repeated interviews (BBC World News, 3/20/18; Morning Joe, 3/20/18; CNN, 3/19/18) last week, Shihabi, the head of the nominally independent group, spun for war crimes, human rights abuses and a whole host of morally dubious activities carried out by the increasingly despotic Saudi ruler. The Arabia Foundation’s ties to the Saudi government are never noted or even vaguely referenced in these interviews.

On MSNBC’s Morning Joe, after saying the “crown prince” has engaged in a “massive corruption crackdown” (a wholly PR frame discredited earlier this month by the New York Times, 3/11/18), host Mika Brzezinksi teed up Shihabi to comment on Saudi Arabia. The softball interview that followed hit all of the regime’s central premises without question: as well as “cracking down on corruption,” bin Salman is “modernizing Saudi Arabia” and “taking on the religious establishment.”

No one on the panel brought up Saudi Arabia’s ongoing war crimes in Yemen—consistent with MSNBC’s network-wide virtual blackout on one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises (FAIR.org, 3/20/18). The Council on Foreign Relations’ Richard Haas made one opaque reference to Saudi “war with Yemen,” but didn’t note the thousands killed or up to one million infected with cholera; the US-backed war was was simply dismissed as a “strategic overreach.” The New York Times’ Elisabeth Bumiller, another panelist, did get in a question about torture, which Ali Shihabi dismissed as having “no evidence” despite Bumiller speaking with several doctors who witnessed it.

Reliable Saudi stenographer David Iglesias who, as FAIR (4/28/17) noted last year, has been running the same reformist press release for the royal family for 15 years, continued his unique brand of faux criticism, insisting that the Saudi prince was too “bold”—the political commentary equivalent of answering “I work too hard” when asked on a job interview what your biggest flaw is.

Shihabi claimed without irony that what Saudi Arabia needed was “autocracy to affect change,” and a “benevolent autocrat.” His evidence that the masses approved of bin Salman’s “bold, needed” leadership was approved of by the masses? That there has been “no bloodshed, there’s been no demonstration, no domestic strife.” Of course, the last time there were anti-government demonstrations, in 2011, the Saudi military opened fire on protesters, and snuffed out resistance with torture and extrajudicial killings. In 2017, when one Shia town resisted the regime, Riyadh flattened an entire neighborhood. This could perhaps be why the general population isn’t quick to take to the streets, but the Arabia Foundation insist it’s an implicit admission the crown prince is loved and popular.

The CNN and BBC interviews, likewise, didn’t note the Arabia Foundation’s obvious ties to the Saudi regime.

Forbes keeps running “op-eds” by Arabia Foundation fellow Ellen Wald that amount to little more than press releases for Saudi investment opportunities (e.g., 12/11/17, 2/1/18, 3/13/18). Another pundit on the Arabia Foundation’s payroll, Bernard Haykel, writes fawning profiles of bin Salman in the Washington Post (1/22/18) without disclosing he’s a founding director of the organization—instead listing his more benign academic credentials.

The Arabia Foundation is so satisfied with the media’s presentation of its messaging that it routinely tweets out articles it’s featured in and TV appearances it’s had, knowing its messaging is syncing up nicely with bin Salman’s PR tour to the United States. “Yemen is a tragedy. Wars are a tragedy. Saudi is aware of that and is going out of its way to try to address humanitarian issues there,” boasted one tweet, quoting Shihabi’s interview with the BBC.

By contrast, this obtuse inability to connect dots is absent when discussing think tanks “close to” the Syrian government. Never is the Assad-connected British Syrian Society set up as a neutral arbiter of affairs of the Syrian conflict. It is met with disdain, painted as “little more than a Syrian regime propaganda exercise” (Guardian, 10/26/17), the “mouthpiece in the West” (Middle East Eye, 10/19/17) for a war crime–committing tyrant. Those who associate with it, including academics, journalists and British members of parliament, are publicly shamed for participating in a “regime PR exercise” (Independent, 10/29/16). Yet somehow the “Saudi-connected” Arabia Foundation, which cheers on a “benevolent autocrat” as he rains bombs on Yemen and uses hunger as a weapon of war, receives no such moral banishment. Instead, it is dressed up as just another respectable think tank.

The fact that the Arabia Foundation is a thinly veiled PR firm for the Saudi government matters. The average reader or viewer would take Shihabi and his network of mercenary “fellows” less seriously if they were presented as spokespeople for a repressive government rather than quasi-academics from a impressive-sounding “foundation.”

With all the hysteria surrounding RT and foreign influence on the American public, one might think such an obvious racket would give editors and TV producers pause. But the same rules don’t apply to American allies. Their propaganda is treated not like a sinister “influence operation,” but like a respectable group of academics calling balls and strikes on international affairs.

France is once again on the brink of an all-out industrial war – and its outcome could transform the country’s political landscape. The showdown is over the plans that President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Edouard Philippe have for the state-owned National Railway Company (SNCF), which have been described by Le Monde as “the biggest change for the SNCF since its founding in 1937.”

The stakes in the fight are huge: France’s 150,000 rail workers could suffer a defeat like that of Britain’s miners under Margaret Thatcher. On the other hand, Philippe could suffer the same fate as former PM Alain Juppe, whose 1995 economic “reform” was trashed by a vast wave of industrial action and popular revolt.

As an initial response, rail worker unions led a Paris demonstration on March 22 in defence of public services that also involved workers from Air France, air traffic control centres, Paris regional public transport, public hospitals and retirement homes and other services. The demonstration was one of 150 across the country. The country’s four rail unions have also announced that they will launch 36 days of strikes over a three-month period beginning on April 3, alternating 48-hour stoppages with 72 hours of normal work.

Previously, in an extremely rare display of unity, 13 left organizations issued a joint statement calling for participation in the demonstration. The call was initiated by former New Anti-Capitalist Party presidential candidate Olivier Besancenot, taken up by Communist Party of France general secretary Pierre Laurent and eventually supported by the other main forces of the left, France Unbowed and the Socialist Party (PS), as well as by the Greens and smaller left forces.

The March 22 mobilization attracted 400,000 across the whole of France, with 65,000 in Paris, 55,000 in Marseilles, 35,000 in La Rochelle, 20,000 in Toulouse and 15,000 in Lyon. Forty per cent of high-speed trains and 50 per cent of regional services were cancelled on the day.

Trial of Strength

The government’s plan for the SNCF covers all aspects: train operations, the rail network, infrastructure, finances, and company structure and legal form. However, for Macron and Philippe, the plan’s immediate target is the collective agreement that has covered rail employees since 1920 (when the rail companies were private). Defeating the rail workers in a fight over their contract is the key to unlocking the plan’s other aspects. Focussing public attention on “rail worker privilege” also has the advantage of diverting attention from the pile of unanswered questions the plan provokes: for example, how exactly will increased competition lead to lower fares and a reduction in accumulated debt?

Rail workers realised they were Macron’s primary target on February 24, when he announced at the annual Agriculture Show that, “I can’t have on one side farmers without any retirement plan and on the other a rail worker collective agreement [that includes a retirement package] and not change it.”

Macron did not say a word about any SNCF plans in his campaign for president. However, from his behaviour it is clear that he judges that a successful fight with the rail workers would be his ‘Thatcher moment’ and help boost his authority. It will also give French employers the crushing victory over organized labour that they have been seeking for decades.

Spokesperson for the rail worker division of the radical union Solidarity Unity Democracy (SUD-Rail) Bruno Poncet said: “The government wants a trial of strength. It’s moving to try us out. It wants this test because it knows if it wins, the last resistance will have been overcome.”

A ‘Lucid and Comprehensive’ Diagnosis?

Encouraged by success in November in defeating union opposition to their “reform” of France’s labour laws, Macron and Philippe have been acting over the past three weeks like bullies determined to pick a fight. Their first move was to accept the diagnosis and recommendations of the report Philippe had commissioned from Air France CEO Jean-Cyril Spinetta, The Future of Rail Transport.

Spinetta’s “lucid and comprehensive” (Philippe) report – essentially a Readers’ Digest summary of long-standing neoliberal wish lists for the SNCF – paints a gloomy picture of a “massively subsidized” operation sinking toward oblivion under a crushing debt burden, politically determined low prices and tariffs, suffocating bureaucracy, torpid management, rent-seeking unions and regional special interests.

According to the document, in a business-as-usual scenario the application by the end of 2018 of the European Union’s transport competition policy would see the SNCF’s €46 billion debt burden become a French government budget liability: the resultant budget deficit blow-out would force huge spending cuts to meet EU deficit reduction targets.

Spinetta’s 43 recommendations include: line closures (up to a third of the network’s 30,000 kilometres); increases in ticket prices and freight rates; opening the SNCF network to private operators; offloading the burden of regional line subsidies onto regional governments; opening services to competition; compulsory staff transfers to private operators; and the progressive extinction of the collective agreement via the introduction of worse conditions for new staff.

The report also recommends using costs savings to fund increased investment in maintenance of the shrunken rail network that would emerge from the application of the plan. This infrastructure combines the “shopfront” High Speed Train operations for which France is famous with local and regional rail networks that basically have not changed for up to 80 year – even in the greater Paris region – and on which deteriorating maintenance standards have produced increased accidents and declining punctuality.

Spinetta’s proposals continue the application to the SNCF of the neoliberal rail transport directives (the four “railway packages”) that have been coming from the European Commission since 2001. These have been applied with missionary zeal by an SNCF management which even before their arrival was turning the company inside out in the name of competition. As a March 22 Mediapart report by Martine Orange noted:

“The image of an archaic, fossilized SNCF totally closed in on itself and which could only benefit from the great breeze of opening up to competition isn’t exactly that of the public company’s wage-earners. They rather have the feeling of living in a totally unstable universe where reforms happen at an average rate of one every two years without any review of the experience just undergone.

“‘Competition? In the SNCF we’ve been living with the ideology of competition for more than 20 years! The whole business has been re-organized as if it were always going to open tomorrow, even if there no motive for us to do that. Public service has been completely forgotten. The harm has already been done: only now are the conclusions being drawn’ (Hervé, former SNCF manager).”

The overall result of over two decades of blind pursuit of competitiveness – turning more and more parts of the SNCF into business units governed by profitability maximization and cost minimization targets – has been to disorganize a very complex, interrelated organism and accumulate huge extra costs that were supposed to be impossible in the magic realm of competitiveness.

Here are two revealing indicators of the impact of this disorganization: the fact, acknowledged by Spinetta himself, that it is now impossible to calculate the average price of a railway ticket in France and the impossibility, due to the division of the SNCF into separate administrative ‘silos’, of passenger train drivers driving freight trains and station staff helping rail maintenance workers shift material. This experience, visited on the SNCF by its management of neoliberal true believers contrasts with that of the German railways (Deutsche Bahn), whose executives declined to implement important aspects of the “directives” coming from Brussels.

The Spinetta report is also notable for what it does not say: it contains no audit of environmental and social impacts and no cost-benefit analysis: the huge SNCF is treated as a purely commercial operation, a financial closed loop with no impact on ecology or social well-being. Thus, while Macron poses as world leader in the fight against global warming, he accepts a report that ignores that every passenger or tonne of freight lost from rail represents a rise in greenhouse gas emissions, road accidents and noise pollution. As the joint statement of left organizations for March 22 noted:

“Since 1997 … the SNCF has become increasingly segmented, to break up the railway workforce and to pursue the privatizations recommended by the European “directives.” Today Macron is pushing this tendency to its logical conclusion, the break-up of the SNCF itself.

“Throughout Europe the recipes that [Macron] wants to apply are producing line closures, price hikes, rolling stock and infrastructure degeneration and loss of freight. The population as a whole foots the bill in three ways: financially; in terms of inequality between regions; and in deteriorating health due to the extra pollution produced.”

Hearts and Minds

Philippe’s next step was to stage an ostentatious ritual of meetings with rail unions. One by one, delegations from the rail worker divisions of the General Confederation of Labour (CGT), the National Alliance of Independent Unions (UNSA), SUD-Rail and the French Democratic Labour Confederation (CFDT), had the plan explained to them and were invited to put forward their point of view and make proposals. This, however, was not a negotiation but a show of consultation that would allow the government to say it had more than 20 meetings with rail unions. None of the unions’ proposals, nor those of rail transport users groups, were taken into consideration.

The government then announced that the plan would not be set in legislation to be debated in parliament, but instead rammed through as a temporary statute (ordonnance) by the Macronite majority, with the aim of launching the “reform” before summer and with as little debate as possible. While the government claimed that Spinetta’s proposals in no way envisaged privatizing the SNCF, when the ordonnance was published it concentrated on just two points: opening the SNCF to competition and phasing out the rail workers’ collective agreement.

The mainstream French media, alert to the presidential attack strategy, lost no time in backing Macron’s double goal: to instill the feeling that the plan is “unavoidable” and to make the rest of the working class – which has suffered a steady loss of wages and conditions – envy and hate rail workers. France had to see the fight as a struggle between a brave, reforming government and a tiny minority of recalcitrant and privileged industrial dinosaurs.

It was beside the point that the “reform” of the collective agreement proposed would save the SNCF only €100-€150 million over ten years and received only a brief treatment in Spinetta’s report. Obviously, people who have permanency, can retire at 53, have free train travel and a retirement package that pays close to the final wage have no choice but to be brought into line with (falling) community standards. To help the public grasp these truths, important people like IMF head Christine Lagarde spoke out against “sacred cows” while Spinetta himself said: “They have to accept the idea that in a world that is changing, the conditions in which they work also have to change.”

TV current affairs shows over the last month have often taken the form of “panel discussions” in which a sole rail union delegate has been besieged by an aggressive majority of plan supporters, with their debate interspersed with interviews with “outraged public transport users” incited to blame rail staff for their missed and late trains. In this hostile atmosphere, rail union spokespeople have had their work cut out explaining their real working conditions – on average only slightly better than the norm for most workers, but in no way privileged.

Olivier Besancenot explained the Macron government game on a France 2 TV appearance:

“We are all of us a ‘rail worker’ for someone else. Don’t fall for the poison of division. We live in a world where those who earn €150,000 a month exploiting others end up convincing those who live on €1500 that the cause of their problem are those that live on €2000. We’re on the way to getting jealous about crumbs while those on high must be having a great laugh.”

French media watch website Acrimed has been monitoring this operation, which has included totally loaded survey questions like “Should rail workers be able to stop the trains for a month and penalize everyone in France?” and “In what way does the rail workers’ collective agreement improve service to the public?” Acrimed noted that during one TV debate, SUD-Rail federal secretary Fabian Dumas was interrupted by his fellow panellists 66 times in eight minutes – once every seven seconds on average.

Winnable

Opinion polls show that the idea that rail workers have to make a sacrifice to help out the SNCF still has majority support – 69%, according to a recent RMC poll. The poll also showed that 43% would support the rail workers if they went on strike. Clearly, there is still a way to go in winning the battle for hearts and minds. Nonetheless, at the time of writing, signs are emerging that Macron’s blitzkrieg is beginning to run into problems.

First, his determination to pick a fight has forced the four rail union confederations, with a history of conflict and rivalry, into a unified response, even though SUD-Rail – the most radical of the confederations – maintains that the rolling stoppage plan will at some point have to become an all-out strike. This unity reflects that willingness to strike is high in all parts of the SNCF workforce. The March 10 edition of the web-based transport industry newsletter Mobilettre stated that 93% of SNCF workers and a similar percentage of SNCF management were ready to strike.

Second, Macron’s popularity is down to 41% and his La Republique En Marche! movement has suffered losses in two recent by-elections.

Most importantly, the longer the battle for hearts and minds continues, the more the case against the Spinetta plan will sink in. A big problem for Macron is that his war on the SNCF is coming late in the privatization cycle that began in the 1980s. The evidence has long been in as to the disastrous impact of rail privatization, with two-thirds of people in Britain, for example, supporting rail renationalization. In France itself, many remember that a similar restructuring of France Telecom in 1997 was sworn by the PS government of the day not to open the door to privatization. That giant state firm has since become a gold mine for private interests.

As the fight continues, the most fundamental issue will also start gaining more weight: the need for a comprehensive rail network as part of any project for environmental sustainability. The CGT rail worker division’s pamphlet Together for the Railway, published on March 9, is an important weapon in this battle for hearts and minds.

It begins by showing with facts and figures that rail is the least polluting, safest and healthiest transport mode. For passenger traffic, trains have nearly seven times less negative impact than private cars, two-and-a-half times less than aircraft and two times less than buses. For freight, the impact for trains is five times less than for trucks and 1.8 times less than for ships.

The document then lays to rest the myth that rail privatization is needed to guarantee greater efficiency and better services, noting that the best rail system in Europe as measured by Boston Consulting Group’s European Railway Performance Index is the 100% public Swiss network.

It next reveals the extent of state subsidy to road transport, including expressway construction, the degree of underinvestment in the rail network compared, say, to Germany, as well as the real cost of the partial privatization to date of rail-related services and of restructuring for competitiveness and eventual privatization.

It finishes with a “transitional program” for transport, including the state taking over some part of the SNCF’s debt (as happened with Germany and Deutsche Bahn), the renationalization of the expressway system (since 2005 run by private franchises) and the establishment of environmental, social and safety standards for all transport modes.

A vital battle has just begun and is winnable. As “someone very close to Macron,” quoted in the March 15 Liberation, said: “If Macron starts to wobble, the whole show collapses.” •

This article first published on the Links–International Journal of Socialist Renewal website.

A lawsuit alleging that President Donald Trump has violated constitutional law by profiting from his Washington, D.C. hotel will proceed, after a federal judge in Maryland rejected the Trump administration’s bid to have the case thrown out on Wednesday.

The attorneys general of Washington, D.C. and Maryland allege that Trump is in violation of the Constitution’s emoluments clauses, which bar the president from receiving gifts from foreign or state governments, by continuing to benefit from the business of the Trump International Hotel.

“If the president would like to avoid the case going further and curtail the serious harms caused by his unconstitutional conduct, now would be a good time to divest from his businesses.” —Noah Bookbinder, CREW“The basic principal here is Donald Trump is not above the law, and the court recognized that and said that we can enforce the nation’s original anti-corruption law,” Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh told the Washington Post.

Foreign heads of state and state officials have stayed in and held events at the hotel frequently since Trump took office. Maine Governor Paul LePage stayed at the property last year just before the president included a national monument that LePage had opposed in a review of national parks. A public relations firm also spent $270,000 on behalf of the Saudi government at the hotel, as the country was fighting to roll back a law allowing the families of September 11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia for any alleged involvement in the attacks.

Trump gave up running the hotel when he became president last year, but he still owns and can withdraw funds from his business at any time.

Though a similar ethics lawsuits against the president, filed by the Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington (CREW) was thrown out in December, the watchdog group  is now serving as co-counsel on the attorneys generals’ suit.

The judge ruled that Maryland and the District of Columbia could reasonably claim to have been harmed by the business of the Trump International Hotel, which may have an unfair advantage over hotels and convention centers in the area.

If the ruling goes unchallenged, the plaintiffs could obtain financial records of Trump’s business to determine exactly how much money the organization has received from foreign and state governments.

“The president’s violations of the emoluments clauses are immediate and serious, and it was vital for civic-minded leaders inside and outside of government to take decisive action to protect the constitution and the interests of the people,”

said CREW’s executive director, Noah Bookbinder, in a statement.

“If the president would like to avoid the case going further and curtail the serious harms caused by his unconstitutional conduct, now would be a good time to divest from his businesses and end his violations of the emoluments clauses of the Constitution. We need to know that the president is acting in the best interest of the country, not his companies.”

A couple of years ago I had a pair of sunglasses stolen from my car when I forgot to take them with me when the car was being serviced. I complained to the garage and indignantly reported this important event to my wife. Spookily, the following day I started receiving ads in my Facebook feed for where I could buy exactly the same pair of sunglasses. I thought my natural gift of cynicism had turned into paranoia. As Joseph Heller said in Catch 22 – “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.” In Facebook’s case – it turns out they are!

From Canada’s National Post, (Screenshot below) comes the report that one of their own citizens is testifying that exactly my sunglasses experience was indeed not paranoia but a matter of fact – Facebook did indeed have the capacity to listen in to my private conversations.

The report starts off with “Facebook could be listening to its user’s conversations through smartphone microphones, Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie says. He appeared in front of a committee of British parliamentarians on Tuesday, and in his nearly four hours of testimony, he used words like “fraud” and “cheat” to describe the use of Facebook data to affect the outcomes of Brexit. He also addressed the longstanding internet theory that Facebook spies on its users to shape their advertising.”

The report goes on to say that last year, a YouTube video of a man claiming Facebook gave him cat food ads because of a conversation with his girlfriend went viral. And the eavesdropping claims are regularly discussed on social media. To be fair, the video is actually both quite funny and just a bit scary.

Conservative MP Damian Collins, who chaired the committee, asked Wylie if the rumours were true.

“There’s been various speculation about the fact that Facebook can, through the Facebook app on your smartphone, listen in to what people are talking about and discussing and using that to prioritize the advertising as well,” Collins said. “Other people would say, no, they don’t think it’s possible. It’s just that the Facebook system is just so good at predicting what you’re interested in that it can guess.”

Whilst Wylie said that he was only speculating (presumably to protect his legal position), he went on to say that Facebook and other apps can listen in and figure out the context of where you are based on the sounds in your environment. It picks up whether your TV is on, or if you’re at work or at home based on “environmental context,” he said.

“There’s audio that could be useful just in terms of, are you in an office environment, are you outside, are you watching TV, what are you doing right now?” Wylie said.

The social media giant has repeatedly denied using people’s microphones to target ads or tailor users’ news feeds. But Facebook also said that its app only accesses the microphone on a smartphone if the user gave it permission to do so, and only if the user is using a feature that requires audio, for example, if they are recording a video.

Last October, Facebook’s vice president of ads addressed the rumour again. “I run ads product at Facebook. We don’t — and have never — used your microphone for ads. Just not true,” Rob Goldman tweeted.

But as privacy activist Paul-Olivier Dehaye, who was at the hearing, points out, Facebook’s “opaque” practices means there’s no telling how much data users hand over.

Dylan Curran at The Guardian downloaded his Facebook data – his was roughly 600MB, which is roughly 400,000 Word documents. This includes every message you’ve ever sent or been sent, every file you’ve ever sent or been sent, all the contacts in your phone, and all the audio messages you’ve ever sent or been sent. It stores everything you liked and what you and your friends talk about. They store all the apps you’ve downloaded, what type of phone you have and when you bought it.

Curran confirms the data they collect which includes tracking where you are, what applications you have installed, when you use them, what you use them for, access to your webcam and microphone at any time, your contacts, your emails, your calendar, your call history, the messages you send and receive, the files you download, the games you play, your photos and videos, your music, your search history, your browsing history, even what radio stations you listen to.

And there’s a sinister side to all of this. Facebook is willing to sell all this data to anyone with enough money to buy it. It knows what your political tendencies are, your sexual preferences and even designed tools to understand what you are thinking by your device keystrokes and are quite prepared to sell these most private of thoughts.

In fact, according to the BBC, Facebook will sell 5,000 pieces of information about you. Did you know you even had 5,000 pieces of interesting information to know? I didn’t. But if they can listen in, record and store everything as you step through daily life, then I guess they would. It’s not just about selling advertising though is it. It’s about who they sell it to and what they want with it.

What happens if the government fancied the idea of clamping down on dissenting voices for instance. Nah – they wouldn’t do that, would they? After Thersa May’s recent announcement you might want to think again.

Facebook has shown no professional ethics whatsoever – this much is revealed with the scandal engulfing them with their association with Cambridge Analytica and SCL Elections. There’s more to come on this story, of course.

The Pentagon and Poland Wednesday signed a $4.75 billion deal to sell the eastern European country the Patriot anti-missile system.

While Poland’s extreme right-wing government hailed the arms deal, the largest in the country’s history, it will undoubtedly further stoke tensions between the West and Moscow, which has viewed the deployment of such systems as part of a concerted effort by Washington and its allies to undermine Russia’s ability to defend itself against a nuclear attack.

“It is an extraordinary, historic moment; it is Poland’s introduction into a whole new world of state-of-the-art technology, modern weaponry, and defensive means,” Polish President Andrzej Duda said during the signing ceremony, which was held at an armaments factory before a column of Polish troops.

“It’s a lot of money, but we also know from our historical experience that security has no price,” said Duda, whose authoritarian regime will no doubt extract the money to pay for the missiles through redoubled attacks on the living standards of Polish workers.

The Polish arms deal has been inked in the midst of a coordinated international campaign led by London and Washington to indict Moscow for the poisoning of the ex-Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the southern English city of Salisbury on March 4.

Russia has denied any involvement in the poisoning, which the British authorities have claimed was carried out with a nerve agent “of a type” (Novichok) that had once been manufactured in the Soviet Union and that it was “highly likely” that the attack was the work of Russia.

Without presenting any evidence to substantiate these accusations—much less any conceivable motive for Moscow to carry out such an action on the eve of the presidential election in Russia—the British Conservative government of Prime Minister Theresa May expelled 23 Russian diplomats.

London has refused Moscow’s requests to supply a sample of the alleged nerve agent used in the attack, as is required by international chemical weapons treaties. The Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement Wednesday charging that the attitude of the May government shows that “UK authorities are not interested in finding out the motives and those responsible for the crime in Salisbury and suggests that the British intelligence services are involved in it.”

Washington joined this anti-Russian crusade, ordering the expulsion of 60 Russian diplomatic personnel and the closing of the Russian consulate in Seattle, while joining with London in pressuring other countries to follow suit. More than 20 other countries responded with expulsions. Most of these countries took only token actions, however, involving one or two Russian diplomats. Nine members of the EU took no action. The only expulsion of more than four diplomats in Europe came from the rabidly anti-Russian government of Ukraine, which ordered 13 Russian diplomats to leave the country.

Poland, which along with Germany, France and Canada was one of the countries expelling four Russians, has long served as a pillar of the military buildup by the US and NATO against Russia.

Since the coming to office of the Trump administration, Washington has openly promoted the forging of closer ties to Warsaw and other eastern European governments, reviving the so-called Intermarium project of the 1920s, in which the US sought an alliance with fascistic and right-wing regimes in the region directed against both the Soviet Union and the rise of Germany as a continental hegemon.

The turn toward Eastern Europe is in large part a response to mounting tensions between Washington and Germany, which is increasingly seeking its own great power interests, including through commercial and other ties with Russia. While Berlin joined with the UK, France and the US in signing a joint declaration blaming Russia for the Skripal poisoning, there exist sharp divisions within the German ruling establishment and Chancellor Angela Merkel’s grand coalition government over the issue.

“We must do everything possible to prevent a new Cold War with Russia,” Social Democrat Gernot Erler, the government coordinator for Russia, told the Passauer Neue Presse.

Other prominent Social Democrats went further. Former European Commissioner Guenter Verheugen questioned the objective basis for the sanctions. “The view that if in doubt, ‘Putin and the Russians are responsible for everything’, is one that poisons thought and must stop,” he told the Augsburger Allgemeine.

Such views reflect the concerns of major German corporate and financial interests, whose profits are tied up with the Russian market.

The German Committee on Eastern European Economic Relations, whose members include some 200 German companies, warned against “over-hasty conclusions” over the Skripal affair leading to a “spiral of escalation.”

Just one day after it expelled a handful of Russian diplomats, the German government on Tuesday announced final approval for the construction and operation of the Russia-led Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which will pipe Russian natural gas to Germany under the Baltic Sea. The project has been bitterly opposed by both Washington and its Eastern European allies.

It is no doubt such tensions that the US defense secretary, Gen. James Mattis, had in mind when he told reporters at the Pentagon that Russia was “trying to break the unity of the Western alliance.” Mattis claimed that it was “pretty obvious” that Russia was responsible for the attack on Skripal and charged Moscow with having “chosen to be a strategic competitor, even to the point of reckless activity.”

The sharp divisions that have emerged among the NATO powers notwithstanding, there are continuous signs that active preparations are underway for war with Russia.

Senior US military officers speaking at the Association of the United States Army’s Global Force Symposium on Monday issued warnings that the Pentagon must “dramatically increase the range of the service’s artillery and missile systems to counter a Russian threat that would leave ground forces without air support in the ‘first few weeks’ of a war in Europe,” the website military.com reported. The American military, the officers revealed, is working on a number of new weapons systems designed to counteract supe’ve got to push the maximum range of all systems under development for close, deep and strategic, and we have got to outgun the enemy,” Gen. Robert Brown, commanding general of United States Army Pacific Command, told an audience of military officers and defense contractors.

Meanwhile, the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, announced Wednesday that it has launched an initiative to create a “military Schengen zone,” allowing NATO military forces to freely cross European borders. The military project is being unveiled even as right-wing nationalist and anti-immigrant European politicians, including Germany’s new Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, are openly rejecting the original Schengen Agreement, in effect for over two decades, which allows border control free travel between the 26 European countries that signed on to it.

EU transport commissioner Violeta Bulc told reporters that the aim was to ensure “quick and seamless mobility across the continent. This is a matter of collective security.”

In addition to removing border controls, she said that investments would be made to assure that key corridors would be capable of handling tanks and heavy military vehicles. “We must be able to quickly deploy troops either within the EU or rapidly launch military operations abroad and to do so we need infrastructure that is fit for the purpose.”

Russian Deputy Defense Minister Col. Gen. Alexander Fomin responded to the announcement by stating that the real goal was to “fast-track to the maximum extent … deployment towards Russia’s borders.”

He also told the Russian Defense Ministry’s official newspaper that the US and NATO were creating arsenals of weapons ammunition and food supplies in various countries, including Poland, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, to prepare for war with Russia.

On March 27, 13 defendants went into the West Roxbury District courthouse to answer charges related to their arrests protesting the West Roxbury Massachusetts Lateral Pipeline. They expected to have charges against them reduced to civil infractions — the equivalent of a parking ticket. While finding no grounds to deny that motion from the prosecution, the judge chose to let each defendant testify briefly on the necessity of their actions.

The defendants collectively presented a powerful and comprehensive argument for why it was necessary to engage in civil disobedience to stop the imminent local and global harms of this fracked gas pipeline. Following their testimony, the judge acquitted ALL the defendants by reason of necessity.

While defendants in this case were still denied a jury trial and the possibility of presenting a full necessity defense, this was the first time that we know of that defendants were acquitted based on climate necessity. The defendants told the story of the campaign against the West Roxbury Lateral Pipeline and how their actions were justified by the threat of climate change.

Lawyers for the 13 activists suggested there may even have been a “cause and effect” – that charges were reduced in order to avoid the trial for which the defendants, their legal team, eight expert witnesses, and many supporters had prepared.

Activists said they were disappointed that they would not get the chance to present their case to a jury of their peers, but not disheartened. “The attempt to take these cases to trial was a long shot,” said Marla Marcum, co-founder of the Climate Disobedience Center and a spokesperson for the group. “As climate activists in 2018, we know that long shots and moral imagination are some of the most promising tools for culture-shifting transformation.”

With the judge dismissing the charges, the campaign was a success even without the trial. As Nathan Phillips, a professor in the Earth and Environment Department at Boston University and one of the defendants, said “We forced Spectra to admit to the judge that they did not have and do not have a safety plan for the West Roxbury Lateral pipeline and likely any projects going forward.”

The result in this case is an important part of building power to fight the fossil fuel industry. Climate justice advocates told their story not just in court but from the way they created their protest, which included “Digging Mass Graves” to highlight the dangers of climate change.

“What we stood for is true, and that truth is in the process of coming to light, regardless of the fact that the system is unable to fully hear it right now,” said Karenna Gore, daughter of former Vice President Al Gore and Director of the Center for Earth Ethics of at Union Theological Seminary in New York.

Activists continued to tell their story after the protest. See this blog from Tim DeChristopher, and by Rev. Lara Hoke. The participants consistently made the point that they restated before the court — there is an urgent necessity to stop building carbon infrastructure as climate change will kill millions of people and cause immense environmental damage.

This protest and refusal to accept a plea bargain built the movement’s power and demonstrated the violence of carbon energy infrastructure projects.

The defendants were among roughly 200 protesters who had been arrested as part of a massive campaign against this pipeline, beginning in mid 2015. Initially concerned with local  safety– the risk of locating a high pressure facility in a densely-populated neighborhood and across the street from an active blasting quarry—protesters gained support from Boston Mayor Walsh and the entire Boston City Council, Congressman Lynch, Senators Markey and Warren, State Representative Coppinger and State Senator Rush, as well as residents and officials from the Town of Dedham through which the pipeline also runs.

This is not just one protest but part of a national resistance movement for climate justice with activists taking action across the country to stop carbon energy infrastructure and extraction of oil and gas. We urge you to share this report so tens of thousands of people will see principled climate disobedience actions as one kind of necessary leadership in a time when our regulatory systems and our government are owned by the fossil fuel industry. We hope this action will inspire more people to take direct action, risk arrest, and pursue novel legal strategies.

The Climate Disobedience Center provides a guide for activists on how to use the tool of the necessity defense in climate cases. It defines climate necessity as: “The climate necessity defense is an argument made by a criminal defendant to justify action taken on behalf of the planet. It’s offered by activists who have been arrested for protesting fossil fuel extraction and government inaction on climate policy.” [Emphasis in original] The necessity defense is a long-time defense used in civil disobedience cases where activists argue that their violation of the law should not result in conviction because they were acting out of necessity to prevent a greater harm. In climate cases, the argument is the impacts of climate change are so serious that breaking the law is necessary to avert them.

The trial was supported by Climate Disobedience Center, the Massachusetts Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, Climate Defense Project, and 198 Methods.

For more information visit the Climate Disobedience Center and Stop the West Roxbury Lateral. The above report is based in part on the press release from the defendants.

The latest neo-conservative warmonger to join the Trump Administration does not bode well for the people of Iran.

On Thursday Donald Trump announced that John Bolton, a former official in George W. Bush’s administration and former ambassador to the UN, would be his new National Security Advisor. Bolton is a warhawk who called for the invasion of Iraq in search of non-existent weapons of mass destruction and has for years called for the invasion of Iran.

I am pleased to announce that, effective 4/9/18, @AmbJohnBolton will be my new National Security Advisor. I am very thankful for the service of General H.R. McMaster who has done an outstanding job & will always remain my friend. There will be an official contact handover on 4/9.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 22, 2018

Middle East Eye collected a number of quotes from Bolton over the years that indicate his plans for Iran and other nations viewed as a threat to national security of the U.S. government. And by that I mean the people who secretly wield control of corporate and state power. In 2009, Bolton said that regime change is “ultimately, the only thing that will stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons.” As recent as 2015 Bolton call for a U.S./Israel joint bombing campaign.“Such action should be combined with vigorous American support for Iran’s opposition, aimed at regime change in Tehran.”

People, let this be very clear: The appointment of Bolton is essentially a declaration of war with Iran.

With Pompeo and Bolton, Trump is assembling a WAR CABINET.

If we want peace, Pompeo MUST be blocked in the Senate. A vote for him is a vote for war. https://t.co/6TF2pdhJAG

— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) March 22, 2018

Further, it seems that Bolton and former Mayor of New York Rudy Giuliani have already promised the regime change would be happening within the next year. “Just eight months ago, at a Paris gathering, Bolton told members of the Iranian exile group, known as the Mujahedeen Khalq, MEK, or People’s Mujahedeen, that the Trump administration should embrace their goal of immediate regime change in Iran and recognize their group as a ‘viable’ alternative,” The Intercept reports.

“The behavior and the objectives of the regime are not going to change and, therefore, the only solution is to change the regime itself,” newly appointed National Security Advisor John Bolton told the crowd. The Intercept also noted that Iranian expatriate journalist Bahman Kalbasi reported that Bolton ended his talk by promising, “And that’s why, before 2019, we here will celebrate in Tehran!”

At a recent celebration of the Persian New Year, Rudy Giuliani promised the audience that “if anything, John Bolton has become more determined that there needs to be regime change in Iran, that the nuclear agreement needs to be burned, and that you need to be in charge of that country.” Disturbingly, Giuliani reportedly led the crowd in a chant of “regime change!”.

It should also be noted that Bolton is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, an organization whose members have influenced the state of geopolitics for the last few generations. Bolton was also a member of the neo-conservative, warhawk think tank, “Project for the New American Century,” which was enthusiastically promoting the lie about Saddam Hussein possessing weapons of mass destruction.

In 2000, PNAC released a report titled Rebuilding America’s Defenses which outlined a strategy of regime change in Iraq and beyond. Under a section titled “Creating Tomorrow’s Dominant Force,” the think tank wrote the following controversial line:

Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbor.

The UK government’s presentation on the Salisbury incident, which was repeatedly cited in recent days as an “ultimate proof” of Russia’s involvement into Skripal’s assassination attempt, was made public earlier today.

This 6-paged PDF is a powerful evidence of another intellectual low of British propaganda machine. Open it and you can tell that substantially it makes only two assertions on the Skripal case, and both are false: 

First. Novichok is a group of agents developed only by Russia and not declared under the CWC” – a false statement. Novichok was originallydeveloped in the USSR (Nukus Lab, today in Uzbekistan, site completely decommissioned according to the US-Uzbekistan agreement by 2002).

One of its key developers,  Vil Mirzayanov, defected to the United States in 1990s, its chemical formula and technology were openly published in a number of chemical journals outside Russia. Former top-ranking British foreign service officer Craig Murray specifically noted this point on March 17:

I have now been sent the vital information that in late 2016, Iranian scientists set out to study whether novichoks really could be produced from commercially available ingredients. Iran succeeded in synthesising a number of novichoks. Iran did this in full cooperation with the OPCW and immediately reported the results to the OPCW so they could be added to the chemical weapons database.

This makes complete nonsense of the Theresa May’s “of a type developed by Russia” line, used to parliament and the UN Security Council. This explains why Porton Down has refused to cave in to governmental pressure to say the nerve agent was Russian. If Iran can make a novichok, so can a significant number of states.

Second. “We are without doubt that Russia is responsible. No country bar Russia has combined capability, intent and motive. There is no plausible alternative explanation”

– an outstading example of self-hypnosis. None of the previous items could even remotedly lead to this conclusion. The prominent British academician from the University of Kent Prof. Richard Sakwa has elaborated on this on March 23 the following way:

Rather than just the two possibilities outlined by Theresa May, in fact there are at least six, possibly seven. The first is that this was a state-sponsored, and possibly Putin-ordered, killing…  This version simply does not make sense, and until concrete evidence emerges, it should be discounted…

The second version is rather more plausible, that the authorities had lost control of its stocks of chemical weapons. In the early 1990s Russian facilities were notoriously lax, but since the 2000s strict control over stocks were re-imposed, until their final destruction in 2017. It is quite possible that some person or persons unknown secreted material, and then conducted some sort of vigilante operation…

The third version is the exact opposite: some sort of anti-Putin action by those trying to force his policy choices…

The fourth version is similar, but this time the anti-Putinists are not home-grown but outsiders. Here the list of people who would allegedly benefit by discrediting Russia is a long one. If Novichok or its formula has proliferated, then it would not be that hard to organise some sort of false flag operation. The list of countries mentioned in social media in this respect is a long one. Obviously, Ukraine comes top of the list, not only because of motivation, but also because of possible access to the material, as a post-Soviet state with historical links to the Russian chemical weapons programme. Israel has a large chemical weapon inventory and is not a party to the OPCW; but it has no motivation for such an attack (unless some inadvertent leak occurred here). Another version is that the UK itself provoked the incident, as a way of elevating its status as a country ‘punching above its weight’. The British chemical weapons establishment, Porton Down, is only 12 kilometres from Salisbury. While superficially plausible, there is absolutely no evidence that this is a credible version, and should be discounted.

The fifth version is a rather more elaborate development of the previous point. There is circumstantial evidence, a version outlined by the Daily Telegraph, that Skripal may have had a hand in devising Christopher Steele’s ‘Trump Dossier’. The British agent who originally recruited Skripal, Pablo Miller, lives in Salisbury, and also has connections with Orbis International, Steele’s agency in London. In this version, Skripal is still working in one way or another with MI6, and fed stories to Steele, who then intervenes massively in US politics, effectively preventing the much-desired rapprochement between Trump and Putin. Deep anger at the malevolent results of the Steele and British intervention in international politics and US domestic affairs prompts a revenge killing, with the demonstration effect achieved by using such a bizarre assassination weapon.

The sixth version is the involvement of certain criminal elements, who for reasons best known to themselves were smuggling the material, and released it by accident. In this version, the Skripals are the accidental and not intended victims. There are various elaborations of this version, including the activities of anti-Putin mobsters. One may add a seventh version here, in which Islamic State or some other Islamist group seeks to provoke turmoil in Europe.

Do you wish to know our refutations of any other substantial “hard evidence” against Russia in the UK paper? Sorry, but that is all. The primitive information warriors in what used to be the heart of a brilliant empire, today are incapable of designing an even slightly plausible (they love this word, right?) document on a super-politicized case.

What follows is even more depressing. Slide 3 is dedicated to some sort of anatomy lesson:

The authors of this “report” mixed up a very strange cocktail of multitype allegations, none of which have ever been proven or recognized by any responsible entity (like legal court or dedicated official international organization). Of course we are not committed to argue on every cell, but taking e.g. “August 2008 Invasion of Georgia” we actually can’t understand why the EU-acknowledged Saakashvili’s aggression against South Ossetia is exposed here as an example of “Russian malign activity”…

Have you totally lost your minds, ladies & gentlemen from the Downing Street?

The US and EU economic sanctions on Syria are inflicting suffering upon ordinary Syrians and preventing the delivery of humanitarian aid, according to a leaked UN internal report. Embargoes supposed to target President Bashar al-Assad to contribute to his removal from power instead are creating difficulties for transit of foodstuffs, fuel and healthcare to the populace.

Aid agencies cited in the report say they cannot procure basic medicines or medical equipment for hospitals because sanctions prevent foreign commercial companies and banks having anything to do with Syria. A European doctor working in Syria remarks “the indirect effect of sanctions … makes the import of medical instruments and other medical supplies immensely difficult, nearly impossible.”

Revelations in the internal UN assessment of effects of sanctions on aid delivery titled “Humanitarian Impact of Syria-Related Unilateral Restrictive Measures,” leaked by the investigative publication The Intercept, have opened the US and EU to charges of hypocrisy since Syria and Russia were criticized for impeding delivery of UN aid to besieged Syrian cities.

The Intercept quotes an internal UN e-mail by a senior official saying sanctions have been a “principal factor” degrading the Syrian health system; they’ve contributed to price rises of 300% for wheat flour and 650% for rice following a doubling of fuel prices in the last 18 months.

Syria was once largely self-sufficient in pharmaceuticals but many production plants in the Aleppo area have been destroyed or rendered unusable by conflict. The e-mail indicates many surviving plants have been forced to close due to sanctions on obtaining raw materials from abroad (and the foreign currency to pay for them).

The UN report’s author describes conflict in Syria as the greatest humanitarian crisis the world has seen since 1945; 13 million people, or two-thirds of the population, in need of assistance. The disaster has prompted exodus of at least five million refugees and displacement of four million people internally. It goes further to say chaos has weakened the state and certain conditions have fostered the growth of ISIS.

Sanctions are catalyzing humanitarian calamity while Mr. Assad remains firmly in power. In many respects the situation resembles Iraq’s (between 1990 and 2003): UN sanctions lead to social dissolution and destroyed that economy without reducing the power of Saddam Hussein as Iraqi leader. Many critics of Iraqi sanctions argue that mass impoverishment contributed significantly to political and sectarian breakdown after the invasion of 2003.

The report asserts the same process is now taking place in Syria. “In totality, the US and EU sanctions in Syria are some of the most complicated and far-reaching sanctions regimes ever imposed.” Synchronous with the humanitarian crisis is a complex network of non-UN sanctions targeting the government and entities and individuals alleged to have contributed to violence and human rights abuses. The EU has imposed wide-ranging prohibitions on commercial and banking dealings with Syria and controlled export of “dual use” items potentially having some security application while US sanctions extend further– a blanket ban on financial dealings with and export of foreign goods (with US content exceeding ten percent of a finished item’s value) to Syria. Viable means of getting purely humanitarian goods into the country are sporadic if possible at all.

The report cites numerous aid agencies in Syria describing work difficult or impossible by a system of licenses, export controls, and risk management assessments worthy of Dante or Machiavelli; other complications require expensive legal advice to navigate. For instance, the ban on “dual use” goods includes such items as drilling equipment and pipes used for water and sanitation which require a special license – even though a shortage of fresh drinking water is a major health issue in Syria.

The big aid agencies universally condemn present sanctions as compounding miseries caused by war. None are named in the report, but a large one from the EU complains of license applications (for sending goods via national government bureaucracies) requiring criteria of which officials there know nothing — compounding delays — while many commercial companies and banks reject business with Syria for fear of unwittingly breaching sanctions punishable by heavy fines.

Russia calls on US and EU to lift Syrian Sanctions

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called on the US and EU to reconsider lifting their sanctions imposed on the Syrian people. “Continuing communications between Moscow and Brussels is a very important issue while cutting them off is shortsightedness,” Lavrov said at a press conference held with Federica Mogherini, the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. Mogherini, for her part, affirmed that the EU is ready to “support the process of having normal life back in Syria,” according to RT.

How sanctions have affected children with cancer in Syria

Of an estimated 300,000 new cases of childhood cancer diagnosed each year globally, survival rates for children is approaching 80% in developed countries compared to 10% in developing and low-income countries, according to SANA.  

According to a study conducted by BASMA Association for children with cancer, which provides free treatment to about 650 yearly, up to 50% in Syria are cured amid international concerns over the growth of this non-communicable disease– and an abundance of local challenges including drug shortage and price hikes. Rima Salem, Executive Director at BASMA Association, said the study used data for children between 2009 and 2013 based on fact that treatment for most common cancers requires at least 5 years to determine treatment benefits.  She added that to mark International Childhood Cancer Day (February 15th annually) the association’s campaign this year will launch under the title “Smile has returned” and will include 28 ways to bring focus to pediatric cancer, provide support to children with cancer, and awareness-raising activities in public and private universities. Salem noted there has been a little improvement in medicine availability and is highly appreciative of efforts made by those attempting to bring smiles to the faces of children.

Director of the University Children’s Hospital in Damascus Dr. Mazen al-Haddad said the hospital receives up to 7000 children with cancer every year, providing 97% of cancer medicines to patients for free– another high-pressure challenge related to temporary closure of al-Bairouni Hospital and transfer of all cancer patients to the Children’s Hospital.

Al Qamishly cancer concerns due to oil extraction

According to Syrian-Australian documentary film-maker and activist Eddie Hanna Gaboro, he learned of cancer cases in the city of Al Qamishly during his trip in July of 2017. He was on a mission bringing aid to and assisting various churches in Syria. Due to sanctions, ten hospitals in operation are still unable to obtain medicine and treatment necessary for their assortment of cancer afflictions. While visiting he was told that methods of deriving diesel fuel from oil heavily polluted the air, drastically increasing the number of patients–90 in Al Qamishly alone–now suffering from certain types of cancer.

Image: SANA Prime Minister Imad Khamis visiting cancer patients in the Children’s Hospital in Damascus

Sanctions need to be lifted and false pretenses dropped

Sanctions meant to negatively impact the democratically elected president of Syria have proven detrimental to civilians, especially when it comes to health and medical needs. What the US and EU have effectively done with their harsh sanctions is make life increasingly difficult for the most vulnerable and innocent members of society. The Syrian government is doing whatever it can to counter these obstacles providing medicine and medical care to the best of it’s ability. If the US and EU actually cared about civilians, placing human need before strictly-focused agendas, they would ease sanctions directly affecting the majority of civilians. Evidence to the contrary is blatant: their humanitarian guise is nothing more than excuse to force “regime change” in a war- torn country.

“They called in [Roy] Wilkins; they called in [A. Philip] Randolph; they called in these national Negro leaders that you respect and told them, ‘Call it off.’ Kennedy said, ‘Look, you all are letting this thing go too far.’ And Old Tom said, ‘Boss, I can’t stop it, because I didn’t start it.’… And that old shrewd fox, he said, ‘If you all aren’t in it, I’ll put you in it. I’ll put you at the head of it.’… (Malcolm X on the 1963 “Farce on Washington”)

Liberals and Democrat party connected organizations and networks have been quite adept at getting out in front of movements to pre-empt their radical potential and steer them back into the safe arms of liberal conformism. Before resistance to the election of Donald Trump could be developed into a radical rejection of the neoliberal order, the new alignment of ruling class forces that coalesced around the candidacy of Hilary Clinton launched a pre-emptive strike against Trump with the two-fold objective of preventing him from governing and ensuring that opposition to Trump did not take on an anti-system character. 

A similar thing happened after the 2006 massive marches of undocumented migrant workers that had a militant anti-capitalist component. It was quickly marginalized and transformed into something called “immigrant rights” with the highest demand being a demand to become legalized settlers. Then, on the 50^th anniversary of the historic 1963 March on Washington when Black people were still experiencing the devastating and disproportionate impact of the capitalist crisis of 2007-08, members of the Black Mis-leadership class warmly welcomed the first Black president to join in the day’s festivities ensuring that the gathering would be devoid of any meaningful politics.    

Unfortunately, for the young people who sincerely want to understand and confront gun violence, the opportunism of the democrats made these students and their pain easy targets to advance the agenda of the democrat party that sees this issue as one that will advance their electoral agenda.   

While the democrat party and liberals pretend to respect and celebrate the young people, they know that the narrow focus on largely irrelevant gun control reforms like more background checks, banning certain ammunition clips, and sale of assault weapons will do nothing to confront what Dr. King referred to as the deep malady at the heart of U.S. culture that makes it so fundamentally violent.

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, points out in lavish detail on the subject in her new book Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment.” She reminds the reader of the central role of violence and the reason why the second amendment was seen by the ruling elite of the U.S. settler state as a fundamental right, second only to freedom of speech. She argues that the gun control and the normalization of violence was essential to how white nationalism, racialized dominance, and social control through systematic violence operated in the U.S. It was the method in which white settlers appropriated Native land and controlled their massive enslaved population.

So the young people will need to understand that this normalization of violence is reflected in the social institutions, values, and ethical framework of their society. The violent, white male shooters that are now turning their guns on the society at large are not an aberration but a logical, almost inevitable consequence of a culture in which people are degraded and de-humanized as instruments for others pleasure and exploitation, made into things, through what Dr. King called the process of “thingingfication.”

A respectful engagement with these young people is one in which you struggle with their understanding of the terms of their culture, its history and reality. We must be honest with them and help them to understand the role of violence not only as a cultural product but as the main instrument that created their nation.  That violence is systemic to the system and history of their settler-colonial nation and for the maintenance of the U.S. empire.

Judging from some of the statements, many of these young people are close to making the right connections. That it is the “thingingfication” of the racialized “other” that more people cannot see the moral contradiction between the concern for gun violence in the U.S. and their continued support for U.S. militarism abroad. 

Radical politicization means that they and the public at large come to terms with the fact that the arms industry and the proliferation of arms/weapons is not just a problem domestically but that it is a billion-dollar industry in which representatives from both parties are implicated. And if the NRA is a terrorist organization, what does that make the arms industries and the U.S. state? 

However, as long as those young people are ensnared by the morally challenged liberal democrats, their ideological development will be arrested, and a few will emerge as “new leaders” given salaries, awards for being in the struggle for two weeks and will become weapons used to block authentic radicalization among their constituency.  That is how hegemony works.   

Fredrick Jameson reminds us of the lesson that these young people will have to learn that they will not learn from their liberal benefactors: “The lesson is this, and it is a lesson about systems: one cannot change anything without changing everything.”

So, it was a good week for both bourgeois parties. The democrats didn’t get called out for their collaboration with Trump and the republicans on the budget. The Trump folks have more ammunition to use to mobilize their supporters in opposition to what they will frame as efforts to violate the constitution and take away their guns and give more power to a repressive government. Even the intelligence agencies benefited from the week’s events with attention being shifted away from the FBI scandal that is threatening to blow the cover off of official criminal activity to undermine the electoral process, not by the Russians, but unelected forces in the U.S. state.

But for those of us from the colonized Black and Brown zones of non-being, we can never allow ourselves to be distracted by the diversionary and accommodationist politics of the latest carefully crafted spectacle, especially one that proports to be advancing a superior moral politics.

We must always remind ourselves that some can march with the confidence that “their” government might be trusted with regulating weapons and protecting their lives but that the protection of our fundamental human rights rest with our ability to defend our collective rights, and no one else.

Through our painful lived experiences, we understand and must live by the insight provided by our dear brother, James Baldwin, who counseled us that we must be vigilant when our oppressors speak of morality and the sanctity of life: 

“The “civilized” have created the wretched, quite coldly and deliberately, and do not intend to change the status quo; are responsible for their slaughter and enslavement; rain down bombs on defenseless children whenever and wherever they decide that their “vital interests” are menaced, and think nothing of torturing a man to death; these people are not to be taken seriously when they speak of the “sanctity” of human life, or the conscience of civilized world.”   

Distraction can be deadly, let’s us get and stay woke!

Ajamu Baraka is the national organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace and was the 2016 candidate for vice president on the Green Party ticket. He is an editor and contributing columnist for the Black Agenda Report and contributing columnist for Counterpunch.  His latest publications include contributions to “Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Self-Determination in Jackson, Mississippi. He can be reached at: Ajamubaraka.com 

Introduction

Today it is quite obvious that Western-backed process of creation of a Greater Albania is not any propaganda myth but rather visible reality. South Serbia’s province of Kosovo-Metochia is already, de facto, a part of “united” Albania from June 1999 and current political situation in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia is surely going in the direction of the separation of North-West Macedonia mainly populated by Albanians who succeeded with the crucial Western support to promulgate a new language law in Macedonia’s Parliament according to which, the Albanian language is going to be the second state language (i. e., together with Macedonian the official language of the country) at the same time, however, when the Russian language is in the process of elimination from the schools at the Baltics.

Both concepts and projects of a Greater Albania were historically founded on the imperialistic ambitions of certain Albanian national leaders and supported by the Western Great Powers for geopolitical reasons. Therefore, claims on Greater Albania, to be established by the annexation of the territories from all present-day Albania’s neighbors, are founded on the following three policies of Albanian imperialistic nationalism as the history of Kosovo-Metochia is the best example of illustration: 1) Ethnic cleansing or expulsion of autochtonous inhabitants;[1] 2) Massive migration from Albania to neighboring territories and occupation of their households; and 3) Execution of politically motivated policy of extremely high natural birth-rate for the sake of changing ethnic breakdown of the land in question.[2] Nevertheless, one of the fundamental questions in regard to the issue of modern Albanian nationalistic imperialism is when it historically started. According to the relevant historical sources, it can be concluded that historical roots of the projects to create a Greater Albania are dating back to the year of 1878.

Anniversary

It is today 140-years anniversary of both the San Stefano Treaty and the Berlin Congress – two historical events which tremendously influenced the history of South-East Europe, or the Balkans, with direct implications to the European history as well as. There were many consequences of the “The Year of 1878” phenomenon to the European history but one of the most important was the opening of the “Albanian Question” to the Great European Powers of the time. Surely, Europe in 1878 faced the “Balkan Question” and its Albanian reflections. Consequences of this issue are clearly visible up today in Kosovo-Metochia and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia as Europe does not want to fix the problem of Albanian brutal nationalism and territorial expansion.

Albanians

The Albanian and Macedonian national movements emerged as the latest among all Balkan people for different reasons. Both of them started to be developed in a pure form in 1878 as a consequence of the results of the Great Eastern Crisis (1875−1878), which started in Serb-populated Ottoman East Herzegovina[3] and finished with Russo-Ottoman War (1877−1878). The Great Eastern Crisis “dramatically shifted the ethnic picture of the Balkans as the cartography of homogenization begin to transform ethnically heterogeneous regions into far more homogeneous spaces”.[4]

The Ottoman Muslim provincial governors (pashas) in Albania did not up to 1878 represent an Albanian national movement which could be comparable to that of the Balkan Christian nationalities in the neighboring areas regardless of the fact that they intended to establish autonomous administrative-political territory under their governorship. Although there was a strong intention and struggle for self-administration in Albania followed by resistance to taxation by the central Ottoman authorities, the population, which was composed by 70% of Muslims, 10% of Roman Catholics and 20% of Christian Orthodox, was in a great majority (only Muslims) in favor of living in the Ottoman Empire as Albania’s population of Islamic denomination understood all the time Muslim Ottoman Empire as their national-confessional state. Therefore, Muslim Albanians before 1878 have been firstly Muslims and then Albanians.

After Russian military victory over the Ottoman Empire in the 1877−1878 Russo-Ottoman War, it was signed the San Stefano Treaty between these two states on March 3rd, 1878.[5] According to the treaty, a Greater “San Stefano” Bulgaria, under the direct protectorate by Russia, had to be established within the borders of the Ottoman Empire. However, an idea of “San Stefano Bulgaria” directly affected three Balkan nations: Serbs, Greeks, and Albanians as some of their ethnic and historic territories had to become part of a Greater Bulgaria. A “San Stefano Bulgaria” was projected by Russia’s authorities to cover a territory from Danube River to the Aegean Sea and from present-day Albania to the Black Sea, including whole geographic-historic Macedonia, present-day East Serbia, and present-day South-East Albania. As a result, Albanian nation living in present-day South-East Albania and West Macedonia would become part of a Greater Bulgaria that would be governed by Russian representative.[6]

Treaties

It is characteristic of both the 1878 San Stefano Treaty and the 1878 Berlin Congress that they conceived parts of Albanian-populated Balkan territories to be given to other Balkan states according to the principle of ethnic and historic rights – decisions which became soon politicized by Albanians as allegedly being of an anti-Albanian policy by Europe. The remained Albanian ethnic space would be within the borders of the Ottoman Empire but without any “special status”, i.e., autonomous rights and ethnopolitical privileges.

The Ottoman government itself was feeble to protect Albanian populated territories consisted of about 85% of Muslim population, which showed the highest degree of political and ideological loyalty towards the sultan and Sublime Porte in Istanbul. Nevertheless, the decisions of the 1878 San Stefano Treaty resulted in the organization of Albanian self-defence system by their (Muslim) political leaders who preferred an autonomous status of a Greater Albania’s province within the Ottoman Empire, similarly to the status of Serbia, Moldavia and Wallachia, as the only guarantee for a “justifiable” administration over the (Muslim) Albanians in the future based on Islamic law and values.

For the very purpose to preserve the territories populated by Muslim Albanians it was established in 1878 the (First) League of Prizren in Metochia (Western Kosovo). This League of Prizren was created primarily in order to prevent encroachment by the Balkan Christian nations on self-understood national territory of Albanians regardless of the fact that in many regions or municipalities Albanians at that time were minority among the local population: for instance, in 1878 there were 70% Serbs and 30% Albanians in Prizren – the city called by Serbs as “Serbian Jerusalem”. Kosovo-Metochia as a region still at that time was populated by Serbian majority but the League of Prizren required the whole region for the province of a Greater Albania within the Ottoman Empire. However, at that time, the aim was not to establish an independent Albania[7] as the Ottoman Empire still was seen as a national-confessional state of the majority of Albanians who were the Muslims. The 1878 League of Prizren was convoked primarily as the Balkan pan-Islamic, but not particularly Albanian, a conference to deal with the preservation of the Ottoman Empire at the time of the sessions of Berlin Congress in June-July of the same year. The Berlin Congress, participated by all European Great Powers, had as its fundamental aim to drastically revise the decisions of San Stefano (Russo-Ottoman) Treaty.

The San Stefano Treaty accorded to the Slavic Bulgaria a portion of the following Albanian-settled lands: 1) The district of Korçë; and 2) The Debar area. According to the same treaty, Montenegro was granted by several municipalities at present-day North Albania and the areas of Bar and Ulcinj. The border between Ottoman Albania and Montenegro was fixed on the Bojana River and the Scodra Lake (as it is today). Nevertheless, an official representative of the Principality of Montenegro, Radonjić, required in Adrianople (Edirne) the city of Scodra to be included into enlarged Montenegro[8] on the basis that it was a capital of medieval Montenegro (called at that time Zeta).

However, what was exactly regarded at that time as Albania, and the Albanians as an ethnic identity, was not clear at all to anybody in Europe. The main reason was the fact that the official Ottoman censuses became a quite unreliable source to fix such problems because they were based rather on the religious identity than on strict ethnonational (i.e., ethnolinguistic) belonging. Practically, all Ottoman Islamic population, either they were the Albanians, Bosnians or Turks, were selected to one category (millet) – the Muslims (nation of Mohammed).[9] In other words, the national/ethnic differences were not marked in the Ottoman censuses at all. Nevertheless, regardless of the lack of the official statistics, it is possible to reconstruct the dispersion of the Albanian ethnicity at that time by using other historical sources. One of such source, for instance, is a report to the Austro-Hungarian authorities about the northern boundaries of Albanian language written by Austro-Hungarian consul F. Lippich in the mid-1877 during the Great Eastern Crisis and the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877−1878. According to this report, a northern linguistic border of the Albanians run from the city of Bar on the Montenegrin Adriatic littoral towards the Scodra Lake, then through two Montenegrin regions of Kolašin and Vasojevićs, after that towards the Ibar River and the city of Novi Pazar in Sanjak (Raška) up to the area of the South Morava River at present-day Serbia. The Albanian linguistic borderland was fixed on the East and the South-East to be around the Ochrid Lake, the cities of Bitola (Monastir) and Debar, and the upper Vardar River.[10] However, in many of these areas the Albanian language was spoken together, and even as a minority language, with the Slavonic languages as they are today officially called as Serbian, Montenegrin and Macedonian.

Nationalism

Surely, the San Stefano Treaty provoked the emergence of Albanian nationalism and forged Albanian nationalistic movement. A germ of Albanian national movement was growing from the 1840’s to the time of the Great Eastern Crisis of 1875−1878 when the first requirements for the establishment of Albanian-language schools and the preservation of national language were requested by Albanian public workers in the Ottoman Empire (Naum Panajot Bredi, Engel Mashi, Josiph Kripsi, John Skiroj, Hieronim de Rada, Vincenzo Dorsa, etc). However, Albanian national movement received a new impetus during the Balkan crisis of 1862 at the time of a new Montenegrin-Ottoman war when several members of the so-called “Scodra group” (Zef Ljubani, Pashko Vasa, and others) propagated the uprising of North Albania’s tribes in Roman Catholic Mirditë region against Montenegrin territorial pretensions on Albanian-populated areas. They also opposed the Ottoman authorities as they relied on the support by French Emperor Napoleon III (1852−1870) who was a protector of Roman Catholics in the region. In the case of the successful result of the rebellion, the independent and united principality of Albania would be created at the Balkans which would include all Albanian-populated territories.

The main Albanian ideologist at that time was Zef Jubani, born in Scutari in 1818, who claimed that Albanians already became a nation.[11] His primary political goal was a creation of an autonomous united Albania within the Ottoman Empire. Others, like Thimi Mitko and Spiro Dineja, favored Albania’s separation from the Ottoman Empire and creation of a dual Albanian-Greek confederate state similar to Austria-Hungary (from 1867). During the Great Eastern Crisis of 1875−1878, Albanian uprising in Mirditë in 1876−1877, led by Albanian patriots from Scodra, had as its ultimate political goal a creation of an autonomous Albania in the Ottoman Empire. The leaders of the uprising visited Montenegrin court in order to obtain a financial support from Montenegrin prince Nikola I (1860−1910; king 1910−1918). Such support was promised to the leader of Albanian delegation, Preng Dochi. What is important to stress is that Montenegrin prince stated on this occasion that Montenegro does not have any territorial aspirations on “Albanian” territories. At the same time, a Russian diplomat in Scodra, Ivan Jastrebov, pointed out that Europe faced the “Albanian Question”.

Albanian tribal chieftains from South Albania and North Epirus under the presidency of a prominent Muslim Albanian feudal lord Abdul-beg Frashëri convoked in 1877 a national meeting in the city of Ioannina when they required from the Sublime Porte in Istanbul to recognize a separate Albanian nationality, and therefore to give them a right to form an autonomous Albanian province (vilayet) within the Ottoman Empire. They required, in addition, that all officials in such Albanian vilayet should be of Albanian ethnic origin (but only Muslims), Albanian-language schools to be open and finally Albanian-language courts to be established. The Memorandum with such demands was sent to the Sublime Porte, but this supreme Ottoman governmental institution rejected to meet any of these Albanian national requirements which, in fact, were calling for the creation of a Greater Muslim Albania within the Ottoman Empire.

Privileges

A publishing of the San Stefano Treaty’s articles caused a great unrest and dissatisfaction among Albanian people[12] but primarily among those of Islamic confession as they understood that they will lose all social, economic and political privileges if they will be included into a Christian state. From that time onward, a previous Albanian movement just for improvement of the social conditions of Albanians living in the Ottoman Empire became, however, now transfigured into Albanian nationalistic movement which, in essence, was rooted into Islamic tradition and political dogmatism. Now Albanians were requiring either the creation of the politically autonomous province of (a Greater) Albania within the Ottoman Empire or the establishment of an independent (Greater) Albanian national state (based on the Islamic tradition and values).[13]

Especially North-East and East Albania experienced massive unrest and protest against the San Stefano Treaty that was addressed to the Great European Powers.[14] Thus, in April 1878 (Muslim) Albanians from the city of Debar (today in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) sent a telegram to British and Austro-Hungarian ambassadors to the Ottoman Empire, Layard, Zichy respectively, protesting against the annexation of the region of Debar by a newly projected San Stefano Bulgarian principality. It was emphasized in the telegram that the people from Debar are Albanians but not Bulgarians. Furthermore, according to the protest memo, the district of Debar encompassed 220,000 Muslims and 10,000 Christians; all of them, allegedly, were ethnic Albanians.[15] Finally, it was required that the Great European Powers would not allow Bulgaria to annex the region of Debar; instead, it should be left within the Ottoman Empire (as a “national” state of all Muslim Albanians).[16]

Similarly to Albanians from Debar, their compatriots from the city of Scodra and North-West Albania asked the Austro-Hungarian authority to foil inclusion of “Albanian” territories into Montenegro (whose independence was recognized by the Berlin Congress in 1878).[17] Albanians from several districts in Kosovo-Metochia (Prizren, Đakovica, Peć) protested in the Memorandum to Vienna against the partition of “their” lands between Serbia and Montenegro.[18] On May 8th, 1878 when “…today, we learned from the newspapers that the Ottoman government, unable to resist the pressure of Russia, has been obliged to accept our annexation by the Montenegrins…” a protest of Albanian population of Scodra, Podgorica, Spuž, Žabljak, Tivat, Ulcinj, Gruda, Kelmend, Hot, and Kastrat was addressed to the ambassador of France in Istanbul against the annexation of „Albanian“ land by the Principality of Montenegro.[19] Albanians from North Albania and Kosovo-Metochia, either Muslims or Roman Catholics, started to organize their own self-defense detachments (a territorial militia) and the local committees against incorporation of these territories into either Christian Orthodox Serbia or Montenegro. Another task of those numerous committees was to help to Albanian “refugees” from the areas already taken by Serbia and Montenegro according to the San Stefano Treaty.[20] Therefore, for example, on June 26th, 1878 from Priština was issued a protest of 6,200 Albanian emigrants who left the districts of Niš, Leskovac, Prokuplje, and Kuršumlija (today in Serbia), addressed to the Berlin Congress allegedly against the mass murders and rapes committed by Serbia’s army and the Bulgarian military units.[21]

Propaganda

Nevertheless, this letter of protest did not inform the participants of the Berlin Congress about three focal points of the issue that: 1) Those „expelled“ Albanians were not authochtonous people of the area as they were settled there as the Muslims from North Albania by the Ottoman authorities after 1699; 2) They firstly expelled local Christian Serbian population occupying their houses and land; 3) Majority of these Albanians were not expelled but rather left the region to Ottoman Kosovo-Metochia or Macedonia as being Muslims they did not want to live in Cristian state. In one word, such official protests by (Muslim) Albanians were much more a way of a political propaganda work but not based on the reality on the ground at least not to such extent as it was formally presented. The fact was that majority of (Muslim) Albanian „refugees“ voluntary left those lands ascribed by Russian-Ottoman Treaty of San Stefano to a Greater Bulgaria for the reason that Muslims do not want, in principle, to leave under non-Muslim government – i.e., the government of the „infidels“.[22]

Imperialism

It is true that the 1878 San Stefano Treaty provoked the creation of Albanian nationalism but, at the same time, it is also true that Albanian nationalism established the foundation of modern Albanian imperialism. From 1878 onward the programs that were more in line with contemporary European imperialistic nationalism were developed by some elements of Albanian leadership who were emphasizing the cultural and ethnolinguistic unity of Albanians, rather than the religious divisions. However, they called for the creation of Albanian united either autonomous province within the Ottoman Empire or an independent state composed of the four „Albanian“ vilayets (Ottoman administrative units): Kosovo, Bitola, Scodra, and Ioannina. However, only in two of them, Bitola and Scodra, ethnic Albanians had a single majority of a population. For instance, in 1878 Serbs still have been the ethnic majority of present-day territory of South Serbia’s province of Kosovo-Metochia but the province was already at that time fully appropriated by Albanian nationalistic imperialists for the creation of a Greater Albania – a project already realized for the first time during the WWII under the sponsorship by B. Mussolini and from September 1943 by A. Hitler.[23]

Conclusions

The roots of Albanian territorial megalomania that is formulated within the framework of a „united“ Greater Albania are dating back in 1878 as a consequence of the results of the Great Eastern Crisis. Modern Albanian nationalistic imperialism is originally framed by the (First) League of Prizren in 1878, which had an Islamic and pro-Ottoman character,[24] and from that time up to present day had, in essence, an Islamic foundation. All projects of a Greater Albania have been anti-Christian Orthodox and primarily anti-Russian. That is a focal reason why Roman Catholic and Protestant Western Christian Great Powers all the time have been supporting the creation of a Greater Albania.

Today, the fundamental sponsors of Albanian territorial imperialism are Western Christian leaders of US, NATO, and EU but not their Christian Orthodox member states or citizens. The reason for such reality is of а pure geopolitical nature: а Greater Albania has to be the fundamental bulwark against Russian presence and influence in the Balkans. Therefore, „the 1999 international intervention on Kosovo was largely a NATO affair“.[25]

Finally, which kind of a Greater Albania would face Europe can be seen from the example of present-day „independent“ Kosovo(stan): an Islamic mafia state.[26]

*

Dr. Vladislav B. Sotirović is Founder & Director of the Private Research Centre “The Global Politics” (www.global-politics.eu), Ovsishte, Serbia. Personal web platform: www.global-politics.eu/sotirovic. Contact: [email protected].

Notes

[1] For instance, Serbs from Kosovo-Metochia and Macedonia (i. e., from at that time Ottoman province of Vilayet of Kosovo) sent a Memorandum to the 1899 International Peace Conference in the Hague with the claims about Muslim Albanian terror against Christians [Батаковић Т. Д., Косово и Метохија у српско-арбанашким односима, Друго допуњено издање, Београд: Чигоја штампа, 2006, 115−123].

[2] For instance, in 1948 there were 498,242 Albanians and 171,911 Serbs in Kosovo-Metochia. However, according to Yugoslav census in 1981, there were 1226,736 Albanians and 209,497 Serbs in the same province [Батаковић Т. Б., Косово и Метохија: Историја и идеологија, Друго допуњено издање, Београд: Чигоја штампа, 2007, 182]. Nevertheless, according to the first Ottoman census in Kosovo-Metochia (in 1455), there were only 2% of the population with Albanian personal and family names. The rest have been the Serbs [Hadžibegić H., Handžić A., Kovačević E., (eds.), Oblast Brankovića. Opširni katastarski popis iz 1455. godine, 1, Sarajevo: Orijentalni institut u Sarajevu, 1972].

[3] Екмечић М., „Велика источна криза 1875−1878“, Прекретнице новије српске историје, Крагујевац: Лицеум, 1995, 66.

[4] Biondich M., The Balkans: Revolution, War, and Political Violence since 1878, Oxford−New York: Oxford University Press, 2011, VI.

[5] San Stefano (Yeşilköy) is today the Istanbul Airport [Петер Бартл, Албанци: Од Средњег века до данас, Београд: CLIO, 2001, 93].

[6] Parliamentary Papers, series “Accounts and Papers”, Vol. LXXXIII, Turkey, № 22, London, 1878, 10.

[7] Jelavich B., History of the Balkans: Twentieth Century, Cambridge, UK−New York−Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 1985, 84.

[8] “Article № 1” of the San Stefano Peace Treaty in Parliamentary Papers, series “Accounts and Papers”, Vol. LXXXIII, Turkey, № 22, London, 1878, 9−10; Sumner B. H., Russia and the Balkans, 1870−1880, Oxford, 1937, 410−415.

[9] For European officials, Albanians at that time were the Turks as they have been Muslims [Петер Бартл, Албанци: Од Средњег века до данас, Београд: CLIO, 2001, 94].

[10] Haus-Hof-und Staatsarchiv, Politisches Archiv, XII/256, Türkei IV, Lippich F., “Denkschrift über Albanien”, Wien, June 20^th, 1877, 8−9.

[11] According to M. Jevtić, the Albanians have not been formed as a nation in a modern European sense of the meaning of the term at that time or they are not a nation even today as the main framework of the Albanian national identity was and is primarily Islam – a religion which does not recognize existence of any ethnolinguistic identity among the Muslims who are considered to be one (confessional) “nation” [Јевтић М., Албанско питање и религија, Београд: Центар за проучавање религије и верску толеранцију, 2011; Јевтић М., „Исламска суштина албанског сецесионизма и културно наслеђе Срба“, Национални интерест, Vol. 17, No. 2, 2013, 238]. On the Islamic tradition and political doctrine, see in [Itzkowitz N., Ottoman Empire and Islamic Tradition, Chicago−London: The University of Chicago Press, 1980].

[12] Archives du Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, Paris, “Ceccaldi to Waddington, April 27^th, 1878”, № 213, Turquie, Correspondance politique des consuls, Scutari, 1878−1879, Vol. XXI.

[13] On the strong confessional-political division and even religious wars between the Albanians later on in 1915, see in [Pollo S., Puto A., Histoire d’Albania des origines á nos jours, Roanne, 1974, 183−186; Јевтић М., Проблеми политикологије религије, Београд: Центар за проучавање религије и верску толеранцију, 2012, 159−161].

[14] An academic concept of a Great Power is defined as a state “deemed to rank amongst the most powerful in a hierarchical state-system. The criteria that define a great power are subject to dispute, but four are often identified. (1) Great powers are in the first rank of military powers, having the capacity to maintain their own security and, potentially, to influence other powers. (2) They are economically powerful states… (3.) They have global, and not merely regional, spheres of interests. (4) They adopt a ‘forward’ foreign policy and have actual, and not merely potential, impact on international affairs” [Heywood A., Global Politics, New York−London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011, 7].

[15] The numbers of people of the Debar district was drastically exaggerated. The ethnic Albanians have not been the only districts’ inhabitants.

[16] Parliamentary Papers, series “Accounts and Papers”, “Layard to Salisbury, Therapia, May 4^th, 1878, Vol. LXXXIII, Turkey, № 41, London, 1878, 60−61; Archives du Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, Paris, “Ceccaldi to Waddington, Scutari, May 4^th, 1878”, № 214, Turquie, Correspondance politique des consuls, Scutari, 1878−1879, Vol. XXI.

[17] Novotny A., Österreich, die Türkei und das Balkan-problem im Jahre des Berliner Kongresses, Graz−Köln, 1957, 246.

[18] Ibid, 37, 247−253; Parliamentary Papers, series “Accounts and Papers”, 1878, Vol. LXXXI, Turkey, № 45, London, 1878, 35−36.

[19] Archives du Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, Paris, French Embassy at the Sublime Porte, Turkey, Vol. 417, 51−54, Supplement to the Report № 96 (original in French); Pollo S., Pulaha S., (eds.), Pages of the Albanian National Renaissance, 1878−1912, Tirana, 1978, 12−13.

[20] Parliamentary Papers, series “Accounts and Papers”, “Green to Salisbury, May 3^rd, 1878”, Vol. LXXXIII, Turkey, № 40, London, 1878, 60; Archives du Ministère des Affaires Etrangères, Paris, “Ceccaldi to Waddington, Scutari, May 4^th, 1878”, № 214, Turquie, Correspondance politique des consuls, Scutari, 1878−1879, Vol. XXI; Ibid, a copy of telegram signed by the Montenegrin Prince Nikola I Petrović-Njegoš, Cetinje, June 5^th, 1878, as annex № 1 to Dèpêche, June 9^th, 1878, № 218.

[21] Politisches Archiv des Auswartigen Amtes, Bonn, Turkey 129, Vol. 2, The Acts of the Congress of Berlin, 2, 1878, document № 110 (telegram); Pollo S, Pulaha S., (eds.), The Albanian League of Prizren, 1878−1881. Documents, Vol. I, Tirana, 1878, 73−74.

[22] Unfortunately, many Western quasi-academic „public opinion formers“ are misusing such historical sources in order to support Albanian false claims on the territories designed to be annexed into a Greater Albania. See, for instance: Malcolm N., Kosovo: A Short History, New York: New York University Press, 1998. To the same category of a political propaganda of „academic journalism“ are Albanian publications about „the truth on Kosova“ as, for example: Prifti K. et al (eds.), The Truth on Kosova, Tirana: Encyclopedia Publishing House, 1993.

[23] Imperialism is „policy of extending a state’s authority by territorial acquisition or by the establishment of economic and political hegemony“ [Mansbach W. R, Taylor L. K., Introduction to Global Politics, Second edition, London−New York, Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2012, 578].

[24] Самарџић Р. et al, Косово и Метохија у Српској историји, Београд: Српска књижевна задруга, 1989, 221.

[25] Gowland D., Dunphy R., Lythe Ch., The European Mosaic: Contemporary Politics, Economics and Culture, Third edition, Harlow, England: Pearson Education Limited, 2006, 311.

[26] Pean P., Fontenelle S., Kosovo une guerre ‘juste’ pour créer un etat mafieux, Paris: Librairie Arthème Fayard, 2013.

All images in this article are from Oriental Review.

The prospective meeting between President Trump and North Korea’s Chairman Kim Jong Un would be historic, and regardless of the outcome it will have major implications for years to come. The conflict over North Korea’s nuclear arsenals and ballistic missiles is complex. It is driven by a mindset seething with mutual suspicions and profound distrust between the US and North Korea, which dates back nearly seven decades and has profoundly prejudiced their ultimate intentions.

North Korea has violated several agreements with successive American administrations to end its nuclear program, while the US maintained open hostility and made no secret of its desire to effect regime change. What has dramatically changed the dynamic of the conflict, however, is the convergence of four major developments which made it possible for Kim to invite Trump to negotiate an end to the conflict.

First, North Korea has succeeded in becoming a nuclear power, with a stockpile of such weapons large enough to deter any enemy, including the US, from using force to depose the North Korean dynasty with impunity. It has mastered the technology of intercontinental missiles, which provides it with a delivery system for nuclear warheads, and has concluded that it can no longer improve its position by prolonging the conflict. Having reached such a milestone, North Korea has changed the dynamic of the conflict, making it possible for Kim to negotiate from a position of strength.

Second, although the sanctions and international isolation have certainly played a role, they were not as decisive as the Trump administration is trying to project. Indeed, North Korea has suffered from the sanctions for many years, but has come to the negotiating table in the past for tactical reasons, seeking temporary relief from the sanctions only to resume the development of its nuclear and missile technology. Now, however, having become a recognized nuclear power, Kim is seeking a strategic change that would permanently lift sanctions to alleviate the economic hardship on his people and provide them with their basic and urgent needs, while demonstrating that the regime is delivering on its promises.

Third, by meeting President Trump for face-to-face talks, Kim would also be accorded the legitimacy he has been craving while ensuring that North Korea is treated with respect as an independent state among the community of nations.

North Korea’s participation in the Winter Olympics provided the initial thaw between North and South Korea, and created the opportunity for South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in (whose country would be most affected under the conditions of war or peace) to broker a face-to-face meeting between Trump and Kim, to which the latter was already disposed to accept. Although the North Korean delegation (led by Kim, which is most unusual) traveled to China to keep Beijing abreast of developments regarding the pending summit and ensure its support, it is also indicative of Kim’s seriousness about reaching an agreement with the Trump administration.

Finally, as odd as it may seem, in the mutual public acrimony between Trump and Kim—the name calling, the insults, the threats and counter-threats coupled with their crude audacity and bluster—the two have found their match. Defiant, daring, and detested by the international community with overblown egos, both wanted to demonstrate that they can go against the political current and diplomatic niceties to achieve what their predecessors have failed to realize.

Pyongyang, however, will come to the negotiating table with a set of demands, including: the assurance that the US will recognize the North Korean regime as the legitimate government and not seek regime change; lift all sanctions without linking them to human rights; end military exercises with South Korea; substantially reduce and ultimately remove its military forces in South Korea; and sign a peace treaty once a comprehensive agreement is reached.

The main demands of the US are the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, which the Trump administration views as central to any agreement; that North Korea freezes further testing of  ballistic missiles; immediately ends the development of miniaturized nuclear warheads that could be mounted on intercontinental missiles; and finally, re-joins the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and accepts the most unfettered monitoring regime by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Regardless of how well-intentioned both leaders may be to end the conflict, given the time constraints and the inability of either leader to deal with technological intricacies coupled with an environment completely lacking in trust, the prospective summit cannot and will not resolve these complex issues. Thus, neither side should have any high expectations to reach an agreement in short order. For North Korea and the US, the stakes are high, and the premature collapse of the negotiations could make matters worse, which both sides must avoid. At best, they can pave the way for substantive negotiations that would follow.

Secretary of State Designate and former CIA Director Mike Pompeo is certainly knowledgeable of Kim’s position and the nature of relations he wants to forge with South Korea and other states in the area. Although Pompeo is a hard-liner and extremely suspicious of the North Korean leader, he must seize this historic opportunity to forge a lasting agreement.

The wild card here is the appointment of John Bolton as National Security Advisor, who is known for his extreme views. He has advocated the abrogation of the Iran deal and the bombing of North Korea to destroy its nuclear arsenals, which could precipitate a horrific war and cause the death of hundreds of thousands of North and South Koreans, Japanese, and Americans, and potentially lead to a much wider regional war.

Pompeo, with the support of Secretary of Defense Mattis, who deeply believes in a diplomatic solution and enjoys Trump’s confidence, must disabuse Bolton and persuade Trump that force against North Korea will invite disaster. Pompeo must, however, be realistic about what can initially be achieved, and build on it to reach a lasting agreement. For this reason, he must come to the negotiating table with the understanding that a transitional period of five to seven years will be necessary, during which both sides undertake confidence-building measures to nurture trust and reach interim agreements that deal with various aspects of the conflict, which will eventually lead to denuclearization.

Any initial agreement must meet both sides’ initial demands: for North Korea, the lifting of sanctions, albeit gradually, is a central issue, without which it will have no reason to enter any negotiation. For the US, the immediate cessation of any nuclear testing and freezing further development of its intercontinental missiles is the prerequisite to the continuation of the negotiating process.

The talk of war against North Korea, as Bolton has been advocating, must be removed from the lexicon because it is beyond insanity. The solution lies with diplomacy and diplomacy alone, which must be pursued especially now that the conditions to reach an agreement are more favorable than any time before.

The changing dynamic of the conflict in favor of Kim, and Trump’s aspiration to reach an agreement that his predecessor failed to achieve, offer a historic opportunity to end a 70-year-old conflict that neither leader can afford to squander.

*

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

[email protected] Web: www.alonben-meir.com

Note: This article was revised on April 9, 2018 to add some additional material and to correct some inadvertent errors in the previous version.

Few people understand the Canadian government’s relationship with the Bank of Canada or the nature of the Bank’s original raison d’être. Back in 2011 a lawsuit had been filed in the Federal Court by the Committee on Monetary and Economic Reform against the Government of Canada and the Bank of Canada. The lawsuit attempted to:

[R]estore the use of the Bank of Canada to its original purpose, by exercising its public statutory duty and responsibility. That purpose includes making interest-free loans to the municipal/provincial/federal governments for ‘human capital’ expenditures (education, health, other social services) and/or infrastructure expenditures.

After nearly five and a half years of contentious litigation, after five court hearings resulting in contrary decisions, on May 4, 2017 the Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear the appeal case, in “deference” to the political process, i.e., their decision was that the matter appeared to be more of a political issue than a judicial one. However, strong arguments can be made to the contrary and further court procedures may still take place. But in the meantime, since it appears that the issue at present cannot be resolved through a judicial process, there is now an urgent need to deal with this in the political arena.

The Bank of Canada was established in 1934 under private ownership but in 1938 the government nationalized the bank so since then it has been publicly owned. It was mandated to lend not only to the federal government but to provinces as well. To help bring Canada out of the Great Depression debt-free money was injected into various infrastructure projects. With the outbreak of World War II, it was the Bank of Canada that financed the enormously costly war effort – Canada created the world’s third largest navy and ranked fourth in production of allied war materiel. Afterwards, the Bank financed programs to assist WW2 veterans with vocational and university training and subsidized farmland.

For the next 30 years following World War II, it was the Bank of Canada that helped to transform Canada’s economy and lift the standards of living for Canadians. It was the Bank that financed a wide range of infrastructure projects and other ventures. This included the construction of the Trans-Canada highway, the St. Lawrence Seaway, airports, subway systems, and financial assistance to a corporation that placed Canada in the forefront of aviation technology – a project that was scuttled and destroyed by a controversial federal government decision. In addition, during this period seniors’ pensions, family allowances, and Medicare were established, as well as nation-wide hospitals, universities, and research facilities.

The critical point is that between 1939 and 1974 the federal government borrowed extensively from its own central bank. That made its debt effectively interest-free, since the government owned the bank and got the benefit of any interest. As such Canada emerged from World War II and from all the extensive infrastructure and other expenditures with very little debt. But following 1974 came a dramatic change.

In 1974 the Bank for International Settlements (the bank of central bankers) formed the Basel Committee to ostensibly establish global monetary and financial stability. Canada, i.e., the Pierre Trudeau Liberals, joined in the deliberations. The Basel Committee’s solution to the “stagflation” problem of that time was to encourage governments to borrow from private banks, that charged interest, and end the practice of borrowing interest-free from their own publicly owned banks. Their argument was that publicly owned banks inflate the money supply and prices, whereas chartered banks supposedly only recycle pre-existing money. What they purposefully suppressed was that private banks create the money they lend just as public banks do. And as banking specialist Ellen Brown states: “The difference is simply that a publicly-owned bank returns the interest to the government and the community, while a privately-owned bank siphons the interest into its capital account, to be reinvested at further interest, progressively drawing money out of the productive economy.” The effect of such a change would remove a powerful economic tool from the hands of democratic governments and give such control to a cabal of foreign bankers. This was one of Milton Friedman’s radical free-market ideas.

At that time it seems that Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau came under the influence of neoliberalism, promulgated by Frederich Hayek and Milton Friedman. Then, while attending the Basil Committee sessions, he probably came under further influence of fellow Bilderberg attendees and as a result he accepted the partisan flawed logic from the world’s top banks. Apparently on the basis of this, he decided that Canada should dramatically reduce borrowing interest-free money from Canada’s own bank and instead borrow the bulk of its money from chartered banks and pay interest on the loans. It appears that this decision was made without informing Canada’s parliament. This was such a fundamental change of policy that it should not only have been debated in parliament, this should have been put to a national referendum. Strangely, even when this became known, this was apparently never questioned by the opposition parties, especially the NDP, and never revealed in the media. Strange indeed.

Since the Coyne affair in the early 60s, the long-standing debate about the autonomy of the Bank of Canada from so-called government control has been ignored. Central banks around the world are supposed to be autonomous, concerned only with monetary policy while the governments are to be concerned with fiscal policy. What many elected representatives do not realize is that fiscal policy and monetary policy interact with each other and can supplement each other. This is acknowledged in the Bank of Canada Act where the Governor of the Bank of Canada and the Finance Minister must consult regularly with each other.

Successive Canadian governments have surrendered sovereign control over monetary policies and money supply to the beliefs of the international neoliberal private bankers and investors. As a result, Canadians have been saddled with government debt at all levels – debt that has risen exponentially since 1974. During the time that the Bank of Canada provided additional money, interest-free, to federal and provincial governments when it was needed, according to data supplied by Jack Biddell (accountant with Clarkson-Gordon, the first commissioner on the federal anti-inflationary board representing the province of Ontario and the chairman of the Ontario Inflation Restraint Board), the federal debt remained very low, relatively flat, and quite sustainable during all those years. (See his chart below.) In fact, in 1974 the country’s debt totalled only 18 billion dollars. When Canada stopped relying on its own bank it launched the country on a staggering deficit accumulation path. In 2016/17 the combined federal and provincial debt was $1.4 trillion, of which the federal debt was $728 billion. It appears that perhaps as much as 90% of the $1.4 trillion is the result of compound interest charges created by investors and private banks.

David Orchard led the anti-war campaign across Canada relentlessly mobilizing support against NATO’s war on Yugoslavia.

March 24, 2018 commemorates the 19th anniversary of  NATO’s war on Yugoslavia.

This article was originally published on Globe and Mail on March 26, 1999 (published in a slightly edited version).

***

Following the lead of the U.S., Canada is participating in a massive military assault against a sovereign nation in central Europe. The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia is a small country of approximately 12 million. Its crime is that it is fighting to preserve its territorial integrity against an armed secessionist movement. Every other nation would do the same.

When Abraham Lincoln went to war against the Confederate South “to preserve the union,” as he put it, he was regarded as a hero and Washington bore long and vindictive grudges against any countries — including Canada and Britain — that did not leap to support it.

Has not Britain waged a decades long war against the Irish Republican Army? Was it not a Canadian government in Ottawa that invoked the War Measures Act and moved troops into Quebec when faced with “apprehended insurrection”?

We are told that Yugoslavia refused to sign a “peace agreement” with its armed separatists. There is no peace agreement. There is an 81 page document, drawn up by the U.S. which will in effect sever Kosovo, long regarded as the cradle of Serbian nationhood, from Yugoslavia. Belgrade was told to sign or be bombed.

The majority of the population of the separatist region are of a different ethnic group than those in the rest of Yugoslavia, we are told. If this were justification for secession, most nations in the world, including Canada and the U.S., would disintegrate overnight.

A long political and media campaign to demonize the Serbs has culminated with Bill Clinton‘s comparison of war-torn Yugoslavia to Hitler’s Germany. Equating a weak, already partially dismembered country under economic sanctions for almost a decade, struggling to hang on to its heartland, surrounded and menaced by the world’s most powerful nations armed to the teeth with the latest high tech weapons, to Nazi Germany only goes to graphically illustrate graphically that truth is the first casualty of war.

Lest anyone be confused, the attack on Yugoslavia is not a United Nations operation in any way, nor does it have U.N. sanction. Both Russia and China have condemned it unequivocally. It is a unilateral and unprecedented act of war by the world’s most powerful military alliance in violation of international law and of NATO’s own charter, which provides for defence in the case of attack against a member nation. No member nation of NATO has been attacked or threatened by Yugoslavia.

Why is Canada, the famed peacemaker, involved in the illegal destruction of a founding member of the U.N. and our ally in both world wars? Today, Yugoslavia is virtually defenceless, yet with a long and proud history of fighting for its independence — for almost five centuries the southern Slavs led by Serbia fought against the Ottoman Empire, for years Yugoslavia fought against Hitler’s Nazis and, under Tito, against control by the Soviet Union.

As in Iraq, many of the bombs and missiles raining on the people of Yugoslavia are coated with depleted uranium. The radioactive fallout will, as is happening today in Iraq, ensure an agonizing death for tens of thousands in the years ahead, long after the bombs stop falling.

After years of pious bleating by Canadian governments about war crimes (always those by small nations, mind you), we are committing one of vastly larger proportions as these words are being written.

Who has given NATO the authority to attack Yugoslavia? What exactly is the Kosovo Liberation Army (regularly described as a terrorist organization less than a year ago) on whose side we are now entering this conflict? How, and with what financial backing, did it emerge as a fully equipped army complete with anti-tank weapons, uniforms and grenade launchers? What is its connection to U.S. intelligence and, as recently reported in the London Times, to organized crime and the heroin trade? If NATO has become an instrument of terror against the virtually defenceless population of our former ally — and it has — Canada should reconsider its membership in that organization.

*

This article was originally published on Globe and Mail on March 26, 1999 (published in a slightly edited version).

David Orchard is the author of The Fight for Canada – Four Centuries of Resistance to American Expansionism. He  ran twice for the leadership of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. He was convenor in 1999 of the Ad Hoc Committee to Stop Canada’s Participation in the War on Yugoslavia.  He farms in Borden, SK and can be reached  at [email protected].

Militarização do Brasil vem sendo esboçada há anos, e os sucessivos golpes à democracia possuem remetente e objetivos tão claros que apenas um míope intelectual (para dizer o mínimo) é incapaz de enxergar. Atual guinada à extrema-direita não se trata de “fenômeno a ser sociologicamente desvendado”. Pelas dúvidas, WikiLeaks e Snowden corroboram de maneira inconteste tais verdades, aos espíritos realmente dispostos a encontrá-las.

É realmente espantoso que, a fim de se tantar compreender (se é que determinados indivíduos buscam compreender) o que anda ocorrendo na política e na própria sociedade brasileira, haja considerável dificuldade no País em se colocar alguns fatos da mais alta relevância em contexto, e inclusive se lambrar hoje, tempos mais sombrios pós-“redemocratização”, das denúncias documentais de Edward Snowden de que o Brasil vinha sendo, por dez anos até 2013, o país mais espionado de toda a América Latina e um dos mais espionados em todo o mundo pelo regime de Washington.

Logo da descoberta de petróleo na camada pré-sal do litoral brasileiro em 2008, que coloca o País entre as maiores reservas mundiais do produto, Tio Sam reativou a IV Frota Naval desativada até então desde o final da II Guerra Mundial (1945) que navega até hoje nas proximidades da mencionada região petrolífera, ferindo a soberania e, consequentemente, é claro, ameaçando a segurança nacional.

Vale destacar que, sobre isto, os autodeclarados “patriotas” à direita no Brasil (donos de peculiar raiva ideológica que perambula entre esquizofrenia democrática e histeria justiceira de acordo com cada caso, e quando lhes convém) jamais disseram uma vírgula sequer, repetindo assim um velho filme, bem conhecido de longa-data e que se repetiria mais tarde, em casos similares.

Naquela mesma época, o jornal mensal carioca A Nova Democracia publicou reportagem (role a tela) em que denunciava:

“Os brasileiros vêm sendo alvo de uma monumental tentativa de embuste, na sequência de uma série de casos de grampos telefônicos legais ou ilegais. (…)

“São investigações de fachada, falsos surpreendidos, mentirosos fingindo-se de escandalizados, CPI dos grampos comandada por um legítimo representante do Estado policialesco, e promessas de regulamentação daquilo que foi criado exatamente com o objetivo de funcionar na surdina, à revelia de qualquer supervisão de caráter verdadeiramente democrático. (…)

” As classes populares não podem se deixar iludir por toda esta concertação (…). A Abin (Agência Brasileira de Inteligência) não passa de uma reedição do SNI, o Serviço Nacional de Informações, criado sob a supervisão da CIA em 1964 pelo gerenciamento militar então recém instaurado no Brasil.

“A Abin foi criada há quase dez anos, e quase dez anos depois do fim do seu antecessor. O “monstro” — nas palavras do antigo manda-chuva do SNI, o general Golbery Couto e Silva — foi extinto em 1990 e ressuscitado em 1999 por obra e graça de Fernando Henrique Cardoso, sendo então devidamente rebatizado. (…)

“Hoje, os sucessivos casos de grampos ilegais que chegam ao conhecimento público — além das exorbitantes 407 mil autorizações judiciais para escutas telefônicas — nada mais são do que a ponta do iceberg. Valendo-se das atualizações tecnológicas, generalizou-se uma prática fascista do SNI na época dos milicos sob o nome de “sangrar linhas. (…)

“Manteve-se para a Abin a dupla missão que norteava o SNI, ou seja, minar a resistência interna às políticas de entreguismo e colaborar com o USA na perseguição internacional àqueles que se opõem à dominação imperialista.”

Em janeiro de 2013, segundo documentos apresentados pelo ex-contratista da CIA Edward Snowden, o Patropi era exatamente o mais espionado do mundo, e junto (atenção para estas informações) sua então presidente Dilma Rousseff, a Petrobras e até milhões e milhões de civis comuns (incluindo as figuras dos perfeitos idiotas que hoje integram movimentos “tipo-exportação” como MBL, comprovadamente financiados por personagens ao norte do Rio Bravo). Naquele período, foram nada menos que “2,3 bilhões de telefonemas e mensagens espionados”, segundo a reportagem”, segundo reportagem (role a tela) de O Globo à época.

Logo a seguir, importamos do mundo árabe (ilustre desconhecido a nível nacional, vale colocar em questão) a “Primavera”: as tais Jornadas de Junho levaram às ruas milhões de pessoas que, fato comprovado por diversas entrevistas inclusive internacionais, atrapalhavam-se em dizer contra o que protestavam então, qual era a reivindicação que as levava às manifestações em enorme medida impulsadas por ele mesmo, Fez-se buque.

Este lixo de rede social, segundo WikiLeaks “máquina de espionagem em massa” que todo cidadão dotado do mínimo senso de diginidade deveria deletar para todo o sempre, criou à época milhares de falsos perfis arrastando as multidões desavisados às ruas de todo o Brasil, inúmeros desavisados que mesclavam alegria ocasional com raiva por não se sabia bem o quê; mas a ordem era extravasar.

Entrevista Telesur com uma reaça tupiniquim do Rio de Janeiro à época, mostrou-a gaguejando ridiculamente diante da pergunta da repórter sobre o que revindicava nas ruas, até palrar qualquer coisa catada em seu imaginário aleatório: “Corrupção! Lutamos contra a corrupção!”.

A revista Caros Amigos entrevistou uma empresária do ramo da farmácia na avenida Paulista entre os manifestantes, que condenava severamente o governo Dilma por tentar importar o bolivarianismo da Venezuela; questionada sobre o que siginficava bolivarianismo, segura na cadeira: a reaça de turno deu mais um exemplo perfeito da ignorância de seu segmento ao dizer que se trata de políticas da Bolívia, destinadas a ferir a soberania nacional uma vez impostas no Brasil (enquanto, para terminar o tragicômico festival da mais retumbante imbecilidade, a mesma cidadã defende, sim, ditadura dentro de casa). Vale destacar que o termo bolivarianismo, e a Caros Amigos observou isto também, refere-se à política independendista de Simón Bolivar (= bolivariano, nada a ver com boliviano) para a América Latina.

Durante nossa “Primavera”, que miraculosamente terminou tão repentinamente quanto começou sem ninguém entender nada do que nem para que aconteceu bem ao estilo das “Primaveras” mundo afora, cuja artificalidade e origem são bem conhecidas (The Arab Spring: Made in the USA; IT’S OFFICIAL: “ARAB SPRING” SUBVERSION U.S. FUNDED; WIKILEAKS: Telegrama secreto emitido pela Embaixada dos EUA em Damasco, Síria, role a tela), os três principais jornais do Brasil publicavam “pesquisas” (guarde-se este dado) claramente favorecendo um cenário para intervenção militar no País, quase que diariamente.

E através de terrorismo jornalístico pela mesma grande mídia, a então presidente Dilma que contava com amplos índices de popularidade e taxas de emprego recorde na história do Brasil, de repente passou a cair vertiginosamente em termos de popularidade, sem nenhuma justificativa a não ser muito xingamento do mais baixo nível.

Sem nenhuma explicação, sem nenhum fato concreto jamais mencionado a não ser muita ofensa pessoal. Ali, passou a ser assustador o cenário; exacerbavam os velhos ódio e ressentimento especialmente das classes média e alta, cheia de preconceitos, enquanto Estratégias de Tensão ocorriam por todo o País na tal “Primavera”, inclusive ataques de militares travestidos de manifestantes contra órgãos públicos.

Até que veio a “Primavera” versão 2016 apresentando como novidade um subproduto da anterior: obscuros movimentos como MBL, desavergonhadamente seletivos e covardes em seus “protestos” – cuja máscara vem se despedaçando em ritmo acelerado há uns tantos meses.

Hoje, a sempre pobre indústria brasileira (também por irresponsabilidade petista, mas não apenas) está destroçada, a começar pela (atenção) Petrobras, e ao menos 50 por cento dos brasileiros apoiam raivosamente intervenção militar a nível nacional – 78 por cento apoiam essa afronta ao Estado de direito e à vida humana quanto à intervenção no Rio há um ano e meio do regime do ultradireitista Donald Trump nos Estados Unidos, que tem manifestado abertamente de levar às últimas consequências a “política” idealizada pelo presidente estadunidense James Monroe (1817-1825), “a América para os americanos” conhecida como Doutrina Monroe, isto é, a América Latina como quintal dos norte-americanos – e isso mesmo os “lords do bem-dizer” na terra da liberdade” declaram em público, sem o menor contrangimento.

Em setembro e dezembro do ano passado, o general Antônio Hamilton Mourão sugeriu que as Forças Armadas podem participar de uma intervenção militar no Brasil, caso se instale uma situação de “caos no País”, ao mesmo tempo que militares norte-amaericanos realizavam exercícios em território roraimense: gravíssima afronta à soberania nacional. Ambos os fatos somam-se entre os vários, que apontam sério indicio de que o Brasil está muito mais próximo de um novo regime militar que à implementação, finalmente, de uma democracia efetiva.

O Brasil que, durante os anos de Luiz Inácio e Dilma fortalecia como nunca antes na história a integração latino-americana (criação da Celac, Banco do Sul etc) e a própria aliança de cooperação Sul-Sul da economia mundial a fim de se descolar de Washington, além do Brics que ascendia potente bloco a nível mundial, está hoje isolado, empobrecido diplomaticamente, e toda essa integração tão temida pelo regime de Washington, enfraquecida.

O Brasil, nos anos do PT, acentuou o tom contra as ocupações sionistas a ponto de a presidente Dilma recusar no início de 2016 (vésperas de sua derrubada, atente-se a isso), de maneira inédita em nossa história, o estabelecimento de Dani Dayan como embaixador israelense em Brasilia por defender abertamente os assentamentos de Tel Aviv sobre indiscriminado massacre e expulsão de palestinos, donos legítimos das respectivas terras.

Houve graves erros petistas, recheados de demagogia e márquetim político mas baixo; houve golpe da Dilma a seu próprio programa de governo assim que, pela segunda vez, pisou no Palácio do Planalto em 2014; as maiores repressões da história pelo Estado brasileiro contra povos originários em favor do agronegócio e dos grandes latifundiários, deu-se nos anos petistas; os lucros bancários promovidos pelo PT deram-se como nunca antes na história, assim como o financiamento petista da grande mídia; Luiz Inácio gargalhou da cara de quem hoje mais precisa para salvar a pele, ao dizer que apenas um débil-mental atinge certa idade mantendo ideias de esquerda, diante de auditório composto pela elite paulistana em 2006; houve alianças indecentes do começo ao fim, que deixavam claro a qualquer um que se voltava contra o PT e ainda cobraria um preço muito maior colocando em risco a própria democracia brasileira (como este autor vinha observando, sob fortes ataques dos neomoderados esquerdistas lulopetistas); houve a mais completa e aberrante cooptação dos movimentos sociais pelo PT, que terminou de generalizar inércia e apatia entre a sociedade, condição que hoje pesa amarga e ironicamente contra o partido derrubado do poder.

Mesmo com issto tudo o Brasil, com o dueto em questão na Presidência da velha República de Bananas, havia deixado o Mapa Mundial da Fome, e retirado 36 milhões de brasileiros da miséria. Com Dilma o Brasil viveu pleno emprego e, com ambos, Luiz Inácio e Dilma, o País estava menos distante (digamos assim, pois o termo “mais próximo” poderia ser um exagero a governos neoliberais com aspecto humano como os do PT, como diz o economista canadense Michel Chossudovsky) de futuros governos efetivamente populares do que esse de hoje e qualquer um envolvendo MDB, PSDB e tantos outros – até pelo que sempre esteve em torno do ex-dueto presidencial e de seu partido.

Nunca o Brasil foi tão respeitado em todo o mundo, nunca esteve tão afirmado diplomaticamente e, consequência disso, com tanta voz nos mais diversos organismos internacionais. Nunca houve tanta esperança no Brasil, em parceria com africanos, latino-americanos, russos, chineses, indianos, de se vencer o imperialismo e de se construir economias mais voltadas à cooperação que à imposição e pilhagem de riquezas alheias.

E inúmeros cabos secretos e ultrassecretos emitidos pelos “embaixadores” (espiões) estadunidenses em Brasilia, liberados pela rede do jornalista australiano Julian Assange, atestam preocupação em relação a isso tudo por parte dos melhores amigos dos hoje donos do poder deste país falido, com sua “Ponte para o Futuro” que terminou de nos arrasar.

O acelerador do desmonte nacional e do enfraquecimento do Estado de todos os lados, Michel Temer, segundo WikiLeaks informante da CIA no Brasil, e o juiz Sérgio Moro, desmantelador da indústria nacional quem ainda, outrossim de acordo com cabos confidenciais liberados por WkiLeaks, foi treinado com colegas de toga por Tio Sam, são a maior evidência disso tudo. Um contexto simples de ser entendido: o “fenômeno” brasileiro está intimamente relacionado a métodos bem antigos, que passam pelas vésperas de 1964.

A (ir) responsabilidade da mídia alternativa diante desta situação caótica – setor midiático que não faz totalmente jus à autodenominação -, dá-se no fato de tentar, em muitos casos envolvendo política nacional, combater tendencionismos dos monopólios midiáticos com outros tendencionismos e ocultação de informações cujo natural efeito colateral, é prestar sua enorme porção de serviço à alienação coletiva. Manipulações midiáticas apenas podem ser combatidas através da verdade dos fatos, e isso não tem sido completamete praticado no Brasil (em nada por ingenuidade “alternativa”, mas por interesses político-partidários).

Ele pode por algum motivo não ocorrer, mas um novo golpe militar está na ordem do dia de diversos usurpadores do poder, entre eles a poderosa FIESP que promoveu o golpe de 1964 travestido de Revolução Democrática: que ninguém esperava, e com dinheiro e orientações da CIA (nem de ideias golpistas originais, nossas classes dominantes são capazes). Hoje, os sinais estão mais que claros, escancaram sobre o sangue de mártires como Marielle. Aliás, em um país sem memória que carece de mártires-exemplos a serem seguidos. Presente!

Edu Montesanti

At the World Social Forum in Salvador de Bahia, thousands of people took to the streets “in the name of democracy”: the women’s movement, Black Lives Matter, Environmentalists, Indigenous People’s Organizations, the Landless Farmers Movement, Youth Organizations, Students, LGBT, among others.

As part of the 13th World Social Forum they marched to the slogan:

“Resist is to Create. Resist is to Transform”  

“Resistir É Criar, Resistir É Transformar” 

.

My question:

Resist Whom?

The leaders and organizers of the WSF in Salvador, Brazil are in persistent denial;  surely by now they should acknowledge that the WSF venue –including travel expenses– are funded by the same corporate interests which are the object of widespread political and social “RESISTANCE” and dissent. 

How convenient. The corporations are funding dissent with a view to controlling dissent and the WSF organizers are complicit.

“The anti-globalization movement is opposed to Wall Street and the Texas oil giants controlled by Rockefeller, et al. Yet the foundations and charities of Ford, Rockefeller et al will generously fund progressive anti-capitalist networks as well as environmentalists (opposed to Wall Street and Big Oil), etc. with a view to ultimately overseeing and shaping their various activities.” (M. C, 2016)

The WSF is said to have transformed progressive movements, leading to what is described as the emergence of the “Global Left”. Nonsense. Real progressive movements have been shattered, largely as a result of the funding of dissent.

What is this Global Left, does it have a grassroots movement?

It is largely composed of  “Leftist Intellectuals” and “Organizers”. They say they are fighting Neoliberalism.

But their WSF movement is largely “funded by neoliberalism”. .

People who participated in the WSF Venue

did not know that “RESIST” GLOBAL CAPITALISM  

is funded by “GLOBAL CAPITALISM”.

They have been misled by the WSF organizers. 

In other words, while the WSF Resist to Transform logo is meaningful, in practice it is also redundant.

Colonial Reparations were contemplated at the World Social Forum 2018, meeting in Salvador, Brazil

The theme of reparations at the 2018 World Social Forum in Salvador de Bahia was treated in the workshop Repairs to Colonialism, in the World Assembly of Resistance Peoples, Movements and Territories and in the Agora of futures. In these activities participated some hundred people, many of whom representatives of other organizations. It was made a point of the situation on the reparations in recent years trying to identify actions most promising for the future.

To whom should these demands for colonial reparation be addressed?

The corporations and Western governments (“former” colonial powers) which generously funded the WSF Venue as well as the NGO participants are routinely involved in a process of neo-colonial social destruction and plunder of resources, not to mention warfare.

When the WSF was held in Mumbai in 2004, the Indian WSF host committee courageously confronted the WSF organizers and declined support from the Ford Foundation (which is linked to the CIA). This in itself did not modify the WSF’s relationship to the corporate donors. While the Ford Foundation formally withdrew, other foundations positioned themselves together with Tony Blair’s Ministry of Overseas Development.

Making the World Safe for Capitalism

In this regard, the Ford Foundation candidly recognizes its role in the “funding of resistance and dissent”:

“Everything the [Ford] Foundation did could be regarded as “making the World safe for capitalism”, reducing social tensions by helping to comfort the afflicted, provide safety valves for the angry, and improve the functioning of government (McGeorge Bundy, National Security Advisor to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson (1961-1966), President of the Ford Foundation, (1966-1979))

The anti-war movement at the Salvador WSF 2018 venue was notoriously absent

Under the banner “Against Militarization and Wars”, the Salvador WSF published an empty declaration:

As parliamentarians and representatives of progressive and internationalist forces  We are concerned by wasting immense resources in the recent global tide of militarization and raising military budgets of a lot of countries worldwide. See the full text here

YES, WARS ARE EXPENSIVE. While “wasted resources” are important, why not mention the names of “the countries” which are threatening World peace (i.e. US, NATO member states, Israel, Saudi Arabia), not to mention the millions of people that have been killed as a result of US-NATO led wars.

THERE IS NO “RESIST” in the above narrative. The text carefully fails to mention the names of the countries (aka US, NATO) which are leading these (imperial) wars of economic conquest and social destruction.

Needless to say the victims of these wars (i.e. Iraq, Syria, Yemen etc) as well as the corporate interests behind these wars are not identified.

RESIST does not apply to the US led wars in Syria, Iraq, Ukraine, Yemen. In fact, it would appear from the program that  the issue of US-NATO led wars is not an object of debate and discussion in the WSF workshops.

Mosaic of WSF workshops

The mechanisms of “manufacturing dissent” require a manipulative environment, a process of arm-twisting and subtle co-optation of  a small number of key individuals within “progressive organizations”.  Many leaders of these organizations have in a sense betrayed their grassroots.

What prevails is a mosaic of workshops. The social activists participating in the WSF have been misled. These workshops do not threaten the imperial world order. They constitute a ritual of dissent and resistance.

The mosaic of separate WSF workshops, the relative absence of plenary sessions, the creation of divisions within and between social movements, not to mention the absence of a cohesive and unified platform ultimately serves the interests of  the Wall Street corporate elites who are generously funding the WSF venue.

The unspoken corporate agenda is to “manufacture dissent”.“The limits of dissent” are established by the foundations and governments which finance this multimillion WSF dollar venue.

The workshop mosaic is imposed by those who finance the WSF. The workshops format does not constitute a threat to global capitalism. Quite the opposite.

The Funding of the WSF  

This section is largely based on an earlier 2016 article pertaining to the 12th WSF held in Montreal in 2016. The funding arrangements, however, pertaining to the WSF Salvador de Bahia venue are broadly similar, dependent on the same donor entities. .

The WSF is supported by a consortium of corporate foundations under the advisory umbrella of Engaged Donors for Global Equity (EDGE). For further details see Michel Chossudovsky 2016

This organization, which previously went under the name of The Funders Network on Trade and Globalization (FTNG), has played a central role in the funding of successive WSF venues. From the outset in 2001, it had an observer status on the WSF International Council.  

In 2013, the Rockefeller Brothers representative Tom Kruse co-chaired EDGE’s program committee.

At the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Kruse was responsible for “Global Governance” under the “Democratic Practice” program. Rockefeller Brothers grants to NGOs are approved under the “Strengthening Democracy in Global Governance” program, which is broadly similar to that put forth by the US State Department.

A representative of the Open Society Initiative for Europe currently (2016) sits on EDGE’s Board of directors. The Wallace Global Fund is also on its Board of Directors. The Wallace Global Fund is specialized in providing support to “mainstream” NGOs and “alternative media”, including Amnesty International, Democracy Now (which supports Hillary Clinton’s candidacy for president of the US). Michel Chossudovsky 2016

In one of its key documents (2012), entitled Funders Network Alliance In Support of Grassroots Organizing and Movement-Building  (link no longer available) EDGE acknowledged its support of social movements which challenge “neoliberal market fundamentalism.” including the World Social Forum, established in 2001:

“From the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas (1994) to the Battle in Seattle (1999) to the creation of the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre (2001), the TINA years of Reagan and Thatcher (There Is No Alternative) have been replaced with the growing conviction that “another world is possible.” Counter-summits, global campaigns and social forums have been crucial spaces to articulate local struggles, share experiences and analyses, develop expertise, and build concrete forms of international solidarity among progressive movements for social, economic and ecological justice.”

But at the same time, there is an obvious contradiction: another world is not possible when the campaign against neoliberalism is financed by an alliance of corporate donors firmly committed to neoliberalism and the US-NATO military agenda.

The limits of social dissent are thereby determined by the “governance structure” of  the WSF, which was tacitly agreed upon with the funding agencies at the outset in 2001.

“No Leaders”

The WSF has no leaders. All the events are “self-organized”. The structure of debate and activism is part of an an “open space” (See y Francine Mestrum, The World Social Forum and its governance: a multi-headed monster, CADTM, 27 April 2013, http://cadtm.org/The-World-Social-Forum-and-its ).

This compartmentalized structure is an obstacle to the development of a meaningful and articulate mass movement.

How best to control grassroots dissent against global capitalism?

Make sure that their leaders can be easily co-opted and that the rank and file will not develop “forms of international solidarity among progressive movements” (to use EDGE’s own words), which in any meaningful way might undermine the interests of corporate capital.

The mosaic of separate WSF workshops, the relative absence of plenary sessions, the creation of divisions within and between social movements, not to mention the absence of a cohesive and unified platform against the Wall Street corporate elites, against the fake US sponsored “global war on terrorism”, which has been used to justify and US-NATO’s  “humanitarian R2P interventions (Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Ukraine, etc).

What ultimately prevails is a ritual of dissent which does not threaten the New World Order. Those who attend the WSF from the grassroots are often misled by their leaders. Activists who do not share the WSF consensus will ultimately be excluded:

“By providing the funding and the policy framework to many concerned and dedicated people working within the non-profit sector, the ruling class is able to co-opt leadership from grassroots communities, … and is able to make the funding, accounting, and evaluation components of the work so time consuming and onerous that social justice work is virtually impossible under these conditions” (Paul Kivel, You Call this Democracy, Who Benefits, Who Pays and Who Really Decides, 2004, p. 122 )

“Another World is Possible” is nonetheless an important concept, which characterizes the struggle of the peoples movements against global capitalism as well as the commitment of thousands of committed activists who are currently participated in the Montreal 2016 WSF.

Activism is being manipulated:  “Another World is Possible”  cannot, however, be achieved under the auspices of the WSF which from the outset was funded by global capitalism and organized in close liaison with its corporate and government donors.

EDGE Board of Directors (2018)

The Edge Board of Directors includes representatives from major foundations and corporate charities including the Charles Leopold Mayer foundation, the Ford Foundation, the American Jewish World Service, the Open Society Foundation, et al. (see below)

Screenshot (March 2018)

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U.S. Officials Demand Al Jazeera Register as Propaganda ‘Agent’

By Peter Van Buren, March 28, 2018

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has called for Attorney General Jeff Sessions to investigate whether Al Jazeera, the news outlet connected to the Qatari government, should register with the Justice Department as an agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). This will have broad implications for the First Amendment, our access to dissenting opinions, and even how the rest of the world views us.

Bolton’s Past Advocacy for Israel at US Expense Heralds Dangerous New Era in Geopolitics

By Whitney Webb, March 28, 2018

Notorious war hawk John Bolton – who has long been vying for a position in Trump’s administration – has been especially eager to work with a president with minimal foreign policy knowledge or experience, allowing him maximum effect in achieving his policy goals.

Caught on Camera: Israel Targets Civilians with a Chemical Weapon Drone

By Zero Hedge, March 28, 2018

The short video clip published by Al-Mayadeen shows a weaponized unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) targeting demonstrations in the southern Gaza Strip, controlled by the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

Old Pretexts for Mass-Murderous Aggression: A New War Against Russia in Ukraine Unfolding Before Our Eyes?

By Prof. John McMurtry, March 28, 2018

This time the big-lie pretext is about the alleged poisoning by the Kremlin/Putin of a double-agent traitor, usually a stock move in the espionage entertainments. Yet here there is no confirmed evidence whatever of the claimed origin of the lethal nerve-agent, but rather expert denial within British defence and weapons research itself that is silence in the press, with devious political word games crafted to get around the absence of any corroborated facts in the familiar denunciations of Russia full of team aggression and hate.

Syrians Defy Fabricated War Propaganda Narratives

By Mark Taliano, March 28, 2018

The purpose of these terror groups has always been to destroy and erase Syria.  Syria is a secular, pluralist, democratic, socially-uplifting country, and this is the identity that the terrorists have been destroying.

Theresa May Playing a Reckless Game of Nuclear Roulette

By Colin Todhunter, March 28, 2018

In April 2017, Russian President Vladimir Putin was told by the UK ambassador to the United Nations, Matthew Rycroft, that he is on the “wrong side of history” because of his support for Syria’s Bashar Assad. Rycroft added that supporting Assad would result in “shame” and “humiliation” for Russia. He said the UN Security Council had been “held to ransom by Russia’s shameless support for the Assad regime” and added that Russia’s credibility and reputation across the world would be poisoned by its toxic association with Assad.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has called for Attorney General Jeff Sessions to investigate whether Al Jazeera, the news outlet connected to the Qatari government, should register with the Justice Department as an agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). This will have broad implications for the First Amendment, our access to dissenting opinions, and even how the rest of the world views us.

The lawmakers include Representatives Josh Gottheimer, (D-NJ), Lee Zeldin (R-NY), and 16 other House members. Senator Ted Cruz, Texas Republican, also signed the letter to Sessions. The letter claims Al Jazeera “directly undermines American interests” and broadcasts “anti-American, anti-Semitic, and anti-Israel” material. If forced to register, Al Jazeera would join Russian outlets RT and Radio Sputnik, Japan’s Cosmomedia, the Korean Broadcasting System, and China Daily as acknowledged foreign state propaganda outlets. The DOJ has also been asked to look into a range of other Chinese media.

Ironically, the bipartisan request to force Al Jazeera to register comes amid a controversy over the network’s filming of a documentary critical of pro-Israel lobbying in the United States. For that exposé, the network used an undercover operative to secure footage revealing possibly illegal interactions between advocacy groups and lawmakers.

The Foreign Agents Registration Act was never intended to regulate journalism. In fact, the legislation includes finely worded exemptions for journalists, scholars, artists, and the like, who are not required to announce themselves as “agents of a foreign principal” regardless of what they do. The law was created in 1938 in response to German propaganda, specifically Nazi officials and those they employed who were delivering pacifist speeches in then-neutral America to organize sympathetic German Americans. By requiring those working for the Nazis to register and report their finances and spending, U.S. counterespionage authorities could more easily keep track of their activities.

FARA doesn’t even prohibit straight up propagandizing, though it does seek to limit the influence of foreign agents by labeling their work, apparently to help out Americans who otherwise would not be able to tell the difference on their own. The law specifically says that

“disclosure of the required information facilitates evaluation by the government and the American people of the statements and activities of such persons in light of their function as foreign agents.”

Indeed, the Atlantic Council claims these actions “do not suppress freedom of speech; instead, it serves the First Amendment by supplementing information available to the public.”

Here’s a use of FARA in line with the law’s original intent: the Abu Dhabi Tourism and Culture Authority, whose job is to lobby Americans on behalf of a foreign government—in this case, to take vacations in Abu Dhabi—is a FARA registrant. That way, when the Abu Dhabi Tourism and Culture Authority says they have decent beaches you should visit, you know who is up to what. Other typical registrants might include an American lawyer hired by Saudi Arabia to lobby Congress in favor of more arms sales. Being a foreign agent is very legal and very popular with former congresspeople and government bureaucrats; you just need to announce who your employer is.

But FARA can also serve a more nefarious purpose: as a catch-22 prosecution (a “compliance statute”) for those the U.S. wants to declare as foreign agents but who resist. Once the feds want to taint you as a foreign agent, you either agree and register or face jail time.

That is what happened in the cases of RT and Radio Sputnik. Following the 2016 election, frightened officials demanded that the Russian organizations register as propaganda agents. RT’s editor-in-chief maintained her network was an independent news outlet, but chose to comply rather than face criminal proceedings, adding

“we congratulate the American freedom of speech and all those who still believe in it.”

Critics then swung RT’s snarky comment on free speech into “proof” that it unfairly criticizes America.

The use of FARA to allow the government to declare which foreign media outlets produce “news” and which produce “fake news” and propaganda is “a shift in how the law has been applied in recent decades,” said the Committee to Protect Journalists.

“We’re uncomfortable with governments’ deciding what constitutes journalism or propaganda.”

As the Justice Department wields its FARA weapon, here’s what Al Jazeera’s journalists could face.

Designation under FARA requires that a media outlet label its reporting “with a conspicuous statement that the information is disseminated by the agents on behalf of the foreign principal”: in other words, a nutritional label for journalism. It also means the outlet must open its finances to the Department of Justice. It means Americans who choose to watch that media, or participate in its talk shows, or who work legally for those outlets, open themselves to accusations of “treason” (one political staffer was fired after being interviewed by Radio Sputnik). It adds credence to the muddy cries of “fake news” used to shut out dissenting opinions. It gives credibility to groups like PropOrNot, which lists websites it “determines” are Russian propaganda, and Hamilton 68, which does the same for Twitter.

Subjecting journalists to FARA sends a message about America. It encourages other governments to impose their own restrictions (Russia has already passed a law requiring outlets like CNN to register as foreign agents). It uses the full authority of the American government to declare that Al Jazeera, a network that reaches 310 million people in more than 160 countries, has no place within a free press because its broadcasts are “anti-American, anti-Semitic, and anti-Israel.” In the specific case of Al Jazeera, it seemingly extends America law to cover anti-Israeli propaganda as well. As with attempts to claim Wikileaks is espionage and not journalism, this particular use of FARA looks to be another instance of laws wielded to harass those with “un-American” opinions.

The employment of FARA to restrict foreign journalists also adds to the growing sense among too many already frightened Americans that our freedoms are being used against us.

“The U.S. is at a huge strategic disadvantage when it comes to the New Media Wars because our information environment is so open and rich,” said one former CIA deputy director of intelligence.

Perhaps too many dissenting voices isn’t a good idea. The Internet is just too much freedom to responsibly allow. Maybe the government should become more involved in what we say, hear, watch, and read, as Facebook and Twitter (which banned RT from advertising) do now—you know, for our own protection. Our open society is a vulnerability, not a strength.

The roots of our most basic rights can be found in the freedom of the press written into the First Amendment. The press must be unfettered in reporting so citizens can make informed decisions when voting, protesting, and petitioning their government. Government should play no role in designating good journalists from bad, in licensing who can report on or access a broad range of ideas. Sorting out the marketplace of ideas—opposing opinions, bias exposed and hidden—is supposed to be our task as an informed citizenry. We should reclaim that mantle and do the job ourselves.

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Peter Van Buren, a 24-year State Department veteran, is the author of We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People and Hooper’s War: A Novel of WWII Japan. Follow him on Twitter @WeMeantWell.

Teachers across the world are leading a global wave of worker militancy as strikes and protests spread across North and South America, Europe, and Africa.

In the United States, protests sparked by the rebellion of West Virginia teachers continued this week as Arizona teachers demanding higher wages protest at the state capitol in Phoenix today and 41,000 Oklahoma teachers prepare for a statewide strike on April 2.

Teachers’ anger boiled over Monday and Tuesday after Democratic and Republican state legislators in Oklahoma voted to pass a deal that increases school funding largely by hiking sales taxes on workers and poor people.

Oklahoma Teachers United (OTU), a Facebook page created by rank-and-file teachers with over 10,000 followers, posted,

“Senate to vote this week on bill passed by house but teachers already saying no. TEACHERS HAVE HAD IT!!!!!! Legislators are so confused right now. I got 100 calls from the Dems and Reps asking, ‘What in the world is wrong with you?’”

The bipartisan deal promised to increase teachers’ wages by $6,000—far below the $10,000 they have demanded.

Oklahoma teachers have little faith in the official trade union, which was roundly denounced by teachers for trying to postpone a strike until the end of April. An online poll published by Oklahoma Teachers United found that roughly half of teachers “believe the union will cave into pressures from the legislature and superintendents before teachers get fair wages.”

Last night, OTU page administrators were invited to participate in a call hosted by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). OTU posted during the call:

“AFT is in the middle of a town hall conference call explaining how teachers MUST take this deal.”

Employing the same tactics as those used by the AFT in West Virginia, the union is telling workers they have no support in the working class:

“They are saying that parents, teachers, and students will not stay in this fight past a week.”

The comments from teachers are overwhelmingly hostile to the AFT scare tactics.

In Kentucky, a state with 42,000 teachers, “pension awareness walk-ins” took place this week while teachers plan to rally today at the state capitol in Frankfort. Republican governor Matt Bevin has denounced teachers as “selfish” and “angry people who want to destroy what’s good for this state.” He pledged to gut pensions “whether they like it or not” as the state Senate approved a two-year budget plan to slash $1.1 billion from the Teachers’ Retirement System.

Arizona teachers paint their cars red for education

In Arizona, with 51,000 teachers, “sickouts” and demonstrations have taken place this week as the likelihood of a strike grows. Teachers are using social media and distributing leaflets to neighbors and parents independent of the teachers union explaining that the state has made $371 million in cuts to education since 2008.

Teachers in New Dallas, Pennsylvania, the Quad Cities of Iowa-Illinois, and Denver, Colorado may be the next districts to strike. Teachers in Denver are demanding the first district strike authorization vote since the 1990s, according to the Denver Post. Sickouts and pickets have broken out in part due to anger over the ProComp pay-for-performance system, which has kept Colorado teachers wages among the lowest in the nation.

In the face of growing opposition, the Denver Classroom Teachers Association extended ongoing contract negotiations without any pledges from the school district. With typical cowardice, the union told teachers to place their faith in the passage of a November ballot initiative to fund public education—but the initiative is not even on the ballot yet!

Large numbers of teachers joined hundreds of thousands of young people during last Saturday’s nationwide protests against mass shootings at public schools, and demands from protesters for increased funding for schools, textbooks and supplies, not the arming of school teachers, were omnipresent.

As nearly 150,000 teachers in several parts of the United States threaten strikes, opposition to attacks on public education is emerging worldwide.

Africa

In North Africa, simultaneous strikes are taking place in Tunisia and Algeria. The demands of teachers across the world are fundamentally the same: higher wages, secure retirements and pensions, and the defense of the right to public education.

After the Algerian teachers’ union CNAPESTE shut down the month-long strike from January 30 to February 28, teachers at high schools, middle schools, and primary schools have announced they will relaunch the nationwide strike on April 9, threatening the country with what Reuters calls “the most important protest movement in Algeria since the troubles that were produced in 2011 after the uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia through the Arab Spring.”

Algerian teachers strike in February

Doctors and medical students are already striking against deteriorating public health conditions. High school students had also joined the February teachers’ strike.

High school teachers in neighboring Tunisia, the birthplace of the Arab Spring, are joining their Algerian counterparts by holding a one-day general strike today. The strike is the second one-day strike the Tunisian General Labour Union (UGTT) was forced to call in the last six weeks as a result of growing opposition among Tunisian teachers.

In Tunisia, teachers are demanding 15 percent bonuses and the reduction of the retirement age to 55. In Algeria, teachers are striking over teacher pay and the Algerian government’s cuts to public education. Both the Tunisian and Algerian governments are threatening to fire strikers and dock their pay.

Latin America

Teachers’ strikes also spread across Central and South America this week. In Argentina, teachers in Buenos Aires province plan to set up a permanent “white tent” encampment on April 5 and are demanding a 20 percent wage increase to make up for 15 percent inflation. A two-day nationwide strike rocked the South American country earlier this month. On March 22, teachers in neighboring Uruguay also held a 24-hour strike.

In Mexico, 16,000 teachers in the state of Chihuahua struck on March 21 demanding back pay, culminating in a large demonstration of thousands in the city of Chihuahua. In the impoverished southern states of Oaxaca, Chiapas, and Michoacán, ongoing teacher strikes have shut down schools with over one million students enrolled. The government is promising to fire any teachers who strike for three days out of the month.

Teachers in Venezuela demonstrate in March

A two-day strike took place last week in Carabobo, Venezuela, where teachers struck for two days to demand large wage increases, prompting impromptu protests in the city of Valencia, two hours outside of Caracas. A strike of teachers in the Brazilian state of Amazonas began on Monday over wages and cuts to healthcare. The action coincides with an ongoing strike of Sao Paolo teachers against planned attacks on pensions.

Europe

In continental Europe, tens of thousands of French teachers participated in the March 22 general mobilization against the government’s plans to privatize the French railroad system, SNCF. In Scotland, a national teachers strike is on the horizon after teachers overwhelmingly rejected a proposed three percent wage hike, demanding 10 percent raises instead. Across the whole of the United Kingdom, lecturers are continuing their month-long struggle after rejecting a sellout deal by the University and College Union (UCU), and teaching staff at 12 Further Education colleges in London and the Midlands are holding limited strikes this week to demand higher wages and to oppose casualization.

Teachers across the world confront the same enemies: governments that cut wages, pensions, and education funding to boost the profits of the banks and corporations, and servile trade unions that isolate strikes and force workers to place their trust in the same capitalist political parties responsible for the attack on public education. Teachers’ greatest strength lies in linking with their coworkers, and the working class more broadly, across the world in a united fight to secure the social right to education with a good income and fully funded pensions for every teacher on earth.

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All images in this article are from the author.

This article is Part I of a series exploring the past of soon-to-be National Security Adviser John Bolton and what his recent appointment will mean for U.S. foreign policy, with a focus on the Middle East, Latin America, and the Koreas. Part I explores Bolton’s history of putting the interests of the Israeli government ahead of those of the U.S., as well as what his appointment means for Israel’s current preparations for a “three front” war and American involvement in that war.

 Last Thursday, President Trump announced that former UN ambassador John Bolton, once called the “most dangerous man” in the entire George W. Bush administration, would replace H.R. McMaster as national security adviser, making him the man in charge of what the President sees and hears regarding issues of national security. Bolton will officially take over McMaster’s post on April 9.

The appointment was not surprising. Indeed, earlier this month, MintPress reported that McMaster was soon to be replaced – largely at the behest of billionaire Republican donor and militant Zionist Sheldon Adelson – and that Bolton was a top contender for that position, largely due to Bolton’s reputation as a “stalwart friend of Israel” and his frequent calls for military action against Iran, Israel’s regional arch-rival.

Yet, Bolton’s appointment – placed in the greater context of recent changes to Trump’s cabinet – is a harrowing portent for those opposed to more U.S. regime-change wars. Mike Pompeo, another proponent of war with Iran, is set to take over the State Department; and Gina Haspel — whose nickname “Bloody Gina” speaks to her history of overseeing torture and depreciating human life — is slated to take over for Pompeo as head of the CIA. Bolton completes the triumvirate and his ultra-hawkishness speaks to the President’s posturing for war against not one but several countries — with hopes of building a unipolar world with the United States as its sole leader, a perverse distortion of his isolationist campaign promise “America First.”

Though he is just one of the war hawks now roosting in the Trump administration, Bolton is arguably more dangerous than all the rest due to his bellicose rhetoric, unilateral decision-making, and his “kiss up, kick down” style of interaction with superiors and colleagues, allowing him to be remarkably effective in getting his way. Not only that, but Bolton – who has long been vying for a position in the Trump administration – has been admittedly eager to work with a president with minimal foreign policy knowledge or experience — obviously true in Trump’s case — as it would allow him to have maximum effect in achieving his policy goals. Bolton has already exercised great influence over the president, reportedly adding statements to Trump’s speech at the United Nations without the knowledge of Trump’s staff.

Thus, Bolton is set to have a disproportionately influential role in the Trump administration, making it essential to examine what his appointment will likely mean for U.S. government policy, particularly regarding geopolitical “hotspots” such as the Middle East and the Koreas.

Freelancing for Israel

Though the domestic reaction to Bolton’s appointment was rather mixed, top ministers of the right-wing Israeli government lavished praise upon the soon-to-be National Security Adviser, calling him “one of the most outstanding” allies to Israel in U.S. politics, and a “true friend” to the Jewish state who brings “great experience and original thinking” to “the most sympathetic administration toward Israel of all time.”

#TBT to Monday when I was in Israel to receive the "Guardian of Zion" award from @BarIlanU's Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies. pic.twitter.com/9uWowxEdt5

— John Bolton (@AmbJohnBolton) June 1, 2017

Indeed, Bolton’s ties to Israel are as deep as they are long-standing — so deep that some have posited that his commitment to extreme Zionism has led him to betray the national interest of his own country on more than one occasion.

For instance, Danny Gillerman, the former Israeli ambassador to the UN, recently noted that Bolton, when serving in the Bush administration, was prone to “direct fire on his own forces,” —  i.e., the U.S. government — in order to advance the goals of the Israeli government. Gillerman, speaking on the Israeli radio program Galei Tzahal this past Sunday, stated:

[W]hen the State Department — then headed by Condoleezza Rice, who wasn’t so friendly to Israel even though the Bush Administration was very friendly — was about to either make a decision, or not abstain, or not veto, or to advance something that was against us [Israel], Bolton would call me, and he would say ‘Danny, you’ve got to call the prime minister right now, in order for him to phone the president to stop this.’”

In addition, Bolton garnered a reputation – as well as the ire of State Department officials at the time – for violating State Department protocol by acting unilaterally in matters of diplomacy to negotiate privately in Israel. The New York Times reported in 2005 that Bolton traveled to Israel without the required State Department clearance in 2003 and 2004 in a direct effort to undermine then-Secretary of State Colin Powell. As journalist Gareth Porter noted:

[A]t the very moment that Powell was saying administration policy was not to attack Iran, Bolton was working with the Israelis to lay the groundwork for just such a war.”

Bolton’s numerous private and unannounced visits to Israel entailed meetings with officials of Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service, including Meir Dagan, then Mossad’s director.

Despite his flagrant violations of government rules, Bolton remained the main liaison between the U.S. and Israeli governments under Bush.

Bolton has pressured Israeli officials to attack Iran even when calling for such an attack was not the U.S. government’s position. According to Shaul Mofaz, former Israeli defense minister, Bolton “tried to convince me that Israel needs to attack Iran,” which Mofaz recently asserted was not “a smart move – not on the part of the Americans today or anyone else until the threat is real.”

Billionaire Adelson gets his way

Sheldon Adelson with PM Benjamin Netanyahu

Bolton’s commitment to the Israeli state has manifested in other ways. For instance, he has remained a constant critic of Palestine’s right to self-determination, calling an independent Palestinian state a plot “of Israel’s opponents to weaken and encircle the Jewish state.” Bolton has called for the Gaza strip and the West Bank to be given to Egypt and Jordan, respectively. This approach, nicknamed the “Three State solution,” would eliminate any hopes for Palestinian sovereignty by giving Palestinian territories to two U.S.-allied countries that enjoy cordial relations with Israel, making this solution preferable for Israel hard-liners that wish to see an end to the Palestinian Authority and Hamas.

Bolton has also praised President Trump’s recent decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, and relocate the U.S. embassy in Israel accordingly – a policy change allegedly orchestrated by pro-Israel Republican mega-donor Sheldon Adelson — as an “injection of reality.” In addition, he has strongly promoted the construction of illegal settlements on Palestinian land, stating recently that Israelis “ought to be able to build houses wherever they want to, including all of the lands of Judea and Samaria [Palestine’s West Bank].”

John Bolton says “Well, I know my strong view is that Jews ought to be able to build houses wherever they want to, including all of the lands of Judea and Samaria.” pic.twitter.com/fnF6eE10Bw

— Bruce Baird (@drbairdonline) March 24, 2018

Given his embrace of extremist Zionism, it is no surprise that Bolton has found himself replacing H.R. McMaster, whose ouster was orchestrated by billionaire Republican donor Sheldon Adelson. Bolton has long been promoted by Adelson, as the latter personally intervened to keep Bolton in contact with the Trump throughout his presidency and had lobbied soon after Trump’s election to have Bolton appointed to his cabinet. Like the embassy move to Jerusalem, Adelson has again gotten his wish.

Adelson’s push to have Bolton installed comes at a crucial time, as Israel is currently preparing for war on “three fronts” — Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria – and is actively lobbying for American aid and involvement in launching that war. With Bolton in the Trump administration, along with numerous other staunch Israel allies in key government positions, Israel will likely get that aid in addition to American troops fighting alongside them, even if Israel is the aggressor in the imminent conflict.

The timing of Bolton’s appointment as National Security Adviser is also noteworthy, as it comes little over a month before the U.S. embassy is set to move to Jerusalem, when tensions between Israel, Palestine and its neighbors will be at their highest and when a war is most likely to break out. Bolton is set to ensure strong U.S. support for any Israeli military action that takes place during this time, even though Israel is explicitly planning to target civilians and civilian infrastructure.

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Whitney Webb is a staff writer for MintPress News who has written for several news organizations in both English and Spanish; her stories have been featured on ZeroHedge, the Anti-Media, and 21st Century Wire among others. She currently lives in Southern Chile.