The World Health Organization honored Cuba’s Henry Reeve Brigade in 2017.[i] Named after a US internationalist, its 48,000 health care workers throughout the South are more than all the rich countries combined. The Brigade has treated 3.5 million people in 21 countries since Fidel Castro created it in 2005.
Some think Cuba’s medical internationalism an impossible dream. Not for a poor country, they say. Don Quixote is honored in Cuba. A large replica dominates a square near the University of Havana.
But Don Quixote is often misunderstood, at least in the North. It is not about impossible dreams.
The word “anarchy” pops up these days, along with “seize your destiny”, “imagine”, “create”. Those following dreams are compared to the Man of the Mancha. We admire them, as if they are courageous, taking risks for an ideal.
Yet Victor Hugo noticed that even revolutionaries resist Don Quixote. They’d rather be Leonidas, with victory assured. Their visions, Hugo writes, are “illusions … [of] human certainty”.
It was not so with Don Quixote. His appealing mixture of “madness and intelligence”, whatever else it was, did not expect certainty. He charged windmills and herds of sheep. But his “madness” was not the straight and narrow.
Cuba has exported solidarity. The US, in contrast, exports ignorance. In 1961, at an economics conference, Che Guevara showed how it works.[ii] President Kennedy said the US development program “Alliance for Progress” was about democracy. He didn’t define the term. It was defined by power.
Guevara knew “democracy”, the US view, was an expectation. No other view was permitted. The demo in “democracy” is supposed to mean people. Guevara knew people were not permitted, at least not Latin American ones. He said so at the meeting. Cuba was expelled.
Expectations arise from practises. If I live in a white society, I expect people to be white. A non-white person becomes “different”. I don’t admit to thinking people are white. But because of social practises, I have that expectation.
Expectations are useful. I expect heat to burn and withdraw my hand. I may not know the physics but my expectation arises from practises, some scientific. It is reliable. Some expectations, though, are arbitrary, defined only by power.
It explains ignorance about the Henry Reeves Brigade and what it means for democracy and human rights.
The great US novel Moby-Dick is about expectations. It is supposed to be about US democracy because of multiplicity of perspectives. The ship includes Queequeg, a cannibal with strange rituals and beliefs, one of the nicest characters on the boat.
But Moby Dick is a US book because of expectations: for certainty. It is about Captain Ahab’s vengeful pursuit of a whale. But it is also about Ishmael, the narrator, who seeks meaning. Ishmael is central because he seeks meaning. Standing watch at the masthead, he takes the “mystic ocean at his feet for the visible image of the deep, blue bottomless soul pervading mankind and nature”.
Some say the search for meaning is a human propensity. Ishmael contemplates the “almighty forlornness” of human beings in nature. He seeks meaning in the whale, its face (which it doesn’t have), its ears and tail.
But we search for what we want to know. We don’t just look for meaning. We look for some meaning. It starts with a question, a set of values, a worldview.
Ishmael cannot know the whale. “Dissect him how I may, then, I but go skin deep. I know him not, and never will. But if I know not even the tail of this whale, how understand his head“. Yet Ishmael wouldn’t say the whale cannot be understood if there were no expectation it might be understood.
Moby-Dick, the novel, is about how Ahab’s expectation for superiority over nature fails and how Ishmael, unlike Ahab, accepts the failure. But expecting such superiority is itself surprising, or should be.
Human beings are part of the mysterious and complex unfolding of the universe. Our existence is insecure and, ultimately, unpredictable. We know this from science. Causation is complex, even chaotic. Human beings are subject to such causation.
Smart, sensitive philosophers from across the ages, and across the globe, say the art of dying and the art of living are the same. The reason is simple: All life, including human life, involves decay. Every moment involves change, which is loss. But as Victor Hugo notes, even revolutionaries want certainty.
He calls it the “blind, iron horse of the straight and narrow”. Following dreams is that blind horse. It is following expectations, arbitrary ones, arising from a single, powerful society, a set of values, a worldview. They are followed in ignorance: of expectations, arbitrary ones.
Don Quixote is not about impossible dreams. It is about rationality. Don Quixote wasn’t driven by an “inner voice”, nourished by himself, seeking security that doesn’t exist. However considered, the Man of the Mancha had a vision. He studied and lived it.
Guevara said that thinking freely and creatively is a “close dialectical unity” between individuals and the vision. There has to be vision, direction and leadership. It cannot be otherwise because of the role of expectations, generated by social practises. In a dehumanizing world, they must be transformed.
The role of expectations, rooted in practises, is well known in the philosophy of science. But it is ignored in political philosophy, especially liberal political philosophy, but also anarchism, even sometimes in academic Marxism.
It means reliance upon dreams, imagination, creativity, can only ever be conservative if there is no vision, no direction, no leadership. Cuba has had a vision, more urgent now than ever. The Henry Reeves Brigade is just part.
Ana Belén Montes had that vision.[iii] She’s in jail, in the US, under harsh conditions. Please sign petition here.
Susan Babbitt is author of Humanism and Embodiment (Bloomsbury 2014).
This article was originally published by CounterPunch.
On Sunday, President Erdogan vowed to open a Turkish embassy in East Jerusalem – following hollow recognition of the occupied city as the Palestinian capital, saying:
“We have already declared East Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state but we haven’t been able to open our embassy there because Jerusalem is currently under occupation. God willing we will open our embassy there,” adding:
“Trump has declared Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, with an evangelist and Zionist understanding, with the logic of ‘I have done it and it’s over.’ “
“The US is also moving its embassy there. Those who have taken this step, despite UN decisions, has moved with the logic of ‘We don’t recognize you.’ Well, we don’t recognize you either.”
At an emergency December 13 session in Istanbul, Turkey, 57 Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) countries declared East Jerusalem the capital of a Palestinian state – rhetorical recognition only, changing nothing on the ground now or ahead.
On Sunday, Erdogan vowed to “take matters into our own hands.”
Construction in Israel and the Occupied Territories requires permit permit – easy forJews to get, near impossible for Palestinians on most all of Judea and Samaria Israel wants for exclusive Jewish development only.
Building permits are required to build, make home renovations, grow crops not competing with Israeli ones, open a factory or business, import equipment, export merchandise, and for whatever else Israel decides to control – making normal life for occupied Palestinians impossible.
Israel’s repressive matrix of control dominates Palestinian life, enforced by 2,500 harsh military orders, covering virtually everything imaginable, including a virtual prohibition to build on their own land the state wants for Jews only.
Palestinian land is confiscated by declaring it “State Land.” Jews may purchase land from unwilling Palestinian owners by using a “power of attorney.”
Land transactions are immune from review as long as they’re carried out by a Jew “acting in good faith.”
Land transactions once completed may not be voided even if proved invalid. Military Order No. 1 designated the West Bank and Gaza closed military areas, occupied Golan treated the same way.
Israel considers Jerusalem its exclusive capital, defying international law, supported by America, notably after Trump’s Jerusalem declaration and intention to move the US embassy there.
Israel maintains tight control over the West Bank and East Jerusalem through an elaborate system of illegal settlements, industrial parks, commercial areas, checkpoints, control over border crossings, bypass roads for Jews only, military zones, tourist sites, no-go areas, and restricting Palestinian movements.
Erdogan’s vow for a Turkish embassy in East Jerusalem, recognizing the city as the capital of a Palestinian state, was posturing for a home audience and the Islamic world, aiming to solidify his dictatorial control while bolstering his tarnished image.
With Israeli permit permission not forthcoming, no Turkish embassy will be built in East Jerusalem or anywhere else in the Occupied Territories.
Militarized occupation and Israel’s “permit regime” maintain tight control, rights afforded solely to Jews and allies of the state, no one else.
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.
The US is attempting to sell to the public the next phase of its continued occupation and military operations across the Middle East. Predicated on claims of “rebuilding” Iraq and “fighting terrorists” in Syria, it is in actuality a plan to perpetuate for as long as possible the upheaval currently consuming the region in hopes of overextending and exhausting Iran – and by extension – Russia.
Iranian Roadblock to Western Hegemony
The United States in its pursuit of global hegemony has placed particular focus on encircling, containing, undermining, and if possible, overthrowing the socioeconomic and political order of Iran as a means to secure for itself primacy over the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.
Since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the British followed by the Americans have pursued a multi-generational policy of divide and conquer across MENA.
Nations Ango-American influence could not outright conquer and co-opt such as the Persian Gulf monarchies – or create in the case of Israel – have been either picked apart and left in ruins through direct or indirect military interventions, or have spent decades staving off open and concerted efforts to divide and destroy their respective nations. These nations include Yemen, Libya, Iraq, and Syria most recently, as well as Egypt, Lebanon, Algeria on and off throughout the 20th and 21st centuries.
Iran – above all other nations in the region – reserves a special place for Western attention. Its large population, geography, economy, and military might has provided it space and time to incrementally grow its power and influence throughout the region and the world to dimensions difficult for the West to overcome and dominate.
With 80 million people, a GDP of nearly $400 billion, and an army over half a million strong, Iran is not Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, nor Libya. And as the technological disparity among nations in regards to conventional military capabilities closes, the West finds itself in an increasingly disadvantageous position in regards to coercing Iran directly through force.
Because of this emerging reality, US policy versus Tehran is shifting from attempting to justify a military confrontation it is no longer certain it can win, to a policy of containment and limited conflict similar to America’s maneuvering in Asia Pacific regarding Beijing.
US Plans to “Minimize” Iran’s Influence in the Middle East
A piece in The Nation Interest penned by Brookings policymakers titled, “A blueprint for minimizing Iran’s influence in the Middle East,” attempts to summarize America’s current plans regarding the containment or “minimization” of Iranian influence.
In Iraq, the US appears poised to extend its military presence under the pretext of aiding and rebuilding the country. It even suggests proposed aid levels comparable to those given to Afghanistan – a nation where, despite immense aid and a continuous US military presence since 2001 – still has seen and suffered the arrival and spread of the so-called “Islamic State” (ISIS).
The paper claims:
A stronger, more stable Iraq will be much better positioned to resist domination by Iran. Given the stakes, and America’s previous investment, aid levels comparable to those given Afghanistan or Egypt are in order. Engaging in this way can also enable the United States to help Baghdad keep an eye on the Iran-backed Shia militias as they are partially disbanded and partially worked into Iraqi Security Forces in coming months.
In reality, the US is neither capable of creating a “stronger, more stable Iraq,” nor does it genuinely seek to do so. It will use its continued presence in Iraq to undermine and roll back progress made by Baghdad and its Iranian allies against militant groups including ISIS and Al Qaeda as well as US-backed Kurds in the nation’s north.
In particular, the US has invested an inordinate amount of time and resources to secure highways leading from Baghdad to Iraq’s borders with Jordan and Saudi Arabia – two nations that have played a pivotal role in arming, funding, and harboring militants engaged in militant operations from Lebanon and Syria to Iraq and Yemen. With a US presence along these highways, any torrent of logistical support for sectarian violence within Iraq would be difficult to target and eliminate by the Iraqi military or any of its allies – ensuring perpetual conflict.
A stronger, more stable Iraq, considering the nation’s Shia’a majority, would be more inclined to seek stronger ties with neighboring Iran than occupying Western forces and fits nowhere into Washington’s real plans for the nation. Instead, dividing Iraq into further sectarian conflict and drawing in Iranian support would seek to overextend and exhaust Iranian military power in the region.
In essence, the actual US plan for Iraq is to organize and implement the next round of deadly sectarian fighting.
Regarding Syria, US plans to occupy and administer seized Syrian territory were reiterated – plans that have been openly pursued since outright US-backed regime change stalled in 2011.
The paper claims:
Still, the United States and like-minded states—as well as global-aid agencies—need to help provide security and economic assistance to regions free of Assad’s rule as well as the Islamic State. Some of these regions should be treated as temporary autonomous zones and help govern themselves as well. Additionally, more western and GCC military strength and support for moderate insurgents is needed in northwest parts of the country, such as in and around Idlib, where the Al Qaeda affiliate, formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, is still active. Otherwise, either the latter group or Assad’s forces backed by Russia and Iran will be the likely victor.
Essentially, the US seeks to Balkanize Syria and continue its proxy war against Damascus.
The article sidesteps intentionally around the fact that Idlib’s Al Qaeda occupants were armed, funded, trained, and sent there by the United States and its allies in the first place. It also intentionally sidesteps the reality that there are no “moderate insurgents” in Syria, and there never were.
The paper tips America’s hand, revealing that ongoing Western operations in Syria are aimed not at fighting and defeating ISIS or Al Qaeda, but using the presence of both groups as a pretext to prevent the Syrian government from restoring order to the country, preserving its territorial integrity, and rebuilding its economy. Both terrorist organizations serve as placeholders, denying Damascus access to its own territory until US military assets can take and hold it.
In other words, in regards to minimizing Iranian influence in Iraq and Syria, the US is determined to divide and destroy both nations and their people, plunder their resources, and maintain their collective territory as a breeding ground for sectarianism and extremism. Iranian attempts to assist each nation – or both – comes at the cost of extending itself militarily and economically.
Admitting this would be unfeasible in the pages of The National Interest. But claiming that the US must remain in Iraq to “rebuild” the country and continue operations in Syria to “fight terrorism” allows Washington to continue sowing chaos in both nations, chalking up any noticeable inconsistencies between its alleged policy and its actual plans to tenacious terrorists or even Iran itself.
Tony Cartalucci is a Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook” where this article was originally published.
Featured image: East Antarctica’s Riiser-Larsen ice sheet. (Source: By Ben Holt, NASA, via Wikimedia Commons)
New research has confirmed one of the worst nightmares of climate science: the instability of the East Antarctic ice sheet.
This vast mass holds enough water to raise sea levels by 53 metres worldwide. And researchers have confirmed that one stretch of the southern polar coastline has melted many times in the past: by enough to raise sea levels by three to five metres.
A rise of just one metre would render at least 100 million coast dwellers homeless.
US scientists report in the journal Nature that they went to what they called the Sabrina Coast of eastern Antarctica to look for geological and geophysical evidence of change.
“The widespread loss of Antarctic ice shelves, driven by a warming ocean or warming atmosphere, could spell disaster for our coastlines”
Although the western region, and the Antarctic peninsula, is warming swiftly, for decades scientists have assumed that the great mass of ice in the eastern Antarctic was stable.
“It turns out that for much of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet’s history, it was not the commonly perceived large stable ice sheet with only minor changes in size over millions of years,” said Sean Gulick, of the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics, one of those who led the study.
“Rather, we have evidence for a very dynamic ice sheet that grew and shrank significantly between glacial and interglacial periods. There were also often long intervals of open water along the Sabrina Coast, with limited glacial influence.”
“As ice melts, global sea levels rise. Most of Florida is at or several feet above sea level.
Catastrophe for Florida
“We are already seeing the effects of rising seas caused by melting ice sheets and ocean warming. There is enough ice in our study region alone to raise global sea level by as much as 15 feet (5m). This, in isolation, would be catastrophic to Florida.”
But real estate investors and citizens who put their money into Florida are not likely to get any long-term certainty: nor are the hundreds of millions of people who dwell in low-lying communities from Bangladesh to the Nile Delta, from the coral atolls of Kiribati in the Pacific to the polders of the Netherlands in Europe.
That is because a second study, in the journal Earth’s Future, led by scientists from New Jersey and Massachusetts, reports that estimates of future change are likely to stay uncertain until around 2060.
“There’s a lot of ambiguity in post-2050 projections of sea-level rise and we may have to live with that for a while,” saidRobert Kopp, director of the Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences at Rutgers University. “We could end up with 8 feet of sea level-rise in 2100, but we’re not likely to have clear evidence for that by 2050.”
If these are reduced to zero in the next 40 or so years, sea level rise could be limited. If nations went on burning fossil fuels at an ever-increasing rate, then ultimately all the ice piled kilometres high on Antarctica could melt.
The rate at which the polar icecaps melt will initially be governed by the stability of the ice shelves around the coast that slow glacial flow.
“The widespread loss of Antarctic ice shelves, driven by a warming ocean or warming atmosphere, could spell disaster for our coastlines, and there is sound geological evidence that supports what the models are telling us,” said co-author Rob Deconto, of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
“We’re making progress, but we still don’t know exactly when these processes might kick in, and how fast sea level might rise if they do. The ice shelves are the key.
“They hold back the flow of Antarctic ice toward the ocean, so we don’t want to lose them. The problem is, they don’t last very long when they are sitting in warm water or if they are covered with summer meltwater, so keeping global temperatures in check is critical.” – Climate News Network
The following two articles document the recent unfolding of hate demonstrations targeting Japan’s Korean minority population (hereafter Zainichi Koreans). This introduction provides historical context for the organized expressions of hate against Zainichi Koreans. Earlier analyses of Japan’s far right have emphasized how internet communications, explicit expressions of bigotry, and the frustrations of the “lost” generation,1 contributed to an emergent subculture of grassroots conservatism.2
More recent studies reveal that these post-Internet conservative movements build on a perspective widely shared across the Japanese establishment.3 Whether or not hateful remarks are tolerated in Japanese public space (including cyberspace), the fundamental interpretation of the legacy of Japan’s war and colonization is virtually identical among ultra-right grassroots activists and some prominent mainstream public figures. Recent aggressive street campaigns could strengthen these influences on the general public. Japan’s establishment, including both elite conservatives, and ultraconservatives, as well as their grassroots counterparts, have recently reached a point in which they had a clear shared perspective. Once the Internet became accessible to millions of people in the past two decades, such people were able to subtly instill their views on mainstream society.4
Zainichi Koreans are the migrants and descendants of people who originated in colonial Korea. Japan’s colonization of the Korean peninsula lasted for more than three decades between 1910 and 1945, although one can say that the Japanese Empire’s encroachment on Korea began in 1876, when Japan forced the opening of the country and imposed a unequal treaty on Yi Dynasty Korea (1392-1897).5 Japan’s two major wars against China (1894-1895) and Russia (1904-1905) were triggered by conflicts between Japan and other powers over the control of Korea and Manchuria. As of 2016, conservative estimates of the Korean minority population in Japan put the total at 330,537. That number includes 299,488 South Koreans and 31,049 stateless Koreans.6 In addition, between 1952 and 2016, 365,530 Koreans were naturalized.7 Zainichi Koreans obtain Japanese nationality through naturalization or by having one legally-Japanese parent (i.e., cases in which nationality is transmitted according to the principle of jus sanguinis or “right of blood”).
During Japan’s colonial rule of Korea, large numbers of Koreans migrated to Japan to fulfill the demand for labor, and many more to Manchuria and other parts of the Empire. Substantial numbers of Korean students also migrated to Japan seeking educational opportunities. Both groups, however, were considered threats to the social order by the Japanese authorities, who moved vigorously to repress labor disputes as well as socialist and communist activities and the Korean Independence Movement. The Korean population in Japan steadily increased and in 1923, when the great Kanto earthquake devastated downtown Tokyo, an estimated 6,000 Koreans were killed by Japanese civilians.8 Over 130,000 Koreans were living in Japan at that time.9
The Monument for Korean Victims, Yokoami-chō Park, Tokyo.
The outdoor map of Yokoami-cho Park, Tokyo. The Monument for Korean Victims is located to the right of the main Memorial Hall.
Japan embarked on the Fifteen Year War in China with the 1931 Manchurian Incident. Growing numbers of Korean laborers were then mobilized to alleviate chronic labor shortages in war-industry-related manufacturing, construction, and mining sectors. Conscripted labor migration dramatically increased the number of Koreans in Japan. By the end of World War II there were more than 2 million Koreans in the country. Although most conscripted labor migrants returned to the Korean Peninsula following the 1945 collapse of the Japanese Empire, some 600,000, mainly longer-term sojourners remained, especially those with children who had been born in the country. In 1945, the Korean Peninsula was divided across the 38th parallel, and occupied by the USSR in the North and the US in the South. The increased political tension of the late 1940s also discouraged the return of the remaining Koreans in Japan.10
In 1952, all Zainichi Koreans were deprived of their Japanese nationality as Japan regained its sovereignty. Zainichi Koreans were then temporarily defined as Law-126 residents who were permitted to stay in Japan “for the time being.”11 After 1965, those who opted for South Korean nationality were granted “treaty-based permanent residency” for two further generations. Only in 1981 at the time of Japan’s ratification of the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, did stateless Koreans (those who did not declare allegiance to South Korea) gain a relatively stable permanent residency called “exceptional permanent residency.” In 1991, the residency status of all “former-Japanese” Koreans whose ancestors were in Japan by 1952, was unified into and replaced by a more stable type of “special permanent residency.” This special permanent residency, which took nearly half a century to establish and finally settled the legal limbo of those stateless people who originated from colonial Korea and their descendants, has been under vehement criticism by various grassroots conservative activist groups since the mid-2000s. These groups manifest their presence through street demonstrations and online video-streaming. The fact that special permanent residency is more stable than other types of permanent residency is attacked as if Zainichi Koreans have unfairly received some kind of privilege. In this way, the fake-news urban myth of “Zainichi Korean privilege” gained currency in ultranationalist networks in the era of the Internet.
Collective memories are always contentious depending on crisscrossing positionalities. The historical debate between the former colonizer and the colonized has far-reaching and long-term consequences. Narusawa Muneo’s report below provides a detailed, behind-the-scenes view of the politics surrounding historically contentious matters about which Koike Yuriko, the outspoken conservative governor of Tokyo, has staked a position. Koike has abandoned the Tokyo governor’s long-established practice of formally issuing a eulogy in memory of the massacre of Koreans that following the Great Kantō Earthquake in 1923. This occurs at a time when a conservative women’s group and a Tokyo Assembly Member have launched a concerted effort to remove a contentious monument commemorating the massacre.
The Memorial Hall for Earthquake victims and Air-raid victims, Yokoami-chō Park, Tokyo. Downtown Tokyo was burnt down twice in September 1923 and in March 1945.
At present, Japanese conservatives and progressives express conflicting interpretations of Japan’s past as a colonizer and aggressor in East Asia.12 The three most contentious war-related memorial matters are probably the “comfort women,” conscripted labor migration to Japan and the war front, and the overall assessment of Japanese colonial rule. These recurrent conflicts continue to roil diplomatic and civilian relationships between South Korea and Japan. Conservative critics as well as politicians argue that the 1965 treaty establishing diplomatic relations between Japan and South Korea stipulated that in exchange for the Japanese economic aid package that benefited major business conglomerates in South Korea, no Korean individual could receive redress for damages inflicted on them during Japan’s colonization and war mobilization. Japanese conservatives and ultra-conservatives who defend Japan’s pre-war regime contest South Korean accusations of “wrong-doing” on the part of Japan. So-called “history disputes” remain landmines which could explode at any time and upset diplomatic and civilian relations between Japan and South Korea. And Zainichi Koreans forever remain foreigners in Japan, left awkwardly in-between, even as fourth-generation Japan-born Zainichi Koreans are coming of age. In addition, the fraught relationship between Japan and the DPRK (with no formal diplomatic relations) adds additional twists in the plight of Zainichi Koreans.13
The legal limbo aside, Zainichi Koreans continue to be placed in an historical limbo, being permanently excluded from the orthodox narratives of Japan’s “national” history. This historical limbo exacerbates hate demonstrations, as reported by Ishibashi Gaku. The new 2016 Hate Speech Act declares that hate speech against someone who is not originally from Japan shall not be tolerated, but Ishibashi’s observations on the ground make clear that the law is toothless. Anti-hate advocacy groups, in which Japanese citizens and Zainichi Koreans work together, continue to urgently require more proactive and comprehensive measures, such as the enactment of anti-discrimination laws that specify penalties for violators. Nevertheless, without any thorough-going solution to the historical plight of Zainichi Koreans who remain in limbo, other means of hate and bigotry may appear, regardless of how law enforcement authorities handle hate demonstrations, on and off-line, as Higuchi Naoto insightfully predicts.14
Acknowledgement
The author thanks Joseph Essertier and Mark Selden for comments on earlier versions, as well as Satoko Oka Norimatsu, and Tomomi Yamaguchi for making this project possible.
Behind Tokyo Governor Koike’s Refusal to Send a Eulogy to the ‘Memorial Service for Korean Victims of the Great Kanto Earthquake’: a Rightist Women’s Group and Nippon Kaigi
By Narusawa Muneo
Translated by Satoko Oka Norimatsu
On August 28, 2016 a number of elderly women and men gathered in front of JR Ryogoku Station in Tokyo with a big banner that read,
“Do Not Tolerate the Memorial Stone for Koreans at Tokyo Metropolitan Yokoami-cho Park. It Demeans Japanese People.”
One woman took the microphone and said,
“There is no scientific evidence of the massacre of six thousand [Koreans]… given the political situation at that time when terrorism was occurring frequently… Japanese people stood up (in the wake of the Great Kanto Earthquake) in order to protect themselves. That was how they came to form vigilante groups.”
This was a street campaign organized by a right-wing women’s group called Soyokaze [“Gentle Breeze”], which describes itself as “a group of women that tries to improve Japan even if only slightly!” Since last year, this group has intensified its campaign for removal of the “Memorial Stone for Korean Victims of the Great Kanto Earthquake.” Located within Yokoami-cho Park (in Sumida Ward) fairly near Ryogoku Station, the Memorial is under the jurisdiction of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government.
A right-wing rally at Yokoami-chō Park, surrounded by the police and bureacrats.
The reason for their protest, they say, is that a certain passage is “demeaning to Japanese people.” This is the part that says, “In the turmoil of the Great Kanto Earthquake, as many as six thousand Korean people were deprived of their precious lives because of scheming and slanderous rumours, which were false.”
In the meantime, Tokyo Metropolitan Governor Koike Yuriko this year indicated that she would break with the tradition of sending a eulogy for the annual memorial service held in front of the Memorial on September 1, the anniversary of the 1923 earthquake that killed over one hundred thousand people. Koike did send a eulogy last year [the first quake anniversary after taking office]. This change in policy is not unrelated to the development of the Soyokaze movement.
On June 1, 2016, before the street-campaign speeches, members of Soyokaze went to the Park Section of the Park and Greenery Department in the Construction Bureau of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. According to Soyokaze’s blog of June 2, they got the Section to commit to the idea that the “Tokyo Metropolitan Government is responsible for the wording of the inscription on the Memorial Stone since they own it and the land that it stands on.” They then followed that up with this: “The inscription, including the statement that ‘as many as six thousand Korean people were deprived of their precious lives because of false scheming and slanderous rumours, which were wrong,’ might forever be imprinted on the minds of Japanese children.”
Korean Riots?
Back in 2012, Soyokaze protested the Memorial Stone To Mourn the Gunma Prefecture Korean Victims of Forced Labour, located in Takasaki City of Gunma Prefecture, attacking the wording “With heartfelt remorse, we inscribe deeply in our memory the historical fact that our country caused tremendous damage and suffering to Korean people,” claiming this to be “a fabricated history that Korea imposed on us.” This ignited subsequent right-wing movements to demand its removal.
In 2014, the Gunma Prefectural Assembly passed a resolution asking the prefecture not to renew the approval of the memorial stone, due to the fact that “the memorial stone, located within a prefectural facility, is being used for political purposes.” The prefecture demanded that the group that installed the memorial stone remove it, and both parties are currently disputing the matter in the Maebashi District Court.
The goal of Soyokaze’s attack on the Memorial Stone for Koreans at the Tokyo Metropolitan Park is its removal. Likewise regarding the memorial stone in Gunma. Governor Koike’s refusal to send a eulogy for the annual memorial service may set the stage for achieving that goal. In fact, what directly triggered this move was the meeting of eight members of Soyokaze with Koga Toshiaki, a Metropolitan Assembly member, on June 19, 2016.
Assembly Member Koga of the Liberal Democratic Party is the Vice Chair of the Local Assembly Members’ League of Nippon Kaigi, one of the biggest right-wing organizations in Japan, and an advisor to Shuken kaifuku wo mezasu kai (“Group for the Restoration of Sovereignty”), a right-wing group known for its racist remarks. His association with Soyokaze is clear enough. At their meeting with Koga, according to their blog of the same date, Soyokaze members “reported to him on the issue of the inscription on the Korean memorial—its history and the current situation.” They also “reported that the inscription comes ‘under the responsibility of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government,’ and after exchanging such information, ‘came upon a single goal.’”
Koga took up the issue of the Korean memorial at the Metropolitan Assembly’s Education Committee on November 8, 2016, and said that “the part about six thousand people does not accord with the facts.” He mentioned author Kudo Miyoko’s book Kanto Daishinsai “Chosenjin gyakusatsu” no shinjitsu (“The Great Kanto Earthquke – The Truth About the ‘Massacre of Koreans’”), published by Sankei Shinbun Shuppan, claiming that “it was an undeniable fact that Korean independence activists staged riots,” and that attributing the “killings and injuring of Koreans” to “groundless rumours” … “defames our grandfathers and forefathers through false and malicious slander.”
A Book of Random Notes for Attacking the Memorials
Koga went further by saying, “Governor Koike Yuriko is sending a eulogy to the event held in front of the Memorial Stone,” and stated that the “Governor must change her perception of the issue, too.” It is therefore possible that the “single goal” that Soyokaze and Koga agreed on in their June 19 meeting was Koike’s withdrawal of the governor’s annual eulogy to the Korean memorial ceremony.
At the Metropolitan Assembly’s Regular Meeting on March 2 this year, Koga, again referring to Kudo’s book, went a step further and demanded “measures for improvement, including removal” of the Memorial Stone. In response, Governor Koike said that she would “handle this appropriately,” and with regard to the eulogy said, “on future occasions, I will personally go through [the eulogy] and make an appropriate judgment.”
But Kudo Miyoko’s book Kanto Daishinsai “Chosenjin gyakusatsu” no shinjitsu (The Great Kanto Earthquake. The Truth About the “Massacre of Koreans”), the book that Koga used as the basis of his complaint about the Memorial Stone, takes the widely reported “Korean riots” to be “facts,” while the newspapers at the time, amid the chaos after the earthquake, reported the riots without providing any actual evidence of them. There are numerous falsifications and distortions of sources in the book, making it unworthy of any serious expert review. This is one of those books of hate, claiming that since we are talking about “Korean terrorists,” killing them would not be called a “massacre.”
Koike announced in a press conference on August 25 that she would attend the big Buddhist memorial service organized by the Metropolitan Government’s Mourning Association and said, “Since I will express my condolences to all the victims (there), I will not commemorate specific groups or individuals.” Concerning this, Kato Naoki, a journalist who wrote the book Kugatsu, Tokyo no rojo de (In September, On the Streets of Tokyo, published by Korocolor Publishers), which covers in detail the massacre of Koreans at the time of the Great Kanto Earthquake, pointed out that “It is a huge problem to treat people who died as a result of the earthquake, and Koreans massacred by Japanese, on an equal basis lumping them all together with the word ‘all’.” He also said:
The Memorial Stone was erected with the determination never to do something like this again, precisely due to the fact that administrative bodies such as the police were complicit in spreading the groundless rumours that caused the massacres. In spite of that determination, Governor Koike’s refusal to send a eulogy there for the annual memorial service is quite possibly the same as the massacre denialism of people like Kudo Miyoko. If nothing is done, this could escalate into a ban on the memorial ceremonies in front of the Memorial Stone, and even its removal. Governor Koike once spoke at an event organized by Soyokaze in 2010, when she served as a member of the Lower House. This makes one feel uneasy about what will happen in the years ahead.
This article appeared in the September 1, 2017 Shukan Kinyobi, pp.16-17. Hyperlinks have been added by the translator.
A Japanese Hate Group that Attacked Korean Residents
By Ishibashi Gaku
Translated by Joseph Essertier
“A ring-the-doorbell-and-run demo (pin pon dasshu demo).”1 Mr. Arita Yoshifu, a member of the House of Councillors (the upper house of the National Diet) from the Democratic Party (Minshinto) watched part of the demonstration from beginning to end with his own eyes. He severely criticized the behavior of these absurd and therefore conspicuously hideous racists.
The participants numbered approximately 20, the distance they walked about 300 meters, and the time they spent a little more than 8 minutes. Riding up in a microbus, they changed their starting point as if to poke fun at the few hundred citizens countering them, waited for the right moment to protest, jumped into the bus for refuge, and ran off. They certainly resembled children full of naughty pranks, dashing off at full speed after ringing the bell at the door entrance.
“I’ve never seen such a clumsy demo.” Diet member Arita is someone who has long been on the front lines of those countering racists and who put all his energy into the Hate Speech Act of 2016 (Heito Supiichi Kaishō Hō).2 He is outraged by the reality that “pseudo demos” such as this are permitted. The spectacle of the hate demo that was carried out on 16 July in Nakahara-ku, Kawasaki City brought to the surface the limits of the Hate Speech Act, a law that contains no provisions for banning hate speech.
The ringleaders are Tsuzaki Naomichi, who has conducted 12 hate demos in Kawasaki, and Seto Hiroyuki, the true Nazi believer who is the top adviser to the “Japan First Party” (Nippon Daiichi tō), an extreme right-wing political organization that was a successor to the “Association of Citizens against the Special Privileges of the Zainichi” (Zainichi Tokken o Yurusanai Shimin no Kai, or “Zaitokukai” for short). It is unimaginable that a demo organized by such luminaries of committed discriminationism would have any purpose other than racist agitation.
On the other hand, they were extremely careful to disguise their maneuvering. In their application for the demo they explained to the Kawasaki Police and the Prefectural Public Safety Commission (Ken kōan iinkai) that their “goal is to denounce the Japan Communist Party” and said that they would “not engage in hate speech.” The unprecedented tactic of chartering a bus was aimed at their opposition. The demo organizers, who had planned it last year, on 5 June, were surrounded by protesting citizens, so they were forced to cancel.3 At that point, they had labeled it the “Demo To Start the Cleansing of Japan in Kawasaki,” evoking images of ethnic cleansing. Certainly, it seems to have become difficult to hold demos that announce hate speech openly and one can see a certain chilling effect brought about by the Hate Speech Act, which says that discriminatory actions will not “be permitted.”
“Of course we say ‘kill them’”
Yes, but for racists who aim at discrimination, it does not matter how the demo is packaged, or how small the scale of the demo is. Their targets and their effectiveness were displayed in videos uploaded to YouTube. One sees an actual situation in which the person with the camera runs up to the protestors and, speaking of citizens who are raising their voices against discrimination, claims that “violent groups from the extreme left and terrorists are on the rampage.” In a period of one month this video was viewed over 80,000 times. The comment area overflows with discriminatory posts.
“Hurry up and go home, you cockroach Koreans.” “Interfering Koreans make me sick. Hang in there, Japanese.”
It was twisted hatred to claim that all the people on the side protesting were Koreans who were “anti-Japanese” and had to be denounced. It was also twisted hatred for Mr. Tsuzaki to pour oil on the flames of discrimination openly at a “Japan purification demo.” The participants, with loudspeakers in hand, put themselves in good spirits in the following way.
“South Korea and North Korea are enemy countries. They spread groundless rumors and bad mouth Japan all over the world. Of course, we say kill those from the enemy country. So don’t be shy about it, let your voice be heard. Cockroach Koreans, get the hell out. Slaughter the enemy.”
As these right-wing demo organizers and participants see it, the former “comfort women” are liars, Zainichi Korean residents are liars, and so we Japanese have been treated unfairly and have been falsely accused. A perversion in which victimizers justify their discrimination by taking hold of the feelings of victims i.e., self-victimization.4 Fabrications of history make this perversion possible and this reflects the way in which such a circuit of discrimination infiltrates this society.
This is why it did not matter that it was a “pseudo demo.” Under the pretext of raising funds for their activities, an account number is displayed on Mr. Tsuzaki and Mr. Seto’s blog. The Hate Speech Act, merely a law of principle, is powerless in the face of professional discriminators who make money from discrimination. What we need next is a law that bans racial discrimination itself and provisions for local government enforcement. It must be something that severs the roots of the historical and structural discrimination against resident Koreans that began with colonial domination, domination that this country’s government has preserved and continued.
This article originally appeared in Shukan Kinyobi, September 2017.
Ishibashi Gaku is a Kanagawa Shimbun journalist.
Narusawa Muneo is a journalist and editor and the author of books on the Obama administration and 9.11.
Youngmi Lim received a Ph.D. in Sociology from the City University of New York Graduate Center, and currently teaches Sociology at Musashi University, Tokyo. Youngmi is writing a book on intermarriage between Zainichi Koreans and Japanese.
Sources
Hashimoto, Akiko. 2015. The Long Defeat: Cultural Trauma, Memory, and Identity in Japan. Oxford University Press.
Higuchi, Naoto. 2016. Japan’s Ultra-Right. Tr. Castelvetere, Teresa. Melbourne: Trans Pacific Press.
Jung, Yeang Hae. 2003. Sengo tsukurareta shokuminchishihai. (The post-war construction of a colonial rule). Jung, Yeang Hae, Tamigayo seishō: Aidentitī, kokka, gendā (People’s anthem: Identities, nation, and gender). Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, pp. 105-150.
Klein, Adam. 2012. Slipping Racism into the Mainstream: A Theory of Information Laundering. Communication Theory 22(4): 427–448. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2885.2012.01415.x
Mun, Gyung-su. 2007. Zainichi chōsenjin ni totteno sengo. (The post-war period for Zainichi Koreans.) Mun, Gyung-su Zainichi chōsenjinmondai no kigen (The origin of Zainichi Korean problem) Tokyo: Kurein (Crane), pp.81-150.
Nishinarita, Yutaka. 1997. Zainichi chosenjin no “sekai” to “teikoku” kokka (Zainichi Koreans’ “world” and the “imperial” state). Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai (University of Tokyo Press).
Sōmushō (Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications). n.d. Shokan hōrei ichiran (Laws within jurisdiction)
Yamaguchi, Tomomi. 2013. Xenophobia in Action: Ultranationalism, Hate Speech, and the Internet in Japan. Radical Historical Review 117: 98-118. doi 10.1215/01636545-2210617
Yasuda, Koichi. 2012. Netto to aikoku: Zaitokukai no “yami” o oikakete. (Internet and patriotism: Pinning down Zaitokukai’s darkness.) Tokyo: Kōdansha.
Notes
1 The children of post-WWII baby boomers. “Rosujene” (the lost generation, abridged in katakanatransliteration) had undergone the most competitive college admission as well as job placement (resulting in higher participation in irregular employment and lower marriage rates) due to Japan’s faltering economy since the collapse of the economic bubble in 1992.
2 Yasuda, 2012; Sakamoto, 2011.
3 Higuchi, 2014; Yamaguchi, 2013.
4 See Klein, 2012 for “information laundering.”
5 Reestablished as the Great Korean Empire (Daehan Jeguk 1897-1910).
6 Hōmushō, 2017. Those who have “special permanent residency” are “former Japanese nationality holders” and their descendants; their migration took place during Japan’s colonization of the Korean Peninsula (1910-1945). When Japan first introduced Alien Registration in 1947, these legally-Japanese Koreans were registered simply as “Koreans” (Chōsen) just to indicate their regional origin, prior to the 1948 foundation of two Korean states, the Republic of Korea (ROK) or “South Korea,” and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), or “North Korea,” in 1948. Those who formally pledged allegiance to the ROK gradually switched their registration to the ROK (Kankoku in Japanese). The ROK government was formally recognized by Japan following the establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and South Korea in 1965. Those who continue to be registered as just Koreans (Chōsenjin) are stateless Koreans. Not all such Koreans support the DPRK regime.
7 Calculated from Hōmushō 2017b. Once naturalized, Zainichi Koreans or any other former foreigners, are counted simply as Japanese and are statistically lost.
8 Ryang, 2007.
9 Nishinarita, 1997, p.42, Table II-1.
10 Mun, 2007, p. 87-88. The fighting in the years 1950 to 1953 that is conventionally referred to as the “Korean War” in the pro-US narrative was only one stage in this civil war. The division of the Korean Peninsula into two territories, one Communist-controlled and the other US-controlled, at the 38th parallel in August 1945, as well as the undemocratic elections that were lent legitimacy by the newly-established-yet-still-weak United Nations in 1948 exacerbated Korean-versus-Korean strife. With the dark clouds of a civil war on the horizon and intense guerrilla fighting in the late 1940s, e.g. the left wing and grassroots independence struggles in southwestern Korea and on Cheju Island, it is not surprising that many Koreans chose to remain in Japan rather than return immediately to their ancestral homeland. I thank Joseph Essertier for pointing out this deeper context.
11 Law-125 (Alien Registration Law) and 126 (Residency of Former Japanese Subjects), and Law-127 (Compensation for Death and Injury associated with Military Duties), possess tremendous symbolic meaning in Japan’s re-establishment as a sovereign state. Law-125 and 126 disconnected Zainichi Koreans from the new Japanese state, and Zainichi Korean war veterans receive no compensation. See Jung 2003. Only in 2001 did they receive temporary remuneration, by which time, the vast majority of war veterans were already deceased and the law itself expired in 2004 (Sōmushō n.d.).
12 Hashimoto, 2015.
13 See Ryang, 2016 for a range of issues surrounding Zainichi Koreans who are sympathetic to the DPRK.
14 Higuchi, 2016.
15 A “ring-the-doorbell-and-run demo” (pin pon dasshu demo) is the way that Mr. Arita has described this hate demo that was held in the city of Kawasaki on 16 July 2017.
16 The Hate Speech Act of 2016 is a toothless law against hate speech that was enacted on 25 May 2016 by Japan’s National Diet. It does not “legally ban hate speech and sets no penalty.” Tomohiro Osaki, “Diet passes Japan’s first law to curb hate speech,” Japan Times (24 May 2016)
17 In other words, it appears that a decision to carry out the hate demo in Kawasaki was made on 5 June 2016, almost two weeks after the Hate Speech Act was enacted and about 13 months before the day of the demo, 16 July 2017. This supports the suggestion of Ishibashi Gaku, the author of the article, that this demo would be banned, if Japan had real laws against hate speech.
18 A term from psychology, “self-victimization” refers to a kind of deception in which the abuser plays the victim, deceiving others by portraying himself or herself as the victim in order to elicit sympathy from others, divert attention away from his or her abusive acts, to place responsibility for wrongdoing on his or her chosen scapegoat. This is what Ishibashi seems to intend to express with the word “perversion”—that this hate group twists the history to such an extent that they make it look as if the people who are obvious victims and have little power, i.e., “comfort women” who have given testimony about how they were tortured and Zainichi Koreans who face discrimination in Japan, are, in fact, the ones in power and doing the bullying. This contradicts the historical evidence and is a complete reversal of roles.
Every day, the ranks of China’s young workforce bubble with bright minds, a cosmopolitan vanguard, striving for a piece of the coveted “Chinese dream”— that level of technical and professional jobs and economic security never known to their parents’ generation. But every day the race for Asia’s globalization miracle masks a shadow labor market that uses the education system to exploit a hyper-competitive youth labor market, under crushing pressure to achieve middle-class status.
In September 2017, youth activists in Hong Kong launched a campaign to expose one facet of this growing phenomenon of youth in precarious manufacturing work: the labor advocacy group Students and Scholars against Corporate Misbehaviour (SACOM) called out one cutting-edge tech brand for perpetuating exploitative labor practices in its supply chains in China. The group’s investigation into the Quanta Chongqing factory—a mega-industrial facility in one of China’s rapidly developing inland cities, which Beijing has been promoting as rising global export hubs—revealed a small army of young laborers. Although these student workers were, on paper, described as temporary interns, presumably apprenticing for skilled positions in electronics—they hardly matched the international profile of China’s best and brightest marching toward technological progress: rather, they were, according to a recent research investigation, often engaged in the grudge work of neoliberal capital, toiling as many as 12 hours a day, sometimes overnight, without the standard labor protections afforded to regular workers and in gross violation of China’s regulations for protecting student interns.
SACOM accused Quanta, a Taiwanese-owned subcontractor for some of the world’s leading tech brands, of forcing student interns to work under harsh conditions under the guise of educational programming. The work performed, according to the group’s investigation, had little to do with training, nor was it compensated according to the skills or time they had invested in vocational school programs. And on an institutional level, their role as cogs in Apple’s supply chain fueled a wider phenomenon of student workers being drafted as inexpensive “surplus” labor for China’s export economy.
Ironically, these youth also fit the demographic profile of China’s emerging consumer class, who relish their Apple, Samsung and Microsoft products as icons of a new material culture. The two sides of China’s millennial caste—the surging “youthquake” of mass consumption, alongside an increasingly precarious and alienated wave of young low-wage workers, many of them among China’s three hundred million rural migrants—represent two faces of China’s rising young masses. Trapped between soaring ambitions and increasingly constricted prospects for social advancement, they are tethered to a labor market and a product market built on Digital Age sweatshops.
A “Social Responsibility” Crisis
Following SACOM’s report, Quanta, a leading producer of laptops, and other electronic products denied the allegations in the press, though it did not directly refute the group’s claims. But SACOM’s campaign primarily targeted the top of the supply chain, calling on Apple to adhere to its Corporate Social Responsibility code by reining in exploitation of student workers and pushing to improve wages and working conditions at its suppliers. Though Apple has publicly denied SACOM’s claims on their specific charge that its longtime supplier Quanta was directly producing the Apple Watch Series 3 model in question at the Chonqing plant. However, activists dispute Apple’s refutation, saying their investigations show that the company is still profiting from its intern workforce on an ongoing basis, though it appears to have since severed a specific recent contract under pressure. Recently, in fact, Apple issued its own report conceding that an internal audit had uncovered labor exploitation of interns at a different facility run by another major multinational electronics supplier, Foxconn, its leading supplier and China’s largest industrial employer with more than one million workers..
Following a similar pattern of plausible deniability, HP did not respond specifically to the charges following SACOM’s reports, but later told The Guardian that it closely regulates its supply chain to ensure compliance with local labor standards. Multinational brands often distance themselves from smaller under-regulated subcontractors at the base of its supply chain. Following a labor scandal, tech giants routinely promise to investigate such incidents under their voluntary social responsibility codes. But while companies perfunctorily reassure the public they will self-regulate their sourcing, the usual methods of internal supply-chain monitoring and factory audits have been criticized as ineffective whitewashing by independent advocacy groups.
More broadly, the reports of widespread intern abuse represent the standard, not the exception, in China’s low-wage manufacturing system. With more development moving into regional interior cities and manufacturing investment shifting to cheaper parts of Asia, the workforce is being dispersed across more remote areas, and labor watchdogs warn of downward pressure on wages and a decline in government regulation of working conditions.
An analysis from Hong Kong Polytechnic University researcher Jenny Chan (who is also a contributing editor of The Asia Pacific Journal) describes an intern labor pipeline in which significant numbers of the 18 million youth in vocational schools find themselves programmed as labor bots, powering assembly lines through the systematic cheapening of student labor presented as internships. These interns are often subjected to worse conditions and lower wages than the standard employees they work alongside in violation of China’s internship laws prohibiting 16- to 18-year old students from working overtime and night shifts. According to Chan, across China’s manufacturing sector, scarcely regulated networks of low-wage casual student labor enable both government and commercial profiteers to profiteer from a “two-tier” labor system, under a legal rubric of vocational education.
China’s electronics-export sector banks on young people’s career aspirations to fill spots in its supply chain. As the exclusionary university exam system shunts millions of “leftover” Chinese students into vocational schools. The system is driven by and perpetuates collusion with multinationals with interns channeled into high-tech low-skill factories: as Chinese wages have risen with global manufacturing investments over the last decade, the internship infrastructure has simultaneously emerged as a way for huge corporations, including Honda and another massive Apple contractor, Foxconn, to circumvent regulations and strip student-workers of their labor rights. Foreign-contracted Chinese firms exploit young workers as disposable seasonal labor required to work long illegal overtime hours to meet peak-season production demands (as when a new iPhone rolls out), at the expense of their families, the school system, and low-wage workers of all skill levels.
Student interns working at Foxconn
Yet some of the hyperexploited interns in the investigation have sometimes displayed a savvy awareness of their degraded status. A 16-year-old interviewee told researchers: “Come on, what do you think we’ve learned standing for more than ten hours a day manning machines on the line?…There’s no relation to what we study in school. Every day is just a repetition of one or two simple motions, like a robot.”
Since the student workforce churns seasonally with the academic calendar, these feeder programs offer no professional development opportunities or promotional prospects. Interns are excluded from core social-welfare obligations that accompany standard employment, saving companies from matching payments, while they work the comparable, backbreaking hours, often as many as 60 hours a week including overtime. The paternalistic social structure, typically constructed around a dorm-like living arrangement, is designed to present a youthful atmosphere. But the insularity of the intern’s work-lives, coupled with the constant surveillance of their activities, risks eroding student-workers’ sense of personal autonomy as lines between their jobs and private lives blur.
The main feeders for this workforce are vocational institutions that, like for-profit trade schools in the United States, reflect the corporatization and commercialization of the “middle tier” education system. Since internships are incorporated into the training—while heavily promoted by local governments and teachers as a career springboard—young interns enter jobs hoping to prepare for careers as technicians, healthcare workers, or business managers. But by the time they discover they’ve been piped into seasonal grunt work on electronics-assembly lines with no training in their specializations, their time is already firmly controlled by their quasi-employers, who, through shady contract arrangements with schools and labor agencies, are able to expand work terms “to meet production needs, ranging from three months to a full year, with scant regard for student training needs.”
At Foxconn, China’s largest industrial employer, for example, students who are legally exempt from “medical insurance, work injury insurance, unemployment benefits, maternity insurance, and old age pensions” are also, because of their trainee status, excluded from the standard on-the-job “skills subsidy” for long-term workers, despite being typically underpaid.
Student interns en route to their assignments
At Quanta Chongqing, similarly, recruiting firms had reportedly drawn students from local vocational schools, helping to stock the assembly lines with more than 60 percent of the total workforce, according to one mid-level manager. In language reflecting the on-demand global tech economy, he explained to researchers that students served as a more “flexible” spigot of labor than the older worker pool who might be hired for longer-term jobs: “It takes only a few weeks,” he said, “to order those students from the schools….The factory doesn’t want to keep too many regular workers as it gets far fewer orders during low seasons. You can’t easily fire workers if they are regular employees, but you can tell the interns to leave at almost any time.
SACOM has accused Quanta of violating both domestic labor law and Apple’s corporate code of conduct. Existing policies require generally that student internships in the manufacturing sector involve work relevant to their major. But overall, the intern experience today reflects the structural incentives in the neoliberal global economy to rely on a fluid, liminal workforce of expendable workers, as interchangeable as the widgets they produce.
The charges brought against Quanta fit a grimly familiar pattern of young students being pressed to work in manufacturing facilities as part of a school-mandated internship. But the persistence of the pattern over years, despite existing laws limiting internships to education-related activities, show that current oversight mechanisms are failing. Whether this is a product of suppliers managing to continue finding ways to circumvent the law, often in collusion with local governments, or of regulators being under-resourced or corrupted, a sense of malign neglect surrounds the supply network. This is most clearly borne out in the public denials among multinational firms operating in China. While companies like Apple may be technically able to downplay links to certain subcontractors with unsavory track records, watchdog reports regularly turn up contravening evidence, tracing at least some parts of various devices back to unregulated subcontracted facilities with brutal labor practices. The links are often indirect, and perhaps increasingly institutionalized, as complicity throughout the industry keeps global importers, China-based vendors, and multinational subcontractors intertwined under a status quo of mutually reinforcing profits.
According to Chan, because of the scarcity of decent job opportunities for students excluded from university, employers readily capitalize on the rising vocational-worker surplus, knowing that, by law, interns “don’t have the right to join trade unions,” and, in turn, “are wanted also because they can be used to break the strikes or to divide the labor force. This is integral to control of the work force.”
Chan also argues that recent reforms purporting to standardize internships might have further entrenched the two-tier system, since the measures “institutionalized the reality that interns would be paid at 80 percent of employees of the same positions.” So in effect, “the state is actively shaping and sustaining labor precarization.”
There are signs that the government is getting more serious about cracking down on intern abuses and pressuring corporations to police their own supply chains. For example, the central government promulgated a new internship law for vocational students in April 2016, setting age limits on hiring students and adding parent consent mandates as well as standards for three-party contracts for schools, businesses and students. SACOM’s report on Quanta notes that another Apple supplier, Foxconn Zhengzhou, under pressure from critics, issued a memorandum in the summer 2017 barring the hiring of all students under 22 years of age and clarifying vetting requirements for hiring older students.
Though this appears to indicate that the company, and Apple, as the chief contractor, are focused on compliance, the crisis at Quanta suggests that massive exploitation continues, even within a framework of voluntary corporate “compliance.”
Moreover, Chan noted in follow-up correspondence that while the government moved to tighten regulations in 2016, recent labor investigations suggest the practice of pressing interns into excessive shifts has persisted at Foxconn, and the cases that have attracted media attention represent “probably the tip of a huge iceberg.” Noting the role of global electronics brands in creating an “on demand” manufacturing system that relies on precarious intern labor, she adds that although there might be “pro-labor legislators at the center…the new rules on internship governance are weakly implemented thus far.” Amid market forces buttressing corporate impunity, the integrity of the regulatory system may hinge on civil society and independent labor activism through grassroots initiatives like SACOM.
The Global Incorporation of Education in the Neoliberal Era
Once a vaunted institution of social advancement in Chinese society, vocational schools have turned into clearinghouses for working-class youth, as bosses and local officials pressure program managers to dispatch short-term laborers to meet companies’ production goals. Yes, students nominally volunteer for these programs, but as Chan explains, interns are socialized and taught by teachers to “unthink exploitation” in a way that, in the eyes of the state, rationalizes the expropriation of their undervalued labor.
Parallel examples can be seen in the United States with a similar internship model that treats the pre-professional internship program (often available to college students or recent graduates) as a form of apprenticeship that is generally exempt from the federal regulatory standards that apply to regular workers. Instead, a parallel legal framework has emerged, one established about 70 years ago, long before they became a white-collar training ground in professions ranging from entertainment to law offices. Journalist and activist Ross Perlin has explored the structural implications of this for the wider US workforce, positing that equity at every level of labor is undermined when the law grants corporations unlimited authority to employ an underregulated contingent workforce with the intention of meeting spot labor demands with as few legal obligations as possible. Any two-tier system of labor, Perlin argues, promotes displacement and substandard work. This is even the case in white-collar professions when a surplus labor force is available, particularly when young trainees are desperate to “break into” a field. The system often operates with impunity in collusion between the intern’s educational institution and the firm.
The pattern currently unfolding in China’s student labor system illustrates one extreme example of the consequences of this convergence of educational, political, regulatory and business institutions in a cycle of exploitation and structural corruption, affecting the entire spectrum of the economic hierarchy, from the classroom to the corporate boardroom.
Intern Ethics
The fundamental ethical dilemma underlying the internship system is that interns eviscerate the wage system by allowing academic credit or ill-defined “learning experience” to lower or eliminate their compensation to the benefit of the firm. The legal definition of an internship requires that the work offer “primary benefit” in the form of vocational or educational reward, to the intern. But often, the employer capitalizes on degrading the real-life value of the work as a vocational program and by setting intern wages far below standard wages for workers they essentially replace. To an even greater extent, perhaps, than professional industries in the US, China’s intern economy has been captured by a liminal labor infrastructure in which the state, corporations, and the educational bureaucracy cooperate to maximize production and profit at the student’s expense.
Nonetheless, Perlin also reflects on the potential ramifications of reform—noting a backlash that has emerged recently in some industries as interns have taken legal action and campaigned to end the abuse of unpaid and underpaid internships. Though there has been some legal backslide, he argues that the momentum is on the side of the many workers at all tiers of the workforce who see the corrosive effects of internships on workplace standards. This will require, he points out in a recent commentary, stronger regulations that align internship conditions with those of federal labor law. As the two-tier structure is leveled out, he argues in a New York Times commentary, “those workers who have been displaced or in many cases replaced by unpaid labor, by unpaid interns, will benefit.
In China, a regulatory overhaul could yield similar benefits for students and the workers they often replace, if it provides a streamlined way of investing in their education in a career-track job. When the law incentivizes a more balanced distribution of jobs across different social segments, the resulting restructuring of the labor force will allow a more orderly economic procession that encourages more sustainable development, which the government is already trying to promote in order to harness the country’s overheated expansion.
The tech sector might be especially primed for change, given the relative mobility and international exposure of the workforce: Part of China’s recent efforts to reform intern labor has called for reducing the number of internships—for example, by aiming to cap intern employment at 10 percent of a facility’s total workforce and no more than 20 percent of workers in a specific position—and importantly, ensuring some educational programming is incorporated into existing internships. International industry associations such as the Electronics Industry Citizenship Coalition have called for revamping vocational education systems in order to improve program quality. Still, applying these regulations remains dependent on the industry’s willingness to pioneer a new model of public accountability and social sustainability, which is spurred from below by public pressure from the next generation of worker-consumers.
The trend of “proletarianization” of students should also inform American and global debates on the future of work. In the current national push to train and uplift the semi-skilled workforce and revive manufacturing after decades of offshoring, US communities should be wary of what kind of work President Trump is promising to “bring back” from abroad. The potential for shared exploitation—not the shared prosperity neoliberalism professes to give us—makes the rights and welfare of China’s intern class deeply relevant as young workers worldwide grapple with the question of what kind of future they can build.
This is a revised and expanded version of an article that originally appeared at The Nation on May 31, 2017 under the title “Your Phone May Have Been Built by an Intern.
Michelle Chen is a contributing writer at In These Times and The Nation, a contributing editor at Dissent and a co-producer of the “Belabored” podcast. She studies history at the CUNY Graduate Center, and tweets at @meeshellchen.
Venezuela has “the largest reserve of hydrocarbons in the world and, from that point of view, any oil company should aspire to work in this country.”
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has met with representatives from Russia’s state-owned oil company, Rosneft, to strengthen bilateral ties in the energy and gas sector.
The meeting, which took place Saturday in Maiquetia, in the Venezuelan state of Vargas, honored a promise made by Maduro in July.
“In the second semester, important documents will be signed to expand bilateral investments between Russian oil and gas companies and our PDVSA,” the Venezuelan president told Russia Today at the time.
Meanwhile, Rosneft President Igor Sechin has asserted in multiple media interviews that the oil company intends to continue working with the Latin American nation’s state-controlled Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), steadily increasing levels of cooperation over time.
“As I repeated on several occasions, we will never leave; no one can expel us, we will work with Venezuela and we will increase the levels of our cooperation,” Sechin has said.
Venezuela has “the largest reserve of hydrocarbons in the world and, from that point of view, any oil company should aspire to work in this country.”
The meeting was attended by Venezuela’s Minister for Oil Manuel Quevedo, and Minister for Agricultural Production Wilmar Castro Soteldo.
Rosneft and PDVSA are partners in five joint ventures: Petromonagas; Petromiranda; Boqueron; Petroperija, and Petrovictoria.
During the course of 15 years of cooperative relations between Venezuela and Russia, more than 260 agreements have been signed in areas such as medicine, tourism, agriculture, mining and oil.
In October, Maduro traveled to Moscow in Russia to meet President Vladimir Putin in person, taking the opportunity to thank Putin for his support in “difficult times.”
“I thank you for all the support, political and diplomatic, in difficult times which we are living through,” Maduro told Putin at talks in the Kremlin.
“I’m very thankful for the agreement on grain, it has helped keep consumption in Venezuela stable.”
Despite a lack of evidence at its core – and the risk of nuclear conflagration as its by-product – Russia-gate remains the go-to accusation for “getting” the Trump administration, explains Russia scholar Stephen F. Cohen.
The foundational accusation of Russia-gate was, and remains, charges that Russian President Putin ordered the hacking of Democratic National Committee e-mails and their public dissemination through WikiLeaks in order to benefit Donald Trump and undermine Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election, and that Trump and/or his associates colluded with the Kremlin in this “attack on American democracy.”
As no actual evidence for these allegations has been produced after nearly a year and a half of media and government investigations, we are left with Russia-gate without Russia. (An apt formulation perhaps first coined in an e-mail exchange by Nation writer James Carden.) Special counsel Mueller has produced four indictments: against retired Gen. Michael Flynn, Trump’s short-lived national-security adviser, and George Papadopolous, a lowly and inconsequential Trump “adviser,” for lying to the FBI; and against Paul Manafort and his partner Rick Gates for financial improprieties. None of these charges has anything to do with improper collusion with Russia, except for the wrongful insinuations against Flynn.
Instead, the several investigations, desperate to find actual evidence of collusion, have spread to “contacts with Russia” — political, financial, social, etc. — on the part of a growing number of people, often going back many years before anyone imagined Trump as a presidential candidate. The resulting implication is that these “contacts” were criminal or potentially so.
This is unprecedented, preposterous, and dangerous, potentially more so than even Joe McCarthy’s search for “Communist” connections. It would suggest, for example, that scores of American corporations doing business in Russia today are engaged in criminal enterprise.
More to the point, advisers to U.S. policy-makers and even media commentators on Russia must have many and various contacts with Russia if they are to understand anything about the dynamics of Kremlin policy-making. I myself, to take an individual example, was an adviser to two (unsuccessful) presidential campaigns, which considered my wide-ranging and longstanding “contacts” with Russia to be an important credential, as did the one sitting president whom I advised.
To suggest that such contacts are in any way criminal is to slur hundreds of reputations and to leave U.S. policy-makers with advisers laden with ideology and no actual expertise. It is also to suggest that any quest for better relations with Russia, or détente, is somehow suspicious, illegitimate, or impossible, as expressed recently by Andrew Weiss in The Wall Street Journal and by The Washington Post, in an editorial. This is one reason why I have, in a previous commentary, argued that Russia-gate and its promoters have become the gravest threat to American national security.
Russia-gate began sometime prior to June 2016, not after the presidential election in November, as is often said, as an anti-Trump political project. (Exactly why, how, and by whom remain unclear, and herein lies the real significance of the largely bogus “dossier” and the still murky role of top U.S. intel officials in the creation of that document.)
That said, the mainstream American media have been largely responsible for inflating, perpetuating, and sustaining the sham Russia-gate as the real political crisis it has become, arguably the greatest in modern American presidential and thus institutional political history. The media have done this by increasingly betraying their own professed standards of verified news reporting and balanced coverage, even resorting to tacit forms of censorship by systematically excluding dissenting reporting and opinions.
(For inventories of recent examples, see Glenn Greenwald at The Intercept andJoe Lauria at Consortiumnews. Anyone interested in exposures of such truly “fake news” should visit these two sites regularly, the latter the product of the inestimable veteran journalist Robert Parry.)
Still worse, this mainstream malpractice has spread to some alternative-media publications once prized for their journalistic standards, where expressed disdain for “evidence” and “proof” in favor of allegations without any actual facts can sometimes be found. Nor are these practices merely the ordinary occasional mishaps of professional journalism.
As Greenwald points out, all of the now retracted stories, whether by print media or cable television, were zealous promotions of Russia-gate and virulently anti-Trump. They, too, are examples of Russia-gate without Russia.
Flynn and the FBI
Leaving aside possible financial improprieties on the part of General Flynn, his persecution and subsequent prosecution is highly indicative. Flynn pled guilty to having lied to the FBI about his communications with the Russian ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, on behalf of the incoming Trump administration, discussions that unavoidably included some references, however vague, to sanctions imposed on Russia by President Obama in December 2016, just before leaving office.
Those sanctions were highly unusual — last-minute, unprecedented in their seizure of Russian property in the United States, and including a reckless veiled threat of unspecified cyber-attacks on Russia. They gave the impression that Obama wanted to make even more difficult Trump’s professed goal of improving relations with Moscow.
Still more, Obama’s specified reason was not Russian behavior in Ukraine or Syria, as is commonly thought, but Russia-gate — that is, Putin’s “attack on American democracy,” which Obama’s intel chiefs had evidently persuaded him was an entirely authentic allegation. (Or which Obama, who regarded Trump’s victory over his designated successor, Hillary Clinton, as a personal rebuff, was eager to believe.)
But Flynn’s discussions with the Russian ambassador — as well as other Trump representatives’ efforts to open “back-channel” communications with Moscow – were anything but a crime. As I pointed out in another commentary, there were so many precedents of such overtures on behalf of presidents-elect, it was considered a normal, even necessary practice, if only to ask Moscow not to make relations worse before the new president had a chance to review the relationship.
When Henry Kissinger did this on behalf of President-elect Nixon, his boss instructed him to keep the communication entirely confidential, not to inform any other members of the incoming administration. Presumably Flynn was similarly secretive, thereby misinforming Vice President Pence and finding himself trapped — or possibly entrapped — between loyalty to his president and an FBI agent. Flynn no doubt would have been especially guarded with a representative of the FBI, knowing as he did the role of Obama’s Intel bosses in Russia-gate prior to the election and which had escalated after Trump’s surprise victory.
In any event, to the extent that Flynn encouraged Moscow not to reply in kind immediately to Obama’s highly provocative sanctions, he performed a service to U.S. national security, not a crime. And, assuming that Flynn was acting on the instructions of his president-elect, so did Trump. Still more, if Flynn “colluded” in any way, it was with Israel, not Russia, having been asked by that government to dissuade countries from voting for an impending anti-Israel U.N. resolution.
Removing Tillerson
President Trump speaking at a Cabinet meeting on Nov. 1, 2017, with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to Trump’s right and son-in-law Jared Kushner seated in the background. (Screen shot from whitehouse.gov)
Finally, and similarly, there is the ongoing effort by the political-media establishment to drive Secretary of State Rex Tillerson from office and replace him with a fully neocon, anti-Russian, anti-détente head of the State Department. Tillerson was an admirable appointee by Trump — widely experienced in world affairs, a tested negotiator, a mature and practical-minded man.
Originally, his role as the CEO of Exxon Mobil who had negotiated and enacted an immensely profitable and strategically important energy-extraction deal with the Kremlin earned him the slur of being “Putin’s pal.” This preposterous allegation has since given way to charges that he is slowly restructuring, and trimming, the long bloated and mostly inept State Department, as indeed he should do. Numerous former diplomats closely associated with Hillary Clinton have raced to influential op-ed pages to denounce Tillerson’s undermining of this purportedly glorious frontline institution of American national security. Many news reports, commentaries, and editorials have been in the same vein. But who can recall a major diplomatic triumph by the State Department or a Secretary of State in recent years?
The answer might be the Obama administration’s multinational agreement with Iran to curb its nuclear-weapons potential, but that was due no less to Russia’s president and Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which provided essential guarantees to the sides involved. Forgotten, meanwhile, are the more than 50 career State Department officials who publicly protested Obama’s rare attempt to cooperate with Moscow in Syria. Call it by what it was: the sabotaging of a president by his own State Department.
In this spirit, there are a flurry of leaked stories that Tillerson will soon resign or be ousted. Meanwhile, however, he carries on. The ever-looming menace of Russia-gate compels him to issue wildly exaggerated indictments of Russian behavior while, at the same time, calling for a “productive new relationship” with Moscow, in which he clearly believes. (And which, if left unencumbered, he might achieve.)
Evidently, Tillerson has established a “productive” working relationship with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, the two of them having just announced North Korea’s readiness to engage in negotiations with the United States and other governments involved in the current crisis.
Tillerson’s fate will tell us much about the number-one foreign-policy question confronting America: cooperation or escalating conflict with the other nuclear superpower, a détente-like diminishing of the new Cold War or the growing risks that it will become hot war. Politics and policy should never be over-personalized; larger factors are always involved. But in these unprecedented times, Tillerson may be the last man standing who represents the possibility of some kind of détente. Apart, that is, from President Trump himself, loathe him or not. Or to put the issue differently: Will Russia-gate continue to gravely endanger American national security?
Stephen F. Cohen is a professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at New York University and Princeton University and a contributing editor of The Nation, where a version of this article first appeared.
Featured image: VP M Venkaiah Naidu (Source: Livemint)
India’s Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidurecently stated that the country cannot survive on imported produce for its food security. He called for a greater focus on agriculture: “We can export (agricultural produce) for the time being but the population is growing.”
Naidu pointed out what has become increasingly apparent:
“People are leaving agriculture and going to other professions. An agriculturist does not want his son to continue with the profession because of uncertain monsoons, natural calamities, market exploitation, etc. All this is affecting agriculture.”
Noting that agriculture is becoming financially unviable for farmers, he called for an end to the urban-rural divide by ensuring that people living in rural areas are provided basic amenities.
There are hints of the need to achieve food self-sufficiency in what he says and that is encouraging. But there is also a World Bank-backed plan for the future of India and the majority of farmers don’t have much of a role in it. Successive administrations in India have been facilitating this plan by making farming financially unviable with the aim of moving farmers out of farming and into the cities to work in manufacturing or service sector jobs – jobs that, by the way, do not exist. It is an agenda founded on a bogus model of ‘development’.
According to this report, the number of cultivators in India declined from 166 million to 146 million between 2004 and 2011. Some 6,700 left farming each day. Between 2015 and 2022 the number of cultivators is likely to decrease to around 127 million.
The aim is to restructure agriculture according to the wishes of the US and its agribusiness corporations.
It entails displacing the existing labour-intensive system of food and agriculture with one dominated by a few transnational corporate agribusiness concerns which will control all aspects of the sector from seed to plate. As a result, small, independent cultivators and food processing concerns are being impoverished through exposure to a rigged international market and rising input costs or find it increasingly difficult to operate and are being forced out of the sector.
Although there is talk about doubling farmers’ incomes in the coming years, at the same time this also involves drastically reducing the numbers remaining in agriculture. Moreover, a doubling of income is still too little too late considering just how much farmers’ incomes have fallen behind those of the wider population, reflected in the dire conditions of India’s rural dwellers.
For all the discussion about loan waivers for farmers and raising income levels, this does not address the core of the problem affecting agriculture: spiralling input costs, lack of government assistance and the impacts of cheap, subsidised imports which depress farmers’ incomes.
Take the cultivation of pulses, for instance. Pulses production increased by 40% during the last 12 months (a year of record production). At the same time, however, imports also rose resulting in black gram selling at 4,000 rupees per quintal (much less than during the previous 12 months). This has effectively driven down prices thereby reducing farmers already meagre incomes. We have already witnessed a running down of the indigenous edible oils sector thanks to Indonesian palm oil imports on the back of World Bank pressure to reduce import tariffs.
On the one hand, there is talk of India becoming food secure and self-sufficient; on the other, there is pressure from the richer nations for the Indian government to further reduce support given to farmers and open up to imports and ‘free’ trade. But this is based on hypocrisy.
Consider that some 3.2 million people were engaged in agriculture in the US in 2015. The US govt provided them each with a subsidy of $7,860 on average. Japan provides a subsidy of $14,136 and New Zealand $2,623 to its farmers. In 2015, a British farmer earned $2,800 and $37,000 was added through subsidies. The Indian govt provides on average a subsidy of $873 to farmers. However, between 2012 and 2014, India reduced the subsidy on agriculture and food security by $3 billion.
According to policy analyst Devinder Sharma subsidies provided to US wheat and rice farmers are more than the market worth of these two crops. He also notes that, per day, each cow in Europe receives subsidy worth more than an Indian farmer’s daily income.
Mechanisms such as minimum support prices, public distribution and government procurement (whatever the deficiencies of these may be) have assured a certain degree of food security for India. But what does the US and its agribusiness corporations desire? A return to an India unable to feed itself and reliant on US shipments?
How can the Indian farmer compete with an influx of artificially cheap imports? The simple answer is that s/he cannot. These imports destroy the livelihoods of small-scale cultivators who are the backbone of food production in India.
Relying on imports and transnational agribusiness with its proprietary seeds and inputs to take over Indian agriculture is not a recipe for food security.
“In an economy driven by jobless growth, compulsive migration to cities is often a case of distress transhumance. These migrants then become the new “serfs” of the informal services and construction sector, while the existing rural and agrarian problems remain unresolved.”
Does India want to follow in the footsteps of Mexico? Aside from destroying the nation’s health and home-grown food supply chain, ‘free’ trade has allowed subsidised US corn to be dumped in the country, fuelled unemployment and transformed a former productive peasantry into a problematic group.
The problem is that self-sufficiency is not to the liking of the US and the World Bank. Washington has for many decades regarded its leverage over global agriculture as a tool to secure its geostrategic goals.
The future it has in mind for Indian agriculture is another story entirely and, as an alternative to a system of ecologically sustainable, self-sufficient farming, is one well worth contemplating.
Scores of government officials throughout the world have admitted (either orally, in writing, or through photographs or videos) to carrying out – or seriously proposing – false flag attacks:
(1) Japanese troops set off a small explosion on a train track in 1931, and falsely blamed it on China in order to justify an invasion of Manchuria. This is known as the “Mukden Incident” or the “Manchurian Incident”. The Tokyo International Military Tribunal found: “Several of the participators in the plan, including Hashimoto [a high-ranking Japanese army officer], have on various occasions admitted their part in the plot and have stated that the object of the ‘Incident’ was to afford an excuse for the occupation of Manchuria by the Kwantung Army ….” And see this, this and this.
(2) A major with the Nazi SS admitted at the Nuremberg trials that – under orders from the chief of the Gestapo – he and some other Nazi operatives faked several attacks on their own people and resources which they blamed on the Poles, to justify the invasion of Poland. The staged attacks included:
The German radio station at Gleiwitz [details below]
The strategic railway at Jabłonków Pass, located on the border between Poland and Czechoslovakia
The German customs station at Hochlinden
The forest service station in Pitschen
The communications station at Neubersteich
The railroad station in Alt-Eiche
A woman and her companion in Katowice
The details of the Gleiwitz radio station incident include:
On the night of 31 August 1939, a small group of German operatives dressed in Polish uniforms and led by Naujocks seized the Gleiwitz station and broadcast a short anti-German message in Polish (sources vary on the content of the message). The Germans’ goal was to make the attack and the broadcast look like the work of anti-German Polish saboteurs.
To make the attack seem more convincing, the Germans used human corpses to pass them off as Polish attackers. They murdered Franciszek Honiok, a 43-year-old unmarried German Silesian Catholic farmer known for sympathizing with the Poles. He had been arrested the previous day by the Gestapo. He was dressed to look like a saboteur, then killed by lethal injection, given gunshot wounds, and left dead at the scene so that he appeared to have been killed while attacking the station. His corpse was subsequently presented to the police and press as proof of the attack.
(3) The minutes of the high command of the Italian government – subsequently approved by Mussolini himself – admitted that violence on the Greek-Albanian border was carried out by Italians and falsely blamed on the Greeks, as an excuse for Italy’s 1940 invasion of Greece.
(4) Nazi general Franz Halder also testified at the Nuremberg trials that Nazi leader Hermann Goeringadmitted to setting fire to the German parliament building in 1933, and then falsely blaming the communists for the arson.
(5) Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev admitted in writing that the Soviet Union’s Red Army shelled the Russian village of Mainila in 1939 – while blaming the attack on Finland – as a basis for launching the “Winter War” against Finland. Russian president Boris Yeltsinagreed that Russia had been the aggressor in the Winter War.
(6) The Russian Parliament, current Russian president Putin and former Soviet leader Gorbachev all admit that Soviet leader Joseph Stalin ordered his secret police to execute 22,000 Polish army officers and civilians in 1940, and then falsely blamed it on the Nazis.
Source: The Daily Beast
(7) The British government admits that – between 1946 and 1948 – it bombed 5 ships carrying Jews who were Holocaust survivors attempting to flee to safety in Palestine right after World War II, set up a fake group called “Defenders of Arab Palestine”, and then had the psuedo-group falsely claim responsibility for the bombings (and see this, this and this).
(8) Israel admits that in 1954, an Israeli terrorist cell operating in Egypt planted bombs in several buildings, including U.S. diplomatic facilities, then left behind “evidence” implicating the Arabs as the culprits (one of the bombs detonated prematurely, allowing the Egyptians to identify the bombers, and several of the Israelis later confessed) (and see this and this).
The U.S. Army does not believe this is an isolated incident. For example, the U.S. Army’s School of Advanced Military Studies said of Mossad (Israel’s intelligence service):
“Ruthless and cunning. Has capability to target U.S. forces and make it look like a Palestinian/Arab act.”
And former Israeli Prime Moshe Minister admitted in his diary:
I have been meditating on the long chain of false incidents and hostilities we have invented, and on the many clashes we have provoked which cost us so much blood ….
(9) The CIA admits that it hired Iranians in the 1950′s to pose as Communists and stage bombings in Iran in order to turn the country against its democratically-elected prime minister.
(10) The Turkish Prime Minister admitted that the Turkish government carried out the 1955 bombing on a Turkish consulate in Greece – also damaging the nearby birthplace of the founder of modern Turkey – and blamed it on Greece, for the purpose of inciting and justifying anti-Greek violence.
Starting in the 1950s Turkey’s deep state sponsored killings, engineered riots, colluded with drug traffickers, staged “false flag” attacks and organised massacres of trade unionists. Thousands died in the chaos it fomented.
(11) The British Prime Minister admitted to his defense secretary that he and American president Dwight Eisenhower approved a plan in 1957 to carry out attacks in Syria and blame it on the Syrian government as a way to effect regime change.
(13) In 1960, American Senator George Smathers suggested that the U.S. launch “a false attack made on Guantanamo Bay which would give us the excuse of actually fomenting a fight which would then give us the excuse to go in and [overthrow Castro]”.
(14) Official State Department documents show that, in 1961, the head of the Joint Chiefs and other high-level officials discussed blowing up a consulate in the Dominican Republic in order to justify an invasion of that country. The plans were not carried out, but they were all discussed as serious proposals.
(15) As admitted by the U.S. government, recently declassified documents show that in 1962, the American Joint Chiefs of Staff signed off on a plan to blow up AMERICAN airplanes (using an elaborate plan involving the switching of airplanes), and also to commit terrorist acts on American soil, and then to blame it on the Cubans in order to justify an invasion of Cuba. See the following ABC news report; the official documents; and watch this interview with the former Washington Investigative Producer for ABC’s World News Tonight with Peter Jennings. This plan was subsequently admitted again in other declassified government documents.
Provocations considered by the Joint Chiefs of Staff included:
Sink ship near harbor entrance. Conduct funerals for mock-victims ….
***
3. A “Remember the Maine” incident could be arranged in several forms:
a. We could blow up a US ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba.
b. We could blow up a drone (unmanned) vessel anywhere in the Cuban waters. We could arrange to cause such incident in the vicinity of Havana or Santiago as a spectacular result of Cuban attack from the air or sea, or both. The presence of Cuban planes or ships merely investigating the intent of the vessel could be fairly compelling evidence that the ship was taken under attack. The nearness to Havana or Santiago would add credibility especially to those people that might have heard the blast or have seen the fire. The US could follow up with an air/sea rescue operation covered by US fighters to “evacuate” remaining members of the non-existent crew. Casualty lists in US newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation.
4. We could develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington.
The terror campaign could be pointed at Cuban refugees seeking haven in the United States. We could sink a boatload of Cubans enroute to Florida (real or simulated). We could foster attempts on lives of Cuban refugees in the United States even to the extent of wounding in instances to be widely publicized. Exploding a few plastic bombs in carefully chosen spots, the arrest of Cuban agents and the release of prepared documents substantiating Cuban involvement also would be helpful in projecting the idea of an irresponsible government.
***
6. Use of MIG type aircraft by US pilots could provide additional provocation. Harassment of civil air, attacks on surface shipping and destruction of US military drone aircraft by MIG type planes would be useful as complementary actions. An F-86 properly painted would convince air passengers that they saw a Cuban MIG, especially if the pilot of the transport were to announce such fact. The primary drawback to this suggestion appears to be the security risk inherent in obtaining or modifying an aircraft. However, reasonable copies of the MIG could be produced from US resources in about three months.
***
8. it is possible to create an incident which will demonstrate
convincingly that a Cuban-aircraft has attacked and shot down a chartered civil airliner en route from the United States to Jamaica, Guatemala, Panama or Venezuela. The destination would be chosen only to cause the flight plan route to cross Cuba, The passengers could be a group of college students off on a holiday or any grouping of persons with a common interest to support chartering a non-scheduled flight.
a. An aircraft at Eglin AFB would be painted and numbered as an exact duplicate for a civil registered aircraft belonging to a CIA proprietary organization in the Miami area. At a designated time the duplicate would be substituted for the actual civil aircraft and would be loaded with the selected passengers, all boarded under carefully prepared aliases. The actual registered aircraft would be converted to a drone.
b. Take off times of the drone aircraft and the actual aircraft will be scheduled to allow a rendezvous south of Florida. From the rendezvous point the passenger-carrying aircraft will descend to minimum altitude and go directly into an auxiliary field at Eglin AFB where arrangements will have been made to evacuate the passengers and return the aircraft to its original status. The drone aircraft meanwhile will continue to fly the filed flight plan. When over Cuba the drone will being transmitting on the inter-national distress frequency a “MAY DAY” message stating he is under attack by Cuban MIG aircraft. The transmission will be interrupted by destruction of the aircraft which will be triggered by radio signal. This will allow ICAO radio stations in the Western Hemisphere to “tell” the US what has happened to the aircraft instead of the US trying to “sell” the incident.
9. It is possible to create an incident which will make it appear that Communist Cuban MIGs have destroyed a USAF aircraft over international waters in an unprovoked attack.
a. Approximately 4 or 5 F-101 aircraft-will be dispatched in trail from Homestead AFB, Florida, to the vicinity of Cuba. Their mission will be to reverse course and simulate fakir aircraft for an air defense exercise in southern Florida. These aircraft would conduct variations of these flights at frequent intervals. Crews would be briefed to remain at least 12 miles off the Cuban coast; however, they would be required to carry live ammunition in the event that hostile actions were taken by the Cuban MiGs.
b. On One such flight, a pre-briefed pilot would fly tail-end Charley at considerable interval between aircraft. While near the Cuban Island this pilot would broadcast that he had been Jumped by MIGs and was going down. No other calls would be made. The pilot would then fly directly west at extremely low altitude and land at a secure base, an Eglin auxiliary. The aircraft would be met by the proper people, quickly stored and given a new tail number. The pilot who had performed the mission under an alias, would resume his proper identity and return to his normal place of business. The pilot and aircraft would then have disappeared.
c. At precisely the same time that the aircraft was presumably shot down a submarine or small surface craft would disburse F-101 parts, parachute, etc., at approximately 15 to 20 miles off the Cuban coast and depart.
U.S. government documents declassified in October 2017 admitted that a very high-level 1962 meeting of U.S. government officials – separate from the Joint Chiefs of Staff – also discussed:
The possibility of U.S. manufacture or acquisition of Soviet aircraft …. There is a possibility that such aircraft could be used in a deception operation designed to confuse enemy planes in the air, to launch a surprise attack against enemy installations or in a provocation operation in which Soviet aircraft would appear to attack U.S. or friendly installations in order to provide an excuse for U.S. intervention.
(16) In 1963, the U.S. Department of Defense wrote a paper promoting attacks on nations within the Organization of American States – such as Trinidad-Tobago or Jamaica – and then falsely blaming them on Cuba.
(17) The U.S. Department of Defense also suggested covertly paying a person in the Castro government to attack the United States: “The only area remaining for consideration then would be to bribe one of Castro’s subordinate commanders to initiate an attack on Guantanamo.”
(18) A U.S. Congressional committee admitted that – as part of its “Cointelpro” campaign – the FBI had used many provocateurs in the 1950s through 1970s to carry out violent acts and falsely blame them on political activists.
(19) A top Turkish general admitted that Turkish forces burned down a mosque on Cyprus in the 1970s and blamed it on their enemy. He explained: “In Special War, certain acts of sabotage are staged and blamed on the enemy to increase public resistance. We did this on Cyprus; we even burnt down a mosque.” In response to the surprised correspondent’s incredulous look the general said, “I am giving an example”.
(20) A declassified 1973 CIA document reveals a program to train foreign police and troops on how to make booby traps, pretending that they were training them on how to investigate terrorist acts:
The Agency maintains liaison in varying degrees with foreign police/security organizations through its field stations ….
[CIA provides training sessions as follows:]
a. Providing trainees with basic knowledge in the uses of commercial and military demolitions and incendiaries as they may be applied in terrorism and industrial sabotage operations.
b. Introducing the trainees to commercially available materials and home laboratory techniques, likely to he used in the manufacture of explosives and incendiaries by terrorists or saboteurs.
c. Familiarizing the trainees with the concept of target analysis and operational planning that a saboteur or terrorist must employ.
d. Introducing the trainees to booby trapping devices and techniques giving practical experience with both manufactured and improvised devices through actual fabrication.
***
The program provides the trainees with ample opportunity to develop basic familiarity and use proficiently through handling, preparing and applying the various explosive charges, incendiary agents, terrorist devices and sabotage techniques.
(21) The German government admitted (and see this) that, in 1978, the German secret service detonated a bomb in the outer wall of a prison and planted “escape tools” on a prisoner – a member of the Red Army Faction – which the secret service wished to frame the bombing on.
(22) A Mossad agent admits that, in 1984, Mossad planted a radio transmitter in Gaddaffi’s compound in Tripoli, Libya which broadcast fake terrorist transmissions recorded by Mossad, in order to frame Gaddaffi as a terrorist supporter. Ronald Reagan bombed Libya immediately thereafter.
(23) The South African Truth and Reconciliation Council found that, in 1989, the Civil Cooperation Bureau (a covert branch of the South African Defense Force) approached an explosives expert and asked him “to participate in an operation aimed at discrediting the ANC [the African National Congress] by bombing the police vehicle of the investigating officer into the murder incident”, thus framing the ANC for the bombing.
(24) An Algerian diplomat and several officers in the Algerian army admit that, in the 1990s, the Algerian army frequently massacred Algerian civilians and then blamed Islamic militants for the killings (and see this video; and see Agence France-Presse, 9/27/2002, French Court Dismisses Algerian Defamation Suit Against Author).
(25) In 1993, a bomb in Northern Ireland killed 9 civilians. Official documents from the Royal Ulster Constabulary (i.e. the British government) show that the mastermind of the bombing was a British agent, and that the bombing was designed to inflame sectarian tensions. And see this and this.
(26) The United States Army’s 1994 publication Special Forces Foreign Internal Defense Tactics Techniques and Procedures for Special Forces – updated in 2004 – recommends employing terrorists and using false flag operations to destabilize leftist regimes in Latin America. False flag terrorist attacks were carried out in Latin America and other regions as part of the CIA’s “Dirty Wars“. And see this.
(27) Similarly, a CIA “psychological operations” manual prepared by a CIA contractor for the Nicaraguan Contra rebels noted the value of assassinating someone on your own side to create a “martyr” for the cause. The manual was authenticated by the U.S. government. The manual received so much publicity from Associated Press, Washington Post and other news coverage that – during the 1984 presidential debate – President Reagan was confronted with the following question on national television:
At this moment, we are confronted with the extraordinary story of a CIA guerrilla manual for the anti-Sandinista contras whom we are backing, which advocates not only assassinations of Sandinistas but the hiring of criminals to assassinate the guerrillas we are supporting in order to create martyrs.
(28) A Rwandan government inquiry admitted that the 1994 shootdown and murder of the Rwandan president, who was from the Hutu tribe – a murder blamed by the Hutus on the rival Tutsi tribe, and which led to the massacre of more than 800,000 Tutsis by Hutus – was committed by Hutu soldiers and falsely blamed on the Tutis.
(30) Senior Russian Senior military and intelligence officers admit that the KGB blew up Russian apartment buildings in 1999 and falsely blamed it on Chechens, in order to justify an invasion of Chechnya (and see this report and this discussion).
(31) As reported by the New York Times, BBC and Associated Press, Macedonian officials admit that in 2001, the government murdered 7 innocent immigrants in cold blood and pretended that they were Al Qaeda soldiers attempting to assassinate Macedonian police, in order to join the “war on terror”. They lured foreign migrants into the country, executed them in a staged gun battle, and then claimed they were a unit backed by Al Qaeda intent on attacking Western embassies”. Specifically, Macedonian authorities had lured the immigrants into the country, and then – after killing them – posed the victims with planted evidence – “bags of uniforms and semiautomatic weapons at their side” – to show Western diplomats.
(32) At the July 2001 G8 Summit in Genoa, Italy, black-clad thugs were videotaped getting out of police cars, and were seen by an Italian MP carrying “iron bars inside the police station”. Subsequently, senior police officials in Genoa admitted that police planted two Molotov cocktails and faked the stabbing of a police officer at the G8 Summit, in order to justify a violent crackdown against protesters.
Even after the 9/11 Commission admitted that there was no connection, Dick Cheney said that the evidence is “overwhelming” that al Qaeda had a relationship with Saddam Hussein’s regime, that Cheney “probably” had information unavailable to the Commission, and that the media was not ‘doing their homework’ in reporting such ties. Top U.S. government officials now admit that the Iraq war was really launched for oil … not 9/11 or weapons of mass destruction.
Despite previous “lone wolf” claims, many U.S. government officials now say that 9/11 was state-sponsored terror; but Iraq was not the state which backed the hijackers. (Many U.S. officials have allegedthat 9/11 was a false flag operation by rogue elements of the U.S. government; but such a claim is beyond the scope of this discussion. The key point is that the U.S. falsely blamed it on Iraq, when it knew Iraq had nothing to do with it.).
(35) According to the Washington Post, Indonesian police admit that the Indonesian military killed American teachers in Papua in 2002 and blamed the murders on a Papuan separatist group in order to get that group listed as a terrorist organization.
(36) The well-respected former Indonesian president also admits that the government probably had a role in the Bali bombings.
(38) In 2003, the U.S. Secretary of Defense admitted that interrogators were authorized to use the following method:
False Flag: Convincing the detainee that individuals from a country other than the United States are interrogating him.
While not a traditional false flag attack, this deception could lead to former detainees – many of whom were tortured – attacking the country falsely blamed for the interrogation and torture.
(39) Former Department of Justice lawyer John Yoosuggested in 2005 that the US should go on the offensive against al-Qaeda, having “our intelligence agencies create a false terrorist organization. It could have its own websites, recruitment centers, training camps, and fundraising operations. It could launchfake terrorist operations and claim credit for real terrorist strikes, helping to sow confusion within al-Qaeda’s ranks, causing operatives to doubt others’ identities and to question the validity of communications.”
(40) Similarly, in 2005, Professor John Arquilla of the Naval Postgraduate School – a renowned US defense analyst credited with developing the concept of ‘netwar’ – called for western intelligence services to create new “pseudo gang” terrorist groups, as a way of undermining “real” terror networks. According to Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh, Arquilla’s ‘pseudo-gang’ strategy was, Hersh reported, already being implemented by the Pentagon:
“Under Rumsfeld’s new approach, I was told, US military operatives would be permitted to pose abroad as corrupt foreign businessmen seeking to buy contraband items that could be used in nuclear-weapons systems. In some cases, according to the Pentagon advisers, local citizens could be recruited and asked to join up with guerrillas or terrorists…
The new rules will enable the Special Forces community to set up what it calls ‘action teams’ in the target countries overseas which can be used to find and eliminate terrorist organizations. ‘Do you remember the right-wing execution squads in El Salvador?’ the former high-level intelligence official asked me, referring to the military-led gangs that committed atrocities in the early nineteen-eighties. ‘We founded them and we financed them,’ he said. ‘The objective now is to recruit locals in any area we want. And we aren’t going to tell Congress about it.’ A former military officer, who has knowledge of the Pentagon’s commando capabilities, said, ‘We’re going to be riding with the bad boys.’”
(41) United Press International reported in June 2005:
U.S. intelligence officers are reporting that some of the insurgents in Iraq are using recent-model Beretta 92 pistols, but the pistols seem to have had their serial numbers erased. The numbers do not appear to have been physically removed; the pistols seem to have come off a production line without any serial numbers. Analysts suggest the lack of serial numbers indicates that the weapons were intended for intelligence operations or terrorist cells with substantial government backing. Analysts speculate that these guns are probably from either Mossad or the CIA. Analysts speculate that agent provocateurs may be using the untraceable weapons even as U.S. authorities use insurgent attacks against civilians as evidence of the illegitimacy of the resistance.
(42) In 2005, British soldiers dressed as Arabs were caught by Iraqi police after a shootout against the police. The British soldiers shot two Iraqi policemen, killing one. The soldiers apparently possessed explosives, and were accused of attempting to set off bombs. While none of the soldiers admitted that they were carrying out attacks, British soldiers and a column of 10 British tanks stormed the jail they were held in, broke down a wall of the jail, and busted them out. The extreme measures used to free the soldiers – rather than have them face questions and potentially stand trial – could be considered an admission.
(43) Undercover Israeli soldiers admitted in 2005 to throwing stones at other Israeli soldiers so they could blame it on Palestinians, as an excuse to crack down on peaceful protests by the Palestinians.
(44) Quebec police admitted that, in 2007, thugs carrying rocks to a peaceful protest were actually undercover Quebec police officers (and see this).
(45) A 2008 US Army special operations field manual recommends that the U.S. military use surrogate non-state groups such as “paramilitary forces, individuals, businesses, foreign political organizations, resistant or insurgent organizations, expatriates, transnational terrorism adversaries, disillusioned transnational terrorism members, black marketers, and other social or political ‘undesirables.’” The manual specifically acknowledged that U.S. special operations can involve both counterterrorism and “Terrorism” (as well as “transnational criminal activities, including narco-trafficking, illicit arms-dealing, and illegal financial transactions.”)
He should do what I did when I was Minister of the Interior … infiltrate the movement with agents provocateurs inclined to do anything …. And after that, with the strength of the gained population consent, … beat them for blood and beat for blood also those teachers that incite them. Especially the teachers. Not the elderly, of course, but the girl teachers yes.
(47) An undercover officer admitted that he infiltrated environmental, leftwing and anti-fascist groups in 22 countries. Germany’s federal police chief admitted that – while the undercover officer worked for the German police – he acted illegally during a G8 protest in Germany in 2007 and committed arson by setting fire during a subsequent demonstration in Berlin. The undercover officer spent many years living with violent “Black Bloc” anarchists.
(48) Denver police admitted that uniformed officers deployed in 2008 to an area where alleged “anarchists” had planned to wreak havoc outside the Democratic National Convention ended up getting into a melee with two undercover policemen. The uniformed officers didn’t know the undercover officers were cops.
(49) At the G20 protests in London in 2009, a British member of parliament saw plain clothes police officers attempting to incite the crowd to violence.
(50) The oversight agency for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police admitted that – at the G20 protests in Toronto in 2010 – undercover police officers were arrested with a group of protesters. Videos and photos (see this and this, for example) show that violent protesters wore very similar boots and other gear as the police, and carried police batons. The Globe and Mail reports that the undercover officers planned the targets for violent attack, and the police failed to stop the attacks.
(51) Egyptian politicians admitted (and see this) that government employees looted priceless museum artifacts 2011 to try to discredit the protesters.
(52) Austin police admit that 3 officers infiltrated the Occupy protests in that city. Prosecutors admit that one of the undercover officers purchased and constructed illegal “lock boxes” which ended up getting many protesters arrested.
(53) In 2011, a Colombian colonel admitted that he and his soldiers had lured 57 innocent civilians and killed them – after dressing many of them in uniforms – as part of a scheme to claim that Columbia was eradicating left-wing terrorists. And see this.
(54) Rioters who discredited the peaceful protests against the swearing in of the Mexican president in 2012 admitted that they were paid 300 pesos each to destroy everything in their path. According to Wikipedia, photos also show the vandals waiting in groups behind police lines prior to the violence.
(55) On November 20, 2014, Mexican agent provocateurs were transported by army vehicles to participate in the 2014 Iguala mass kidnapping protests, as was shown by videos and pictures distributed via social networks.
(56) The highly-respected writer for the Telegraph Ambrose Evans-Pritchard says that the head of Saudi intelligence – Prince Bandar – recently admitted that the Saudi government controls “Chechen” terrorists.
(57) Two members of the Turkish parliament, high-level American sources and others admitted that the Turkish government – a NATO country – carried out the chemical weapons attacks in Syria and falsely blamed them on the Syrian government; and high-ranking Turkish government admitted on tape plans to carry out attacks and blame it on the Syrian government.
It’s gotten so ridiculous that a U.S. Senator has introduced a “Stop Arming Terrorists Act”, and U.S. Congresswoman – who introduced a similar bill in the House – says: “For years, the U.S. government has been supporting armed militant groups working directly with and often under the command of terrorist groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda in their fight to overthrow the Syrian government.”
(59) Government officials on both sides of the conflict, as well as the snipers who actually pulled the trigger, all admit that shots were fired on both sides – killing both government officials and anti-government protesters in Ukraine – to create maximum chaos and destabilization.
(60) Speaking of snipers, in a secret recording, Venezuelan generals admit that they will deploy snipers to shoot protesters, but keep the marksmen well-hidden from demonstrator and the reporters covering the events so others would be blamed for the deaths.
(61) Burmese government officials admitted that Burma (renamed Myanmar) used false flag attacks against Muslim and Buddhist groups within the country to stir up hatred between the two groups, to prevent democracy from spreading.
(62) Israeli police were again filmed in 2015 dressing up as Arabs and throwing stones, then turning over Palestinian protesters to Israeli soldiers.
(63) Britain’s spy agency has admitted (and see this) that it carries out “digital false flag” attacks on targets, framing people by writing offensive or unlawful material … and blaming it on the target.
(64) The CIA has admitted that it uses viruses and malware from Russia and other countries to carry out cyberattacks and blame other countries.
(65) U.S. soldiers have admitted that if they kill innocent Iraqis and Afghanis, they then “drop” automatic weapons near their body so they can pretend they were militants.
(66) German prosecutors admit that a German soldier disguised himself as a Syrian refugee and planned to shoot people so that the attack would be blamed on asylum seekers.
(67) Police frame innocent people for crimes they didn’t commit. The practice is so well-known that the New York Times noted in 1981:
In police jargon, a throwdown is a weapon planted on a victim.
Perez, himself a former [Los Angeles Police Department] cop, was caught stealing eight pounds of cocaine from police evidence lockers. After pleading guilty in September, he bargained for a lighter sentence by telling an appalling story of attempted murder and a “throwdown”–police slang for a weapon planted by cops to make a shooting legally justifiable. Perez said he and his partner, Officer Nino Durden, shot an unarmed 18th Street Gang member named Javier Ovando, then planted a semiautomatic rifle on the unconscious suspect and claimed that Ovando had tried to shoot themduring a stakeout.
As part of his plea bargain, Pérez implicated scores of officers from the Rampart Division’s anti-gang unit, describing routinely beating gang members, planting evidence on suspects, falsifying reports and covering up unprovoked shootings.
(68) A former U.S. intelligence officer recently alleged:
Most terrorists are false flag terrorists or are created by our own security services.
He has himself admitted to carrying out a false flag attack.
(69) The head and special agent in charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles office said that most terror attacks are committed by the CIA and FBI as false flags.
(70) The Director of Analytics at the interagency Global Engagement Center housed at the U.S. Department of State, also an adjunct professor at George Mason University, where he teaches the graduate course National Security Challenges in the Department of Information Sciences and Technology, a former branch chief in the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, and an intelligence advisor to the Secretary of Homeland Security (J.D. Maddox) notes:
Provocation is one of the most basic, but confounding, aspects of warfare. Despite its sometimes obvious use, it has succeeded consistently against audiences around the world, for millennia, to compel war. A well-constructed provocation narrative mutes even the most vocal opposition.
***
The culmination of a strategic provocation operation invariably reflects a narrative of victimhood: we are the victims of the enemy’s unforgivable atrocities.
***
In the case of strategic provocation the deaths of an aggressor’s own personnel are a core tactic of the provocation.
***
The persistent use of strategic provocation over centuries – and its apparent importance to war planners – begs the question of its likely use by the US and other states in the near term.
(71) Leaders throughout history have acknowledged the “benefits” of of false flags to justify their political agenda:
“Terrorism is the best political weapon for nothing drives people harder than a fear of sudden death”.
– Adolph Hitler
“Why of course the people don’t want war … But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship … Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
– Hermann Goering, Nazi leader.
“The easiest way to gain control of a population is to carry out acts of terror. [The public] will clamor for such laws if their personal security is threatened”.
– Josef Stalin
Postscript 1: It is not just “modern” nations which have launched false flag attacks. For example, a Native American from one tribe (Pomunkey) murdered a white Englishwoman living in Virginia in 1697 and then falsely blamed it on second tribe (Piscataway). But he later admitted in court that he was not really Piscataway, and that he had been paid by a provocateur from a third tribe (Iroquois) to kill the woman as a way to start a war between the English and the Piscataway, thus protecting the profitable Iroquois monopoly in trade with the English.
Postscript 2: On multiple occasions, atrocities or warmongering are falsely blamed on the enemy as a justification for war … when no such event ever occurred. This is more like a “fake flag” than a “false flag”, as no actual terrorism occurred.
For example:
The NSA admits that it lied about what really happened in the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964 … manipulating data to make it look like North Vietnamese boats fired on a U.S. ship so as to create a false justification for the Vietnam war
One of the central lies used to justify the 1991 Gulf War against Iraq after Iraq invaded Kuwait was the false statement by a young Kuwaiti girl that Iraqis murdered Kuwaiti babies in hospitals. Her statement was arranged by a Congressman who knew that she was actually the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to the U.S. – who was desperately trying to lobby the U.S. to enter the war – but the Congressman hid that fact from the public and from Congress
Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Ron Suskind reported that the White House ordered the CIA to forge and backdate a document falsely linking Iraq with Muslim terrorists and 9/11 … and that the CIA complied with those instructions and in fact created the forgery, which was then used to justify war against Iraq. And see this and this
Time magazine points out that the claim by President Bush that Iraq was attempting to buy “yellow cake” Uranium from Niger:
had been checked out — and debunked — by U.S. intelligence a year before the President repeated it.
Everyone knew that Iraq didn’t have weapons of mass destruction. More
The “humanitarian” wars in Syria, Libya and Yugoslavia were all justified by highly exaggerated reports that the leaders of those countries were committing atrocities against their people. And see this
Comments Off on There Are Now So Many Admissions by Government Officials of False Flag Terror that Only the Willfully Ignorant Still Doubt the Reality of the Concept
The worst of times, and the best of times. This must be a sentiment that filters through the Trump administration as it discusses, disagrees and fights itself on how best to deal with Kim Jong-un and the North Korean situation. With a transactional presidency – one that treats deals as matters of pressure, deception and cornering – situations oscillate, ebb and flow.
Given the increasingly factional approach of foreign policy from the Trump administration, lip reading is becoming a popular pastime. Adding to this a deal of undergraduate psychology, and we have a layering of speculation about the idiosyncrasies of the show.
On December 12, the US State Department, through Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, went commando. Layers were left at home; flesh was flashed. Naked, determined, forceful, Tillerson felt confident enough to push an option that eliminated preconditions in dealing with North Korea – at least initially.
The situation had been encouraged by a visit to the DPRK by United Nations political affairs chief Jeffrey Feltman, the highest-level UN official to visit Pyongyang since 2011. After meetings with Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho and Vice Minister Pak Myong Muk, the information trickling back was not promising.
“They… agreed that the current situation was the most tense and dangerous peace and security issue in the world today.” In a statement, the UN further expressed “the urgent need to prevent miscalculations and open channels to reduce the risks of conflict.”
Then came the personal circumstances of Tillerson, who is popularly believed to be awaiting the fall of Trump’s erratically deployed axe. (Surviving eleven months might be regarded as a personal triumph of sorts.) His tenure has been nothing if not busy, pruning back staff with a gardener’s ferocity in a weed-infested flower bed and presiding over the departure of veterans in the foreign service.
This made what took place at the Atlantic Council and Korea Foundation conference all the more intriguing. “We’re ready to talk any time North Korea would like to talk and we’re ready to have the first meeting without preconditions.”
In a conciliatory tone, Tillerson suggested that anything could be on the table – including the shape of the table.
“Let’s just meet and let’s – we can talk about the weather if you want. We can talk about whether it’s going to be a square table or a round table if that’s what you are excited about.”
Jaws dropped; intakes of breath registered: Tillerson was essentially suggesting to the DPKR leadership something it had wanted to hear. It might only be talking about talking, but it was still important chatter. It was “not realistic to say we’re only going to talk if you come to the table ready to give up your program. They have too much invested in it.”
This was, in a sense, the most enlightened gesture from a US cabinet figure for years in terms of confronting the crisis on the Korean peninsula. Any move towards Pyongyang that envisages the removal of its nuclear arsenal as a precondition without any more is bound to fail. To surrender such invaluable political leverage is hardly going to come about without some striking quid quo pro.
By Friday, the mood had changed. The White House had been busying itself amputating a good deal of what the Secretary of State had been suggesting. The roughing up had begun.
“We simply cannot continue to accept the progress of North Korea’s program,” an old to new and back to old Tillerson explained at a UN press conference on Friday.
A more familiar tune from the White House was reiterated, one of maximum, disabling pressure:
“We will maintain the pressure campaign and, in fact, we undertake efforts to increase the effectiveness of the pressure campaign both through a combination of the sanctions regime, full implementation and compliance of the sanctions regime, as well as unilateral actions on the part of many, many countries to send the message to North Korea through diplomatic steps as well as economic steps that we do not accept the pathway you’re on.”
In that statement lie all the troubles of the current, certifiably doomed approach. It entails a failed policy – the historical application of sanctions that serves to harm the populace, not those in power – and a steadfast refusal to acknowledge that the weapons, as long as they supply invaluable insurance, are hardly going to be surrendered.
As this revised version of Tillerson explained, such actions were designed to convince Pyongyang to “re-examine whether this truly is going to lead to a more secure – more security for the regime, and whether it is possible for them to even sustain an economy if they continue the path their on.” The dreaded suggestion here is that the Trump administration is happy to consider precipitating the collapse of the DPRK before it even considers talks, a nightmare scenario China is intent on avoiding.
Before representatives of the UN Security Council, Tillerson, having fallen back to the more belligerent tone stemming from the White House, insisted that the DPRK was perpetrator, villain and problem. It had a choice: “reverse course, give up its unlawful nuclear weapons program, and join the community of nations, or it can continue to condemn its own people to poverty and isolation.”
There was “but one party that has carried out illegal detonation of nuclear devices; there is but one party that continues to launch intercontinental ballistic missiles in violation of UN Security Council resolutions, overflying another sovereign nation, Japan, threatening civil aviation security because these launches were undertaken with no notification.”
The secretary, reiterating the persisting mania in the sanctions regime, rebuked China and Russia for not doing more. “We particularly call on Russia and China to increase pressure, including going beyond full implementation of the Security Council resolutions.” Russia received special mention for permitting “North Korean labourers to toil in slave-like conditions inside Russia in exchange for wages used to fund nuclear weapons programs”. This called “into question Russia’s dedication as a partner for peace”.
Tillerson’s gesture earlier in the week promised, at least at first, a possible, if only sparsely cleared avenue. Reeled in from such unwarranted exuberance, we await the next overture, the next timed provocation, the next startlingly juvenile remark. North Korea might well have to “earn its way back to the table”, as Tillerson claims, but on the current trajectory, it will be most happy to do so with adding, rather than subtracting, from its nuclear capabilities.
Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. Email: [email protected]
In fact, Syria taught the west a lesson. Dear Syria, you already have won this war at the moral side. And your splendid army has proven to be of iron and fire at the battleground. Your people are so firmly committed to your nation that no enemy from outside will succeed, just as Cicero had stated, about 2000 years ago!
Still, it is very important to name the real enemies, mainly the western imperialistic mass-murdering genocidal monstrous terrorists: Trump, Merkel, Macron, May, and their partners, Erdogan and al-Saud (I do not forget Qatar, though).
We in the west, EU and USA, Canada and Australia, are obliged to always, on a daily basis, point our fingers at those who claim to govern us for our best by exporting genocide, devastation, and death to the world, mainly to the Middle East and Africa. And we must never forget that these terrorists in white collars are still just the powerless minions, the servants of the real powers, the men in black suits who rule this world via their computers, their (stolen) money, their media, their corporations. We can name them: Rothschild plus their muppets like Kissinger or Brezinsky, Warburg, Morgan, Goldman-Sachs, Rockefeller, the “Queen” of Britain (literally owning a large number of peoples), and in Germany Springer, Mohn, Quandt, and others – to name a few.
We – the people in the West – are obliged to overcome and finish these terroristic regimes in the name of peace and justice. It is in our hands to end the terror and to create a better international order, for our children and for yours. It is all up to us, we have to do it.
But we failed in the past and we are failing now – not because we are weak and the regimes are strong, but because the vast majority of us is deliberately complicit with the terrorists as long as this would pamper their comfort, their ego-driven lifestyle. Do you really think that the Germans do care for you? NOT AT ALL, neither do the people in UK, France, USA. The majority of the people in the West appear to be dumbed-down, deliberately ignorant, cold-hearted monsters who do care nothing for the horror they help to impose on others to keep their lifestyle.
This, to me, seems to be the real issue.
The terrorists you in Syria, unfortunately, are exposed to are not the cause but the result. They had been made by the very same monsters I named above (and their predecessors in office, Obama, Sarkozy, Hollande, Cameron). They originate not from any problem inherited in the Syrian society but from Western greed. Therefore, the western-made terrorism, which is just a tool of our imperialism, will never end before we, the peoples, have not taken back our countries to overthrow the imperialistic regimes in Washington, Berlin, Paris, London, and Tel-Aviv (never forget the real masters behind the curtain, the elephant in the room no-one is allowed to name).
As we fail, you have the utter right and need to defend yourself, your lovely nation, your great people, your homes and your families. And, by doing so, you always defend the values of a truly human heart, of humanity, of mankind, for all of us, whether we stand with you or aside (which means at the side of the terrorists).
Syria has taught the whole world a lesson. Syria will be victorious, by her own strength and faith, and by the tremendous support of her real friends (Iran, Hezbollah).
Syria will prevail, by the sacrifice of her people. We, your supporters in the West, are all tremendously grateful we are allowed to stand with you, although we actually do not sacrifice anything but time.
Syria, the nation that gave civilization to the world, will be victorious, and the west will downfall (hopefully soon and forever).
Dear Syria, I send all my love and utter respect to you and your wonderful people.
God bless you.
Stefan Heuer, born in 1964, is a German historian and political scientist.
This article was first published by GR in March 2017.
Syrians are just like you and me.
They seek to live happy, secure lives, in which they can thrive and prosper.
NATO terrorists are destroying Syria, and they have been destroying Syria for about six years. Infrastructure such as schools, hospitals, water supplies, electric plants, roads and bridges have been and continue to be targeted and destroyed.
NATO terrorists deny Syrians safety, and the means to earn a living. They seek the complete destruction of Syria, its history, and its secular identity.
The real, evidence-based account of Syria’s plight is obliterated by the West’s criminal mainstream media complex, which serves as an appendage of the warmongering elites.
Humanitarian Pierre Le Corf demonstrates that the sources for the Western news stories are not only embedded with the terrorists, but that, in some instances, as is the case with the infamous White Helmets, the sources are the terrorists.
Evidence from the liberation of Aleppo reveals that the White Helmets are FSA, that they are al Qaeda/al Nusra, and that they are Daesh/ISIS.
Video by Pierre Le Corf
Prof. Tim Anderson compiles the evidence from the above video in the photo montage below.
Western governments have lost their legitimacy. They do not represent the informed will of the people whom they claim to represent. They conduct their criminal foreign policy based on a foundation of lies.
Order Mark Taliano’s Book “Voices from Syria” directly from Global Research.
Taliano talks and listens to the people of Syria. He reveals the courage and resilience of a Nation and its people in their day to day lives, after more than six years of US-NATO sponsored terrorism and three years of US “peacemaking” airstrikes.
Mark Taliano combines years of research with on-the-ground observations to present an informed and well-documented analysis that refutes the mainstream media narratives on Syria.
His administration’s holiday season “gifts” to the public include killing digital democracy, illegally recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, and the great GOP tax cut heist – stealing from ordinary people to benefit privileged ones, and now his latest move explained below.
Trump banned multiple Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) divisions, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) from using the following words in their official documents:
vulnerable
entitlement
diversity
transgender
fetus
evidence-based (and)
science-based.
Are they the Trump administration’s political equivalent to the seven deadly sins?
The divisions were also told to use Obamacare, not ACA or the Affordable Care Act, and to use exchanges, not marketplaces in naming venues where consumers can buy health insurance.
The State Department is affected. It must now refer to sex education as sexual risk avoidance.
Shades of Orwell newspeak, changing language, limiting thought to the lowest level, so no one can question what they’re told, along with doublespeak, disguising language to conceal uncomfortable truths.
No explanation was given for the forbidden words, other federal agencies likely given instructions similar to HHS and State.
Unnamed federal officials said language restriction was unusual, a departure from previous years.
Public outrage followed. American Association for the Advancement of Science CEO Rush Holt denounced the policy, saying:
“Among the words forbidden to be used in CDC budget documents are ‘evidence-based’ and ‘science-based.’ I suppose one must not think those things either. Here’s a word that’s still allowed: ridiculous.”
National Center for Transgender Equality executive director Mara Keisling blasted the move, saying:
“To pretend and insist that transgender people do not exist, and to allow this lie to infect public health research and prevention is irrational and very dangerous, and not just to transgender people.”
Rep. Ted Lieu called the move ‘MAKING AMERICA STUPID AGAIN…Are we now going to use Voodoo & leeches to treat diseases?”
NARAL communications director Kaylie Hanson Long said
“(f)orbidding scientists and researchers from using medically accurate terminology in order to push an extreme, ideological agenda is more dystopia than United States of America.”
“This latest move from the Trump administration amounts to yet another backdoor tactic to curtail Americans’ basic rights and freedoms, including the right to access abortion, and will put lives in real danger.”
Planned Parenthood public policy vice president Dana Singiser called the move “unimaginably dangerous.”
HHS staffers were informed directly about the language changes. State Department personnel got a guidance document, explaining how they must develop country operating plans under Trump’s Plan for Emergency AIDS Relief for 2018.
According to the Foundation for AIDS Research, federal funding for Abstinence/Be Faithful programs fell from $258.3 million in 2008 to $20.1 million this year – perhaps heading for elimination in 2018 to help pay for the great GOP tax cut heist.
An unnamed HHS official said
“(p)eople were surprised. (They) were not thrilled. We all kind of looked at each other and said: ‘Oh, God.’ “
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.
No último dia 5 pôde conhecer a verdade sobre sua origem, e abraçar a família.
As Avós da Praça de Maio anunciamos, com grande felicidade o encontro da neta nova, filha de Violeta Graciela Ortolani e Edgardo Roberto Garnier, nascida em janeiro de 1977 durante o cativeiro da mãe. Ela poderá conhecer a avó paterna, Blanca Díaz de Garnier, que mora em Concepción do Uruguai, onde nasceu seu pai e poderá conversar com seus parentes paternos e maternos, com os companheiros de militância dos pais que já a estão acompanhando para abraçá-la na verdade.
Violeta nasceu na cidade de Buenos Aires em 11 de outubro de 1953. Aos três anos de idade, sua mãe morreu de maneira que foi criada por uma tia em Bolívar. Ela era uma ótima companheira, sensível, alegre. Gostava muito de matemática e era apaixonada por pesquisa espacial. Ela também gostava de futebol. Era católica praticante. Não era de sair nem de dançar. Era falante e vivaz. Foi estudar Engenharia Química em La Plata, tendo conseguido uma bolsa de estudos. Ela também trabalhou como empregada no Hospital de Crianças. Iniciou a militância política na faculdade, onde conheceu Edgardo.
Edgardo nasceu em 7 de agosto de 1955 em Concepción do Uruguai, província de Entre Ríos. Ainda criança, era muito engenhosa: desmontou e montar de novo sua primeira bicicleta. Foi à escola N° 1 Nicolás Avellaneda, e era uma excelente aluna. Lia história em quadrinhos e preferia matérias humanas. Era torcedora do Independiente. Era muito interessada em tudo que se relacionava à conquista do espaço. Era ajuizado e silencioso. Mudou-se à cidade de La Plata para estudar Engenharia Eletromecânica.
O casal militou na FAEP, e Edgardo também militou no JP e Violeta no JUP. Desta maneira, ambos eram parte de Montoneros. Seus colegas de classe a chamavam de “La Viole” e, ele, “La Vieja Bordolino” ou “El Viejo”.
Durante seus estudos e militância, Edgardo e Violeta moraram em Ensenada, na mesma casa de outros estudantes de Engenharia, entre eles Marita Aiub e Rafael Caielli, que também desapareceram com o filho, a quem ainda procuramos.
Naquela casa, eles montaram uma oficina elétrica chamada “El pollo eléctrico”. E na parte de trás, mantinham um jardim.
Violeta e Edgardo casaram-se em 7 de agosto de 1976 em uma cerimônia religiosa simples , realizada em Bolívar. Ela estava grávida de três meses. O casal pensou em dar ao bebê o nome de Vanessa, se fosse menina; Marcos ou Enrique, se fosse menino.
Violeta foi sequestrada em 14 de dezembro de 1976 no bairro La Granja da cidade de La Plata, grávida de oito meses. Desde então, Edgardo procurou a esposa por céu e terra e depois retornou ao seu povoado em Entre Rios. Próximo à data provável do parto, ele a procurou novamente. Despediu-se dizendo que iria procurar pelo filho e, pouco depois, em 8 de fevereiro de 1977 em La Plata, ele também foi sequestrado.
Desde então, sua família deu continuidade à busca e foi uma das primeiras a fazer o denúncia nas Avós da Praça de Maio. Mas nenhuma informação confiável e concreta foi obtida sobre o casal, nem sobre a menina ou o menino que deve ter nascido em cativeiro. Até agora.
Assim como em muitos dos últimos casos, uma jovem aproximou-se da Área de Apresentação Espontânea de Avós da Praza de Maio após alguém de seu meio ter-lhe confessado que ela não era filha biológica daqueles que a haviam criado. Até então, ela não tinha dúvidas sobre sua identidade.
Sua falsa Certidão de Nascimento foi assinado pela médica Juana Franicevich, quem já havia atestado a Certidão de Nascimento de três netos recentemente restituídos.
Na Área de Apresentação Espontânea, ela foi atendida e posteriormente encaminhada à Comissão Nacional de Direito à Identidade (CONADI) a fim de fornecer a informação documental e, posteriormente, realizar a análise no Banco Nacional de Dados Genéticos.
No último dia 5, essa jovem soube que era filha de Violeta e Edgardo. Ela recebeu a notícia no CONADI com grande felicidade, e concordou imediatamente em aproximar-se das Avós para conhecer sua família e os colegas dos seus pais, com quem ela já pode fazer brincadeiras e abraçar.
Esses encontros enchem-nos de esperança, e dão-nos força para redobrar a procura.
Este caso, mais uma vez, demonstra a importância de que quem tem alguma informação sobre um possível filho de desaparecidos, falem com ele ou com ela, ou nos tragam essa informação. Longe de causar-lhes danos, os ajudarão a viver na liberdade que só a verdade pode oferecer.
Poucas avós vamos restando com o passa dos anos; alguns dias atrás tivemos a tristeza de despedirmo-nos de duas grandes companheiras, Raquel e Marta, que não conseguiram alcançar o tão esperado encontro.
Com a urgência do tempo que corre, estamos novamente convocando a sociedade a fim de nos ajudar nesta procua que já leva 40 anos.
E, a nossos netos e netas, reafirmamos que aqui só lhes espera o amoroso abrigo da verdade. Bem-vinda, neta 126!
Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo
Fonte: Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo Argentina.
Tradução: Edu Montesanti, tradutor do sítio de Abuelas (Avós da Praça de Maio)
The following text on Rumsfeld’s “Office of Strategic Influence” (OSI) was first published by Global Research in January 2003 two months before the onslaught of the war on Iraq. The analysis largely pertained to the role of the Pentagon in planting fake stories in the news chain with a view to providing a “human face” to US-led military interventions.
Already in 2002, the “Militarization of the Media” was on the drawing board of the Pentagon. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld created the OSI with a view to influencing public opinion in the months leading up to the war on Iraq in March 2003. “The purpose [of the OSI] was to deliberately lie to advance American interests,” (quoted in Air Force Magazine, January 2003). It consisted in feeding disinformation into the news chain as well as seeking the support of the corporate media. Acknowledged by the New York Times:
“The Defense Department is considering issuing a secret directive to the American military to conduct covert operations aimed at influencing public opinion and policy makers in friendly and neutral countries [Germany, France, etc], senior Pentagon and administration officials say.
The fight, one Pentagon official said, is over ”the strategic communications for our nation, the message we want to send for long-term influence, and how we do it.”
As a military officer put it: ”We have the assets and the capabilities and the training to go into friendly and neutral nations to influence public opinion. We could do it and get away with it. That doesn’t mean we should.”…
In February [2002], Mr. Rumsfeld had to disband the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Influence, ending a short-lived plan to provide news items, and possibly false ones, to foreign journalists to influence public sentiment abroad. Senior Pentagon officials say Mr. Rumsfeld is deeply frustrated that the United States government has no coherent plan for molding public opinion worldwide in favor of America in its global campaign against terrorism and militancy.(NYT, December 10, 2002)
Many administration officials agree that there is a role for the military in carrying out what it calls information operations against adversaries, especially before and during war, as well as routine public relations work in friendly nations like Colombia, the Philippines or Bosnia, whose governments have welcomed American troops.
… But the idea of ordering the military to take psychological aim at allies has divided the Pentagon — with civilians and uniformed officers on both sides of the debate.
Some are troubled by suggestions that the military might pay journalists to write stories favorable to American policies or hire outside contractors without obvious ties to the Pentagon to organize rallies in support of American policies. (NYT, December 16, 2002)
The Ongoing “Militarization of the Media”
Most people do not even know that an Office of Strategic Influence (tantamount to a “Ministry of Truth”) existed within the confines of the Pentagon. Why? Rumsfeld decided to abolish the OSI. In reality, it was never abolished. They just changed the name to something else (as confirmed by Rumsfeld in a November 2002 Press Conference):
Rumsfeld: And then there was the office of strategic influence…. I went down that next day and said fine, if you want to savage this thing fine I’ll give you the corpse. There’s the name. You can have the name, but I’m gonna keep doing every single thing that needs to be done and I have.
That was intended to be done by that office is being done by that office, NOT by that office in other ways.
While the OSI process launched by the Pentagon in 2002 is still functional as intimated by Rumsfeld, it has become increasingly sophisticated. Moreover, the media environment has changed dramatically since 2002 with the rapid development of social media.
Harper Magazine, Screenshot
Today, the Militarization of the Media is accepted. It is part of a “New Normal”. The actions of both by the Pentagon and NATO are now largely directed against the Blogosphere integrated by social media and independent online news and analysis.
“Strategic Influence” seeks to undermine critique or opinion by the alternative online media directed against (illegal) acts of war. Since 2001, a firm relationship has developed between the mainstream media and the Military establishment. War crimes are tacitly ignored. US-NATO “acts of war” are routinely upheld by the corporate media as humanitarian endeavors, i.e. a so-called “Responsibility to Protect”(R2P).
“America is Under Attack”
On September 11, 2001, Afghanistan had allegedly attacked America, according to NATO’s North Atlantic Council. The legal argument was that the September 11 attacks constituted an undeclared “armed attack” “from abroad” by an unnamed foreign power.
In the months leading up to the announced 2003 invasion of Iraq, the propaganda campaign consisted in sustaining the illusion that “America was under attack”.
A similar logic prevails today: America’s is allegedly being threatened by “rogue states”: Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.
“Information Operations” are now envisaged by the Pentagon against alternative media which refuse to acknowledge that “America is under attack”. The online independent media are tagged as “adversaries”. Countering (critical) social media is part of a US-NATO’s agenda. NATO points to the “weaponization of disinformation”, suggesting that online media directed against US-NATO constitutes a “weapon”.
Both the US DoD and NATO consider that online “false information” (published by independent and alternative media) has “security implications”. The objective is ultimately to dismantle all civil society media and movements which are opposed to America’s global war agenda.
Below is the text on the failed Office of Strategic Influence (OSI), written 15 years ago, published in January 2003.
Michel Chossudovsky, December 17, 2017
***
War Propaganda
by Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research, January 16, 2003
Military planners in the Pentagon are acutely aware of the central role of war propaganda. Waged from the Pentagon, the State Department and the CIA, a fear and disinformation campaign (FDC) has been launched. The blatant distortion of the truth and the systematic manipulation of all sources of information is an integral part of war planning. In the wake of 9/11, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld created to the Office of Strategic Influence (OSI), or “Office of Disinformation” as it was labeled by its critics:
“The Department of Defense said they needed to do this, and they were going to actually plant stories that were false in foreign countries — as an effort to influence public opinion across the world.1
And, all of a sudden, the OSI was formally disbanded following political pressures and “troublesome” media stories that “its purpose was to deliberately lie to advance American interests.”2 “Rumsfeld backed off and said this is embarrassing.”3 Yet despite this apparent about-turn, the Pentagon’s Orwellian disinformation campaign remains functionally intact: “[T]he secretary of defense is not being particularly candid here. Disinformation in military propaganda is part of war.”4
Rumsfeld later confirmed in a press interview that while the OSI no longer exists in name, the “Office’s intended functions are being carried out” 5 (Rumsfeld’s precise words can be consulted here).
A number of government agencies and intelligence units –with links to the Pentagon– are involved in various components of the propaganda campaign. Realities are turned upside down. Acts of war are heralded as “humanitarian interventions” geared towards “regime change” and “the restoration of democracy”. Military occupation and the killing of civilians are presented as “peace-keeping”. The derogation of civil liberties –in the context of the so-called “anti-terrorist legislation”– is portrayed as a means to providing “domestic security” and upholding civil liberties. And underlying these manipulated realties, “Osama bin Laden” and “Weapons of Mass Destruction” statements, which circulate profusely in the news chain, are upheld as the basis for an understanding of World events.
In the critical “planning stages” leading up to an invasion of Iraq, the twisting of public opinion at home and around the World, is an integral part of the War agenda, War propaganda is pursued at all stages: before, during the military operation as well as in its cruel aftermath. War propaganda serves to drown the real causes and consequences of war.
A few months after the OSI was disbanded amidst controversy (February 2002), The New York Times confirmed that the disinformation campaign was running strong and that the Pentagon was:
“…considering issuing a secret directive to American military to conduct covert operations aimed at influencing public opinion and policymakers in friendly and neutral nations …The proposal has ignited a fierce battle throughout the Bush administration over whether the military should carry out secret propaganda missions in friendly nations like Germany… The fight, one Pentagon official said, is over ‘the strategic communications for our nation, the message we want to send for long-term influence, and how we do it….’We have the assets and the capabilities and the training to go into friendly and neutral nations to influence public opinion. We could do it and get away with it. That doesn’t mean we should.’6
Fabricating the Truth
To sustain the war agenda, these “fabricated realities”, funneled on a day to day basis into the news chain must become indelible truths, which form part of a broad political and media consensus. In this regard, the corporate media –although acting independently of the military-intelligence apparatus, is an instrument of this evolving totalitarian system.
In close liaison with the Pentagon and the CIA, the State Department has also set up its own “soft-sell” (civilian) propaganda unit, headed by Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Charlotte Beers, a powerful figure in the advertising industry. Working in liaison with the Pentagon, Beers was appointed to head the State Department’s propaganda unit in the immediate wake of 9/11. Her mandate is “to counteract anti-Americanism abroad.”7 Her office at the State department is to:
“ensure that public diplomacy (engaging, informing, and influencing key international audiences) is practiced in harmony with public affairs (outreach to Americans) and traditional diplomacy to advance U.S. interests and security and to provide the moral basis for U.S. leadership in the world.” (Source)
The Role of the CIA
The most powerful component of the Fear and Disinformation Campaign (FDI) rests with the CIA, which, secretly subsidizes authors, journalists and media critics, through a web of private foundations and CIA sponsored front organizations. The CIA also influences the scope and direction of many Hollywood productions. Since 9/11, one third of Hollywood productions are war movies. “Hollywood stars and scriptwriters are rushing to bolster the new message of patriotism, conferring with the CIA and brainstorming with the military about possible real-life terrorist attacks.”8 “The Sum of All Fears” directed by Phil Alden Robinson, which depicts the scenario of a nuclear war, received the endorsement and support of both the Pentagon and the CIA.9
Disinformation is routinely “planted” by CIA operatives in the newsroom of major dailies, magazines and TV channels. Outside public relations firms are often used to create “fake stories” Carefully documented by Chaim Kupferberg in relation to the events of September 11: “A relatively few well-connected correspondents provide the scoops, that get the coverage in the relatively few mainstream news sources, where the parameters of debate are set and the “official reality” is consecrated for the bottom feeders in the news chain.”10
Covert disinformation initiatives under CIA auspices are also funneled through various intelligence proxies in other countries. Since 9/11, they have resulted in the day-to-day dissemination of false information concerning alleged “terrorist attacks”. In virtually all of the reported cases (Britain, France, Indonesia, India, Philippines, etc.) the “alleged terrorist groups” are said to have “links to Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda”, without of course acknowledging the fact (amply documented by intelligence reports and official documents) that Al Qaeda is a creation of CIA.
The Doctrine of “Self Defense”
At this critical juncture, in the month(s) leading up to the announced invasion of Iraq, the propaganda campaign is geared towards sustaining the illusion that “America is under attack”. Relayed not only through the mainstream media but also through a number of alternative internet media sites, these “fabricated realities” portray the war as a bona fide act of self-defense, while carefully concealing the broad strategic and economic objectives of the war.
In turn, the propaganda campaign develops a casus belli, “a justification”, a political legitimacy for waging war. The “official reality” (conveyed profusely in George W’s speeches) rests on the broad “humanitarian” premise of a so-called “preemptive”, namely “defensive war”, “a war to protect freedom”:
“We’re under attack because we love freedom… And as long as we love freedom and love liberty and value every human life, they’re going to try to hurt us.” 11
Spelled out in the National Security Strategy (NSS), the preemptive “defensive war” doctrine and the “war on terrorism” against Al Qaeda constitute the two essential building blocks of the Pentagon’s propaganda campaign. The objective is to present “preemptive military action” –meaning war as an act of “self-defense” against two categories of enemies, “rogue States” and “Islamic terrorists”:
“The war against terrorists of global reach is a global enterprise of uncertain duration. …America will act against such emerging threats before they are fully formed.
…Rogue states and terrorists do not seek to attack us using conventional means. They know such attacks would fail. Instead, they rely on acts of terror and, potentially, the use of weapons of mass destruction (…)
The targets of these attacks are our military forces and our civilian population, in direct violation of one of the principal norms of the law of warfare. As was demonstrated by the losses on September 11, 2001, mass civilian casualties is the specific objective of terrorists and these losses would be exponentially more severe if terrorists acquired and used weapons of mass destruction.
The United States has long maintained the option of preemptive actions to counter a sufficient threat to our national security. The greater the threat, the greater is the risk of inaction— and the more compelling the case for taking anticipatory action to defend ourselves, (…). To forestall or prevent such hostile acts by our adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act preemptively.”12 (National Security Strategy, White House, 2002)
Feeding Disinformation into the News Chain
How is war propaganda carried out? Two sets of “eye popping” “statements” emanating from a variety of sources (including official National Security statements, media, Washington-based think tanks, etc.) are fed on a daily basis into the news chain. Some of the events (including news regarding presumed terrorists) are blatantly fabricated by the intelligence agencies. These statements are supported by simple and catchy “buzzwords”, which set the stage for fabricating the news:
Buzzword no. 1. “Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda” (Osama) is behind most news stories regarding the “war on terrorism” including “alleged”, “future” “presumed”, and “actual” terrorist attacks. What is rarely mentioned is that this outside enemy Al Qaeda is a CIA “intelligence asset”, used in covert operations.
Buzzword no. 2. The “Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)” statement is used to justify the “pre-emptive war” against the “State sponsors of terror”, –i.e. countries such as Iraq, Iran and North Korea which allegedly possess WMD. Amply documented in the case of Iraq, a large body of news on WMD and biological attacks, are fabricated.
The “WMD” and “Osama bin Laden” statements become part of day to day debate, embodied in routine conversations between citizens. Repeated ad nauseam, they penetrate the inner consciousness of ordinary people molding their individual perceptions on current events. Through deception and manipulation, this shaping of the minds of entire populations, sets the stage –under the façade of a functioning democracy—for the installation of a de facto police State. Needless to say, war propaganda weakens the antiwar movement.
In turn, the disinformation regarding alleged “terrorist attacks” or “weapons of mass destruction” instils an atmosphere of fear, which mobilizes unswerving patriotism and support for the State, and its main political and military actors.
Repeated in virtually every national news report, this stigmatic focus on WMD-Al Qaeda essentially serves as a dogma, to blind people on the causes and consequences of America’s war of conquest, while providing a simple, unquestioned and authoritative justification for “self defense.”
More recently, both in speeches by President Bush and Prime Minister Blair, as well as in the news, WMD statements are now carefully blended into Osama statements. UK Defense Minister Jack Straw warned in early January “that ‘rogue regimes’ such as Iraq were the most likely source of WMD technology for groups like al-Qaeda.”13 Also, in January, a presumed al Qaeda cell “with links to Iraq” was discovered in Edinburgh, allegedly involved in the use of biological weapons against people in the UK. The hidden agenda of “the links to Iraq” statement is blatantly obvious. The objective is to discredit Iraq in the months leading up to the war: the so-called “State sponsors of terror” are said to support Osama bin Laden, Conversely, Osama is said to collaborate with Iraq in the use of weapons of mass destruction.
In recent months, several thousand news reports have woven “WMD-Osama stories” of which a couple of excerpts are provided below:
“Skeptics will argue that the inconsistencies don’t prove the Iraqis have continued developing weapons of mass destruction. It also leaves Washington casting about for other damning material and charges, including the midweek claim, again unproved, that Islamic extremists affiliated with al-Qaeda took possession of a chemical weapon in Iraq last November or late October.”14
North Korea has admitted it lied about that and is brazenly cranking up its nuclear program again. Iraq has almost certainly lied about it, but won’t admit it. Meanwhile Al Qaeda, although dispersed, remains a shadowy, threatening force, and along with other terrorist groups, a potential recipient of the deadly weaponry that could emerge from Iraq and North Korea.15
Britain’s Prime Minister Tony Blair listed Iraq, North Korea, the Middle East and al-Qaeda among “difficult and dangerous” problems Britain faced in the coming year.16
The WMD-Osama statements are used profusely by the mainstream media. In the wake of 9/11, these stylized statements have also become an integral part of day to day political discourse. They have also permeated the workings of international diplomacy and the functioning of the United Nations.
Notes
1. Interview with Steve Adubato, Fox News, 26 December 2002.
2. Air Force Magazine, January 2003, italics added..
11. Remarks by President Bush in Trenton, New Jersey, «Welcome Army National Guard Aviation Support Facility, Trenton, New Jersey », 23 September 2002.
To understand the complex web of deceit aimed at luring the American people and the rest of the world into accepting a military solution which threatens the future of humanity, get your copy of Michel Chossudovsky’s international bestseller America’s War on Terrorism.
In Adrian Lyne‘s 1990 drama, Jacob’s Ladder (see book cover right below), Tim Robbins plays a haunted Vietnam War vet mourning his dead son, while suffering from severe disassociation. Throughout the film he attempts to decipher reality and life itself from his weird dreams and delusions. Everything in his daily life seems to be ‘ offbeat and surreal’ as he stumbles to find the truth of it all. In the end we see him back in Vietnam lying in a triage cot… dying. The entire film was but part of his nightmare. Finally, as he is dying, we see his already dead son’s spirit guiding him up Jacob’s ladder into the other side, or maybe what we would label heaven.
So it is with 2017 America. Imagine how surreal it is that we have Donald Trump as our president, a few years removed from being the ‘ reality television star’. How utterly surreal it is that the real Deep State is showing its muscle now. All the hogwash from the Trump version of right wing America about the ‘ Deep State ‘ being the enemy is just that, HOGWASH!
The right wing Neo Cons and their adversaries running Trump are still delighted to get what they all want: A total Military Industrial Empire.
We know, from when Eisenhower warned us in January of 1961, that this has always been a Military Industrial Empire. Now , however, it is one that is on steroids! From the tax cuts for the super rich individuals and corporations, to the increases in military spending , to satisfying the Neo Fascist Israeli government on Jerusalem, to controlling the internet, to preparing for the overturn of a woman’s right to choose… my goodness, need I go on?
In this fantastic ( in a poor sense) version of 2017’s Jacob’s Ladder the other right wing political party, the lesser of two evils Democrats, actually are looking very appealing to many. Why not? They are standing there ready to place a few band-aids on our economic and moral wounds.
Of course, the Democrats will never go the distance and stand up for cutting this War madness, or advocating for real and viable socialistic programs, like National Government run health care and nationalized energy, nationalized Pharma and public banking to name but a few. No, they will continue to serve this Military Industrial Empire but with more tenderness for the indigent and some sort of safety net. As Porky Pig would say at the end of the cartoon: ” And a that’s all folks!!”
PA Farruggio
December 16 2017
Philip A Farruggio is a son and grandson of Brooklyn , NYC longshoremen. He has been a free lance columnist since 2001, with over 300 of his work posted on sites like Consortium News, Information Clearing House, Global Research ,Nation of Change, World News Trust, Op Ed News, Dissident Voice, Counterpunch, Activist Post, Sleuth Journal, Truthout and many others. His blog can be read in full on World News Trust., whereupon he writes a great deal on the need to cut military spending drastically and send the savings back to save our cities. Philip has a internet interview show, ‘ It’s the Empire… Stupid’ with producer Chuck Gregory, and can be reached at [email protected] )
When President Trump on 6 December 2017 declared unilaterally Jerusalem as the capital of Israel to where the US Embassy shall relocate, he violated UN Resolutions, international law, common sense and went against all diplomatic efforts to eventually bring peace to the region, not to speak about 130 countries that have already voiced opposition to such a decision. And this, before the Peace Process is coming to an end, at which point the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords would play out. They are also called the Road Map for Peace, between Palestine and Israel, which foresees a two-state solution and accordingly a mutual decision on Jerusalem becoming the capital city for both Palestine and Israel. These Oslo Peace Accords are still valid today.
But Mr. Trump may not have a clue that such a Peace Accord even exists. And his handlers obviously had no interest of telling him. – And even if they did, it would make no difference, because the exceptional nation has no scruples demolishing any agreements of the past, regardless whether or not it – the US of A – were party to the shaping of them. – See also the Iranian Nuclear Deal.
By the same token, Washington does not give a hoot about international law and UN Resolutions. We are talking about the only and perfect rogue state the world has known in the past two centuries, by far surpassing, actually without any comparison with the western customarily accused villains, like Zimbabwe, North Korea, Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba — and all those that refuse to bend to the Chief-Rogue-State, the United States of America.
In fact, what Trump has done, was just confirming what previous US Administrations had already as an objective, namely following the so-called „Jerusalem Embassy Act of 1995“, with which the US Congress already 20 years ago, requested and prepared this step by legislation that says, “Since 1950, Jerusalem is the Capital of the State of Israel…”. Never mind and, of course not reported by the mainstream media, that immediately after promising the US Embassy would be moved to Jerusalem, Trump signed a ‘waiver’ postponing the move indefinitely, or until the international situation becomes ‘clear(er)’. – Who does the US Congress think they are – God the Almighty? To decide over the “Holy City”, Jerusalem, the historic center of the three-religion monotheist culture of 5,000 years of Judo-Christianism, also incorporating Islam, is an act of arrogance without comparison.
This insensitive Trump decision or affirmation at this point in time – another one in his basket of disasters – brought everything else but peace to the region, and especially to Palestine. It caused unrest, angry demonstrations from people who are basically fighting with their bare hands; protests which were immediately oppressed with firepower and violence by the Israeli military and police force, killing people in the Israel imposed ghetto of Gaza and the West Bank – i.e. in Palestine, what should become an independent state.
Instead of bringing peace, Trump killed the aspiration of peace, he de facto killed the notion of a two-state solution – and he effectively isolated the US from literally the rest of the world. Was this a bold provocation inspired by Trump’s Zionist masters, a trial balloon to find out how much of impunity the world would tolerate?
At no time was even mentioned that Jerusalem, if anything, might also be the capital of Palestine. The Motherland of Israel, let’s not forget, Palestine, was ignored. Palestine was provoked into protests, just to be brutally suffocated by the Israeli defense Forces (IDF). They do this with sadistic pleasure, like killing helpless flies. All this prompted by the criminal and irresponsible behavior of the President of the United States, the exceptional Nation – or rather his invisible handlers behind the throne.
But the propaganda mantra must go on – the lie that declaring Jerusalem the capital of Israel was good for the Middle East, was good for peace, was and still is repeated over and over again, like a mantra, tras-mantra, tras-mantra – by Trump and his mannequins, his foreign affair puppets, Rex Tillerson and Nikki Haley, who is masquerading as Washington’s UN Ambassador, repeating over and over again, the same lie, the same lie, the same lie, in the hope, as the common saying goes after Goebbels, Hitler’s Propaganda Minister, if repeated enough, the lie becomes the truth. Do these clowns really believe that if a world renown repeat-liar keeps repeat-lying the globes populace believes that the repeat-lie becomes the truth?
The people at large have moved forward towards awakening since the horrendous murderous lies about Iraq with weapons of mass destruction that weren’t; about Gaddafi horrors committed to his people, which he didn’t, to the contrary, he provided them with free education, health services and cutting edge medical facilities, with free infrastructure and a broad social safety net; or UN-proven lies about Bashar Al-Assad’s poison gas used against his own people; the lies about Iran’s nuclear program that never was; the lies about Russia’s meddling in Ukraine, when it is now amply proven that the Maidan massacre was planned and carried out via the US Embassy in Kiev and through US and NATO military and paid mercenaries; the lies about the US and NATO fighting against ISIS which Washington created – and the list of lies go on – endlessly.
The entire vassal state of the European Union, country after country – led by the three “Ms”, Germany’s Merkel, France’s Macron, and the UK’s May – have said they would not go along with Trump’s decision and moving their Embassies to Jerusalem. Bravo! – Will this decision last, or will there be some high-power arm-twisting by Washington? – Is Washington still able to do arm-twisting, economic sanctions? Haven’t they noticed yet, that the west, even the hitherto puppet West, is gradually but surely moving away from the Atlantic Alliance towards the East. Probably for purely selfish economic and financial reasons, though some western politicians may look deeper and see the light, what I call, the Future is in the East.
What is also mazing though, is that nobody seems to even question the basics – the right of the self-styled emperor Trump, the typical emperor without cloths – intervening with the decision of another nation’s capital city. Of course, we know that Trump’s buddy and family friend, Bibi Netanyahu, holds and / or twists arms (smilingly) with the Donald on Jerusalem through the infamous family relations of the two warrying aggressors and through the seemingly unbeatable Zion-power the western world is being subjected to.
Trump, with this unwise decision, may have brought Jerusalem back to the 12th Century, the ages of the Crusades, when in 1187, on behalf of the Muslim Ayyubids Dynasty, Sultan Saladin, a Sunni Muslim, of Kurdish origins, besieged and eventually re-conquered the so-called Christian Kingdom of Heaven, invaded and stolen by the ‘Christian’ emperors of Rome two-hundred years earlier.
Perhaps Mr. Trump nilly-willy has started a new Arab Crusade against the artificially imposed Kingdom of Israel, artificially implanted in the land of Palestine, implanted by the Zionists who used the power of the British Empire which at that time was colonizing Palestine, to corrupt the freshly created UN system in 1948 to cut up and destroy Palestine – see the Balfour Declaration,
The British Foreign Secretary, Arthur Balfour, wrote on 2nd November 1917, hundred years ago, to Lord Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, suggesting the carving up of Palestine the creation of a State of Israel. The ‘proposal’ was to be transmitted to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland. Lord Rothschild was co-drafter of the letter. The text of the declaration was made official by publication in the media on 9 November 1917.
The idea was eventually carried out by a UN Resolution in 1948, bringing about the State of Israel on 14 May 1948, the day Palestine became a non-country and enslaved to Israel.
Behind the Trump strategy lays a broader objective, the creation of a Greater Israel, that would stretch from the Euphrates to the Nile, cutting through Saudi Arabia, absorbing Jordan, a large portion of Syria and most of Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. This is to make Israel a Middle Eastern super-power, sitting on a huge junk of the sub-continent’s energy wealth and on most of the Middle east’s fresh water reserves, on behalf of the Anglo-Zionist Empire.
It is yet to be seen whether this bold and aggressive move by Trump went a step too far; whether this impunity is the straw that may break the empire’s back.
What if nobody – not even the traditional allies – participates in this nefarious endeavor to move their embassies from Tel Avia to Jerusalem?
What if sanctions that Washington undoubtedly may dish out to those who do not obey its orders do no longer work?
What if this Trump lunacy opens the gates to the East even further for all those who have been fed-up with the empire’s financial-, fury-and-fire, and propaganda-crusades to conquer the world; and that this Washington insanity leads them to a new healthier, promising and honest economic system striving towards equality – of which we know already the fundamental bedrock – the multi-trillion New Silk Road, President Xi’s One Belt Initiative?
Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a former World Bank staff and worked extensively around the world in the fields of environment and water resources. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for Global Research, ICH, RT, Sputnik, PressTV, The 21st Century (China), 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.
Ajit Pai, the former Verizon lawyer who is chair of the FCC, went too far last Thursday in undermining the Internet when he led the dismantling of net neutrality rules. As a result, he has fueled the energy needed to protect Internet rights. It is time for Movement Judo, where the energy created by the overreach of the FCC is turned into energy not just to overturn the FCC’s decision, but to also create the Internet we need in the 21st Century.
Over the past few months, there has arisen an epic mass mobilization in support of net neutrality and national consensus, with a University of Maryland poll finding 83% support for the Internet being open and equal to all. There was a record number of comments to the FCC on this issue over the summer. More than 1.2 million calls and 12.5 million emails went into Congress through the coalition site, Battle For the Net, and more than 700 protests were held across the country for net neutrality on December 7. The Internet is important to all of us and politicians who do not side with the people will pay a heavy political price.
This week, three FCC commissioners gave a handful of mega-corporations the power to control the speed of websites and where we go, what we see and what we pay for access to content on the web. The battle for the Internet is not over – it has just begun, and we will go into next steps to protect our Internet, but first we will start with a bigger question – what should the Internet be in the 21st Century?
Protest at the FCC the day before the FCC decision. By John Zangas of the DC Media Group.
What Kind of Internet Would You Like to See?
If the movement for Internet equality and justice were to put forward a vision for the Internet in the 21st Century, we could make that vision into a reality.
We start with the view that the Internet is a key venue for Freedom of Speech. It is a place where First Amendment protections should apply. Political speech should not only be protected in print and television, but it should also be protected in the digital world, including websites, video, social media and new outlets we cannot yet imagine.
Political speech on the Internet has been vital in recent years to putting new issues on the political agenda. Video of police violence, sometimes resulting in death, have brought these issues, that have been ignored for years, to the center of political debate. The movement for Black Lives Matter has resulted in prosecution of police, widespread discussion and policy changes, e.g. police wearing cameras, new laws and policies.
The occupy encampments that swept the nation in 2011 would not have occurred without the Internet. Early in Occupy Wall Street a small number of people camped out in Zuccotti Park. It was on a weekend march where protesters were arrested and placed behind a mesh barrier by the police that occupy exploded. One high ranking officer went toward the captives and pepper sprayed them. This was caught on camera by multiple individuals and shared on the Internet. When the police tried to claim the protesters were being violent or threatening, the videos showed the opposite to be true. Seemingly overnight, hundreds of occupy encampments sprang up throughout the country. The political meme of the 99% became widespread and the issue of income and wealth inequality became part of the political dialogue.
These are two examples of many showing how equal Internet access has become critical to free speech and political development.
Part of free speech includes commercial speech and the Internet has been an essential element in new products and services that would not have otherwise reached enough people to support new businesses. This is why outside of the telecoms and cable companies, net neutrality is supported by businesses, especially small start-up enterprises.
The Internet has become a basic human right. The Internet is essential to function in modern society. People sign up for health insurance, apply for jobs, do research for school, develop income . . . many activities of life are now conducted online.
Indivisibility: Human rights are indivisible and interdependent, i.e. if a government violates rights it affects people’s ability to exercise other rights such as the right to speak politically, participate in democracy or participate in commerce.
Participation: People have a right to participate in how decisions are made regarding protection of their rights.
Accountability: Governments must create mechanisms of accountability for the enforcement of rights.
Transparency: People must know about and understand major decisions affecting Internet rights.
Non-Discrimination: Human rights must be guaranteed without discrimination of any kind. This includes not only purposeful discrimination, but also protection from policies and practices which may have a discriminatory effect.
To achieve these principles requires a re-thinking of the Internet. The Internet was created through public investment and Internet access should be a public utility, not controlled by private corporations. Control of the Internet by the public includes community-developed Internet, municipal Internet or even nationalizing the Internet. Current rules blocking municipal ownership need to be reversed. Twenty-one states prevent or discourage the construction of public broadband networks.
If there is corporate involvement in the Internet, monopolies should be prevented and corporations should be regulated so that human rights principles are not violated.Profiteering from the Internet has currently reached grotesque proportions, with Charter’s Tom Rutledge the highest paid CEO at $98.5 million in 2016, and this will worsen without net neutrality.
We already know the parameters of what we need. Jimmy Lee, an investor and adviser in socially minded start-ups, writes, a”forward-looking agenda must focus on expanding digital access and participation. We cannot build a more equal America, or a future with greater opportunity and economic mobility, if large numbers of Americans are stuck on the wrong side of a growing digital divide.” Everyone needs a free or affordable pathway to high-speed internet access.
It is time to develop national consensus on what we want the Internet to be in the 21st Century. What are the key principles or services needed? Comment on our Facebook page and discuss it in your own communities, organizations and Internet spaces. After we develop consensus, we must work to make it a reality.
Movement educator and author Rivera Sun describes how the Internet is as ubiquitous as salt was during British rule of India. When Gandhi began the salt march protest of the British monopoly over salt, no one expected it would bring down the British empire. Our fight for the human right to Internet access could be a key boomerang in response to the extremism of corporate power and the Trump era.
People outside of the FCC on the December 13th, the night befor the FCC vote. Some spent the night camping out in freezing cold temperatures.
The Immediate Campaign for Net Neutrality
The mobilized movement for net neutrality will do all it can in court, Congress and the streets to make sure the FCC decision against net neutrality does not stand. The outcome at the FCC was no surprise as Chairman Pai made false and inaccurate claims over the past year against net neutrality. What is a surprise is how strong the movement for Internet equality became in response to his extremism.
The task of the movement now is to turn that energy into political power. We must continue to stay active, involve more people and build the movement we need for an Internet that serves the people.
This week’s 3-2 vote of the FCC was a dramatic break with the history of the free and open Internet. The Internet has always been a common carrier where net neutrality rules and practices have always existed and were protected by commissioners from both parties. The former Chairman, Tom Wheeler, put rules in place in 2015 that codified net neutrality practices and gave the FCC the power to enforce those rules. Ajit Pai dismantled the 2015 rules, and abdicated FCC authority over internet service providers, clearing the way for blocking, throttling, discrimination and profiteering by the nation’s largest phone and cable companies.
While Pai joked about being a pawn of the internet service providers at the Internet prom sponsored by the industry, his actions show he is lining up his next job rather than being a servant of the public interest. Former Chairman Tom Wheeler says the FCC action will turn the Internet into cable TV saying “Stop and think about it — cable operators pick and choose what channels you get. Cable operators pick and choose who they let on. Cable operators turn to you and say, ‘Oh you want that? That’s going to be a little bit more.’”
The first battleground for the people will be the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to pass a resolution of disapproval and reverse a decision by a federal agency. Congress must act with a majority of votes in both chambers and must do so within 60 legislative days — which is likely to take four to six months. The job of the movement is to demand that the representatives in the House and Senate reverse the FCC. Call Congress here.
Now that a movement has been created around net neutrality, the people-powered campaign needs to define what it wants and fight for it. We have the power to make sure that every person running for office in 2018 and 2020 stands with the people by treating the Internet as a human right where people have equal access to high quality and low cost Internet service. Just as we did in our campaign to stop the Trans Pacific Partnership, which at first seemed unstoppable, we need to make sure everyone running for office stands with the people on the Internet.
The movement also needs to work at the local level urging municipal broadband or even communities creating their own Internet. We need to break the regional monopoly control held over access to the Internet by a handful of companies.
Multiple strong cases will be presented that argue the FCC was arbitrary, capricious and abusive of its discretion and violated the Administrative Procedures Act, especially since so many of the arguments made by the FCC were flawed and factually inaccurate, built on lies and showed a lack of understanding of the Internet. An unusual issue is likely to be the flawed public comment period. Pai promised to end net neutrality before the comment period began, making it a phony process, and the FCC did not remove millions of false comments made by bots. Pai refused to work with the New York attorney general investigating these abuses.
One of the early decisions the court will be asked to make is to stop the FCC decision from taking effect. A ruling on a preliminary injunction, never easy to get, seems to meet the legal standards in this case. Of course, a lot will depend on the inclinations of the judge assigned to the case. Litigation will continue through all of 2017 and into 2018, but the movement should not put all of its hopes into lawsuits. We need to continue to build the movement and make this a political issue that cannot be ignored.
Net Neutrality protest in Baltimore. One of more than 700 held on December 7, 2017 the Internet day of action.
The People of the Internet Have Power that Will Not be Ignored
Former FCC commissioner, Michael Copps, wrote: “Ajit Pai and his majority are turning their backs on the millions of Americans who fought for years to win strong net neutrality. This naked corporatism is Washington at its worst.” We know that if the people continue to mobilize and demand Internet justice, then Pai will not be the last word.
Frances Moore Lappé and Adam Eichen wrote that “the recent history of net neutrality offers an encouraging story of the power of the people to protect the core democratic principle of free exchange and shows that even if things look bad, grassroots pressure holds the key to saving the internet as we know it.”
We share their optimism. The people’s response to threats to the Internet has been consistently powerful. Now we need to take power away from the political whims of appointed commissioners, take democratic control of the Internet and define the Internet we want for our future and for future generations. Ajit Pai may not realize it yet, but his abuse of power has awakened an Internet giant.
We urge you to:
Join our Protect Our Internet campaign so you can stay informed about this issue and actions. This is a multi-year campaign and we need your help to build it.
Listen to our next Clearing The FOG Radio show, the first one produced in our new Popular Resistance studio, which will focus on net neutrality and the campaign for the Internet we need for the 21st Century.
Being a moralist in the Olympics doesn’t carry you very far. Turn one way, and there are enterprising drug cheats; turn another, there are wads of cash in envelopes finding their inexorable way to an official’s accounts. The challenge of the Olympics is, in a fundamental way, a challenge of institutional decay, ruination and sport as profit.
Having the International Olympic Committee banish a state from a competition that is itself compromised is a truly tall order. It reeks, by its nature, of falsely applied judgment. In the case of the Russia ban for the Winter Olympics to be held in Pyeongchang, the pot has assumed judgment over the kettle.
The decision assumes that a particular state has gone defiantly rogue to an extraordinary degree while presuming a state of near decent purity on the part of the entire family of Olympic nations. According to Samuel Schmid, chair of the commission report submitted to the IOC charging Russia with an extensive doping program, “We have never seen any such manipulation and cheating and this has caused unprecedented damage to Olympism and to sports.”
The statement resembles a holed raft awaiting its inevitable sinking. As always with such observations, history is risibly ignored in favour of the inglorious present. Doping, after all, was the preserve of state sponsored, and engineered perfection, for decades during the Cold War. The body beautiful became the patriotic instrument, suitably tanked and packed by doping. That’s Olympism for you.
In the current era, the field of performance enhancement supplements and medications is notoriously shifting. What is to be banned or not as assisting the athlete’s performance leaves the administrators baffled. Technically, anything medical, anything soothing, and anything to salve the stretched body, could constitute assistance. Little wonder, then, that the World Anti-Doping Agency has had its work cut out for it, having itself been accused of unevenness.
This notion of the eviscerated state, and institutional morality, supplies us with the option of where the idea of athlete neutrality might be taken. IOC President Thomas Bach expressed his regret at the decision’s impact on athletes who had complied with the rules. “As an athlete myself, I am feeling very sorry for all the clean athletes from all (National Olympic Committees) who are suffering from this manipulation.”
To that end, the IOC has permitted Russia to compete as neutral athletes called “Olympic Athletes from Russia”, to be determined by a panel headed by the chair of the Independent Testing Authority, Valerie Fourneyron. (Russiahas been scoldingly told that they supply $15 million to that authority.)
While this will be understandably sneered at in Russian circles, the precedent might well offer a blessing in rather well kept disguise. Why not consider taking the symbolic flag out of Olympic sports altogether, along with any patriotic vestiges? A little tinkering with this concept and a different variant of Olympism might be forged. Taken in its unadulterated way, the state can be removed from the equation, or at the very least minimised in its influence. Keep the pursuit of the Olympics, but abolish the nonsensical notion of competing under what would amount to entrenched national sponsorship.
The flag of a country, after all, forcefully implies a commitment of allegiance and show pony status, the sponsored performer, the hired hand appointed to do approved tricks. To march with and under the expansive flag – a specific national flag, that is – into a stadium or an arena of competition suggests an instrumental purpose for the competitor. You are not so much advancing yourself as your country’s credentials.
Bearing that symbol suggests benefits, state worship and loyalty. It also advises athletes to be slavish, leaving aside individual autonomy in favour of state policies. The policies might be extreme – the Soviet-DDR model certain affords one example, but others are not that much better. The Australian system is only better in so far as it claims to avoid prohibited doping while still keeping the psychological apparatus in play. This is specifically true for swimmers, who tend to resemble psychological wrecks after an Olympic performance.
Given the stresses athletes already face, the neutrality status may have something going for it. Throw out the oppressive national and nationalist nonsense. Focus on the healthy competition for its sake, sinews, sweat and skill, not the people or entities sponsoring or forcing it. Focus on the sheer gravitas, the imposing physicality of human performance, rather than the manipulative politics and crude finance. This would have an added incentive: taking another layer of the corrupt mechanics and the ceremonial circus lies behind modern Olympism.
Shifting the focus to individual athletes as performers removes the demanding middle man, the all-seeing parent ever in threat of disapproval. Admittedly, that middle man tends to have the resources to back the athlete, generous yet compromising largesse. Removing such entities banishes a particular form of global middle management. To dare this is to dream for a new form of athletic governance. Farewell pigs in clover and welcome the genuine punters.
Unfortunately, the nationalist sentiment beats strongly, fighting any notion of neutrality. The treatment of Russia is popular in various fraternities, notably those who see their own states as noble backers rather than compromised masters. The aesthetic might be important, but it never trumps the chest thumping, the patriotic coaches, and the number crunchers back in the home state seeking medals.
Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. Email: [email protected]
Jerusalem is an international city under a UN protectorate (a corpus separatum), not the legal capital of Israel or any other country.
No nation recognizing Israel has its embassy there. Trump’s lawless declaration puts America at odds with the world community, igniting a firestorm, along with making Israeli/Palestinian peace more unattainable than already.
On June 30, 1980, Security Council members unanimously passed Resolution 476 (America abstaining), declaring “all legislative and administrative measures and actions taken by Israel, the occupying Power, which purport to alter the character and status of the Holy City of Jerusalem have no legal validity and constitute a flagrant (Fourth Geneva) violation.”
Israel claiming the city, “complete and united, as (its) capital” has no legal standing. East Jerusalem is illegally occupied territory.
So is historic Palestine, lawlessly seized by Israel during its 1948 war of aggression, massacring and displacing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, replacing their cities, towns and villages with Israeli ones – exacerbating their long nightmare, begun following the 1917 Balfour Declaration.
According to a one-page Security Council resolution drafted by Egypt, seen by Reuters, “any decisions and actions which purport to have altered the character, status or demographic composition of the Holy City of Jerusalem have no legal effect, are null and void, and must be rescinded in compliance with relevant resolutions of the Security Council.”
It also “calls upon all States to refrain from the establishment of diplomatic missions in the Holy City of Jerusalem, pursuant to resolution 478 (1980) of the Security Council.”
It “demands that all states comply with Security Council resolutions regarding the Holy City of Jerusalem, and not to recognize any actions or measures contrary to those resolutions.”
In December 2016, Security Council 2334 was adopted by a 14 – 0 vote, Washington abstaining.
It said settlements have “no legal validity and constitute a flagrant violation under international law.”
It demanded “Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem.”
It recognized no territorial changes “to the 4 June 1967 lines, including with regard to Jerusalem, other than those agreed by the parties through negotiations.”
It “(c)alled upon all States, to distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967.”
It “(c)alled for immediate steps to prevent all acts of violence against civilians, including acts of terror, as well as all acts of provocation and destruction, calls for accountability in this regard…”
Israel ignores all SC resolutions and other international laws opposing its lawless agenda.
Security Council resolutions need nine votes for passage, and no vetoes from any of its five permanent members.
The resolution will likely be supported by 14 of the 15 Security Council members. If brought to a vote, possibly on Monday, a certain US veto will kill it.
The resolution doesn’t mention Washington or Trump. Turkish President Erdogan said if Security Council adoption fails, he’ll seek a non-binding General Assembly vote for annulment – certain to pass overwhelmingly.
Israel illegally considers Jerusalem its exclusive capital. Under international law, it was illegally annexed.
The SC will hold a regular meeting on the middle east peace process Monday. It’s unclear if a vote on Egypt’s resolution will take place.
On 17 September 2016 a carefully planned US-led air raid on Jabal al Tharda (Mount Tharda), overlooking Deir Ezzor airport, slaughtered over 100 Syrian soldiers and delivered control of the mountain to DAESH / ISIS. After that surprise attack, the terrorist group held the mountain for almost a year, but did not manage to take the airport or the entire city. US-led forces admitted the attack but claimed it was all a ‘mistake’. However uncontested facts, eye witness accounts and critical circumstances show that was a lie. This article sets out the evidence of this crime, in context of Washington’s historical use of mercenaries for covert actions, linked to the doctrine of ‘plausible deniability’.
Syrian eyewitness accounts from Deir Ezzor deepen and confirm this simple fact: the US-led air raid on Syrian forces at Jabal al Tharda on 17 September 2016 was no ‘mistake’ but a well-planned and effective intervention on behalf of the terrorist group ISIS (DAESH in Arabic). After days of careful surveillance a devastating missile attack followed by machine gunning of the remaining Syrian soldiers helped ISIS take control of the strategic mountain, that same day.
Mercenary forces – like ISIS and the other jihadist groups in Iraq and Syria – were a staple of US intervention during the early decades of the cold war, deployed in more than 25 conflicts, such as those of the Congo, Angola and Nicaragua. Whatever their claimed aims and ideologies, they allowed for the ‘multiplication’ of US power and were associated with the doctrine of ‘plausible deniability’, where the ‘formal’ denial of the mastermind role in covert operations minimised damage to domestic public opinion and international relations (Voss 2016: 37-40). That doctrine was discussed during the 1976 Church Committee hearings into CIA covert operations (especially assassinations and coups) and resurfaced during the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s (Hart 2005; Dorn 2010). The key idea behind the doctrine is to be able “to use violence without directly incriminating the [contracting out] regime” (Ron 2002). The use of terrorist proxy armies in Iraq and Syria, both overtly and covertly supported by US forces, is thoroughly consistent with this history.
By September 2016 a US-led coalition had been active in both Iraq and Syria for more than two years, supposedly to help Iraq fight ISIS, but without permission to enter Syria. The foreign powers tried to side-step that legal problem by claiming the invitation from Iraq allowed them to conduct cross border raids against ISIS (Payne 2017). By this time the Russian air force had been assisting Syria for almost a year against multiple terrorist groups, all of them, as senior US officials would admit (Biden in RT 2014 and Usher 2014; Dempsey in Rothman 2014), armed and financed by the US and its allies.
Contrary to the stated aims, there is little evidence the US-led group did anything to fight ISIS in Syria. Washington’s group sat back and watched ISIS twice take over Palmyra (in 2015 and 2016), then did nothing to help the Syrian Army take back Palmyra and Deir Ezzor. Most US activity focused on bombing Syrian infrastructure and helping a Kurdish-led separatist force (the SDF) replace ISIS in the city of Raqqa. On the other hand, the 17 September air raid positively helped ISIS in attempts to wrest the remaining parts of Deir Ezzor from the Syrian Army.
US, Australian, British and Danish forces quickly admitted their role in that attack, but claimed the slaughter of over 100 Syrian soldiers was a ‘mistake’. Now mistakes in war do happen. However they are usually associated with a single, unprepared incident. This attack was well-planned, sustained and achieved a key objective in the attempt to drive ‘the Syrian regime’ from Deir Ezzor. Assisting extremists create an ‘Islamic State’ in eastern Syria, US intelligence wrote back in August 2012, was “exactly” what Washington wanted so as “to weaken the regime in Damascus” (DIA 2012).
One year later, as Syrian forces re-took the whole of Deir Ezzor city from ISIS, I spoke with the commanding officer at Jabal al Tharda on that day, Colonel Nihad Kanaan, one of 35 survivors of the US-led attack. He confirmed US admissions that surveillance aircraft had overflown the mountain days before. He also said that the Syrian Army had held the mountain for many months and that their position was clearly marked with Syrian flags. One year later he still showed shock at recalling attack aircraft return to finish off his wounded comrades, with line-of-sight machine-gunning (Kanaan 2017).
Tim Anderson and Col Nihad Kanaan, at Jabal al Tharda
That Washington could block most western media from serious study of this treacherous attack, simply by saying ‘sorry, mistake’, is testament to the near absence of critical media voices, at a time of war. The surprise attack was treacherous, not only to the Syrians whom the US had promised to not attack, but to the western populations who mostly believed what their governments said: that they were in Iraq and Syria ‘to fight ISIS’.
It was not that the denials over the crime at Jabal al Tharda were particularly ‘plausible’, just that they had been made. Formal denial was enough, it seems, to stop the western corporate and state media in its tracks. The practice of ‘plausible deniability’ was never so much intended to fool those familiar with the facts, as it was to set up a shield of formal denial which might be used to deflect or discredit ‘potentially hostile’ investigations (Voss 2016: 40; Bogan and Lynch 1989: 205). In past and present propaganda wars, less importance is given to independent evidence than to insistent repetition, denunciation and distraction.
This paper is a prosecuted case, not reportage where one side says this and the other side says that. I have announced my conclusion at the outset and intend to demonstrate that case with evidence. I also support the idea that readers are entitled to see all evidence, including the cover story of the criminals. However in this case the crime and its authors, I suggest, can be convincingly established by uncontested facts. Review of the Syrian perspective simply helps deepen our understanding of the conflict.
There are eight elements of this massacre where the facts are virtually uncontested:
First, the attack was on the forces of a strategic opponent, whom the US wished to overthrow, weaken or ‘isolate’;
Second, there was no semblance of provocation;
Third, this was a well-planned operation, with days of advance surveillance;
Fourth, the attack was sustained and effective, meeting conventional military objectives;
Fifth, there was both immediate and longer term benefit to ISIS;
Sixth, the US gave false locality information to the Russians before the attack, and their ‘hotline’ to Russia was defective during the attack;
Seventh, the US made false claims about being unable to identify Syrian troops;
Eighth, the US ‘investigation’ was hopelessly partisan, self-serving and forensically useless; there was no attempt to even contact the Syrian side.
Let’s look at each element in a little more depth
ONE: the attack was on a strategic opponent
Syrian forces were seen as adversaries. This was no ‘friendly fire accident’. The political leadership of the US-led operation had called for the dismissal or overthrow of the Syrian Government and had provided material support to armed opponents of the Government since mid-2011. The terrorist group ISIS had a campaign to create an Islamic State in the region and that objective was shared by Washington. US intelligence, in August 2012, had expressed satisfaction at extremist plans for a “salafist principality” (i.e. an Islamic State) in eastern Syria, “in order to isolate the Syrian regime” (DIA 2012). The US had not admitted providing finance and arms to ISIS / DAESH, but several senior US officials acknowledged in 2014 that their ‘Arab allies’ had done so (Anderson 2016: Ch.12). After the attack US and Australian officials referred to their victims as forces aligned with the ‘Syrian regime’ (Johnston 2016; Payne 2017), reinforcing the fact that the assailants did not recognise Syrian soldiers as part of a legitimate national army.
TWO: no suggestion of provocation
There was no suggestion of any provocation, as had happened in previous ‘mistakes’; for example where a pilot had mistaken gunfire or fireworks for a hostile attack. This attack was premeditated.
THREE: a well-planned operation, with substantial surveillance
Col Kanaan on the mountain
All sides agree this was a carefully planned operation, with surveillance days in advance. Colonel Nihad Kanaan, the Syrian Arab Army commanding officer on ‘Post Tharda 2’ (a military post on the second of three peaks of Tharda mountain range) that day, told this writer that US-coalition surveillance aircraft were seen “repeatedly circling” the area on 12 September, 5 days before the attack (Kanaan 2017). US reports confirm this. On the day of the attack the New York Times cited US Central Command saying that “coalition forces believed they were striking a DAESH fighting position that they had been tracking for a significant amount of time before the strike” (Barnard and Mazzetti 2016). A US military report, some weeks after the attack, said a “remotely piloted aircraft” (RPA) was sent to “investigate” the area the day before and two RPAs revisited the same area on the 17th, identifying two target areas with tanks and personnel (Coe 2016: 1).
Australian Defence Minister Marise Payne wrote that “target identification was based on intelligence from a number of sources”, and that the US-led group had “informed Russian officials prior to approving air strikes on the DAESH position” (Payne 2017). Australian Chief of Joint Operations Vice-Admiral David Johnston pointed out that his country’s contribution to the attack had included “an Australian E7 Wedgetail airborne early warning and control and 2 FA-18 hornet strike fighters” (Johnston 2016). The Wedgetail E-7 is based on a Boeing 737 and came into operation in 2015. It is an intelligence and control aircraft said to have “tonnes of electronic wizardry” (Military Shop 2014) and to be “the most advanced air battlespace management capabilities in the world” (RAAF 2017). All this speaks of a well-planned and technologically capable operation.
Further, surveillance of the area over two years meant the US group were well aware of the strategic troop placements. Kuwait based Journalist Elijah Magnier, who had followed the battles around Deir Ezzor, said that defence of the airport depended on ‘four interconnected Syrian army positions on the Thardah mountain range. Largely because of these elevated fire power positions the “daily attacks’ by ISIS on the airport had failed (Porter 2016: 6). Fabrice Balanche, a leading French expert on Syria, adds that the Syrian Army had held positions along the Tharda range “from March 2016 until the US air strikes”, when ISIS took control (in Porter 2016: 6).
FOUR: the attack was sustained and effective, meeting conventional military objectives
General Aktham at the bridge to Raqqa, one of many destroyed by US planes
The attack was carried out for an extended period and destroyed the Syrian Arab Army post, killing more than 100 soldiers and destroying tanks and all heavy equipment (O’Neill 2016; Kanaan 2017). The Syrian commander says the attack “continued for 1.5 hours, from 5.30 to 7pm”, as night fell (Kanaan 2017). There is some disagreement over exact times. Syrian Army Command said the attack began at about 5pm while US CentCom said the attack began earlier but “was halted immediately when coalition officials were informed by Russian officials that it was possible the personnel and vehicles targeted were part of the Syrian military” (Barnard and Mazzetti 2016). However the US military confirms that this sunset attack was extended, lasting for just over an hour (Coe 2016: 1).
The Syrian command said at first that 62 soldiers had been killed and 100 injured (RT 2016). Within a short time the numbers killed had been raised to “at least 80” (Killalea 2016). In addition, three T-72 tanks, 3 infantry vehicles and anti-aircraft gun and 4 mortars were destroyed (MOA 2016). A surviving solider said he saw planes “finishing with machine guns our soldiers who tried to take refuge … I saw with my own eyes the death of about 100 soldiers” (SFP 2016). Colonel Kanaan puts the final number of dead at 123, with 35 survivors (Kanaan 2017). The US side did not bother reporting numbers killed, with General Richard Coe at first mentioning “15 dead regime loyalists” (Watkinson 2016) then late simply saying “Syrian regime/aligned forces were struck” (Coe 2016: 2). There is no report of ISIS forces on the mountain being struck by the coalition aircraft that day; nor any day over the next year.
FIVE: the attack created immediate and longer term benefit to ISIS
The Syrian side made it clear that the massacre had allowed an almost simultaneous ISIS attack on and takeover of the hill. After planes had pounded the Army position on the mountain, ISIS quickly moved in and took full control of the mountain range (FNA 2016a). Within hours they had posted video of themselves standing on the bodies of the Syrian soldiers, killed by the air strikes (Charkatli 2016). The US side failed to comment on the immediate consequence of their attack, but they did not contradict the Syrian and Russian reports. Colonel Nihad Kanaan confirms that, as the US strikes were being carried out, ISIS attacked the Syrian Army post at Thardah 2. Survivors had to flee, as they did not have time to repel the DAESH attack (Kanaan 2017). Syrian Army defences meant that ISIS did not manage to take the airport, but Syrian forces did not retake the mountain until early September 2017, when the Syrian Army broke the siege and began to liberate the entire city (Brown 2017).
SIX: false information to and delayed communications with Russia
The US military report admits that “incorrect information [was] passed to the Russians” about the locale of the attack. They said:
“the strikes would occur 9 kilometres south of DAZ ‘airfield’. However this information was incorrect, as the strikes were planned approximately 3 to 6 kilometres south of the airfield and 9 kilometres south of Dayr az Zawr city. This may have affected the Russian response to the notification and caused considerable confusion in the DT process” (Coe 2016: 3).
Brigadier General Richard Coe agreed with reporters that this misleading information prevented a Russian intervention: “had we told them accurately, they would have warned us”, he admitted (Porter 2016: 4). Providing false information to Russia was quite consistent with a plan to protect the attack from any unwanted interference.
After that, there was yet another ‘mistake’. The US military admits there was a half hour delay in responding to a Russian alarm (that the US was striking Syrian forces) on their specially constructed ‘hotline’. The US military tried to shift blame for this delay to the Russian caller:
“when the Russians initially called at 1425Z, they elected to wait to speak to their usual point of contact (POC) rather than pass the information immediately to the Battle Director. This led to a delay of 27 minutes, during which 15 of the 37 strikes were conducted” (Coe 2016: 3).
The less benign view of this event was that the ‘hotline’ was left unattended during the attack. Haddad (2017) reported that:
“During the attack, a hotline between Russia and US forces was reportedly left unattended for 27 minutes” (Haddad 2017).
Certainly Russia had to ring twice to pass on the urgent message (McLeary 2016) and, by that time, the attack was virtually complete.
SEVEN: the US made false claims about non-identification of Syrian forces
The US military apologia relies heavily on claims that, despite their several days of surveillance, they identified “irregular forces” on the mountain. US General Coe claims that “in many ways, the group looked and acted like the (Islamic State) forces we have been targeting for the last two years” (Dickstein 2016). Echoing this story, Australian Vice-Admiral David Johnston, Chief of Joint Operations said
“in many ways these forces looked and acted like DAESH fighters the coalition has been targeting for the last 2 years. They were not wearing recognisable military uniforms or displaying identifying flags or markings” (Johnston 2016).
Colonel Kanaan said they had flags flying. The US military confirms this, admitting that they received a report about sighting a “possible [Syrian] flag … 30 minutes prior to the strike”, but did nothing about it (Coe 2016: 2). Could ‘doing nothing’ have been just another ‘mistake’, in such a well-planned operation? It tends to corroborate the case for a deliberate strike, with some attempt at cover up, for “plausible deniability”.
EIGHT: the US ‘investigation’ was hopelessly partisan
A brief report issued in November exonerated US forces of any wrong doing. It did admit some critical facts, as noted above. But this was the US military investigating itself. US General Richard Coe said
“We made an unintentional, regrettable error, based on several factors in the targeting process” (Watkinson 2016).
The ‘errors’ relied upon were a series of random or ‘human’ mistakes and misidentification of the Syrian troops, supposedly because they were dressed in an irregular way. No attempt was made to contact the Syrian side (Coe 2016; Dickstein 2016). By reference to principles of criminal law some admissions made in this report are important and would be admissible evidence in a criminal trial. But the conclusions of the US report are entirely ‘self-serving’ and ‘recent inventions’ after the event. For that reason they are forensically worthless.
Summing up, the US-led air attack was a pre-meditated, brutal and effective massacre of the armed forces of a declared opponent. It gave an immediate and longer term advantage to one of the terrorist groups the US and its allies (as Biden and Dempsey admitted) were covertly supporting. Even before we consider the Syrian perspective, uncontested facts destroy the feeble claim that this well planned and treacherous crime was a ‘mistake’. The US military admits that it gave false information to its Russian counterparts, then admits that its ‘hotline’ did not function properly during the attack. Despite all their sophisticated technology and days of surveillance, they pretend they could not distinguish between entrenched Syrian troops and terrorist ISIS gangs. They admit they had a report of a Syrian flag, but claim they just neglected it. Having carried out a devastating attack on Syrian forces that day, allegedly by ‘mistake’, they did not return even once over the following year to attack the ISIS encampment on the mountain. This is as flimsy a cover story as any criminal has ever presented in court. If the commanders of this appalling massacre ever faced criminal charges, no independent tribunal could fail to convict.
2. The cover story
The ‘defence’ case centres around three matters. First, they say that the 2014 request for assistance against ISIS from the Government of Iraq gave authority to the US coalition to venture into Syria. Second, they insist that there was no intent to kill Syrian soldiers. Third, they argue that their slaughter of soldiers was due to poor intelligence and mistaken identification. Other aggravating factors were random ‘errors’. Then, by way of general excuse, and alluding to the supposed bases of human error, there was reliance on the ‘complexity’ of the situation. US CentCom, in its apologia, said ‘Syria is a complex situation’ (RT 2016); a phrase echoed by Australian Prime Minister Turnbull who said “it is a very complex environment” (Killalea 2016). None of this is compelling but, as was mentioned at the outset, the history of ‘plausible deniability’ rests not so much on its actual plausibility as on formal denials; that is thought sufficient to distract, intimidate and raise doubts.
The US apologia was repeated by its collaborators. Australian involvement in Syria had already been criticised at home (Billingsley 2015). After the attack on Jabal al Tharda, this writer wrote to ask Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull about the massacre and the legal basis for Australian air force presence in Syria. Defence Minister Marise Payne responded on 4 May 2017, addressing the legal question in the following way. Australia’s presence in Syria, the Minister claimed, came from a request made by the Government of Iraq for international assistance against DAESH/ISIS:
“The legal basis for ADF operations against DAESH in Syria is the collective defence of Iraq … The Government of Syria has, by its failure to constrain attacks upon Iraqi territory originating from DAESH bases within Syria, demonstrated that it is unable to prevent DAESH attacks (Payne 2017).
Indeed, two Iraqi ministers of foreign affairs had made requests to the UN Security Council in June 2014 (Zebari 2014) and again in September 2014 (al Ja’fari 2014). Those requests referred to “thousands of foreign terrorists of various nationalities” coming across the border from eastern Syria (Zebari 2014). Both requests also stressed the need to respect national sovereignty. So the US-led forces might have relied on this argument, had they helped Syria reclaim its eastern cities and regions from ISIS. However, as discussed above, they did not.
On the general legal authority question there is one relevant matter. The Australian side was not so confident about its own law, before the strike. Two weeks before the attack it was said that the chief of the Australian Defence Forces Mark Binskin had “fears that Australian Defence Force members could be prosecuted in Australian courts for military actions that are legal internationally [sic]” (Wroe 2016). It is not clear why they were considering this matter at that time, two years after they had committed forces to Iraq and Syria.
The general apologia for the massacre relied on a supposed lack of intent. “We had no intent to target Syrian forces,” said Air Force Brigadier General Richard Coe. He blames, in part, the soldiers’ form of clothing. “The group looked and acted like the (Islamic State) forces we have been targeting for the last two years” (Dickstein 2016). In addition, Coe claimed, the soldiers displayed “friendly” interactions with other groups in an Islamic State “area of influence.” He blamed the massacre on “human factors,” including miscommunications and an optimistic view of the intelligence (Dickstein 2016).
Taking the ‘mistake’ cover story at face value (i.e. assuming that the attack was aimed at ISIS, and defending Syrian forces), some western commentators quickly suggested the massacre of Syrian soldiers represented an alarming turn to US coalition air support for the ‘Syrian regime’. Time magazine said “the location of the strike in Deir al-Zour suggested the raid could have been a rare, even unprecedented attempt to assist regime forces battling ISIS”. Similarly, Faysal Itani, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council tweeted: “U.S. airstrikes on ISIS in such close proximity to regime positions are unusual. Arguably constitute close air support for regime” (Malsin 2016). Following the same logic, but in open disbelief, Russia’s UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin asked:
“Why would, all of a sudden, the United States chose to help the Syrian Armed forces, defending Deir Ezzor? After all they did nothing when ISIL was advancing on Palmyra … All of a sudden the United States decides to come to the assistance of Syrian armed forces defending Deir Ezzor?” (Hamza 2016).
Of course, they did not decide to do that, nor did they ‘assist’ Syrian forces. Nor did Russia believe the attack was a mistake. Damascus was also under no such illusions. President Bashar al Assad, invoking the wider antagonistic role of the US, said the surprise attack “was a premeditated attack by the American forces … the raid continued more than one hour, and they came many times” (Haddad 2017).
The US report of November 2016 became the core of explanations from US collaborators in the attack. Australian Vice-Admiral David Johnston gave more detail on Australian involvement in the Jabal al Tharda attack before he presented the official US version of events (Johnston 2016). The coalition air contingent, which included Australian aircraft, had “conducted multiple air strikes against what was believed to be DAESH fighters near Deir Ezzor”, he said. The Australian contingent had included “an Australian E7 Wedgetail airborne early warning and control and 2 FA-18 hornet strike fighters”, along with aircraft from the US, UK and Denmark. These planes carried out the attack “under the coordination and control of the US combined air operations centre” (Johnston 2016). The Australians were thus deeply involved in intelligence and coordination.
Johnston repeated the self-exonerating conclusions of the US report: “The air strikes were conducted in full compliance with the rules of engagement and the laws of armed conflict”. The investigation found that the decisions that identified the targets as DAESH fighters were supported by the information available at the time … [there was] no evidence of deliberate disregard of targeting procedures or rules of engagement” (Johnston 2016). He repeated the line that situation on the ground in Syria was “complex and dynamic. In many ways these forces looked and acted like DAESH fighters … They were not wearing recognisable military uniforms or displaying identifying flags or markings” (Johnston 2016).
A typical shallow Australian media review of the incident would admit that “something went badly wrong”; but then asserted, based more on loyalty than anything else: “no credible person suggest the RAAF pilots committed war crimes; everyone knows things go wrong in war” (Toohey 2016). Yet some independent, more detailed western commentaries expressed stark disbelief at the cover story. David MacIlwain complained about the failure of media scrutiny of Australia’s role in Iraq and Syria, asking why US coalition forces had not returned immediately to the mountain to correct their “mistake” (Macilwain 2016). Lawyer James O’Neill said, far from a mistake, “what happened at Deir Ezzor is entirely consistent with the long-standing American aim of regime change in Syria” (O’Neill 2016).
This “error” which killed over 100 soldiers who were defending Deir Ezzor from ISIS, was the only serious attack on what US coalition forces “believed to be DAESH fighters” near Deir Ezzor city. US-led forces would do nothing to help liberate Deir Ezzor. The ‘innocent massacre’ story just does not accord with known facts.
3. The Syrian Perspective
For those not bound by wartime propaganda attempts to demonise or prohibit the ‘enemy’ media (a demand which results in reliance on US, British and French media), a Syrian perspective on the crime at Jabal al Tharda helps deepen our understanding. Sources in this section are Syrian, Lebanese, Iraqi, Iranian and Russian. We can speak of a Syrian perspective from the wider view, concerning the particulars of the attack and of events after that attack.
In the wider view the Syrian side has seen the US as the mastermind of all terrorist groups in Syria, making use of regional allies in particular Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Israel and Turkey. The Syrian armed forces make little distinction between ISIS and the western jihadist groups, which collaborate from time to time and whose members pass from one to the other, depending mainly on pay rates (Lucente and Al Shimale 2015). When Aleppo was liberated ISIS flags were seen alongside those of the al Nusra led coalition (RT 2016). Both international terrorist groups fought together for many years with the other jihadist groups which western governments had tried to brand as ‘moderate rebels’ (e.g. Paraszczuk 2013; Mowaffaq 2015). The Syrian Government has regularly expressed ‘strong condemnation’ of US attacks on civilians and infrastructure, calling the group a “rogue coalition” which had added “new bloody massacres” to its record of “war crimes and crimes against humanity” (RT 2017).
US forces mounted several direct attacks on Syrian forces, over 2015-2017. An online investigative group has compiled information of four such attacks, between mid-2015 and mid 2017: on Saeqa airbase in Deir Ezzor (December 2015); on Jabal al Tharda (September 2016); on Shayrat Airbase (April 2017) and an attack on an SU-22 aircraft near Tabqa (June 2017) (MMM 2017). In June 2017 the US group also attacked Syrian forces near the southern al Tanf border crossing (Islam Times 2017). All attacks had different pretexts.
Syrian solider at the front line against ISIS, on the Euphrates
US bombing in Deir Ezzor at the time of the Jabal al Tharda attack (in the name of anti-ISIS operations) was notable for its destruction of infrastructure, in particular the destruction of seven bridges across the Euphrates in September and October 2016 (Syria Direct 2016; SANA 2016). Syrian Army sources told Iranian media that the US aimed to extend its influence in the region and stop the Syrian Army’s advance, as also to cut supply routes between the provinces and separate Deir Ezzor’s countryside from the city’ (FNA 2016a). Syrian General Aktham told me that the US bombing of bridges was to isolate Deir Ezzor, when the city was under siege from ISIS (Aktham 2017).
Direct US support for ISIS had been reported many times in Iraq, over 2014-2015. This was mainly to do with arms drops and helicopter evacuation assistance, as Iraqi forces struggled to contain a strong ISIS offensive. Iraqi MP Nahlah al Hababi said in December 2014 that the US coalition was “not serious” about air strikes on ISIS; she added that “terrorists are still receiving aid from unidentified fighter jets in Iraq and Syria” (FNA 2015a). In February 2015 there were multiple and more specific reports. The Salahuddin Security Commission said that “unknown planes threw arms … to the ISIL” in Tikrit city (FNA 2015c). Majif al Gharawi, an Iraqi MP on the country’s Security and Defence Commission said that the US was “not serious” in its anti-ISIS fight, and that it wanted to prolong the war to get its own military bases in Mosul and Anbar (FNA 2015b). Jome Divan, member of the Sadr bloc in the Iraqi parliament, said the US coalition was “only an excuse for protecting the ISIL and helping the terrorist group with equipment and weapons” (FNA 2015b). Khalef Tarmouz, head of the al Anbar Provincial Council, told Iranian media that his Council had discovered weapons that were made in the USA, Europe and Israel, in areas liberated from ISIS in the al Baghdadi region (FNA 2015b). Hakem al Zameli, head of the National Security and Defence Committee, reported that Iraqi forces had shot down two British planes carrying weapons for ISIS, and that US planes had dropped weapons and food for ISIS in Salahuddin, al Anbar and Diyala provinces (FNA 2015b). In other words, within a few months of the US military re-entering Iraq in late 2014, on a ‘fight ISIS’ pretext, there were several reports of exactly the reverse, from senior Iraqi figures. Although these reports were in English, none of them reached the western media. Apparently those channels had no interest in listening to those actually affected by ISIS, or perhaps they just saw it as unthinkable that their own governments were lying to cover up their support for terrorism.
On the Jabal al Tharda massacre, the Syrian Government immediately said that the strike was no mistake but “a very serious and flagrant aggression” which had aided DAESH (Barnard and Mazzetti 2016). President Assad said the troops were deliberately targeted, pointing out that there had been an hour of bombing (Watkinson 2016). “It was a premeditated attack by the American forces, because ISIS was shrinking”, said the Syrian President (Haddad 2016). Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested the attack must have been deliberate:
“Our American colleagues told us that this airstrike was made in error. This ‘error’ cost the lives of 80 people and, also just ‘coincidence’, perhaps, ISIS took the offensive immediately afterwards … [But] how could they make an error if they were several days in preparation?” (Putin in RT 2016).
Russian spokesperson Maria Zakharova said the attack showed the world that
“The White House is defending ISIS” (FNA 2016a).
More detail was hinted at. President of the Syrian Parliament, Hadiya Khalaf Abbas, said that Syrian intelligence had intercepted an audio recording between the US and ISIS before the airstrike on Deir Ezzor (Christoforou 2016). Syrian UN Ambassador Bashar al Jaafari denounced the attack as a movement from proxy aggression to “personal aggression”, lamenting the US renunciation of the Russian-US agreement of 9 September to combat al Nusra and ISIS (Mazen 2016).
Col Kanaan on the mountain
The detail of eye-witness evidence gives a fuller picture. In October 2017, as the Syrian Army was liberating Deir Ezzor city, Syrian film-maker Sinan Saed and I interviewed Colonel Nihad Kanaan at Jabal al Tharda, where the attack took place. He told us they had seen US coalition surveillance aircraft on 12 September. On the day of the attack:
“Five Coalition aircraft began attacking the site. The fifth aircraft had a synchronized [line of sight] machine gun … I had 2 T-72 tanks, 2 BMP tanks, a 57mm gun on its base, and a 60mm mortar on a base. The aircraft first began attacking the arsenal. They did this by circling the site at very close distance. Once they were done targeting the arsenal, they began targeting the soldiers with perfect precision” (Kanaan 2017).
He says the raid continued for 1.5 hours, using missiles, bombs and machine guns. As the attack took place, ISIS launched “a very heavy attack” from the north-west shoulder of the mountain, using:
“all types of weapons- 14.5 mm, mortars, BKC machine guns and every other weapon they had. This was happening at the same time. They [ISIS] were attacking the post while the aircraft were bombing from above” (Kanaan 2017).
ISIS was using the US-coalition air strikes as cover as they advanced on the army posts, showing “connection and coordination between the US Coalition and ISIS”. The post fell and the airport was then cut off from the Maqaber road. “Then 2 aircraft bombed the actual airport from the Tharda 2 post” (Kanaan 2017).
Colonel Kannan’s group was flying Syrian flags, as the US military would later admit.
“When the Coalition aircraft attacked the post, the post had 3 Syrian flags up – one at the entrance, one in the middle and one at the forefront, and the soldiers were wearing the official military uniforms of the Syrian Arab Army … It is not true what the media reported, that the attack was a mistake. It was very clear that their target was the Syrian army and the Syrian soldiers. The Syrian flags were there, and the Syrian army uniforms were showing, and the site was so obviously belonging to the Syrian army. At the same time, ISIS were attacking us under their cover; the Coalition aircraft didn’t even shoot one bullet at them” (Kanaan 2017).
Eyewitness to the attack, Dr. al Abeid in surgery at Deir Ezzor hospital
There were other eye witnesses. A wounded solider saw dozens of his comrades being finished off with aircraft machine gunning (SFP 2016). Two days before speaking with Colonel Kanaan I had met Doctor Abd al Najem al Abeid, surgeon and head of Deir Ezzor health. As he rushed to the surgery from a group meeting I asked him a question about which I was embarrassed: ‘have you seen any sign of the US coalition helping remove DAESH [ISIS] from Deir Ezzor?’ I asked it this way because I wanted the answer to an open question for a western audience. But as I asked I also apologised, because I knew that the question, to an educated Syrian, would be rather insulting. He immediately said that the US forces had only helped ISIS and that he had seen the attack on Jabal al Tharda. He watched in shock for more than half an hour, as the aircraft attacked the strategic mountain base he knew was guarding the city (Abeid 2017). After that he rushed off to surgery to dig ISIS drone shrapnel from the abdomen of a young boy.
After the massacre, reports of US forces providing logistic and intel support to ISIS, aiding regroupings and evacuations came from all along the Euphrates in late 2017, as Syrian forces took back Deir Ezzor. In September Press TV reported that the US had evacuated 22 DAESH commanders from Deir Ezzor. This writer was in the city for 4 days in late October, as it was being liberated. On 26 August a US air force helicopter was reported as taking two DAESH commanders “of European origin” with family members. On 28 August another 20 DAESH field commanders were also taken by US helicopters from areas close to the city (Press TV 2017a). Then in November Muhammad Awad Hussein told Russian media he had seen US helicopters evacuate more DAESH fighters, after an airstrike outside al Mayadin, a city south of Deir Ezzor (Press TV 2017b). The anti-Syrian Government and British-based ‘Syrian Observatory for Human Rights’ confirmed that US helicopters were transferring DAESH fighters out of eastern Syria. Four DAESH members, including three Egyptians, and a civilian were taken from a house in Beqres, a suburb of Deir Ezzor which had been used as an arms depot (UFilter 2017).
Syrian soldiers at the Euphrates, October 2017
Lebanese and Iranian media corroborated these reports. US forces were backing up ISIS with intelligence during the Syrian Army troops’ operation to liberate the town of Albu Kamal in Southeastern Deir Ezzur, according to the Secretary-General of Iraq’s al-Nujaba Resistance Movement Sheikh Akram al-Ka’abi. The al-Mayadeen news network quoted Sheikh al-Ka’abi saying that the US forces tried hard to push the Syrian army’s operation in Albu Kamal towards failure, and that US forces were targeting pro-government resistance forces before the AbuKamal battle, in ultimately unsuccessful attempts to block their advances (FNA 2017).
In late 2017 the Russian Defence Ministry announced it had evidence that “the US-led coalition provides support for the terrorist group Islamic State”. The US military had twice rejected Russian proposals to bomb identified ISIS convoys retreating from al Bukamal, saying that they enjoyed the protection of international law. That shielding of the terrorist group and its heavy weapons allowed them to regroup and carry out new attacks (TNA 2017). At the same time the US backed deals by the Kurdish-led SDF militia to allow ISIS fighters and their families to leave Raqqa for other parts of the region (Paterson 2017).
A senior Syrian General in Deir Ezzor confirmed to me helicopter evacuations from three points on the east bank of the Euphrates: south Deir Ezzor, east al Mayadeen and al Muhassan. He also spoke of US satellite intelligence being passed to ISIS. From this catalogue of US coordination and collaboration I asked him: ‘you must feel that you are fighting a US command?’ “100%” he responded (General SR 2017).
4. Assessment
As the Syrian Army liberated eastern Syria, over 2016-2017, the US military tried to slow its advance by a series of covert and overt actions. The massacre of more than 100 soldiers at Jabal al Tharda was one of five direct US attacks on Syrian forces, since 2015. Mistakes do happen in war, but this was no isolated mistake. The US-led attack on this strategic anti-ISIS base, protecting Deir Ezzor city, was a pre-meditated slaughter of Syrian forces which allowed ISIS to advance its plan to take the city. As it happened, Syrian Army defences meant that they did not do that. A series of uncontested facts make it clear this was a well-planned and deliberate strike, in support of ISIS. The US military gave false information to its Russian counterparts about the attack, left their ‘hotline’ unattended and hid evidence that showed they knew Syrian forces held the mountain. Having destroyed Syrian forces on that base, they did not return to attack ISIS on the mountain. Their cover story was weak and, while it served to block investigation by the western media, does not hold up to any serious scrutiny. No independent tribunal would fail to convict US coalition commanders of this bloody massacre.
US and Australian denials over their responsibility for the 17 September 2016 massacre at Jabal al Tharda are not credible, on any close examination. However they did serve their immediate purpose. Most of the western corporate and state media was stopped in its tracks. Yet the crime was “entirely consistent with the long standing American aim of regime change in Syria … [and] the Australian Government provided a willing chorus to the regime change demands of the Americans” (O’Neill 2016). North American, British and Australian arms sales to the chief ISIS sponsors, the Saudis, could proceed without interruption or scrutiny (Begley 2017; Brull 2017). The cold war doctrine of ‘plausible deniability’, as on many previous occasions, helped deflect ‘potentially hostile’ investigations. Nevertheless, I urge closer examination of this crime, using conventional principles of criminal law, considering the uncontested evidence and ignoring the intimidation of war propaganda. Particularly adventurous western observers might even read the Syrian perspective, drawing on Syrian, Lebanese, Iraqi, Iranian and Russian sources. That would help deepen their understandings of the conflict.
Sources
Al Abeid, Abd al Najem (2017) Interview with this writer, Deir Ezzor Hospital, 21 October. Dr al Abeid was, at this time, head of Deir Ezzor Health and a surgeon at the city’s main hospital.
Al Ja’fari, Ibrahim al-Usharqir (2014) ‘Annex to the letter dated 20 September 2014 from the permanent representative of Iraq to the United Nations addressed to the President of the Security Council’, United Nations Security Council, S/201/691, 20 September, online:
Aktham, General (2017) Interview with this writer, 21 October, Deir Ezzor
Barnard, Anne and Mark Mazzetti (2016) ‘U.S. admits airstrike in Syria, meant to hit ISIS, killed Syrian troops’, New York Times, 17 September, online:
Bogen, David and Michael Lynch (1989) ‘Taking Account of the Hostile Native: Plausible Deniability and the Production of Conventional History in the Iran-Contra Hearings’, Social Problems, Vol. 36, No. 3 June, pp. 197-224
Brown, Matt (2017) ‘Syria breaks Islamic State siege on eastern city, opens a new phase in the war’, ABC News, 6 September, online:
Christoforou, Alex (2016) ‘Syrian MP: ‘Syrian intelligence intercepted audio recording between US and ISIS before airstrike on Deir ez-Zor’, The Duran, 26 September, online:
Dorn, Walter (2010) ‘Plausible Deniability Plausible Deniability or How Leaders May Try to or How Leaders May Try to Conceal Their Roles Conceal Their Roles’, ICC Prosecutor presentation, 18 May, Walter Dorn, online:
General SR (2017) Interview with this writer, Deir Ezzor, 22 October. I have kept this Syrian General’s name private.
Haddad, Tareq (2017) ‘At least 30 dead in Deir ez-Zour after Isis launches biggest attack in Syria for months’, International Business Times, 14 January, online:
Kanaan, Nihad (2017) Interview with this writer at Mount Tharda (Deir Ezzor, Syria), 23 October. Colonel Nihad Kanaan was the Syrian Arab Army commanding officer at Post Tharda 2 on 17 September 2016.
Killalea, Debra (2016) ‘Syria air strikes mistake: At least 80 dead, Russia, US cast blame’, News Corp, 19 September, online:
Macilwain, David (2016) ‘Australia clears itself of blame in Deir ez-Zor bombing, watches on as Palmyra falls to ISIS’, Russian Insider, 12 December, online:
Mazen (2016) ‘Al-Jaafari: US-led coalition aggression on Syria means moving from a proxy aggression into “personal aggression”, SANA, 21 September, online:
Paterson, Stewart (2017) ‘The Great ISIS exodus: investigation reveals 250 fighters and 3,500 of their family members were driven out of Raqqa in coalition deal and are now ‘spreading across Syria and beyond’, Daily Mail, 14 November, online:
Ron, James (2002) ‘Territoriality and Plausible Deniability: Serbian Paramilitaries in the Bosnian War’, in Bruce B. Campbell and Arthur D. Brenner (2000) Death Squads in Global Perspective: murder with deniability, Palgrave MacMillan, London
Rothman, Noah (2014) ‘Dempsey: I know of Arab allies who fund ISIS’, YouTube, 16 September, online:
SFP (2016) ‘A Syrian survivor soldier from Deir Ezzour attack: “The U.S.-coalition warplanes were finishing the wounded [Syrian soldiers] by machine gun”’, Syrian Free Press, 22 September, online:
Voss, Klaas (2016) ‘Plausibly deniable: mercenaries in US covert interventions during the Cold War, 1964-1987, Cold War History, Vol 16, No 1, 37-60
Watkinson, William (2016) ‘The US-led coalition said it attacked troops loyal to Bashar al-Assad in error on 17 September’, International Business Times, 29 November, online:
Wroe, David (2016) ‘ Australian forces to expand Islamic State strikes after fears military members could be prosecuted’, Sydney Morning Herald, 1 September, online:
Zebari, Hoshyar (2014) ‘Annex to the letter dated 25 June 2014 from the Permanent Representative of Iraq to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary General’, United Nations Security Council, S/2014/440, online:
The Dirty War on Syria: Washington, Regime Change and Resistance, by Tim Anderson
The Dirty War on Syria has relied on a level of mass disinformation not seen in living memory. In seeking ‘regime change’ the big powers sought to hide their hand, using proxy armies of ‘Islamists’, demonising the Syrian Government and constantly accusing it of atrocities. In this way Syrian President Bashar al Assad, a mild-mannered eye doctor, became the new evil in the world.
As western peoples we have been particularly deceived by this dirty war, reverting to our worst traditions of intervention, racial prejudice and poor reflection on our own histories. This book tries to tell its story while rescuing some of the better western traditions: the use of reason, ethical principle and the search for independent evidence.
Title: The Dirty War on Syria: Washington, Regime Change and Resistance
Russia’s “military diplomacy” in the war-torn Central African Republic is designed to stabilize part of Africa’s “Failed State Belt” and set the stage for Moscow to eventually move its peacemaking efforts to the continent’s next cauldron of chaos in the neighboring Congo, all with the intent of reasserting its historic Great Power role in Africa and providing more strategic value to its relationship with China.
Russian Arms In Central Africa
Some unexpected news surfaced earlier this week when it was revealed that Russia requested the UN to make an exception to its arms embargo on the Central African Republic so that Moscow could send weapons to two EU-trained battalions of its military by the beginning of next week. Even more surprisingly, the Western members of the UNSC reacted positively to this idea, though they asked that the measure be temporarily put on hold until they receive more details about how Russia plans to prevent these arms from inadvertently falling into the hands of the country’s rebel groups. They already seem satisfied to find out that Russia plans to store them in new containers under tight security, but they’d like to know the serial numbers for each unit so that they can be traced in the event that they end up in the wrong hands.
EU military training mission in Central African Republic
“Military Diplomacy”
Technical specifics about this news aside, many people are scratching their heads and wondering why Russia’s involving itself in one of the world’s most impoverished and conflict-wreaked countries, especially since the Central African Republic has been in a state of civil war since late 2012 that has since come to carry civilizational-religious overtones in degenerating into senseless Christian-Muslim killings. As with all of Russia’s arms sales abroad, this one is also part of its “military diplomacy” to promote regional stability, which in this particular context means to support government forces in defending themselves and their citizens against rebels and death squads. The idea is that the enhancement of the government’s military capabilities could then allow it to secure the population centers from rebels, destroy terrorists and death squads, and finally return to the prior peace agreement, which could then ultimately see the incorporation of a power-sharing component with the minority eastern-based Muslim rebels that possibly leads to a lasting “federal” (internally partitioned) “solution” to the country’s long-running crisis.
Should Russia’s Central African foray into “military diplomacy” be a success, then it might be able to emulate this model in the neighboring Congo, which has predictably been beset by Hybrid War ever since President Kabila delayed what would have been his country’s first-ever democratic transfer of power in late-2016. The spiraling situation in one of Africa’s largest and most strategically positioned states holds the dire risk of turning into another all-out civil war along the lines of the 1990s conflict that was tellingly referred to as “Africa’s World War” and eventually contributed to the deaths of an estimated 5 million people. It might be too late to avert a disastrous repeat of this scenario even in part, but Russia could be calculating that its Central African experience in “military diplomacy” might be of assistance in this regard if it can use its expected gains in Bangui to eventually reach a similar arms deal with Kinshasa that could give the edge to government forces and prevent the country’s collapse.
“Balancing” With China
All of this is ambitiously visionary and could serve to signify Russia’s return to the African continent from which it largely withdrew after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but the obvious question of intent and expected tangible dividends comes to mind. Russia, as with all Great Powers, isn’t just doing all of this out of the “kindness of its leadership’s heart”, but in order to procure physical benefits such as profitable extraction contracts in these two mineral-rich countries, with both impoverished societies sitting on a wealth of resources such as the Central African Republic’s diamond and uranium reserves and the Congo’s copper and cobalt ones. That’s not the only reason why Russia is doing this, however, since there’s a more pressing one to explain Moscow’s willingness to engage in African adventures, and that’s to provide strategic value to China in an effort to equalize the two states’ partnership with one another.
Russia, like all of Beijing’s partners, has a lingering fear – whether legitimate or not – that it could become politically subservient to the People’s Republic in the future because the sheer scale and magnitude of China’s economic power is multiple levels higher than Moscow’s own. As such, Russia feels compelled to pioneer creative solutions to prove its worth to China and retain equilibirum in this Great Power relationship, which explains its diplomatic balancing act in Asia, fast-moving rapprochement with Pakistan, and exercise of “military diplomacy” in Africa. This latter element is especially important because China needs African stability in order to ensure the success of its Silk Road vision in solidifying the Multipolar World Order, yet the continent has become a battleground in the New Cold War and frighteningly runs the future risk of one day sucking Beijing into an Afghan-like quagmire as a result.
Spreading The Syrian Model
It’s at this point where Russia’s “military diplomacy” in Africa takes on its true value. Moscow gained tremendous military and diplomatic experience from Syria in learning how to leverage these two factors to streamline a “political solution” to what was previously thought to be one of the world’s most intractable conflicts. Now that some mild success has been made on this front, Russia has turned its attention to Afghanistan and Libya in preparation for possibly getting diplomatically involved in Yemen sometime further down the line as well. All four of these conflicts were caused by the US, so it can be said that Russia is using Syria as its springboard for “cleaning up” the mess that its American rival made elsewhere in Afro-Eurasia. Up until now, however, it hadn’t signaled any interest in sub-Saharan conflicts, but that’s evidently changing due to its newfound interest in Sudan, the Central African Republic, and maybe even eventually the Congo, all per the aforementioned strategic imperative vis-à-vis China.
Russia’s African Return
Most readers probably missed the recent news, but Russia is seriously deliberating Sudan’s offer to provide it with a naval base on the country’s Red Sea coast, which could allow Moscow to maintain a strategic presence at the northern mainland-maritime interface of one of China’s African Silk Roads, the Sahelian-Saharan Silk Road. This still doesn’t explain the value that Russia believes that it could provide to China via its prospective “military diplomacy” in the Central African Republic, as this landlocked state doesn’t sit astride the previously mentioned route, but it could have, though, and that’s the point. In the introductory chapters of the author’s book-length analytical series on African geopolitics, it was mentioned that one of China’s greatest goals is to link Africa’s most populous state of Nigeria with its second-largest one of Ethiopia via an overland route, which could in the future be fulfilled via the Sahelian-Saharan Silk Road but at one time could have more profitably gone through resource-rich South Sudan and the Central African Republic instead as opposed to the barren desert.
The “Failed State Belt”
The US’ psy-opcampaign of “Kony 2012” in the early months of the same year was nothing more than a cover for deploying its special forces into the tri-border region between those two states and the Congo in order to foment instability for preemptively disrupting China’s plans. By the end of the year, the Seleka rebels from the eastern Muslim-majority part of the mostly Christian Central African Republic were in open revolt against the authorities and thus began their march on the western capital of Bangui, which had not too long beforehand signed somehigh-level dealswith China. They succeeded in capturing the capital and overthrowing the government in early 2013, which was the first step in forming the “Failed State Belt” that the author described in his earlier mentioned book-length series. Soon thereafter, South Sudan erupted in civil war at the end of 2013, and the second component of the said “belt” was in play.
While it can’t be known for certain, the case can be made for arguing that the US’ regional Kony 2012 special operations forces was just a front for sparking these two conflicts in order to sabotage any of China’s future Ethiopia-Nigeria Silk Road plans for transiting through these countries.
Joseph Kony left
In all actuality, it would have been naïve if China ever seriously thought that it could incorporate the Central African Republic and South Sudan into its connectivity vision without having their inherently unstable situation exploited by the US for Hybrid War ends, but then again, Beijing does believe that its Silk Road strategy represents a new model of International Relations capable of overcoming the burdens of the past. It would therefore be a strong sign of Russia’s strategic value to China as an equal partner if Moscow could contribute to the restoration of stability in one of the “Failed State Belt” countries and help revive Beijing’s Silk Road dreams there.
The Russian-Chinese Tag Team
Furthermore, China might even consider dispatching peacekeepers to the Central African Republic if the military can restore order throughout most of the country and calm the situation down, just like the People’s Republic already has done in neighboring South Sudan, with both operations directed out of Beijing’s first-ever overseas base in nearby Djibouti. This isn’t a groundless forecast either, since the French were forced to unceremoniously withdraw their peacekeeping forces in utter disgrace after a string of child and even animal sex scandals discredited their presence there (though they did retain a few hundred regular troops). China, however, doesn’t want to send its soldiers into a hot warzone, no matter how badly it would still like to acquire some active combat experience (which is one of the reasons why it’s the largest contributor of UN peacekeeping forces out of the five Security Council members), so it would be reluctant to undertake this mission with full gusto unless the situation stabilizes, ergo the purpose of Russia’s “military diplomacy” in this context.
Should this turn out to be the case, then it would signify the development of a new conflict resolution model for Africa, whereby Russia’s “military diplomacy” helps stabilize the situation in war-torn states, and then China follows through by deploying peacekeepers to maintain the progress that Moscow’s munitions helped government forces attain. The next logical step would be for these two multipolar Great Powers to actively involve themselves in UN-backed peace talks and political negotiations, as they would each have a tangible stake in these countries’ success by that point because of their arms relationship and peacekeeper deployment respectively, both of which could eventually yield economic “rewards” for them with time if they can pull off a peacemaking victory. Even though the “Failed State Belt” of the Central African Republic and South Sudan might seem relatively insignificant of a “prize” for Russia and China to focus on, the fact remains that the continuing unrest in these two countries complicates the ongoing Congo Crisis and could lead to the creation of a transnational terrorist nest if left unaddressed.
That, though, is exactly what the US planned in advance when it deployed its special forces to these three countries in 2012 in order to “find Kony”, anticipating that the civil wars in the Central African Republic and South Sudan that its troops would later help set off could forever subvert China’s Silk Road plans and eventually cause pandemonium in the Congo. The author’s June 2016 analysis for The Duran titled “China vs. The US: The Struggle For Central Africa And The Congo” explains the reasoning for this more in depth, but the simplified motivation is that the US also wants to cut off China’s cobalt connection in the country’s southeastern mineral-rich region of Katanga, which could conceivably relive its immediate post-colonial history in once again aspiring for independence as a potential outcome of this century’s Congo Crisis (the third since 1960). China doesn’t want a hostile pro-Western government to come to power there that might nationalize its mining assets and/or re-appropriate them into Western hands, since Beijing is counting on its cobalt reserves there to fuel its emergence as a global superpower in the electric vehicle industry.
Concluding Thoughts
Prognosticating that Russia and China will learn valuable lessons from their joint coordination in the Central African Republic, it’s reasonable then to reckon that they’ll take their African partnership to the Congo afterwards, particularly its mineral-rich and former breakaway region of Katanga in order to safeguard Beijing’s assets there, though their diplomatic-peacekeeping efforts would naturally affect other corners of the country as well. Moscow might even exercise its “military diplomacy” so that its national companies can acquire a stake in Katanga in exchange for Russia’s support of Kinshasa and the Congo’s territorial integrity following a successful conclusion of the current crisis, though provided that it dramatically devolves to the point of teetering near or actually becoming a civil war to “justify” such a handsome “reward”.
In concluding the analysis, Russia’s sub-Saharan Africa policy previously relied on its traditional Cold War partnerships with Angola, Ethiopia, and South Africa – and even those have been very limited in their scope and concentrated only on a few industries – but its “pivot/return” to the region is now seeing it overcome its post-Soviet aversion to getting involved in the continent’s civil conflicts as Russia races to establish a presence for itself in Africa’s geostrategic heartland. There are certainly pecuniary interests at stake, as well as less tangible ones dealing with Great Power prestige, but the main impetus for all of this is for Russia to enhance its strategic value to China and therefore creatively ensure that their relations remain on an equal footing for the foreseeable future.
Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare.
“Anybody who has a minimal understanding of nuclear radiation knows that this would not be a war against North Korea. It would be a war against China, Russia, South Korea and Japan.”
– Professor Michel Chossudovsky (From this week’s interview.)
For months, the US Government and its Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley have been messaging their impatience with the North Korean government and its determination to continue test firing its missiles and threaten the use of nuclear weapons.
Belligerent talk from President Trump, calling the nation’s leader ‘Rocket Man’ and broadcasting his willingness ‘to totally destroy North Korea’ does little to assuage concerns that a nuclear confrontation is on the horizon.
Then on Tuesday Dec 12th, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson sent a hopeful signal when he commented on his government’s willingness to engage Pyongyang in dialogue without preconditions, only to be corrected the next day by the White House and State department. The U.S. is sticking to its resolve and demanding North Korea’s unconditional abandonment of its nuclear capacity before talks could begin.
It’s hard to avoid the impression that the U.S. is in the early stages of yet another military conflict, the consequences of which could lead to the annihilation of all human life on Earth.
This week’s episode of the Global Research News Hour attempts to evaluate the trajectory of the Trump Administration’s bellicose actions toward the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea and the urgency of a renewed anti-war movement at this time in history.
In the first part of the program, we hear from Professor Michel Chossudovsky of the Centre for Research on Globalization. Professor Chossudovsky is convinced that the world is facing a crisis on par with that of the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, though without the leadership that succeeded in turning the world away from catastrophe. He unpacks some of the history of America’s nuclear policy, assesses the U.S. government’s true motives for badgering North Korea, and the normalization of nuclear weapons as applicable in conventional warfare.
Later in the show, Carla Stea, Global Research’s correspondent at the United Nations, examines the campaign to demonize the North Korean government and the North Korean people, subterfuge at the U.N. and a proposal with the prospect of defusing the crisis and finally securing peace on the Korean peninsula.
Carla Steais an American journalist and Global Research’s Correspondent at United Nations headquarters, New York. Her articles have been published in the US, UK, Russia, Latin America, and have appeared in Latin American Perspectives, Covert Action Quarterly, War and Peace Digest, Rock Creek Free Press, Komsomolskaya Pravda, Rabochaya Tribuna, Sovetskaya Rossia, Novosti Press and Tapol, Report on Human Rights, Indonesia.
Professor Chossudovsky will be speaking in Hamilton and Toronto the week of December 18th . He has plans for speaking engagements in Winnipeg and Vancouver in mid-January 2018.
Global Research: We are joined now by Michel Chossudovsky. He is Professor of Economics (Emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, and Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization in Montreal. He is the Editor of Global Research, and he is an award-winning author of eleven books including The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order, Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War, and The Globalization of War, America’s Long War against Humanity. And he is preparing talks in Hamilton and Toronto and potentially other cities across Canada. So he joins us right now. How are you doing today Professor Chossudovsky?
Professor Michel Chossudovsky: Good afternoon. Pleasure to be on the program.
GR: So, tell us a little bit about these talks. What in particular is your concern as you go to these different events?
MC: Well, the danger of nuclear annihilation, which appears to be very abstract, is a reality and it becomes a reality once it happens. People are incapable of conceptualizing.
We have a lot of scientific evidence. We have – well, of course we also have Hiroshima and Nagasaki where a hundred thousand people died – in Hiroshima in the first seven seconds. Today’s bombs are at least one hundred times more powerful – the strategic nuclear bombs.
The tactical nuclear weapons, which are – have been re-categorized by the U.S. Senate as ‘conventional weapons’ can go from one-third to six times a Hiroshima bomb and the latest version, the B61-12 could go up to twelve times a Hiroshima bomb. But they call them ‘mini-nukes’ and scientific opinion on contract to the Pentagon says, “that they are harmless to the surrounding civilian population because the explosion is underground.” These are ‘bunker-buster bombs. They have a different delivery system to the so-called ‘strategic’ nuclear weapons, but they’re thermonuclear bombs and they’re pretty much the same nuclear bombs with different yields that – yields mean explosive capacity. So, the situation is tremendously dangerous.
Now, there’s another thing which people do not know, and it’s of extreme importance. The Manhattan Project started up in 1939. It was initially a U.S. project. And then Britain and also Canada joined the Manhattan Project. And Canadian science and technology was applied to the Manhattan Project. I won’t get into the details but Canada is deeply integrated into the nuclear weapons project right from the outset, and in fact, we might be described as a ‘de-facto’ nuclear power because there was exchange of information. There were agreements. There was a Quebec agreement, I believe it was in 1942-1943. And so on, so forth.
But what’s very important is that in 1942, the United States had already designed a project to bomb the Soviet Union. And that happened when the Soviet Union and the allies were fighting Nazi Germany. They were allies! And in 1945 – September 15 1945, barely one month after Hiroshima. Hiroshima was on the 6th of August, Nagasaki was on the 9th of August – and less than a month later, they released a secret document which essentially reads as follows: “Two hundred and four atomic bombs against sixty-six major cities of the Soviet Union.” It was a U.S. nuclear attack against the U.S.S.R. which was formulated during World War II.
Now, what is the significance of this plan? If the United States had not had the intent of blowing up the Soviet Union – of wiping the Soviet Union off the map – we would not have had an arms race, ‘kay? We would not have had an arms race and the world would be much safer today. So that’s one very important dimension.
Now when we turn to looking at North Korea and China, I think it’s important to stress that North Korea and China had been threatened for 67 years. In fact, the first threat was formulated shortly after China declared its liberation or the foundation of the Peoples’ Republic of China, which was in October 1949… And so, in early 1950 – I think it was mid-1950 – the United States had already plans to attack China and also to attack North Korea with nuclear weapons.
And then we have to say North Korea is a nuclear weapon state, but so is Israel. North Korea is a nuclear weapons state, but so is – so is Turkey! It has tactical nuclear weapons under national command in its Incirlik Air Force Base. And there are other countries. And there we have a small country in East Asia which now has been tagged by the media as a threat to global security.
GR: I think that one of the reasons the public has a lot of concern about the threat posed by North Korea, is the portrayal of the president as being unstable, insane. Here he is with all these tests that every time some concern is expressed they’re conducting one more test. Firing missiles into the sea, intercontinental ballistic missile testing, and so we’re seeing this response on the part of the U.S. president. Granted a lot of the public messaging is that both Trump and Kim Jong-Un are insane and essentially holding the world hostage. But, can you address that? I mean, do you believe the North Korean president is behaving rationally?
MC: Well listen, uh, you know, we can always, um, look at narratives, uh, and um, the narrative of the North Korean leader may appear eclectic, at moments threatening, but in effect, all they have done is to test their missiles and test their nuclear weapons.
But on the other hand, if you want to look at concrete occurrences, for the last 67 years the United States has been threatening to obliterate North Korea. And that ‘Fire and Fury’ was not invented by Donald Trump. It goes back to the Truman doctrine, and I can quote from tonnes of documents. And the, and the, and the – you know – killed 30 percent of the population and then say North Korea is threatening America. There’s not a single family in North Korea that hasn’t lost a loved one in the course of the Korean War! Those are the realities!
And then another thing. This ‘eclectic nut-head’ in North Korea actually instructed – he’s Head of State, or the Head of the Party, the leader – his government actually signed and gave a ‘yes’ vote to a motion in the United Nations General Assembly, to eliminate nuclear weapons! To prohibit nuclear weapons! To make them illegal! And then there were 38 countries that voted against it. Of course Canada was one of them. As a Canadian I say while most Canadians are against nuclear weapons, yet our government did not sign the motion which is now the object of a Nobel Prize to prohibit nuclear weapons!
But the guy in – you know – Pyongyang, he gave the green light to signing that resolution! Now, there’s something wrong there!
I think we have to distinguish between political rhetoric on the one hand, and – I concur that his rhetoric is not encouraging, ‘kay? He makes statements which are a little bit off. But I don’t think that really makes – it’s ammunition for the media. Not a single media has actually acknowledged the fact that North Korea, uh, endorsed the prohibition of nuclear weapons. Something like a hundred and twenty countries said ‘yes’. All the NATO member states said ‘no’. Some of them abstained. But, and Canada also…Canada said ‘no’… We have to understand a bit the history of the Korean peninsula.
I should mention another thing. South Korea was for ten years, and that was official, a nuclear weapons state.
GR: What makes North Korea such a – a focus of attention, at least in the media, and apparently in terms of U.S. foreign policy. It doesn’t obviously have any resources like oil that would be coveted by the U.S. and its partners. Why this fuss over North Korea? Just because they’ve got the nuclear bomb?
MC: I think there are two important issues pertaining to that question. One is that North Korea has a societal project which departs from the diktats of global capitalism. Okay? Whether we like it or not, they’re a socialist country. They have a – they have their own way of organizing economic activity, social programs and so on. And any country which departs from the norm of neoliberalism which exercises its sovereignty is immediately a target. And we saw that …
GR: Yugoslavia.
MC: We saw that in Syria and Iraq. We see it in many different countries. I think that’s the first.
But the second has to do with the fact that North Korea is a buffer state, and it is – it has borders with China and it has borders with Russia. The city of Vladivostok is about a hundred kilometres from the North Korean border. And uh, both Russia and China are the target of the United States.
The war on North Korea is a stepping stone – is a possible stepping stone to a broader war. And it’s also a war of consolidation in East Asia where the United States has established its spheres of influence, well in East Asia but also in Southeast Asia.
GR: If they’re looking for a way of de-escalating things vis-a-vis the United States, what options realistically do they have?
MC: Well, first of all, there is the option of signing a peace treaty which the North Koreans have been insisting upon for many, many years. But the United States have always refused to sign a peace agreement. In other words, a peace agreement would be signed by the three parties of the armistice agreement of 1953. Now that armistice agreement was signed by the United States, the DPRK, and China, because China had what they called the Chinese volunteers army. So those are the three signatories of the armistice agreement.
But there seems to be a dead-end there because systematically Washington said “we’re not entering into any kind of peace negotiations,” or that they set conditions on that. And they’ve even intimated that they would have to have troops stationed in North Korea if there’s a re-unification of the two Koreas.
So, from my stand-point, and I’ve discussed this a lot with people in South Korea, and it’s a project which emanates also from South Korean civil society – for North Korea and South Korea to enter into an agreement, which in a sense nullifies the armistice agreement – would be a peace agreement – but at the same time it would be a means to the – to demilitarize the Korean peninsula. Because at this moment – and that’s very, very important – at this moment the Republic of Korea, namely South Korea, has, um, a bi-lateral agreement with the United States. It’s called the ROK-US Combined Forces Command – the CFC.
Now, what that joint command signifies is that it in case of war, uh, the United States uh, would take over the entire military apparatus of South Korea. In other words, all the forces of South Korea would be under U.S. command. That is called Operational Control (OPCON). It’s the OPCON of both the Republic of Korea and U.S. military forces and uh they’ve signed an agreement which essentially says okay, if there’s war, well, President Moon, the president of South Korea, uh, has absolutely no power. He’s not commander-in-chief. He’s only commander-in-chief when there’s peace, so that’s a non-sequitur! And then Washington dictates its conditions.
And, ultimately, through OPCON, it controls the whole military operations in East Asia, so that even if, let’s say, the United States wanted to attack China, it could then mobilize Korean forces and they would be under the command of a four-star general appointed by the Pentagon. So that what has to be achieved is that for this north-south peace agreement, coupled with cooperation, cultural exchange and so on, some of which has been ongoing, but it started with Kim Dae-Jung in 1998, and then it was interrupted – well I don’t want to go into the details of the history, but the thing is that, um, if North and South Korea, through dialogue, establish a peace agreement whereby they agree that the OPCON, the ROK and U.S. agreement is nullified – that’s something that they can do – so that Operational Control of the United States over the Republic of Korea forces is nullified, combined, let’s say, with the withdrawal of some 27,000 troops – U.S. troops – in South Korea, and what this could signify is that, um, the armistice agreement would in a sense be side-tracked by a bi-lateral north-south peace agreement. In other words, which would de-facto lead to rescinding the 1953 armistice. That is Plan B.
And in effect, that Plan B is much more realistic than Plan A, because the United States has refused to enter into any kind of peace negotiations with North Korea and China, which would then – so that the armistice agreement is still there. And the armistice agreement we know, doesn’t necessarily lead to the end of the war. It simply means it’s a, you know, you stop fighting but the war is still there…
GR: Ceasefire…
MC: Legally, the war is still there…
GR: Yeah…
MC: …because there was never a peace agreement.
Intermission
Part Two
GR: Right now, the United States seems to be facing a major economic crisis. They’ve pretty much out-sourced a lot of their infrastructure, huge debts that they’re not likely to ever pay back. They’re over-strained. And on top of that – that’s something that’s prevailed for years – now you’ve got a president who’s not only somehow, you know, unpredictable and untamed, but he seems to be under assault from within the governing – the military industrial complex, the Deep State, whatever you want to call it. How do you see those factors working together to potentially increase the threat of a nuclear holocaust, be it deliberate or accidental?
MC: Well, I think what is – disturbs me most is that uh, today we have a situation where, um, competing nuclear powers are not communicating in the same way, let’s say, as they were communicating during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.
President Kennedy and, uh, Nicolai Sergeyevich Khrushchev, the Russian leader, were, uh, were communicating at that time. They were, you know, they had means of communicating. Uh, they were both acutely aware, uh, of the fact that a nuclear – the use of nuclear weapons would lead to the unthinkable. That was, um, under the doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction. That doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (M-A-D) prevailed during the Cold War era and was an element of stability, because both sides knew that if they used nuclear weapons, this would be the end of humanity! They knew it! And they had the scientists who were analyzing it, and their policy -makers. But today we don’t have that…
GR: Are you sure? You don’t think Putin understands the, uh, the potential hazards and that he isn’t reaching out to Mr. Trump?
MC: Putin understands them, and there’s no first strike pre-emptive nuclear war doctrine as far as the Soviet – the Russian Federation is concerned. Putin understands it. And he has – his whole background enabled him to understand it. I don’t think that Trump understands it. I don’t think that James ‘Mad Dog’ Mattis, who runs the Pentagon, understands it! And one of the reasons why they don’t understand it, is that they have created an ideology which upholds nuclear weapons, or tactical nuclear weapons, as ‘peace-making’ bombs, because what they have done is a little bit like removing the sticker from a cigarette pack and saying, you know, smoking is good for your health…
GR: Health food!
MC: …and that’s exactly what they’ve done!
GR: Hm…
MC: They redefined those bombs, saying that they’re harmless to civilians. And that’s in the military manuals…
GR: So one thing that’s changed…
MC: …pardon?
GR: One thing that seems to have changed is that back in the ’80s there was the talk about Mutually Assured Destruction, and that was the – THE application of nuclear weapons, and today it’s become a part of conventional warfare.
MC: Well, precisely! Well not all of them but the – they’re now arguing this thing, ‘oh well, we should use the – these small nuclear bombs because … they could insert themselves into a conventional war theatre context. Let’s go ahead and use them.’
In fact we don’t even have to ask President Trump’s permission because the commander, the three-star general in the regional commands can actually call the shots um, and uh, that’s a point that Daniel Ellesberg brought out in a recent interview, the fact that even the commanders in the field have much greater authority to use nuclear weapons than they did previously. It’s an extremely dangerous situation, because even the use of a tactical nuclear weapon against North Korea could unleash a third world war.
And the reason for that is also the fact that North Korea has borders with China and Russia. Anybody who has a minimal understanding of nuclear radiation knows that this would not be a war against North Korea. It would be a war against China, Russia, South Korea and Japan. I mean, as I said, you know, uh, for people in Toronto going from Toronto to Hamilton is about the same thing as going from Seoul to the border with North Korea! Everything is very, very close, and densely populated! So that…we’re at the very dangerous crossroads.
And one of the purposes of the meetings in Hamilton and Toronto is to build a resurgence of the Canadian anti-war movement which has been defunct since the Iraq War, 2003. Nobody moves. Here we’re not talking about one war. We have the War in Yemen, it’s a crimes against humanity. We have the War in Syria. The War in Iraq. But the use of nuclear weapons is the destruction of humanity.
Fidel Castro said, and I actually recorded that statement when I was with him a few years back. He said, “In the case of a nuclear war, the collateral damage is humanity in its entirety.”
GR: Okay, so Professor Chossudovsky, those dates for your lectures again are December 18th in Hamilton and then another one in Toronto on December 19th. Just one more question before I let you go. Just a quick comment on the media’s role in exacerbating or mitigating this new nuclear threat.
MC: Well, you know, what is exacerbating this – the nuclear threat is the act of omission. Here we have something which is absolutely crucial, whatever your views. Um, but it’s not front page news. And we don’t talk about it. And when we do talk about it, we look at the folklore of the North Korean leader, and his hairstyle, and so on. Um, the public attention today…public opinion is misinformed. They don’t know what these bombs can do. They literally will destroy people’s lives and destroy the planet. That’s not an understate – that’s not an overstatement. It’s in fact an understatement because you can blow up the planet several times.
Um, the lie has become the truth. We are led to believe that nuclear weapons are harmless to civilians, and the media is simply mum on the subject. And uh, and then when – when this ‘crazy’ North Korean leader – well they say he’s crazy and so on and so forth, why, if he’s so crazy, why did he actually say ‘yes’ to a U.N. resolution to prohibit and outlaw nuclear weapons, when none of the other nuclear weapons states actually, um, supported that resolution? It was the only nuclear weapons state which actually supported that resolution.
GR: Professor Choss…
MC: And whether we like the North Koreans or not, that statement should have been – should have been heralded by – by the mainstream media. And I can tell you because I reviewed it. You know what they did? They just lumped them together! Said the nine nuclear weapons states, including North Korea, turned down the motion. Not true! They didn’t check the original United Nations Assembly document. Or maybe they just decided that they were going to lie and then…you can look at it in the Ottawa Citizen. And – and – and, in fact – very little coverage of it.
On the whole very little coverage of the nuclear weapons, um, the implications of nuclear weapons, and the importance for humanity to, uh, to abolish nuclear weapons.
GR: Professor Chossudovsky, thank you very much for your time. I wish you all the best in your upcoming speaking events and a happy holiday season and all the best in the new year!
MC: All the best to you and everybody in Winnipeg!
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Mankind discovered the nuclear world by its intellect; atom, nucleus, nucleon, elementary particle, and then some reactions at the nucleus level. A significant discovery was that there are stable nuclei as well as unstable ones, and that an unstable nucleus tends to change to a more stable condition, emitting the extra energy in the form of radiation. Another was nuclear fission and nuclear fusion reactions.
The discovery of nuclear fission immediately led the German government to explore the use of nuclear fission as the basis of powerful weapon. A few scientists including Einstein urged the US president to develop such a weapon before the Germans would succeed. The US government secretly established the “Manhattan project”, and the scientists and the corporations involved managed to make three pieces of such weapon, i.e., atomic bombs before the end of the World War II. One was used to test its effectiveness in New Mexico, and the remaining two were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The results were devastating, killing hundreds of thousands instantly and flattening the entire cities.
Several countries, Soviet Unions (now Russia), UK, France and China, followed suit. They, as well as the USA, eagerly developed the nuclear programs and produced an enormous number of such weapons. Besides, they have made the weapons more powerful, incorporating the nuclear fusion reaction; i.e, the combination of hydrogen bomb (nuclear fusion) and the nuclear fission (atomic bomb). Such a weapon is now called as “thermonuclear weapon”, which seems to reduce the impression of the devastating effects it can cause. In fact, many of them are more than 100 times powerful compared with the Hiroshima bomb. A few other countries have now developed nuclear arsenals despite of the NPT (Non Proliferation Treaty): they are Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea.
The dangers of using the nuclear arsenals are obvious, and yet it took more than half a century to establish the nuclear weapon ban treaty (NWBT). And a Nobel peace prize has been awarded to an international organization “ICAN”, which contributed to the NWBT. Yet, the danger of use of nuclear arsenals is now ever increasing. The creation of this weapon is one of the gravest mistakes Homo sapiens has made.
The major effects of the nuclear explosion are summarized in Fig. 1. The evilness of the military use of the “nuclear” is visible and easily recognizable by anybody; it is caused by the enormous amount of heat produced at the explosion of an atomic bomb ((A and B) in Fig. 1. There is another effect that is associated with the nuclear explosion. That is “radiation”, represented by (C) and (D) in Fig. 1. The nuclear fission produces an enormous amount of radioactive substances. The radiation was quite strong at the moment of explosion, and killed many people through radiation effects (effect (C)). It has been estimated that radiation dose higher than 10 Sv (or Gy) instantly killed a person. Because the exposure dose on the people located within one kilometer from the hypocenter was more than 10 Sv(Gy), they are believed to have died from the radiation effect as well. The people also suffered from the ill effects of radiation, after surviving the immediate death, and they are officially called “hibakusha”.
Another effect is also due to radiation, but it is from the radioactive particles, termed “fallout” ((D) in Fig. 1). The official stance of the AEC (Atomic Energy Commission) and other authoritative organizations has been to ignore the effects of the fallout. However, in reality, it was the major factor causing death and the ill effects on the people who came into Hiroshima and Nagasaki a few days after the explosion; in other words, they were not exposed to the radiation from the explosion. They were exposed to the radiation of the fallout. Besides, the majority of the “hibakusha” who survived the explosion suffered from many ill effects including cancers later on. These are caused not only by the immediate effect from the explosion but also the effects of the fallout.
The fallout, which is substance, could get into human bodies through inhaling or contaminated water and foods, and irradiate the body from inside; this is termed as “internal exposure”. On the other hands, the effect of the radiation from the explosion is considered to be “external exposure”; i.e., radiation gets in a body from the outside. From the very beginning, the nuclear industry and the authorities have been neglecting or denying the effects of the fallout, and hence, the internal exposure effects.
Fig.1 suggests that the same kind of minute radioactive particles could come out from an accident of a nuclear facility (D from the right hand side). The nuclear facilities produce large quantities of a large number of radioactive substances; uranium, plutonium, tritium, radioactive fission products such as iodine (I-131), cesium (Cs-134, 137), krypton (Kr-85), strontium (Sr- 90) and others.
The radioactive minute particles come out into the environment through accidents at nuclear facilities. However, they are released even under a normal operating condition, because the reactor needs to be relieved every so often of its inner pressure by venting the gaseous fission products. The uranium mine is always releasing a gaseous radionuclide, radon. The workers in uranium mines have been exposed to the radiation in the form of radon as well as the fine dust of uranium and/or radium oxides. The workers in the nuclear weapon producing facilities are always subjected to the danger of radiation exposure.
The soldiers and workers who were involved in the nuclear weapon tests, as well as the people living down wind from the test sites have been exposed to radiation through the minute radioactive particles (fallout) at the explosion. Many of these people, mine workers, soldiers as well as citizens, have suffered from many radiation-related illnesses; cancers of various kinds, brain damage (Alzheimer, etc), heart diseases, and others.
The radiation effect (D) is not well recognized by people, as the nuclear industry has been denying the ill effects of radiation. Besides, the radiation effects themselves are hard to be recognized. People affected cannot feel it, because it is colorless (invisible), odorless, tasteless, and would not give mechanical impression. The energy of radiation to cause an immediate death, is10 Sv (Gy) (or higher), which is 10 joule/kg (body). This is minute as the energy value. 10 joule/kg would bring about a body temperature rise of 0.0024 degree. No body would feel such a small temperature rise. Yet, it does instantly kill a person. Smaller doses that may not kill could cause various serious health problems. This is what’s happening everywhere associated with the use of “nuclear”, including the “peaceful use”. Yet, the people involved in the whole process for the NWBT were not aware of this danger. This danger (D in Fgi.1) is subtle and yet devastating. However, the military side of effect (D) has been denied by the authorities. This makes another aspect of D, i.e., that from the peaceful use, invisible to many people.
How many affected by the cause (D) of the peaceful uses so far? There is no definite answer, because most of these incidents of health effects due to radiation have been denied, belittled, and such data, if any, have been suppressed by the governments and the nuclear industry. A rough estimate could be several hundred millions in the last 100 years.
As the amount of radioactive material produced increases, the number of people affected will increase. Even if they now stopped producing more radioactive material, the number of people affected would still increase, because some of the radioactive nuclei last long. For example, Cs-137 takes about 300 hundreds years in order for it to be reduced to about one thousandth of the present quantity. It takes 24,000 years for Pu-238 to do so. It would affect not only the people currently existent on the earth but also the future generations, and all the living organisms.
The last issue (E in Fig. 1) is disposal of the nuclear radioactive waste. Radioactivity affects not only the human bodies (and all living organisms) but also any chemical substance. The container that is used to store radioactive material could be damaged by radiation over the long time, and release the contents. The storage locations, likely underground, may or may not remain stable to allow the container securely stored. No definitive solution to dispose and store the radioactive wastes has been found.
We can do without the energy obtained by the so-called peaceful use of the “nuclear energy”. The renewable natural sources of energy are plenty to provide all the energy the human society needs. There is no good reason for the nuclear energy, because it is not green nor cheap, though the industry claims so. Only about one third of the heat produced in the nuclear reactor can be converted into electricity, and the rest two third is released into the environment heating it directly. As we have established the Nuclear Weapon Ban Treaty, we should now expand the Ban Treaty to the entire “Nuclear”, military as well as Peaceful uses; i.e., “NBT”. Refer also to my other argument and the book “Hiroshima to Fukushima” (Springer Verlag, 2013), which is now available for free download here.
Dr. Eilchiro Ochiai earned his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. from the University of Tokyo. He conducted postdoctoral research at Ohio State University, taught at the University of Tokyo and the University of British Columbia, and was a visiting scholar at the University of Maryland. He is currently Professor emeritus at Juniata College, Department of Chemistry, Huntington, PA.
The US-led coalition uses the al-Hasakah refugee camp as a base for training former members of ISIS, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) and other groups, the Russian center for reconciliation of the warring parties in Syria said on December 16.
US-trained terrorists join new units of the group called “the New Syrian Army” to be sent to southern Syria for fighting against the Syrian Arab Army, according to the statement.
The al-Hasakaha refugee camp is located 20km northeast of al-Shaddadi, the Al-Hasakah Governorate. Currently, about 750 militants are undergoing training there. This number includes 400 ISIS members that left the city of Raqqa under a deal with the US-led coalition in October.
“Despite the statements from the American side about its adherence to elimination of the IS terrorist organization [ISIS], the “International Coalition” continues cooperating with the remaining terrorists in Syria.
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The U.S. instructors of the Special Operations Command tie up separate groups of militants at a training center new the refugee camp into new military units, called the New Syrian Army. The U.S. instructors, according to refugees returning home, are saying after the training the new units would be relocated to Syria’s south to fight the Syrian governmental forces there,” the center said, according to the Russian state-run news agency TASS. “According to refugees returning home, the international coalition has been using that camp for more than six months as a training base for militants, who come there from Syria’s various districts. Most militants, the locals from the refugees camp say, used to be members of the terrorist groups, destroyed by the Syrian governmental forces – IS and Jabhat Al-Nusra. As of today, at the camp are about 750 militants, who have come from Raqqa, Deir ez-Zor, Abu Kamal and the Euphrates’ eastern areas. The grouping’s base are more than 400 IS terrorists, who with support from the U.S. fled Raqqa in a convoy in October.“
“The task of setting free one’s gifts was a recognized labor in the ancient world….the spirit that brings us our gifts finds its eventual freedom only through our sacrifice, and those who do not reciprocate the gifts of their genius [daemon, personal spirit that comes to us at birth] will leave it in bondage when they die.” – Lewis Hyde, The Gift
In a capitalist culture of commodification, people have been reified and things reanimated. Our national artists – the advertisers – have mastered this trick. People become persons through things, or the things images can secure; things possess a life of their own which they can impart to their possessors. Conversely, without such things one becomes a nobody, as the poor know so well. As long as you can convince people that objects and people are of equal value, the rest is easy. You can even declare that you are not an object to be used, even as you have bought into the culture of commodification through images. Daniel Boorstin put it this way in his classic study, The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America:
The deeper problems connected with advertising come less from the unscrupulousness of our ‘deceivers’ than from our pleasure in being deceived, less from the desire to seduce than from the desire to be seduced. The Graphic revolution has produced new categories of experience. They are no longer simply classifiable by the old common sense tests of true or false.
At no time is this more evident than in the months leading up to Christmas and the holidays. Gorging frenetically on “gift” buying, giving, and receiving in a futile attempt to appease an unacknowledged and unconscious indebtedness and guilt, people reveal the truth of a rudderless and faithless society lost in the cosmos. The secularization of the economy with the development of modern capitalism underlies our present condition. Norman O. Brown writes,
The result is an economy driven by a pure sense of guilt, unmitigated by any sense of redemption; as Luther said, the Devil (guilt) is lord of this world….secular ‘rationalism’ and liberal Protestantism deny the existence of the Devil (guilt). Their denial makes no difference to the economy, which remains driven by the sense of guilt; or rather, it makes this difference, that the economy is more uncontrollably driven by the sense of guilt because the problem of guilt is repressed by denial into the unconscious.
That is why so many people will be having a special guest for Christmas. Possessed by their possessions, while disbelieving in Luther’s Satan, the American people are in the process of bringing Satan home for the holidays. Unseen but present, he will have a place of honor at Christmas dinner tables throughout the land. But don’t worry, he has a parsimonious appetite and just nibbles. My sources tell me that he likes turkey and ham, but isn’t too keen on vegetarian fare, and forget vegan. Yet I am told he has a ravenous appetite for presents, so get shopping. I hope my sources are reliable, but I never disclose them. You can always get him an Amazon gift card.
These thoughts were sparked a few weeks ago when I sent my grandchildren chocolate Advent calendars. They are, so I think, innocent treats for children. A chocolate a day delivered out of little doors can’t hurt, except I suppose Grinch would say, “Are you kidding, think of cavities!” To which I reply, echoing Melville’s Bartleby the Scrivener, “I prefer not to.”
But I do want to think about the vast cavity in the American soul. I know Santa is cute, and even though he dresses in red like Satan, I loved him when I was a child. He once brought me a mechanical toy soldier made of metal. You wound his key and he marched to war, no questions asked. Rather than march forward, however, he went in circles, which seemed stupid until I got older and realized he was a prophet. Even Santa makes mistakes.
In those days, and today for my grandchildren, Christmas is also a holy day to celebrate the birth of a political and spiritual radical, a poor boy born in a stable, an anti-war trouble-maker bound to be executed by the state. To contemplate a newborn infant in his mother’s arms – any infant – and to let your mind transport him as an adult to the torturer’s prison, beaten and bloody, and taken ignominiously to his public execution as an example to all those who’ve heard his message of peace and voluntary poverty, redeems the day, banishes the devil from the table where he tries to poison the gift of hope and sharing the presence of loved ones brings. In the presence of intangible gifts, the gluttonous one flees. The song puts it thus:“‘Tis the gift to be simple, ‘Tis the gift to be free, ’Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be.”And when Santa keeps his gift giving for children simple, while excluding adults except for token exchanges, he is a welcome jolly guest at the dinner table, unlike the nasty fellow from below.
Being a sociologist, I am aware that every day in the United States many people are undergoing exorcisms. Satan seems to be a popular guy who gets around and takes many forms, as these reports suggest. I hear he turns heads, and have read that when some possessed people are exorcised they violently cough up parts of radios, computer chips – you name it. You can see why electronics are the number one Christmas gift. Our friend from below probably has the latest cell phone and a chip inserted in his heart. I’m not joking. Trust me.
As a boy I had a dog who was like those possessed ones. He ate and pooped light bulbs, electrical cords, crayons, clothespins, etc. After he bit my little sister on her leg requiring many stitches, my parents banished him to the ASPCA. Maybe they should have called the exorcist. Of course I loved my sister, but as a child I also loved my dog, and his name wasn’t Lucifer, despite carrying light bulbs in his stomach. And in those days I loved Santa too, as only a child can.
As I await his arrival now that I’m a bit older, I have created my own Advent calendar. Every day from December 1 until December 25 I open a little door and drop in something. This door opens down to hell, where our friend gleefully awaits his dinner invitation. Rather than invite the bastard, I try to dump on him all he induced me to possess so he could possess me. Never having been big into electronic crap, my stuff is low-tech but powerful, and the “stuff” is often not any thing at all, but inclinations, habits, ideas, and illusions that keep me thinking I need more while being less – William Blake’s chains:
In every cry of every man,
In every infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind forg’d manacles I hear.
Starting slowly, on day one I threw down a few dozen very sharp pencils that were cluttering up my desk drawer. If you didn’t know it, the pencil was a revolutionary technology in its time. But I had collected too many, as most of us collect the inessential to falsely secure us against embracing the wisdom of insecurity, and rather than write with them all to kill our downstairs neighbor, I hoped to spear the prick with a few, knowing as I did that the etymology of the word pencil is “little penis.”
On day two I picked up the pace and down went the illusion that I should expect my rambles in words to have any effect on people’s thinking.
Day three: Books I’ll never read again but El Diablo might benefit from, though he’s probably illiterate like so many Americans.
Day four: The bad habit of making snide comments about ignorant Americans. This was a little selfish since I didn’t want to be not nice or naughty before Santa’s arrival.
Day five: My sudden realization that the previous day’s confession might mean I’ll get coal in my stocking.
Day six: Clothes I’ll never wear, old foreign coins, extra socks, an eight inch wide tie, a one inch wide tie, all ties, nonsense things, and anything I could lay my hands on.
Day Seven: Many habits that have become useless, but which I won’t mention. I’m sure you understand.
Day eight: The idea that there are any sane American politicians and that they don’t want a nuclear war with Russia.
And on and on they go down the slide to hell. In this way I am hoping by December 25thto have dispossessed myself of all that has a grip on me, all that clutters up my life and mind. I am hoping to have nothing left to give or take, and that on Christmas the only gifts I might receive are the invisible kind.
Then I can hold them in the palms of my hands and set them free to fly away.
Letting go like this, I will contemplate an infant’s birth, how he came with nothing and left with nothing, and because he did not seek the possessions that are the life-blood of a consumer society sick-to-death, he showed us how to beat the devil.
Edward Curtin is a writer whose work has appeared widely. He teaches sociology at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. His website is http://edwardcurtin.com/
Mainstream media in 2017: “ISIS Got a Powerful Missile the CIA Bought!”
Years late to the party, mainstream media outlets like USA Today, Reuters, and Buzzfeed are just out with “breaking” and “exclusive” stories detailing how a vast arsenal of weapons sent to Syria by the CIA in cooperation with US allies fuelled the rapid growth of ISIS. Buzzfeed’s story entitled, Blowback: ISIS Got A Powerful Missile The CIA Secretly Bought In Bulgaria, begins by referencing “a new report on how ISIS built its arsenal highlights how the US purchased munitions, intended for Syrian rebels, that ended up in the hands of the terrorist group.”
The original study that Buzzfeed and other media are referencing comes from a UK-based independent weapons research organization called Conflict Armament Research (CAR) which has had a team of weapons and munitions experts on the ground in the Middle East for years examining arms and equipment recovered from ISIS and other terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria. Using serial numbers, crate shipping markings, and all available forensics data, the CAR experts began finding that as early as 2013 to 2014 much of the Islamic State’s advanced weapons systems as well as small arms were clearly sourced to the United States and the West.
“Supplies of materiel into the Syrian conflict from foreign parties – notably the United States and Saudi Arabia – have indirectly allowed IS to obtain substantial quantities of anti-armor ammunition,” states the CAR report. “These weapons include anti-tank guided weapons and several varieties of rocket with tandem warheads, which are designed to defeat modern reactive armor.”
A PG-9 missile modified to fit a Model 2 recoilless launcher system. Produced in 2016 in Romania, exported to the United States and documented in Mosul in September 2017. (Source: Conflict Armament Research)
The study further reveals that in one notable instance, a weapons shipment of advanced missile systems switched hands from US intelligence to “moderate” Syrian groups to ISIS in only a two month time period. Though the report is now evoking shock and confusion among pundits, the same weapons research group has actually published similar findings and conclusions going years back into the Syrian conflict.
For example, a previous 2014 Conflict Armament Research report found that Balkan origin anti-tank rockets recovered from ISIS fighters appeared identical to those shipped in 2013 to Syrian rebel forces as part of a CIA program.
And CAR’s damning publications presenting such inconvenient empirical data have been consistent for years, yet were largely ignored and suppressed by analysts and mainstream media who were too busy cheerleading US support for Syrian “rebels” cast as romantic revolutionaries in their struggle to topple Assad and his secular nationalist government. Of course, it’s an old story if you’ve been reading Zero Hedge or the profusion of independent outlets that have long reported the truth about the covert “dirty war” in Syria since nearly the beginning.
Even though it’s now suddenly acceptable and fashionable to admit – as does one recent BBC headline (“The Jihadis You Pay For”) – that the US and Saudi covert program in Syria fuelled the rise of ISIS and various other al-Qaeda linked terror groups, it must be remembered that only a short time ago the mainstream media openly mocked analysts and writers who dared make the connection between the West’s massive covert Syrian rebel aid programs and the al-Qaeda insurgents who so clearly benefited.
When news of the 2012 Defense Intelligence Agency report broke, which described what it called a “Salafist principality” or “an Islamic State” as a strategic asset or buffer in Syria that could be used by the Western coalition “in order to isolate the Syrian regime”, American media outlets dismissed what was labelled a “conspiracy theory” at the time in spite of the hard evidence of a US military intelligence report being made available.
The Daily Beast for example mocked what it called “The ISIS Conspiracy Theory that Ate the Web” – describing those analyzing the Pentagon intelligence document as far-right and far-left loons. This occurred even as the document was taken very seriously and analyzed in-depth by some of the world’s foremost Middle East experts and investigative journalists in foreign outlets like the London Review of Books, The Guardian, Der Spiegal , as well as RT and Al Jazeera.
Daily Beast fail from 2015
And yet nowonce again “conspiracy theory” has been confirmed as “conspiracy fact”: Conflict Armament Research’s new report out this week is the result of a three-year ground investigation which compiled findings from 40,000 military items recovered from ISIS between the years 2014 and 2017. Its conclusions are scientific, exhaustive, and irrefutable.
International weapon supplies to factions in the Syrian conflict have significantly augmented the quantity and quality of weapons available to IS forces. Read more here https://t.co/5QKauwzHpUpic.twitter.com/uZqb8zjP3r
The extensive report confirms what former MI6 spy and British diplomat Alastair Crooke once stated – that the CIA established the basis of a “jihadi Wal-Mart” of sorts – to which ISIS had immediate and easy access. Crooke noted that the weapons program was set up with “plausible deniability” in mind, which would allow its American intelligence sponsors to be shielded from any potential future legal prosecution or public embarrassment. Crooke noted in a 2015 BBC interview that, “The West does not actually hand the weapons to al-Qaida, let alone to ISIS…, but the system they’ve constructed leads precisely to that end.”
This is what enables Buzzfeed, USA Today, and others to report the bombshell findings yet continue to soft peddle the significance by emphasizing things like “weaknesses in oversight and regulation” while also highlighting the “accidental” nature of US-supplied missiles “ending up” in the hands of ISIS terrorists.
A guided anti-tank missile ended up in the hands of ISIS terrorists less than two months after the US government purchased it in late 2015 — highlighting weaknesses in the oversight and regulation of America’s covert arms programs, according to information published Thursday by an arms monitoring group called Conflict Armament Research (CAR).
Though the report says the missile was purchased by the US Army using a contractor, BuzzFeed News has learned that the real customer appears to have been the CIA.It was part of the spy agency’s top secret operation to arm rebels in Syria to fight the forces of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. The missile ended up in the hands of ISIS fighters in Iraq, according to the report.
The CIA declined to comment on the Obama-era program to back Syrian rebels, which was canceled by President Trump in July. The Pentagon did not provide information in time for publication.
The missile is one piece of a critical puzzle that is being solved only now, with ISIS on the run: How did the vast terror group arm its war machine? CAR spent three years tracking ISIS weapons as they were recovered by Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish forces — and found that what happened to the missile was no aberration. Indeed, the terror group managed to divert “substantial quantities of anti-armour ammunition” from weapons provided to Syrian opposition forces by the US or Saudi Arabia.
The anti-tank missile recovered from ISIS in February 2016. It originated with the US Army in December 2015. (Source: Conflicts Armament Research, “Weapons of the Islamic State” via Buzzfeed)
But some astute observers might notice the significance of the timeline related to the CIA purchase of one of the anti-tank missiles examined: “A guided anti-tank missile ended up in the hands of ISIS terrorists less than two months after the US government purchased it in late 2015.” As highlighted previously, the CAR team of experts had already documented the trend of CIA weapons delivered to the Syrian battlefield going to ISIS fighters as early as September of 2014. Beyond this 2014 study, a seemingly endless stream of articles going back years published in independent and international media have underscored the reality of ISIS growing and thriving because of Western and Gulf state covert weapons shipments.
This means that CIA and government analysts knew full well where the weapons were going in real time, yet continued with the program anyway. As former Pentagon intelligence chief Michael Flynn told Al Jazeera’s Mehdi Hasan in a stunningly frank summer 2015 interview (significantly before Flynn was part of the Trump campaign), the White House’s sponsoring of radical jihadists (that would emerge as ISIS and al-Nusra/HTS) against the Syrian government was most certainly “a willful decision.”
Thus General Flynn in the summer of 2015, speaking as recently retired military intelligence officer, warned in no uncertain terms that US-supplied weapons in Syria were going to ISIS, al-Qaeda, and other jihadists. This was so well known at the time that it could be openly stated by a retired high ranking official an a major international program. Flynn also said something similar to both Seymour Hersh and the New York Times in 2015.
But what did the CIA and allied intelligence agencies do? They continued arming the jihadist insurgency in Syria in their efforts to oust Assad. This was indeed “a willful decision” as Flynn affirmed and not mere “weaknesses in oversight and regulation” as Buzzfeed would have us believe.
Today is the most perilous time in world history. What’s going on should terrify everyone.
Endless US wars of aggression against sovereign independent states threaten world peace, stability and security.
Its megalomaniacal quest for world dominance risks eventual nuclear war against one or more countries – North Korea and Iran the most likely targets, Russia and perhaps China later on.
Madness defines America’s agenda, undemocratic Dems as bloodthirsty as Republicans. Humanity is at risk of annihilation like never before.
Full-blown tyranny is a hair’s breath away to quash homeland dissent and harden control, the nation on a fast track toward becoming Nazi Germany with nukes, ICBMs and other super-weapons, ready to use them against invented enemies.
No real ones exist so they have to be invented. Trump and ultra-hawkish generals in charge of geopolitical policy want wars and lots of them – ongoing in multiple theaters, new ones planned, ready to be launched at their discretion.
Will North Korea be struck next, followed by Iran? Will Washington use nuclear weapons for the first time since gratuitously against defeated Japan?
Will the Trump administration goad North Korea into a military response by cross-border provocations – the strategy used by Harry Truman to launch the 1950s war – US aggression, not North Korea’s, as falsely claimed to this day.
America uses the Security Council as a platform for its agenda, fortunately restrained by Sino/Russian veto power, Britain and France going along with US policies, virtual appendages of its imperial madness.
On Friday, Rex Tillerson represented Washington in a ministerial session on North Korea. Days earlier, he floated the idea of talks without preconditions.
Rejected by Trump through his press secretary, his position changed, saying
“North Korea must earn its way back to the table.”
US provocations and pressure will continue until “denuclearization is achieved” – an unattainable goal.
Why would the DPRK abandon its most important deterrent, genuinely fearing US aggression could come any time, a strong defense essential for its security?
It would be irresponsible for its leadership to leave the country defenseless. Advancing its nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities is their way to give Washington pause about attacking the country – knowing it can strike back hard.
At Friday’s Security Council session, Tillerson called for toughening positions against North Korea, bellowing:
“The United States will use all necessary measures to defend itself against North Korean aggression.”
Fact: The DPRK never preemptively attacked another country throughout its post-WW II history, defending itself in the 1950s against Truman’s war.
Fact: Its leadership and military threaten no countries now. America threatens everyone, the most belligerent nation in world history – at war at home and/or abroad throughout its history, responsible for countless tens of millions of deaths, numbers way exceeding any other imperial state.
Tillerson sounded like Nikki Haley, saying
“(t)he United States will not allow (the DPRK) to hold the world hostage.”
“We will continue to hold North Korea accountable for its reckless and threatening behavior today and in the future.”
“We ask every nation here to join us in exerting sovereignty to protect all of our people. We ask all to join a unified effort to achieve a complete and verifiable denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.”
As long as America threatens DPRK security, its leadership and military won’t ever abandon their most effective defense.
East Asia and everywhere else is threatened by Washington’s rage for global dominance.
North Korea threatens no one!
A Final Comment
At Friday’s UN Security Council ministerial meeting, North Korean UN ambassador Ja Song-nam said the following:
“Our possession of nuclear weapons was an individual self-defensive means of defending our sovereignty and rights of resistance and development from the US nuclear threat and if anyone is to be blamed for it, the US must be held accountable.”
“There are several nuclear power states all over the world now, but there is no country like the US who is continuing to openly threaten and blackmail other countries with its nuclear weapons.”
His remarks were accurate. Washington is responsible for Korean peninsula brinkmanship, not Pyongyang!
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.
While still a NATO member, Turkey has drifted away from the alliance to a great extent, indicating the way conflict in Syria has changed the Middle East’s geo-political landscape, and largely continues to. It is particularly the end-game in Syria that has now greatly crystalized which country stands where in the regional geo-political spectrum, and Turkey is certainly not in the US-led Western camp, which means that Turkey is an ally of Russia and will directly or indirectly counter-act any NATO manoeuver against Russia.
In simple words, Turkey’s strengthening relations with Russia mean a full NATO member working in a very close tandem with a country that happens to be the reason for NATO’s very existence in the post-cold war era. That certainly sounds counter-intuitive in terms of what NATO seems to stand for, thanks to Russia’s active and truly anti-terror policy in the Middle East where the organization has not only failed to eradicate terror, but its biggest military power, the US, also stands accused of plotting a coup against Turkey, the second biggest NATO power; hence, the crisis within NATO.
The US and the NATO have clearly sensed that their current position is not comparable to the pre-conflict scenario, which means that they need to re-define their relationships with a number of countries. Ironically, the first on the list happens to be Turkey. And, its first emphatic glimpse game on last Monday when HR McMaster, Donald Trump’s National Security Adviser, described Turkey along with Qatar as two countries responsible for the spread of extremist and radical Islamist ideology.
While he did make a passing reference to Saudia’s past involvement in the spread of radical ideology, he emphasised that Qatar and Turkey were more involved into it, adding further that the core reason for Turkey’s growing problems with the West was largely the rise of the Justice and Development Party, to which president Erdogan belongs, in Turkey and presumably its connection with extremism.
While McMaster didn’t make any reference to Turkey’s growing relations with Russia, he did not hesitate to describe Russia and China, just a few days before his Monday statement, as two “revisionist powers”, encroaching on US allies (read: Turkey) and thus bent upon undermining the (US dominated) international order. When the two statements are read together, McMaster seems to clearly mean that the “revisionist powers” are not only undermining the US dominated order, but also bent upon undoing the gains the US claims to have made in its 17 years of ‘war on terror’ by allying with powers, such as Turkey, which are spreading ‘terror’ in the Middle East.
There is as such a little more than a coincidence that McMaster’s verbal attack on Turkey came just within hours of Erdogan’s meeting Russia’s Putin. This meeting not only greatly underscored the fast growing alliance between the two states but also indicated the potential lift both leaders are in the middle of giving to their relations.
“We see significant prospects for expansion of cooperation in the military-technical sphere. We finalized the credit agreement during today’s work and I hope it will be signed in the soonest possible time,” Putin said after talks with his Turkish counterpart, Erdogan.
Erdogan added that “the relevant agencies of our two countries are expected to complete what needs to be done this week” with regard to Turkey’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 missile system. The purchase of Russian defence system in no small thing within NATO’s strategic culture; for, as it stands and as hinted above, what it potentially means is integration of Russian systems within the ‘NATO territory’, which further means that Russia is now setting its own foot in response to NATO’s own advances towards Russia through Ukraine. Erdogan’s this particualr statement came only few days after he had criticized NATO for interfering in Turkey’s defence deals. The deal, besides it, is also a clear rebuff to the US & NATO’s withdrawal of Patriot air defence batteries from Turkey.
Besides the co-operation in military and technical fields, it is particualr the Syrian end-game that has brought Turkey and Russia as much closer as it has driven a wedge between the Turkey and NATO, whose officials were reported to have said that “No NATO ally currently operates the S-400″, implying that Turkey was perhaps no longer an ally.
Thanks to Russia’s ability and capacity to use its leverage over the Kurds, Turkey is no longer even objecting to a Kurdish participation in the Russia led Syrian National Dialogue. Not only does this badly isolate the US in the region—one again—but also leaves with potentially no effective allies on the ground to influence the Syrian end-game and manage a loose ended military presence in Syria even.
“We have handed the list of those who represent the Kurds to Russia,” said recently Turkey’s foreign minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu.
He sounded fairly positive when asked if Kurdish groups other than the YPG could join a conference on Syria’s future to be organized by Russia. There is, as other reports have indicated, more to it than meets the eye.
Russia and Turkey are already in the middle of negotiating the ways and means of clearing Afrin of the Kurdish militia, YPG. Were this to happen, this will be a major paradigm shift not only in Russia-Turkey bi-lateral relations but also in terms of striking at the heart of American interests in the region. While a new flashpoint may arise out of a possible Russia-Turkish operation in Afrin, what is clearly on the horizon is that this flashpoint may very well turn out to be the last nail in the coffin for Turkey’s status as a full NATO member.
While NATO so far has no precedent of ousting a member, and any such decision on Turkey will require unanimity in the organisation, what is becoming evident is that Turkey might just become the first country to face an ‘ex-communication’ from NATO, which might just be necessary to complete its embrace with Russia and re-define its regional and global position.
Salman Rafi Sheikh, research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.
Ajit Pai, President Trump’s hand-picked Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, completed his boss’s directive to dismantle net neutrality today. Claiming without evidence that gutting net neutrality would spur innovation, Pai cast the deciding vote on a package of measures that remove the popular Obama-era regulations that prevented internet service providers from controlling the speeds at which content travels across their networks.
While Democrats have been united in their opposition to Pai’s plan, net neutrality hasn’t been among the top issues Republicans have been talking about for the past year. Few have offered much more than tacit support for Trump’s plan to hand the keys to the internet over to broadband owners. On the eve of the FCC’s vote, however, 107 GOP members of congress came out of the shadows and sent a letter (screen shot below) to Ajit Pai offering their full support for the controversial move.
TeleCom providers like Comcast and AT&T have lobbied hard against net neutrality for months, and Republicans in congress have been particularly receptive to their overtures. Kaleigh RogersandJason Koebler at Vice News just revealed how receptive they have been.
They’ve documented how much in “donations” 84 of those members have received from TeleCom industry giants. Here’s their entire list:
Featured image: Owner of 175 companies, including restaurant chains and Tottenham Hotspur football club – whose fans call themselves the “Yid Army” – the very discreet billionaire Joe Lewis speculates on the exchange market in partnership with his friend George Soros.
The Argentinian authorities are wondering about the massive purchase of land in Patagonia by a British billionaire, and the “holidays” that tens of thousands of Israeli soldiers are enjoying on his property.
In the 19th century, the British government were undecided as to where they should settle Israel – either in what is now Uganda, in Argentina or in Palestine. In fact, Argentina was at that time controlled by the United Kingdom and, on the initiative of French baron Maurice de Hirsch, had become a land of refuge for Jews who were fleeing the pogroms in central Europe.
In the 20th century, after the military coup d’Etat against democratically elected President General Juan Perón, a current of antisemitism developed within the armed forces. A brochure was distributed accusing the new State of Israël of preparing an invasion of Patagonia, the “Andinia Plan”.
It has become apparent today that even though the Argentinian extreme right had exaggerated the facts in the 1970’s, there was indeed a project for implantation (and not invasion) in Patagonia.
Everything changed with the Falklands War in 1982. At that time, the Argentinian military junta attempted to recuperate the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, which from their point of view had been occupied by the British for a century and a half. The UNO recognised the legitimacy of the Argentinian claim, but the Security Council condemned the use of force to recover these territories. The stakes are considerable, since the territorial waters of these archipelagos offer access to all the riches of the Antarctic continent.
At the end of this war, which cost more than a thousand lives (official British figures are largely understated), London imposed a particularly severe Peace Treaty on Buenos Aires – Argentinian armed forces are limited to their most simple expression. Above all, the control of their Southern and Antarctic air space is confiscated for the profit of the Royal Air Force, and they are obliged to inform the United Kingdom about all their operations.
In 1992 and 1994, two particularly devastating, murderous and mysterious attacks successively destroyed the Israëli embassy and the headquarters of the Israëli association AMIA. The first attack took place when the station chiefs of Israëli Intelligence had just left the building. The second occurred in the context of joint Egypt-Argentinian research for the development of Condor ballistic missiles. In the same period, the main Condor factory exploded, and the sons of Presidents Carlos Menem and Hafez el-Assad died accidentally. The various enquiries gave rise to a succession of manipulations.
After having blamed Syria, prosecutor Alberto Nisman turned on Iran, whom he accused of having ordered the two attacks, and Hezbollah, who he claimed had carried them out. The ex- Peronist President Cristina Kirchner was accused of having negotiated the end of the legal proceedings against Iran in exchange for advantageous oil prices. Prosecutor Nisman was found dead at his home, and President Kirchner was found guilty of high treason. However, last week, a coup de theâtre destroyed everything we though we knew – the United States FBI handed over DNA analyses which attest to the absence of the presumed terrorist among the victims, and the presence of a body which has never been identified. 25 years later, we know nothing more about these attacks.
In the 21st century, benefitting from the advantages offered them by the Falklands War Treaty, the United Kingdom and Israël are now setting up a new project Patagonia.
British billionaire Joe Lewis has acquired immense territories in the South of Argentina and even neighbouring Chile. His properties cover areas several times larger than the State of Israël. They are situated in Tierra del Fuego, at the extreme Southern point of the continent. In particular, they surround the Lago Escondido, which effectively denies access to the entire region, despite a legal injunction.
The billionaire has built a private airport with a two kilometre landing strip, in order to be able to receive civil and military aircraft.
Since the Falklands War, the Israeli army has been organising “holiday camps” (sic) in Patagonia for its soldiers. Between 8,000 and 10,000 of them now come every year to spend two weeks on Joe Lewis’ land.
While in the 1970’s, the Argentinian army noted the construction of 25,000 empty houses, which gave rise to the myth of the Andinia Plan, hundreds of thousands have been built today.
It is impossible to verify the state of the construction work, since these are private lands, and Google Earth has neutralised the satellite photographs of the area, just as it does with NATO’s military installations.
Neighbouring Chile has handed over a submarine base to Israël. Tunnels have been dug in order to survive the polar winter.
The Mapuche Indians who inhabit both Argentinian and Chilean Patagonia were surprised to learn that the Resistencia Ancestral Mapuche (RAM) had been reactivated in London. This is a mysterious organisation which fights for independence. First accused of being an old association recuperated by the Argentinian secret services, the RAM is today considered by the left as a legitimate secessionist movement.
On 15 November 2017, the Navy lost all contact with the submarine ARA San Juan, which was finally declared lost at sea. It was one of the TR 1700 class diesel-electric submarines which were the flagships of the reduced Argentinian army. The Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO) has announced that it has recorded an unusual acoustic phenomenon in the Atlantic, close to the area from which the San Juan sent its last signal. The government finally admitted that the submarine was on a non-specified “secret mission”, of which London had been informed. The USA began a search, while the Russian Navy deployed a drone capable of exploring the ocean to a depth of 6,000 metres, but found nothing. The San Juan probably exploded. The Argentinian Press is convinced that the submarine had either collided with a mine, or was destroyed by an enemy torpedo.
It is impossible for the moment to determine if Israël is engaged in a programme for the exploitation of Antarctica, or if it is building a rear base in case of defeat in Palestine.
In late September this year, the State of Palestine was accepted as a member of the International Criminal Police Organisation (Interpol) and a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Immediately, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu moved “to discuss a plan with the administration of US President Donald Trump and members of the Congress to pressure the Palestinians and stop their unilateral actions in the international arena with the aim of disrupting the trial of Israeli officials in international courts and even moving towards the closure of the PLO [Palestine Liberation Organisation] office in Washington” (which Palestinians call an embassy) unless they stop taking such “unilateral” actions! According to the state-owned KAN Israeli television: “The plan to close down the PLO office was discussed during Netanyahu’s meeting with David Friedman, the US Ambassador to Tel Aviv, the American envoy Gibson Greenblatt and Israeli Ambassador to the US, Ron Dremer.”
In 1994, the United States had allowed the PLO (as the official representative of all Palestinians) to open an office in Washington. Former US president Bill Clinton had waived a law that required renewal of certification every six months. In December 2015, the US Congress passed a law imposing conditions on the PLO office, stipulating that the organisation cannot run its office if it pursues prosecution of Israeli officials in the ICC on crimes against the Palestinians. Trump administration used this law to blackmail the Palestinian side, informing the PLO that its office will be closed, citing statements by Palestinian officials pledging to prosecute Israel at the International Criminal Court. A week after this decision, the US State Department notified the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) that it didn’t plan to recertify its office in Washington, unless the PNA resumes peace negotiations with Israel and halt moves to prosecute Israeli officials.
“While we all know that the US administration cannot be a fair mediator between Palestinians and Israelis, the Trump administration persists in being unjust.”-Professor As’ad Abdul Rahman
The Trump administration is the first since the 1993 Oslo agreements, which has not explicitly stated that the achievement of peace is based on the two-state solution and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in the 1967 Palestinian Territories (with occupied East Jerusalem as its capital), and did not even care to explicitly condemn Jewish colonisation drive. Saeb Erekat, the Secretary of the PLO, has referred to “27 draft resolutions in the US Congress to punish the Palestinian people, foremost of which is cutting aid to the Palestinian people, halting certification of the PLO office and moving the American Embassy to occupied Jerusalem. Though, the American extortion is not new in principle, since it was practised by former American administrations against the Palestinians, yet the new development is that the Trump administration did not hesitate to declare its real purpose behind this step. The American intention is to force the Palestinian leadership to return to the negotiating table with Israel according to Israeli conditions, on top of which is avoiding to freeze Jewish colonisation of Palestinian lands by building colonies.
In fact, a few weeks ago, the Foreign Relations Committee in Washington passed a bill that would stop $300 million (Dh1.10 billion) in annual aid from the US to the PNA, “unless it stops spending what the bill described as money that rewards perpetrators of acts of violence against Israeli and American citizens”. In a parallel move, 16 Republican and Democratic members of the Committee have asked the US Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, to “lead international efforts so that other countries take similar actions”. It is known that the US provides $500 million to the PNA annually, and if the legislation becomes effective, the PNA will be granted only $60 million, which is originally earmarked for security coordination with the Israeli occupation authorities.
It is strange that while the US recognises the PLO, it still classifies the organisation as a terrorist group. When Democrats formed a majority in Congress during previous administrations, the six-month waiver, allowing the PLO office to remain open, was brought up at times without taking effect. The White House administrations that link their moves to the country’s higher interests used to show some understanding earlier on. However, nowadays, the Congress, with a Republican majority, is more dominated by Zionist forces, which increased its antagonism towards the PLO. The present White House administration, regardless of the Congress animosity, receives and negotiates with the Palestinian official leadership, while taking a hard-line position towards it. While we all know that the American administration cannot be a fair mediator between Palestinians and Israelis, the Trump administration persists in being unjust. The world can see that the Palestinians always demonstrate their readiness to engage in serious negotiations to achieve peace on the basis of a two-state solution, while Israel hinders efforts towards such a goal. So, it is Israel that should be punished and not the Palestinians. In this context, the recent testimony provided by former US secretary of state John Kerry attests to such facts.
It is remarkable that recent American actions, such as the recognition of occupied Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, are inconsistent with what Trump is talking about to achieve the “Deal of the Century”. Therefore, the entire American-Palestinian relationship must be reconsidered. Trump cannot talk about a historic agreement, and then indulge in political blackmailing of the Palestinians, even as the Netanyahu government continues with its nefarious acts such as land theft and colonisation, ethnic displacement and systematic repression of Palestinians.
Professor As’ad Abdul Rahman is the chairman of the Palestinian Encyclopaedia.
When retired General Wesley Clark reported in March 2007 that, according to his source, the U.S was going to attack seven countries in five years[1], he was announcing to the world an acceleration of pre-planned, cataclysmic, criminal warfare.
We were warned in advance, but most of us paid little attention. Lies and crimes of imperial overlords are always well masked, and the post 911 wars are no exception. The Military Industrial Media Complex sold us these wars, and they will write the histories of these wars as well. Most of us will remain oblivious to reality, as long as we are the ones not being slaughtered. The unstated, criminal logic is that “The ‘Other’ always deserves what he gets”.Canadians seemingly accept the notion that Syria deserves to be destroyed. It is an insane idea, but unconsciously at least, Canadians accept it.
Canadians’ tacit consent for their government’s criminal warmongering would be withdrawn if there was any truth in mainstream media war messaging, but the media conglomerates won’t be dissolved overnight, the CBC will continue to vomit war propaganda, and an informed public won’t emerge anytime soon. Consequently, Canadians still think that al Qaeda blew up the World Trade Center Buildings, they still think that the “War on Terror” is legitimate, and they still think that our military is fighting for freedom and democracy.
Syria and its allies know better. They are the ones destroying the terrorists. They are the ones waging the real war on terror, and they are the ones fighting for freedom and democracy.
Shame on us for thinking otherwise.
The following formula is used to “take out” countries. Each step was employed against non-belligerent Syria.
Illegal regime change announcements are publicly disclosed, coupled with evidence-free atrocity stories, and a demonization campaign against the “prey” country’s leader. War is portrayed as a “humanitarian” undertaking.
Deadly sanctions are imposed which target civilians. The illegal sanctions amount to mass murder, impoverish the country, and create desperation.
Proxy mercenary terrorists are deployed, many flying different banners, and branded in different ways, all with a view to concealing the fact that they are all Western-supported, sectarian terrorists, including ISIS.
(The notion of “going after” your own terrorists is a perfect ruse, because it provides cover for destroying 7 countries in five years.)
Proxy terrorists destroy the country and perpetrate an overseas holocaust.
Coalition forces illegally provide air support for terrorists and bomb civilian infrastructure.
The “end game” is to erase the country and its identity.
Each of us can do something to make a positive difference. Sharing the truth about Syria disempowers the diabolical North American Military Industrial Media Complex that is enslaving us all. The following interview is a window into the Syria that our governments want to disappear.
Carla Ortiz, Reverend Ashdown, and Mohammad Alrefai discuss Syrian realities
All of the post-9/11 wars were sold to Western audiences through a sophisticated network of interlocking governing agencies that disseminate propaganda to both domestic and foreign audiences. But the dirty war on Syria is different. The degree of war propaganda levelled at Syria and contaminating humanity at this moment is likely unprecedented. I had studied and written about Syria for years, so I was not entirely surprised by what I saw.
(Excerpt from Preface, Mark Taliano’s book “Voices from Syria“, Global Research, Montreal, 2017)
In a pattern largely overlooked by many, roughly half of the mainland members of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are experiencing various degrees of regime change instability, with the asymmetrical warfare model presently active in Southern Africa closely resembling the one that was already applied in the neighboring “Global South” region of South America.
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is a regional integration organization that brings together most of sub-equatorial Africa and is largely considered to be a platform for extending BRICS member South Africa’s influence throughout this broad area. After all, South Africa’s Southern African Customs Union (SACU) forms the economic core of the group and has the potential of one day expanding northward to incorporate SADC’s other members. This is a possible eventuality, albeit a long-term one, due to the 2015 Tripartite Free Trade Area(TFTA) between SADC and its counterparts of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and the East African Community (EAC, which has future plans to formally become a federation).
The overarching trend connecting these interlocking organizations together is China’s Silk Road vision for Africa, which the author elaborated on in depth in the relevant chapter of his book-length article series about the Chinese-Indian New Cold War. To be brief about it, Beijing is driving “South-South” connectivity as a means of ensuring that Africa and the People’s Republic truly have a “community of common destiny”, in that China and its partners in the TFTA can economically complement one another all throughout the 21st century in creating a strategic center of gravity in the Afro-Pacific region. Unsurprisingly, this contrasts with American strategy because the success of this ambitious and multidimensional endeavor would complete the transition from the fading Unipolar World Order to the emerging Multipolar World Order, hence the need to wage various Hybrid War campaigns in order to disrupt, control, or influence this development.
In the context of this particular article, it’ll be revealed how the US’ Hybrid War on SADC has resulted in throwing roughly half of the community’s mainland members into five separate phases of regime change turmoil. Aside from the four insular states of Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, and Seychelles, the continental countries who have been mostly unaffected by this so far are Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Swaziland, and Tanzania. While it may seem odd that an entire piece is being written in order to prove a pattern that purportedly exists among 6 of the bloc’s 16 total members, the fact of the matter is that the affected states cover a gigantic geographic area and encompass some of its most strategically important states. To list them off, the targeted SADC countries are Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Mozambique, the Republic of South Africa (RSA), Zambia, and Zimbabwe, with the below map helping the reader understand the sheer scale of this regime change intrigue on a continental level:
Hybrid War SADC States
Red: Hybrid War SADC States Blue: Non-Targeted SADC States
The caveat to the above is that the blue non-targeted states might be victimized in the future, whether directly through their own Hybrid War regime change plots or indirectly as a result of their neighbors’ crises potentially spilling over their border and into their territory. Even so, the disturbing trend of 6 geographically large and relatively populous SADC states experiencing differing extents of unrest all within the same 12-month period point to an unmistakable pattern that the author is describing as the “SADC Spring” because it represents a new level of coordinated regime change activity masterfully adapted for each particular battlefield. Unlike the previous “springs” which were known for deceptively presenting themselves as anti-government “people’s protests”, the SADC Spring mostly eschews that specific technology in favor of “deep state”/”constitutional” coups or militant activity. This doesn’t imply that the basic “building bloc” of the “spring” brand won’t occur at any time, but just that it’s no longer the force that the conspirators are depending on like they did in times past.
Before concisely reviewing the events that make up the SADC Spring theater-wide regime change campaign, it’s important to link what’s happening in sub-equatorial Africa to what’s recently taken place in sub-equatorial South America through the US’ “Operation Condor 2.0”, which is the author’s characterization of the US’ prior application of the same newly evolved “spring” technology in that part of the world. Whether through the “electoral coup” in Argentina or the “constitutional” one in Brazil, the US has managed to substantially sweep away the state-level results of the so-called “Pink Tide” and replace those said leaderships with pro-American right-wing governments. Pairing Operation Condor 2.0 with the SADC Spring, one can plainly see that the US is truly on the asymmetrical offensive all across the literal “Global South” (in the sense of being the Southern Hemispheric states below the equator), and that the examined events in Africa merely represent the continuation of the US’ tendency to indirectly conduct asymmetrical warfare campaigns in peripheral regions of impending strategic significance to its global Chinese rival.
At this point, the analysis will transition to raising awareness about the five separate phases of regime change turmoil that have engulfed many of SADC’s mainland members. The reader should know that the hyperlinked text below is designed to connect them with the author’s previous works on the matter, which include his Hybrid War profiles of the countries in question as well as recent materials. This could be useful to those who want to learn more about these topics beyond the admittedly broad scope that they’re presented in for this article. Having said all of that, here’s how the 6 Hybrid War-afflicted SADC states can be categorized in order of the most “peaceful” regime change transition to the most violent ongoing one:
Successful:
Angola’s“deep state” coup against the dos Santos family was successful, and furthermore, it led to no unrest whatsoever in the streets. It was a swift “electoral” coup that took place entirely behind the scenes, and given the passive support of the military and intelligence services in not preventing or reacting to it, the assumption can confidently be made that they were in favor of it happening. Similarly, a different type of “deep state” coup took place in nearby Zimbabwe, although this one was very dramatic and can be accurately described as more of a military coup. Nevertheless, the ruling party did indeed vote to remove Mugabe, demonstrating military-political coordination and confirming its “deep state” origins. Whereas the Angola “deep state” coup was entirely peaceful, the Zimbabwean one was not, though both of them still ended up succeeding but with uncertain long-term geopolitical results that remain to be seen.
Thwarted:
Moving up the Hybrid War escalatory ladder is Zambia, which found itself threatened by a Color Revolution after the August 2016 election of President Edgar Lungu. It took some time, but by summer 2017, the government had to impose a state of emergency because of the opposition’s riotous behavior in organizing violent crowds and firebomb attacks. The situation has largely calmed down since then, however, but the political polarization within the country hasn’t. President Lungu’s party narrowly won the 2016 vote, and Zambia is electorally divided between his strongholds in the east and the opposition’s bastion of support in the west. More than likely, Zambia’s frozen Hybrid War will thaw out in the coming months as stability and the rule of law continue to deteriorate in the neighboring Congo, with the cross-border consequences potentially prompting a scenario where the opposition decides to commence a renewed round of anti-government unrest.
Peacefully Ongoing:
The next Hybrid War battleground to be discussed is South Africa’s, where the opposition and its external patrons have relentlessly attempted to carry out a peaceful “constitutional coup” against President Zuma, anticipating that the success of this operation would deal a deathblow to the country’s practical integration in BRICS just like the removal of Rousseff did for Brazil. Again, one can identity the similarities between these two pro-American Hybrid War campaigns in the “Global (and geographic) South” against two BRICS members, as they both were plotted via “constitutional” means, though the Brazilian one incorporated a degree of “traditional” Color Revolution unrest in order to give it a level of “legitimacy” to the international audience.
The ruling African National Congress (ANC) is slated to hold its next conference in the coming days, and this gathering acquires extra significance because it’s thought to set the party’s trajectory for the post-Zuma period after the incumbent’s term ends in 2019. This makes it so that the upcoming event will determine the course of the planned-constitutional regime change in the country, with the most influential variable being the competing interests of internal party factions that will guide it in one direction or another. There’s a speculative chance that some cadres might seek to move the ANC in an altogether different direction so as to increase its electoral appeal and provide more convincing competition in the face of the rising opposition, but there’s no telling yet whether this would be a positive or negative development for the country’s multipolar geopolitics.
Low-Intensity Violence:
Scaling up the violence threshold in the SADC Spring, South Africa’s neighboring energy-rich state of Mozambique has found itself embroiled in two fronts of low-intensity violence, one with the rebel-opposition group RENAMO in the western-central regions and the other more newly created one with Muslim terrorists (possibly linked to Al Shabaab) in the north. While the more traditional militia-government violence has subsided ever since both sides agreed to indefinitely extend their ceasefire in order to facilitate a power-sharing “political solution” to their rivalry, the newfound terrorist-government conflict isn’t yet resolved and might even be exacerbated by the authorities’ decision to close down local mosques as a preventative security measure.
Almost 1/5 of Mozambicans are Muslim, so this could have the unintended effect of making them susceptible to the idea that the government is “suppressing” them, thus inspiring some of this demographic to resort to militancy and jihad in response. The author previously warned about a “Swahili Coast” Hybrid War scenario which might see the Muslim-inhabited portions of the East African coastland in Mozambique, Tanzania, and Kenya erupting in revolt against their national governments. This possibility needs to be closely monitored and immediately responded to by the relevant states in order to contain it, possibly even including coordinated multilateral responses especially in the event that Daesh decides to get involved in making the region another “province” in its global “caliphate”.
Civil War Risk:
The highest stage of Hybrid War regime change conflict presently ongoing in the SADC space is in the Congo, which has been wreaked by ever-spreading instability since President Kabila announced late last year that the country’s first-ever democratic political transition will be delayed because of logistical difficulties. Truth be told, this was entirely foreseeable, as the author wrote in his June 2016 analysis for The Duran, because the Congo occupies a crucial place in the New Cold War between the US and China due to its copious cobalt reserves that are nowadays intrinsic to all sorts of electronic products from advanced armaments to iPhones and electric vehicles. Different terrorist attacks have taken place all throughout the country, though the focus point of violence has been the central Kasai region and the eastern parts of the Congo near Rwanda and Uganda, though the latter area holds with it the dangerous potential of becoming a cross-border terrorist nexus that could catalyze another “African World War” by next year with profound humanitarian implications.
***
As a concluding thought, the below map uses color shading to illustrate the intensity of the 6 examined Hybrid War cases, which could possibly provide clues about their overspill potential throughout the SADC region and beyond. The escalation chain goes from Angola à Zimbabwe à South Africa à Mozambique à Congo, but the model predicts that the latter two states’ destabilizations could potentially spread across their borders in causing trouble for Zambia and then Tanzania.
Zambia, as was already explained, had recently thwarted an incipient Hybrid War, but the landlocked state will have difficult dealing with the possibility of simultaneous crises in its Congolese and Mozambican neighbors, and this would be bound to disrupt the TAZARA railway and therefore trigger consequences for Tanzania’s stability as well. Not only that, but the growing refugee crisis that the Congo’s meltdown is creating for Angola might bring the whole cycle full-circle and suck the southwestern African state into the Hybrid War void there.
All in all, what the above SADC Spring model and below map indicate is that this part of Africa isn’t anywhere near as stable as some might have previously considered it to be, and that it’s silently become a serious zone of competition in the New Cold War. When remembering what the US has already accomplished in South America, it should be clear to see that Washington is on the full-fledged asymmetrical offensive in the “Global (and literal) South”, far away from the ‘prying eyes’ of the international media but nevertheless on the forefront of its worldwide counterstrike against multipolarity.
Hybrid War escalation chain in South Africa
Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare.
All images, except the featured, in this article are from the author.
Featured image: Peter Strzok, who served as a Deputy Assistant Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, second in command of counterintelligence. (Source: Consortiumnews)
The disclosure of fiercely anti-Trump text messages between two romantically involved senior FBI officials who played key roles in the early Russia-gate inquiry has turned the supposed Russian-election-meddling “scandal” into its own scandal, by providing evidence that some government investigators saw it as their duty to block or destroy Donald Trump’s presidency.
As much as the U.S. mainstream media has mocked the idea that an American “deep state” exists and that it has maneuvered to remove Trump from office, the text messages between senior FBI counterintelligence official Peter Strzok and senior FBI lawyer Lisa Page reveal how two high-ranking members of the government’s intelligence/legal bureaucracy saw their role as protecting the United States from an election that might elevate to the presidency someone as unfit as Trump.
In one Aug. 6, 2016 text exchange, Page told Strzok:
“Maybe you’re meant to stay where you are because you’re meant to protect the country from that menace.”
At the end of that text, she sent Strzok a link to a David Brooks column in The New York Times, which concludes with the clarion call:
“There comes a time when neutrality and laying low become dishonorable. If you’re not in revolt, you’re in cahoots. When this period and your name are mentioned, decades hence, your grandkids will look away in shame.”
Apparently after reading that stirring advice, Strzok replied,
“And of course I’ll try and approach it that way. I just know it will be tough at times. I can protect our country at many levels, not sure if that helps.”
At a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, criticized Strzok’s boast that “I can protect our country at many levels.” Jordan said:
“this guy thought he was super-agent James Bond at the FBI [deciding] there’s no way we can let the American people make Donald Trump the next president.”
In the text messages, Strzok also expressed visceral contempt for working-class Trump voters, for instance, writing on Aug. 26, 2016,
“Just went to a southern Virginia Walmart. I could SMELL the Trump support. … it’s scary real down here.”
Another text message suggested that other senior government officials – alarmed at the possibility of a Trump presidency – joined the discussion. In an apparent reference to an August 2016 meeting with FBI DeputyDirector Andrew McCabe, Strzok wrote to Page on Aug. 15, 2016,
“I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy’s office — that there’s no way he gets elected — but I’m afraid we can’t take that risk.”
Strzok added,
“It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event that you die before you’re 40.”
It’s unclear what strategy these FBI officials were contemplating to ensure Trump’s defeat, but the comments mesh with what an intelligence source told me after the 2016 election, that there was a plan among senior Obama administration officials to use the allegations about Russian meddling to block Trump’s momentum with the voters and — if elected — to persuade members of the Electoral College to deny Trump a majority of votes and thus throw the selection of a new president into the House of Representatives under the rules of the Twelfth Amendment.
The scheme involved having some Democratic electors vote for former Secretary of State Colin Powell (which did happen), making him the third-place vote-getter in the Electoral College and thus eligible for selection by the House. But the plan fizzled when enough of Trump’s electors stayed loyal to their candidate to officially make him President.
After that, Trump’s opponents turned to the Russia-gate investigation as the vehicle to create the conditions for somehow nullifying the election, impeaching Trump, or at least weakening him sufficiently so he could not take steps to improve relations with Russia.
In one of her text messages to Strzok, Page made reference to a possible Watergate-style ouster of Trump, writing:
“Bought all the president’s men. Figure I needed to brush up on watergate.”
As a key feature in this oust-Trump effort, Democrats have continued to lie by claiming that “all 17 U.S. intelligence agencies concurred” in the assessment that Russia hacked the Democratic emails last year on orders from President Vladimir Putin and then slipped them to WikiLeaks to undermine Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
That canard was used in the early months of the Russia-gate imbroglio to silence any skepticism about the “hacking” accusation, and the falsehood was repeated again by a Democratic congressman during Wednesday’s hearing of the House Judiciary Committee.
But the “consensus” claim was never true. In May 2017 testimony, President Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper acknowledged that the Jan. 6 “Intelligence Community Assessment” was put together by “hand-picked” analysts from only three agencies: the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency.
Biased at the Creation
And, the new revelations of high-level FBI bias puts Clapper’s statement about “hand-picked” analysts in sharper perspective, since any intelligence veteran will tell you that if you hand-pick the analysts you are effectively hand-picking the analysis.
Although it has not yet been spelled out exactly what role Strzok and Page may have had in the Jan. 6 report, I was told by one source that Strzok had a direct hand in writing it. Whether that is indeed the case, Strzok, as a senior FBI counterintelligence official, would almost surely have had input into the selection of the FBI analysts and thus into the substance of the report itself. [For challenges from intelligence experts to the Jan. 6 report, see Consortiumnews.com’s “More Holes in the Russia-gate Narrative.“]
If the FBI contributors to the Jan. 6 report shared Strzok’s contempt for Trump, it could explain why claims from an unverified dossier of Democratic-financed “dirt” on Trump, including salacious charges that Russian intelligence operatives videotaped Trump being urinated on by prostitutes in a five-star Moscow hotel, was added as a classified appendix to the report and presented personally to President-elect Trump.
Though Democrats and the Clinton campaign long denied financing the dossier – prepared by ex-British spy Christopher Steele who claimed to rely on second- and third-hand information from anonymous Russian contacts – it was revealed in October 2017 that the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign shared in the costs, with the payments going to the “oppo” research firm, Fusion GPS, through the Democrats’ law firm, Perkins Coie.
That discovery helped ensnare another senior Justice Department official, Associate Attorney General Bruce Ohr, who talked with Steele during the campaign and had a post-election meeting with Fusion GPS co-founder Glenn Simpson. Recently, Simpson has acknowledged that Ohr’s wife, Nellie Ohr, was hired by Fusion GPS last year to investigate Trump.
Bruce Ohr has since been demoted and Strzok was quietly removed from the Russia-gate investigation last July although the reasons for these moves were not publicly explained at the time.
Still, the drive for “another Watergate” to oust an unpopular – and to many insiders, unfit – President remains at the center of the thinking among the top mainstream news organizations as they have scrambled for Russia-gate “scoops” over the past year even at the cost of making serious reporting errors.
For instance, last Friday, CNN — and then CBS News and MSNBC — trumpeted an email supposedly sent from someone named Michael J. Erickson on Sept. 4, 2016, to Donald Trump Jr. that involved WikiLeaks offering the Trump campaign pre-publication access to purloined Democratic National Committee emails that WikiLeaks published on Sept. 13, nine days later.
Grasping for Confirmation
Since the Jan. 6 report alleged that WikiLeaks received the “hacked” emails from Russia — a claim that WikiLeaks and Russia deny — the story seemed to finally tie together the notion that the Trump campaign had at least indirectly colluded with Russia.
This new “evidence” spread like wildfire across social media. As The Intercept’s Glenn Greenwaldwrote in an article critical of the media’s performance, some Russia-gate enthusiasts heralded the revelation with graphics of cannons booming and nukes exploding.
But the story soon collapsed when it turned out that the date on the email was actually Sept. 14, 2016, i.e., the day after WikiLeaks released the batch of DNC emails, not Sept. 4. It appeared that “Erickson” – whoever he was – had simply alerted the Trump campaign to the public existence of the WikiLeaks disclosure.
“So numerous are the false stories about Russia and Trump over the last year that I literally cannot list them all.”
Yet, despite the cascade of errors and grudging corrections, including some belated admissions that there was no “17-intelligence-agency consensus” on Russian “hacking” – The New York Times made a preemptive strike against the new documentary evidence that the Russia-gate investigation was riddled with conflicts of interest.
The Times’ lead editorial on Wednesday mocked reporters at Fox News for living in an “alternate universe” where the Russia-gate “investigation is ‘illegitimate and corrupt,’ or so says Gregg Jarrett, a legal analyst who appears regularly on [Sean] Hannity’s nightly exercise in presidential ego-stroking.”
Though briefly mentioning the situation with Strzok’s text messages, the Times offered no details or context for the concerns, instead just heaping ridicule on anyone who questions the Russia-gate narrative.
“To put it mildly, this is insane,” the Times declared. “The primary purpose of Mr. Mueller’s investigation is not to take down Mr. Trump. It’s to protect America’s national security and the integrity of its elections by determining whether a presidential campaign conspired with a foreign adversary to influence the 2016 election – a proposition that grows more plausible every day.”
The Times fumed that “roughly three-quarters of Republicans still refuse to accept that Russia interfered in the 2016 election – a fact that is glaringly obvious to everyone else, including the nation’s intelligence community.” (There we go again with the false suggestion of a consensus within the intelligence community.)
The Times also took to task Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, for seeking “a Special Counsel to investigate ALL THINGS 2016 – not just Trump and Russia.” The Times insisted that “None of these attacks or insinuations are grounded in good faith.”
But what are the Times editors so afraid of? As much as they try to insult and intimidate anyone who demands serious evidence about the Russia-gate allegations, why shouldn’t the American people be informed about how Washington insiders manipulate elite opinion in pursuit of reversing “mistaken” judgments by the unwashed masses?
Do the Times editors really believe in democracy – a process that historically has had its share of warts and mistakes – or are they just elitists who think they know best and turn away their noses from the smell of working-class people at Walmart?
Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).
Cell phones are so bright and cheery and a thing of our time, that we forget their darker beginnings connected to WWII and radars. Their growing presence, everywhere we go, their utility and our mundane use of them, help us overlook their increasing complexity and their impact on our lives. In general, we have little understanding of how they work really, or knowledge about their effects on us. Our love for technology and our fear of it keep us close and away. It also provide us with a naïve hope that all our troubles, which at times seem overwhelming, can be solved by our goddess technology. But technology does not offer magical solutions, and often creates problems of its own. We forget this and use it recklessly, often failing to think in terms of safety first, not learning caution from the past.
Cell phones, and the towers they need to function, generate radiation. Cell phones numbers have increased fast, by 2010 there were already 5 billion cell phones in the world and 2 years later the number had grown by .5 billion; just extrapolating from this we can guess that there are easily more than 6 billion cell phones in a world of 7.6 billion people, not too far from a phone for each one of us. Because cell phones could not exist without their towers and grids to help them connect, we also live within that grid of microwave radiation. Still, we do not seem concerned about it, or about its effects on our health and the health of our children. Science is showing that we should, and a campaign about keeping cell phones at a distance started.
Microwaves in our ovens
Paul Brodeaur, a graduate from Andover and Harvard, Army counter intelligence in Germany in the 50s and a staff writer for The New Yorker, raised concerns about microwave radiation in his book “The Zapping of America.” Brodeaur made the connection between radars and microwave ovens. He believed microwave ovens were dangerous because the electromagnetic energy they use can radiate and penetrate deeply into the human body causing damage. There were other culprits, radars, FM radio, TV transmitters all using microwaves (MW). Brodeaur was particularly concerned about the effects of repeated MW radiation exposure on children; he argued that radiation leaked into homes making safety an issue. Brodeaur believed standards were lax, subjecting people to excessive exposure. Nobody questions this, he said, because our modern weapon system (radars, satellites, space communication) depends on MW. (1)
Microwave ovens were developed by Raytheon in the US; they also made the magnetrons used by radars in WWII. Their first microwave oven prototype was completed in 1947; it took until 1955 for the first domestic model to emerge. It was called “RadaRange” a name connecting too closely ovens and radars so it disappeared by the mid 70s replaced by the most acceptable one of “microwave oven,” which became popular and a must in every home. In the US the number of units sold each year climbed reaching a million in 1975. About 24% of US homes had them by 1986 and 90% had them by 1997 when they could be bought for U$S 200. Today, more than 30 million microwave ovens are sold annually throughout the world. (2) Few people even consider not having one and they are big business.
Microwave ovens encase MW radiation within a metal box and were subjected to testing before approved. There have been issues when food is heated in a MW oven using plastic containers including Biphenol A or phthalates these migrate into the food. Thus, MW oven safe containers emerged and people learned to use them. Professor Magda Havas, a radiation expert from Trent University (Ontario in Canada) shares on the dangers of popping our meals in the oven – and watching them cook. People need to know, she said, that MW ovens leak radiation. They have a metal mesh to protect the waves from leaking but she tested over a dozen of the most popular brands and every single one of them leaked. Energy leaks have at least one proven effect on our health: they cause cataracts on people exposed. Most scientists agree and called them “radiation cataracts.” We have to protect our eyes avoiding looking into our MW oven when is on. Some argue MWs lower the nutritional value of our food, Dr. Havas believes so and mentions that “enzymes are denatured by the process of radiation, meaning you get a fraction of the nutrients you would get otherwise,” but heat denatures enzymes, heat is not unique to MW ovens. Dr. Havas shares something she tested herself: MWs affect our hearts. Monitoring the heart rate of people standing near MW ovens she documented variations in heart rates when the oven is on. (3) The next step should be exploring whether MWs change enough the food we cook to cause measurable negative effects on people who ingest it, a still controversial issue.
Microwaves in our Cell phones
Like MW ovens, cell phones use Radio Frequency (RF) waves, or MWs. Devra Davis describes cell phones as “microwave radios.” Without reason or logic, I think, cell phones were assumed to be safer than MW ovens. We are dealing with electromagnetic radiation, the faster the frequency and the shorter the wavelength the greatest the damage they can cause. At the end of the spectrum, X and Gamma rays; we call them ionizing radiation because they break the ionic bonds that hold compounds together. Exposure to them is lethal to life. The rest of the spectrum receives the name of non-ionizing radiation because they do not break those links as fast. MWs are not X-rays but we should not presume them safe without considering the long term effects of exposure to them. In the past, routine examinations of pregnant women included low dosage X-rays and everybody believe them safe and was outraged when Alice Stewart, from the UK, challenged this in 1956 suggesting a link between X-ray examinations of pregnant women and childhood onset of cancer in the child. It took more than 25 years for Stewart’s views to be proved right and accepted. (5)
In making cell phones, Motorola probably assumed them safe based on this view of MWs that as long as they did not burn us they are safe; thus, Motorola ensured phone components did not get hot or heat up things around them. Today we suspect this is not enough. MW ovens and cell phones are very popular –the goal for MW ovens is one or more in each home; the goal for cell phones is probably a cell phone for every woman, man and child. The difference between the two: we do not put our heads into our MW ovens, hug them while we cook, or take them to bed with us but we do those things with our cell phones. Safety has to be a priority. In their almost 5 decades of history cell phones have changed markedly in size, capacity and power, the radiation they emit is also higher. (4, 5)
In 1973 Motorola engineer Martin Cooper called from a New York city street in front of reporters from a device weighting 1.5 kilos, it was the first call from a portable mobile phone. Motorola spent almost a million dollars producing it. The first commercial one was marketed 10 years later (1984) and it was the Motorola Dyna TACs (weighting 800 grams and carrying a rechargeable battery that would last 8 hours). In 1993 Bellsouth and IBM produced the first “smart phone” including a pager, e-mail, styles for writing on its screen and a complete pad featuring numbers and letters (weighting 500 grams, suggested retail price U$S 900). They never made more than 2000 of them. In 2002 the Nokia 7650 appeared almost at the same time with the SPC-5300 produced by Sanyo. They were small, light, and the first phones with built in cameras publicly available. A year later, in 2003, Blackberry created the first integrated phone: the Blackberry 6210 (weighting 136 grams including battery) with e mail, texting, web browser and a messenger service allowing communication between blackberries. The iPhone was created by Apple in 2007; it integrated a mobile phone, an iPad and a wireless communication device, included a visual voicemail box, a touch pad and keyboard, a photo library and a display for watching movies and television. (4)
It seems we never questioned whether they were safe but assumed they were. By now we need them, and want them, all our friends have them. Our children want them too, cell phones are flashy and cool, and everywhere. They are our constant companion. We carry them proudly wherever we go, checking, talking and listening to them in the streets, taking pictures and uploading them to the web, confirming to the world that we exist, and have a life. Sometimes, we take them to bed, so they sooth us with music or white noise. They wake us up in the mornings. We have a “special relationship” with our cell phones and they are useful. They come to work with us and have become indispensable: our 24 hour link to “everything and everybody.” Having one is not always a matter of choice; like my boss told me once, you have to accept and learn about new technology, it is part of your job. Furthermore, our phones represent us: the quality we buy, the gadgets and covers we choose, the pictures and videos we carry, the constantly growing number of sophisticated applications, even for babies, that we can get. Devra Davis, a well known scientist, never questioned their safety either and she loved her cell phone too.
Dr. Devra Davis, the founding director of the Center for Environmental Oncology at University of Pittsburg Cancer Center, published her book about cell phone radiation in 2010; it was a National Book Award finalist. The title, “Disconnect,” highlights her concern with the lack of connection between what we already know about cell phone radiation and human health, and the total lack of public awareness about this, even among researchers and scientists. Davis was surprised by what she found out. Like most of us she thought that if there was anything wrong with cell phones she would know, she is a well informed scientist and an expert on environmental health dangers, but, she was wrong. After researching she felt she had to write and inform people, working to ensure concerns were addressed. The weight of her credentials could help. Few scientists dare to ask questions anymore, those who did paid a price. This is like previous health issues, tobacco, asbestos, benzene and so on Davis says; cell phones are big business; the industry procrastinates action and sponsors research that creates doubt in people´s minds. But Davis is a grandmother and particularly concerned about the aggressive promotion of cell phones to children and the dominant disregard in exposing them to cell phones. As Brodeaur, she thinks children are particularly vulnerable to MW radiation:
“My grandkids come equipped with an array of modern protective armor…their own car seats and bike helmets…pads for wrists, knees and elbows…but what about that phone they are set to have?” (5)
After reading her book I searched the quick start guide coming with my cell phone; for the first time I saw the warning to users. Yes, at the end of page 13 of this 13 page guide, under Industry Canada Radiation Exposure Statement it reads: “this equipment should be installed and operated with minimum distance of 1 cm between the radiator and your body.” Now, nobody mentions “heads” but I guess we can assume them as included in this warning about “bodies.” I see no warning about pregnancy or pregnant women however, but Smart phones Davis says come with one: “Do not keep near the pregnant abdomen,” and Blackberry adds to it saying: “don’t keep near the abdomen of teenagers.”
Science and the need for further research
There is increased risk of brain tumors on heavy and long term cell phone users but research is still not conclusive. Every study, Devis explains, that ever looked at people who have used a cell phone heavily for ten years or more “finds a doubled risk of brain tumors, including the industry-sponsored ones, and there aren’t that many of those.” However, the majority of studies on cell phones and brain cancer have been negative. The issue is that they define a user as a person who averaged one call a week for six months and the average person in the study used a phone for less than six years. “Brain cancer takes a minimum of ten years to develop,” she says, so if you’re studying a group of people who’ve made very few phone calls and have used a phone for a short period of time, you are not going to find anything. (6)
In 2011 the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), part of World Health Organization, appointed a Working Group to examine evidence on the use of cell phones; they classified cell phone use as possibly carcinogenic to humans based on limited data but arguing that findings could not be dismissed, a causal interpretation could not be excluded. The American Cancer Society and the National Institute of Environmental Health Science said that the evidence was not strong but further research was recommended. But, the US Food and Drug Administration, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Federal Communications Commission point was that research had failed to establish a causal link between wireless device use and cancer or other illnesses. (8)
A long term study, the COSMOS study, is underway in Europe since 2007. It is a cohort study of mobile phone use and health involving 290 000 adults to be followed from 20 to 30 years focusing on outcomes and risks of cancers, as well as of benign tumors, neurological and cerebral-vascular diseases and specific changes, such as headaches and sleep disorders. Also, with increased use of cell phones by children and adolescents, there is growing concern about their health which prompted a multinational epidemiological case control study of brain tumours diagnosed in young people in relation to electro-magnetic fields exposure from cell phones and other sources of RF radiation in 14 countries (Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Greece, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Spain, The Netherlands) between 2010 and 2015. The results of the study are under peer review. (7, 9)
Dr. Hugh Taylor, medical professor and chief of Yale’s Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, co-authored a study in 2012 to explore the impact of cell phone exposure on pregnancies. They had pregnant mice in cages and simply put a cell phone on top of the cage. In half the cages the phone was active and in the other half it was turned off. The researchers allowed the mice to give birth and waited until the newborns were young adults to test behaviors. The mice exposed to cell phones in mother’s womb were more active, their memory was slightly decreased. They were bouncing off the walls Dr. Taylor said, and acting as if they did not have a care in the world. According to him, the study shows there is a “biological basis” to suggest cell phone exposure can impact pregnancies. He is encouraging patients to be cautious with them and recommends pregnant women to hold phones away from their body. Cell phone manufacturers, including Blackberry and Apple, also say consumers should keep devices away from the body due to potential safety risks but these warnings often go unnoticed because they are featured in manuals and people rarely read them. (10)
The effects we know and what can we do to increase safety
Davis explains that we know MW radiation effects do not follow the doses-effects response model; increasing the dose does not mean an increase response or effect follows. She thinks effects have more to do with the characteristics of the signal, which is erratic, and with chronic exposure. In her view, cell phone radiation disrupts “resonance” and “interferes” with body functions, such as DNA repair. Research needs to consider this if we are to have answers, she says. We know that MW radiation disrupts/relaxes the brain-blood barrier, which plays a crucial role in protecting our brains from substances that are in the blood and can be damaging or toxic. The brain-blood barrier develops as we grow. If we introduce a blue dye in the blood of an animal, its entire body will go blue but its brain will remain pink. Cell phone radiation relaxes this barrier reason why is used now to enhance the uptake of drugs into the brain, for instance to treat a brain tumor with medications. We also know that cell phone radiation interferes with DNA repair. And, we know that it penetrates further into tissue that is not protected by bone or density -breasts, chest, gonads, which are more vulnerable to its effects. (11)
Davis believes that current regulations are lax. The standard to estimate radiation exposure -the “standard anthropomorphic male” or SAM is not representative of the population exposed to cell phone radiation. SAM was taken from the top 10% of military recruits in 1989 -a six-foot-three 220 pounds male with an 11-pound head. Most people in the world do not have SAM’s head and we know that radiation goes more deeply into smaller heads than larger ones, and we know that today, three out of every four 12-year-olds, and half of all ten-year-olds, have a cell phone. It is too risky to wait for more science when we already know enough to be concerned. We should change regulations to make it safer for cell phone users and we should inform people about the risks and what they can do to be safe. (5)
There is also a strong concern about pregnant women and their babies because of what is known already about animal studies. It may be legal for companies to show advertisements of phones being used in ways that are not recommended, Davis says, but it is not ethical. Selling phones to people, then telling them in fine print to not use them next to the body while in all advertisements they are shown using cell phones exactly next to the body, it is a serious disconnect, and people need to be aware of this. Some countries around the world, including France, have banned companies from advertising cell phones to children due to the possible risks. (10)
Cordless phones are an issue too; they are dangerous but most of us are unaware. The base station of cordless phones radiates all the time; when we hold the handset to our head we get a huge dose. About a third of our exposure to MW radiation comes from cordless phones. Davis recommends we do not use cordless phones, and if we do avoid having the base station close to our bed or in our bedroom. (6)
Davis understands that cell phones are not going away. Her point is about increasing safety for people using cell phones and for companies to consider the safety of users when they make them. Experimental studies show that good nutrition like “literally exposing animals or cells to the natural hormone melatonin or vitamins A, E, or C before you expose them to RF radiation—may help repair damage.” Good cell phone practices help. They include using a speaker-phone or a headset with the phone held a hand’s distance away, never keeping a phone turned on next to our body, or a wireless headset on in our ear or pocket, without turning off the phone. Also, we should use our phones only when signal quality is good, weaker signals boost MW radiation. And, we should text rather than talk on the phone, and teach our children to do the same. Tweens and teens, and the rest of us, should never sleep with cell phones on under our pillow or next to our beds. Pregnant women should keep their cell phones away from their abdomen; and, new mothers should protect babies from their phones. Men should keep their cell phones off when in their pockets; radiation affects their sperm quantity and quality. We should use a landline at home and avoid cordless phones too. We also need to do some political work and require warning labels about safety in using cell phones be applied to cell phones directly, not in manuals where nobody reads them. Also, cell phones should always include earpieces and speakerphones. And, major revisions of safety standards should be conducted, and specific recommendations should be made about lowering direct radiation to the head. Furthermore, a national survey of cell phone radiation exposure is needed, as well as monitoring of heavy cell phone users by creating access to cell phone billing records to qualified researchers, increasing the power of studies made. (5)
In 2015, Dr. Martin Blank (Department of Physiology and Cellular Biophysics, Columbia University) presented a letter signed by a scientists concerned with electromagnetic radiation and their effects on our health, particularly their impact on our DNA. Blank said:
“We are really all part of a large biological experiment, without our informed consent. To protect our children, ourselves, and our ecosystem, we must reduce exposure by establishing more protective guidelines. And so, today, scientists from around the world are submitting an Appeal to the United Nations, its member states and the World Health Organization, to provide leadership in dealing with this emerging public health crisis”. (12)
Cell phones may be here to stay; but, we can demand that they are safe. We, our children and grandchildren, deserve to be protected from the effects of cell phone radiation. We should challenge the callous disregard cell phone makers have shown for our health and well being. We know enough to make some needed changes, reducing exposure, and implementing appropriate safety guidelines. We know that corporations have vested interest and procrastinate addressing this issue, creating doubt about findings so things continue as they are. This has happened before with tobacco, asbestos, insecticides and so on. We are challenging a more than a trillion dollar global industry. Change never happened without struggle. To act we need to be informed, please be informed.
5. The truth about cell phone radiation, what the industry has done to hide it, and how to protect your family. Devra Davis, 2010. Dutton, Penguin Group, USA.
Based on recent interviews with North Korean representatives, both senior level foreign establishment representatives and experts, I am persuaded there is still a chance for diplomacy to head off a conflict over the country’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs. The latest (visibly premature) declarations by Pyongyang that it has completed its nuclear force signal its readiness for dialogue. Taking advantage of this fleeting opportunity requires stronger leadership from the United States and more effective cooperation among the other key stakeholders.
What Does North Korea Want?
In recent discussions, North Koreans reiterated Pyongyang’s standard policy goals: reach “strategic parity” with the US by creating a credible nuclear deterrent and compelling opponents to conclude a peace treaty with the North, recognize the sovereignty and independence of the DPRK, and provide security guarantees to enable the country’s further economic development. The North Koreans with whom I spoke with argued that without a “nuclear deterrent,” the hostility of the US and many of its allies toward North Korea will sooner or later result in “crushing down” the country. However, they did nothing to dispel the suspicion that, in fact, Pyongyang might also aim at aggression and concessions extortion from South Korea if it gets a deterrent against the US.
It is my impression that policymakers in Pyongyang believe the only purpose of US policy is to liquidate the DPRK as a state or even “physically destroy” the country and its leadership. The regime does not believe that removal of North Korean nuclear weapons per se is very significant to the US, and rather sees this demand as an attempt to undermine the country’s deterrence and gain advantage for a military solution of the Korean issue or regime change by other means.
It was clear from my discussions with the North Koreans that internal debates over the country’s nuclear doctrine have not yet been settled and there is no clear picture of what a nuclear war-fighting doctrine would look like. Nor did they seem to understand that having an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capability only gives rise to suspicions that the North wishes to unify Korea by force while using its nuclear capability to protect it from US interference (a common theory among South Koreans and Americans). Going forward, a declaration that North Korea does not have these intentions and a codification of this pledge in official documents might be essential along with an explanation of the country’s nuclear doctrine, which seems to have evolved considerably during the last couple of years. But these ideas, from what I heard, have not been considered by the regime.
The North Koreans stressed that unless the “root cause” of the nuclear stand-off—the “hostile policy” of the US—is removed, nuclear weapons will remain the sole guarantee of the country’s security. The examples of “hostile policy” cited include exercises aimed at “decapitation,” rehearsing attacks on Pyongyang and efforts to undermine the North’s “socialist system,” including covert activities, psychological warfare and sanctions. Nothing I heard gave any hint that North Korea’s nuclear weapons status is anything other than non-negotiable.
All of this is pretty standard fare, but when I asked if denuclearization would be possible if the US ended its “hostile policy,” the North Koreans admitted that they are not, in principle, against a “nuclear-free zone” in and around Korea. They stressed that before the early 2000s, their country was the only one in Northeast Asia to not possess or deploy nuclear weapons, and upon achieving nuclear parity with other parties, the balanced reduction and eventual denuclearization of the whole area is not impossible.
Even if these North Koreans were propagandizing, the declaration of a loosely-defined nuclear-free zone on the Korean peninsula or in Northeast Asia as the final goal of a diplomatic process could create space for the eventual denuclearization of North Korea, and such a formula could be on an agenda during “talks about talks” with Pyongyang.
Framework of a Possible Dialogue
In thinking about how a possible dialogue could be structured, there are some important clarifications that will be needed upfront. That includes asking the question of what constitutes a nuclear weapons program. The answer, while it may seem obvious to some, is far from clear. For example, does it include, in North Korean eyes, just the weapons themselves? Or is it the weapons and the fissile material production? Does it include delivery systems—and does that encompass all ballistic missiles or just the long-range missiles? Does that include the “space” program as well? Depending on the answers to those questions, an important proposal might be considered – that is, possible asymmetric concessions between North Korea and the US. This proposal takes into consideration what seems to be the highest priorities for each country, and would suggest capping North Korea’s ICBM capability—which enables North Korea theoretically to attack the continental United States—while allowing North Korea to keep its “nuclear weapons”—that is, possibly the charges, but not specific delivery systems—as the “sacred cow.”
Although Seoul and Tokyo might not see this proposal as a viable final solution they have been living in the range of a North Korean nuclear strike (possibly delivered by some unconventional means) for years. So bringing down the tensions at least temporarily and giving a chance for diplomacy might be good option—at least as a start. However, the US will have to explain it and chart a clear perspective, should such an option emerge.
It should be understood that North Koreans have not thought about this yet, but their statement of “completing [its] nuclear force” gives room for compromise. If they consider there is no need to further pursue its missile technologies, such as creating a “Hwasong-16,” and a pause is possible, why not start something like “strategic arms limitation talks?” It is true, that the North Koreans still have plans to develop submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) systems, such as the Pukguksong-3 that has been referenced, but perhaps a cap on this project could be part of a deal, provided the right return concessions. And it should be taken into account that most experts agree the North does not yet have a working, weaponized ICBM, as the operability of current systems, especially re-entry technology, is still unproven. However, we should do our best not to compel North Koreans to demonstrate such an ability, such as firing a ballistic missile with a conventional warhead to a target somewhere in Pacific.
So far, the discussions in the UNSC do not promise a swift and heavy retaliation for the latest ICBM test, so the time is right to think about a softer approach to North Korea’s continued testing. The re-listing of the DPRK by the US as a state sponsor of terrorism and consequent sanctions made news, but were not unanticipated and by no means exclude a quiet compromise.
As additional actors consider the “freeze for freeze” idea as the basis for more extensive agreements down the road, opportunities for incremental steps might be explored. The Chinese concept of “parallel advancement” might begin with some form of voluntary restraint of North Korean missile tests, excluding overflying other countries’ territory and airspace. In exchange, the US would refrain from sending strategic assets (like B-1 bombers, aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines) to Korea. And both sides would mute their bellicose rhetoric toward the other.
However, the “window of opportunity” will close once the US and South Korea start preparing for spring exercises. Thus, the upcoming Winter Olympic games in Pyeongchang, South Korea, should be used as a good opportunity for a truce (the Moon administration is already eager to postpone the exercises till at least end of March). Both sides should exercise restraint and avoid any actions that may be considered provocative. I believe that closed-door quiet contacts should be made to agree on an “Olympic truce,” that is, refraining from provocation and hostile propaganda (including, if possible, inflammatory tweets) at least until the successful completion of the games. Such contacts may include not only the US and North Korea, but also South Korea, whom the North, of course, would like to exclude. However, the fact that the issue is the Olympics being held on ROK soil is discussed makes its participation mandatory.
There is No Alternative to Diplomacy
Diplomacy could be effective if only the United States would accept the reality that denuclearization of the DPRK is not possible at this moment. Short of regime change, neither the US nor China can force North Korea to surrender its nuclear potential. Not even the US shooting down a North Korean missile or attacking it on the launch pad would solve the nuclear problem. Some argue that it may still not lead to an all-out war—North Koreans would most likely answer symmetrically by attempting to sink a US ship or destroy another “military asset,” after which both sides would stop short of escalation and a frightened North Korea would then be compelled to capitulate. No North Korean I spoke with found this plausible. However, it is unfortunately clear that such a scenario would make negotiations and compromise more urgent and might brush away illusions and help formulate a sober approach.
At the end of the day, a nuclear but peaceful Korean peninsula would be a better outcome than a war-torn Northeast Asia. The need to admit the failure of US policy toward North Korea’s nuclear program may be hard to swallow, but it is needed to formulate more realistic policy choices (including, unfortunately, living side by side with a nuclear North Korea). Only American leadership can avoid war and lead toward a diplomatic resolution.
Following deficit hawk Bob Corker’s about face, Americans for Tax Fairness issued the following statement:
“Hypocrisy rules in Washington. With Bob Corker’s reversal, the myth of the deficit hawk is now dead.”
“Next year when Republicans propose deep cuts to Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid under the guise of deficit reduction, we will all remember that they increased the deficit by $1.5 trillion in order to give tax cuts to millionaires and big corporations.”
“If this bill becomes law, it will be a travesty for working families, and a slap in the face to principles.”
To avoid needing 60 Senate votes for passage, Republicans must claim their bill won’t exceed a $1.5 trillion deficit.
According to David Stockman, it’s “not even close,” adding
“(i)f you adjust for all of these front-loaded cuts, one-time payfors and sunset cliffs, the total cost of the bill is $2.5 trillion or more…on an honest accounting basis…”
Not by Republicans on a tear to hand corporate predators and super-rich households a massive windfall to be partly paid for by slashing Medicare, Medicaid and other social justice programs, inflicting enormous harm on millions of poor and low-income Americans.
Stockman called GOP mischief a “fiscal doomsday machine,” the chickens certain to come home to roost with punishing force, ordinary Americans hit hardest.
Near-final legislation exceeds 1,000 pages. Likely no Republican lawmakers read what they support. Corporate lawyers and lobbyists drafted the bill. Some of its provisions include:
increasing the standard deduction to $12,000 for singles and $24,000 for married couples;
state and local taxes, including property and sales taxes, deductible up to $10,000;
seven tax brackets remain, the top rate dropping from 39.6% to 37% for singles earning over $500,000 and married couples filing jointly with income over $600,000;
medical expenses exceeding 7.5% of adjusted gross income can be deducted;
individuals can deduct 20% of their business income from partnerships, S corporations and sole proprietorships – up to $157,500 for individuals and $315,000 for married couples filing jointly;
capital gains up to $10,000 annually can be withdrawn tax-free to pay for education expenses, including private or religious school;
Depending on household income, longterm capital gains are taxed at 10, 15, or 20%, the latter percentage applying to individuals in the highest 37% tax rate;
tax preparation will no longer be a deductible expense;
Nothing in the measure helps millions of debt entrapped students. The Obamacare individual mandate is eliminated. Discussion on it continues so tweaking the Senate provision may change it slightly.
House members will vote Tuesday on the reconciled measure, Senate members to follow, perhaps the next day.
If passed as expected, Trump will sign it into law before Christmas, an elaborate televised White House signing ceremony planned.
Corporate predators benefit most, their tax rate lowered from 35%, virtually none pay, to 21%.
Eliminating the individual mandate assures higher premiums and millions more Americans uninsured – 13 million more, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
According to the International Business Times (IBT), an 11th hour GOP bill provision “allow(s) owners of large real estate holdings through LLCs to deduct a percentage of their ‘pass through’ income from their taxes…”
LLCs are limited liability companies, combining features of partnerships, sole proprietorships and corporations. Owners are usually exempt from personal responsibility for its debts and lawsuits.
Trump and Jared Kushner have large ownership stakes in these investments, the GOP bill to benefit them enormously, greatly as well from other provisions meant for high-net-worth households.
IBT explained 13 GOP lawmakers, including House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senator Bob Corker, have large ownership stakes worth millions of dollars in real-estate-related LLCs.
The great GOP tax cut heist is expected to become the law of the land before Christmas – a lump of coal in the stockings of most Americans.
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.
“We don’t know exactly where we’re at in the world, militarily, and what we’re doing,” saidSenator Lindsey Graham, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, in October. That was in the wake of the combat deaths of four members of the Special Operations forces in the West African nation of Niger. Graham and other senators expressed shock about the deployment, but the global sweep of America’s most elite forces is, at best, an open secret.
Earlier this year before that same Senate committee — though Graham was not in attendance — General Raymond Thomas, the chief of U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM), offered some clues about the planetwide reach of America’s most elite troops.
“We operate and fight in every corner of the world,” he boasted. “Rather than a mere ‘break-glass-in-case-of-war’ force, we are now proactively engaged across the ‘battle space’ of the Geographic Combatant Commands… providing key integrating and enabling capabilities to support their campaigns and operations.”
In 2017, U.S. Special Operations forces, including Navy SEALs and Army Green Berets, deployed to 149 countries around the world, according to figures provided to TomDispatch by U.S. Special Operations Command. That’s about 75% of the nations on the planet and represents a jump from the 138 countries that saw such deployments in 2016 under the Obama administration. It’s also a jump of nearly 150% from the last days of George W. Bush’s White House. This record-setting number of deployments comes as American commandos are battling a plethora of terror groups in quasi-wars that stretch from Africa and the Middle East to Asia.
“Most Americans would be amazed to learn that U.S. Special Operations Forces have been deployed to three quarters of the nations on the planet,” observes William Hartung, the director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy. “There is little or no transparency as to what they are doing in these countries and whether their efforts are promoting security or provoking further tension and conflict.”
Growth Opportunity
“Since 9/11, we expanded the size of our force by almost 75% in order to take on mission-sets that are likely to endure,” SOCOM’s Thomas told the Senate Armed Services Committee in May.
Since 2001, from the pace of operations to their geographic sweep, the activities of U.S. Special Operations forces (SOF) have, in fact, grown in every conceivable way. On any given day, about 8,000 special operators — from a command numbering roughly 70,000 — are deployed in approximately 80 countries.
“The increase in the use of Special Forces since 9/11 was part of what was then referred to as the Global War on Terror as a way to keep the United States active militarily in areas beyond its two main wars, Iraq and Afghanistan,” Hartung told TomDispatch. “The even heavier reliance on Special Forces during the Obama years was part of a strategy of what I think of as ‘politically sustainable warfare,’ in which the deployment of tens of thousands of troops to a few key theaters of war was replaced by a ‘lighter footprint’ in more places, using drones, arms sales and training, and Special Forces.”
The Trump White House has attackedBarack Obama’s legacy on nearly all fronts. It has undercut, renounced, or reversed actions of his ranging from trade pacts to financial and environmental regulations to rules that shielded transgender employees from workplace discrimination. When it comes to Special Operations forces, however, the Trump administration has embraced their use in the style of the former president, while upping the ante even further. President Trump has also provided military commanders greater authority to launch attacks in quasi-war zones like Yemen and Somalia. According toMicah Zenko, a national security expert and Whitehead Senior Fellow at the think tank Chatham House, those forces conducted five times as many lethal counterterrorism missions in such non-battlefield countries in the Trump administration’s first six months in office as they did during Obama’s final six months.
A Wide World of War
U.S. commandos specialize in 12 core skills, from “unconventional warfare” (helping to stoke insurgencies and regime change) to “foreign internal defense” (supporting allies’ efforts to guard themselves against terrorism, insurgencies, and coups). Counterterrorism — fighting what SOCOM calls violent extremist organizations or VEOs — is, however, the specialty America’s commandos have become best known for in the post-9/11 era.
In the spring of 2002, before the Senate Armed Services Committee, SOCOM chief General Charles Hollandtouted efforts to
“improve SOF capabilities to prosecute unconventional warfare and foreign internal defense programs to better support friends and allies. The value of these programs, demonstrated in the Afghanistan campaign,” he said, “can be particularly useful in stabilizing countries and regions vulnerable to terrorist infiltration.”
Over the last decade and a half, however, there’s been little evidence America’s commandos have excelled at “stabilizing countries and regions vulnerable to terrorist infiltration.” This was reflected in General Thomas’s May testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“The threat posed by VEOs remains the highest priority for USSOCOM in both focus and effort,” he explained.
However, unlike Holland who highlighted only one country — Afghanistan — where special operators were battling militants in 2002, Thomas listed a panoply of terrorist hot spots bedeviling America’s commandos a decade and a half later.
“Special Operations Forces,” he said, “are the main effort, or major supporting effort for U.S. VEO-focused operations in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, across the Sahel of Africa, the Philippines, and Central/South America — essentially, everywhere Al Qaeda (AQ) and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) are to be found.”
Officially, there are about 5,300 U.S. troops in Iraq. (The real figure is thought to be higher.) Significant numbers of them are special operators training and advising Iraqi government forces and Kurdish troops. Elite U.S. forces have also played a crucial role in Iraq’s recent offensive against the militants of the Islamic State, providing artillery and airpower, including SOCOM’s AC-130W Stinger II gunships with 105mm cannons that allow them to serve as flying howitzers. In that campaign, Special Operations forces were “thrust into a new role of coordinating fire support,” wrote Linda Robinson, a senior international policy analyst with the RAND Corporation who spent seven weeks in Iraq, Syria, and neighboring countries earlier this year. “This fire support is even more important to the Syrian Democratic Forces, a far more lightly armed irregular force which constitutes the major ground force fighting ISIS in Syria.”
Special Operations forces have, in fact, played a key role in the war effort in Syria, too. While American commandos have been killed in battle there, Kurdish and Arab proxies — known as the Syrian Democratic Forces — have done the lion’s share of the fighting and dying to take back much of the territory once held by the Islamic State. SOCOM’s Thomas spoke about this in surprisingly frank terms at a security conference in Aspen, Colorado, this summer. “We’re right now inside the capital of [ISIS’s] caliphate at Raqqa [Syria]. We’ll have that back soon with our proxies, a surrogate force of 50,000 people that are working for us and doing our bidding,” he said. “So two and a half years of fighting this fight with our surrogates, they’ve lost thousands, we’ve only lost two service members. Two is too many, but it’s, you know, a relief that we haven’t had the kind of losses that we’ve had elsewhere.”
This year, U.S. special operators were killed in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, and the Sahelian nations of Niger and Mali (although reports indicate that a Green Beret who died in that country was likely strangled by U.S. Navy SEALs). In Libya, SEALs recently kidnapped a suspect in the 2012 attacks in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. In the Philippines, U.S. Special Forces joined the months-long battle to recapture Marawi City after it was taken by Islamist militants earlier this year.
And even this growing list of counterterror hotspots is only a fraction of the story. In Africa, the countries singled out by Thomas — Somalia, Libya, and those in the Sahel — are just a handful of the nations to which American commandos were deployed in 2017. As recently reported at Vice News, U.S. Special Operations forces were active in at least 33 nations across the continent, with troops heavily concentrated in and around countries now home to a growing number of what the Pentagon’s Africa Center for Strategic Studies calls “active militant Islamist groups.” While Defense Department spokeswoman Major Audricia Harris would not provide details on the range of operations being carried out by the elite forces, it’s known that they run the gamut from conducting security assessments at U.S. embassies to combat operations.
Data provided by SOCOM also reveals a special ops presence in 33 European countries this year.
“Outside of Russia and Belarus we train with virtually every country in Europe either bilaterally or through various multinational events,” Major Michael Weisman, a spokesman for U.S. Special Operations Command Europe, told TomDispatch.
For the past two years, in fact, the U.S. has maintained a Special Operations contingent in almost every nation on Russia’s western border.
“[W]e’ve had persistent presence in every country — every NATO country and others on the border with Russia doing phenomenal things with our allies, helping them prepare for their threats,” said SOCOM’s Thomas, mentioning the Baltic states as well as Romania, Poland, Ukraine, and Georgia by name.
These activities represent, in the words of General Charles Cleveland, chief of U.S. Army Special Operations Command from 2012 to 2015 and now the senior mentor to the Army War College, “undeclared campaigns” by commandos. Weisman, however, balked at that particular language.
“U.S. Special Operations forces have been deployed persistently and at the invitation of our allies in the Baltic States and Poland since 2014 as part of the broader U.S. European Command and Department of Defense European Deterrence Initiative,” he told TomDispatch. “The persistent presence of U.S. SOF alongside our Allies sends a clear message of U.S. commitment to our allies and the defense of our NATO Alliance.”
Asia is also a crucial region for America’s elite forces. In addition to Iran and Russia, SOCOM’s Thomas singled out China and North Korea as nations that are “becoming more aggressive in challenging U.S. interests and partners through the use of asymmetric means that often fall below the threshold of conventional conflict.” He went on to say that the “ability of our special operators to conduct low-visibility special warfare operations in politically sensitive environments make them uniquely suited to counter the malign activities of our adversaries in this domain.”
U.S.-North Korean saber rattling has brought increased attention to Special Forces Detachment Korea (SFDK), the longest serving U.S. Special Forces unit in the world. It would, of course, be called into action should a war ever break out on the peninsula. In such a conflict, U.S. and South Korean elite forces would unite under the umbrella of the Combined Unconventional Warfare Task Force. In March, commandos — including, according to some reports, members of the Army’s Delta Force and the Navy’s SEAL Team 6 — took part in Foal Eagle, a training exercise, alongside conventional U.S. forces and their South Korean counterparts.
U.S. special operators also were involved in training exercises and operations elsewhere across Asia and the Pacific. In June, in Okinawa, Japan, for example, airmen from the 17th Special Operations Squadron (17th SOS) carried out their annual (and oddly spelled) “Day of the Jakal,” the launch of five Air Force Special Operations MC-130J Commando II aircraft to practice, according to a military news release, “airdrops, aircraft landings, and rapid infiltration and exfiltration of equipment.” According to Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Patrick Dube of the 17th SOS,
“It shows how we can meet the emerging mission sets for both SOCKOR [Special Operations Command Korea] and SOCPAC [Special Operations Command Pacific] out here in the Pacific theater.”
At about the same time, members of the Air Force’s 353rd Special Operations Group carried out Teak Jet, a joint combined exchange training, or JCET, mission meant to improve military coordination between U.S. and Japanese forces. In June and July, intelligence analysts from the Air Force’s 353rd Special Operations Group took part in Talisman Saber, a biennial military training exercise conducted in various locations across Australia.
More for War
The steady rise in the number of elite operators, missions, and foreign deployments since 9/11 appears in no danger of ending, despite years of worries by think-tank experts and special ops supporters about the effects of such a high operations tempo on these troops.
“Most SOF units are employed to their sustainable limit,” General Thomas said earlier this year. “Despite growing demand for SOF, we must prioritize the sourcing of these demands as we face a rapidly changing security environment.”
Yet the number of deployments still grew to a record 149 nations in 2017. (During the Obama years, deployments reached 147 in 2015.)
At a recent conference on special operations held in Washington, D.C., influential members of the Senate and House armed services committees acknowledged that there were growing strains on the force.
“I do worry about overuse of SOF,” said House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, a Republican. One solution offered by both Jack Reed, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Republican Senator Joni Ernst, a combat veteran who served in Iraq, was to bulk up Special Operations Command yet more. “We have to increase numbers and resources,” Reed insisted.
This desire to expand Special Operations further comes at a moment when senators like Lindsey Graham continue to acknowledge how remarkably clueless they are about where those elite forces are deployed and what exactly they are doing in far-flung corners of the globe. Experts point out just how dangerous further expansion could be, given the proliferation of terror groups and battle zones since 9/11 and the dangers of unforeseen blowback as a result of low-profile special ops missions.
“Almost by definition, the dizzying number of deployments undertaken by U.S. Special Operations forces in recent years would be hard to track. But few in Congress seem to be even making the effort,” said William Hartung. “This is a colossal mistake if one is concerned about reining in the globe-spanning U.S. military strategy of the post-9/11 era, which has caused more harm than good and done little to curb terrorism.”
However, with special ops deployments rising above Bush and Obama administration levels to record-setting heights and the Trump administration embracing the use of commandos in quasi-wars in places like Somalia and Yemen, there appears to be little interest in the White House or on Capitol Hill in reining in the geographic scope and sweep of America’s most secretive troops. And the results, say experts, may be dire.
“While the retreat from large ‘boots on the ground’ wars like the Bush administration’s intervention in Iraq is welcome,” said Hartung, “the proliferation of Special Operations forces is a dangerous alternative, given the prospects of getting the United States further embroiled in complex overseas conflicts.”
Featured image: Fatima and Ahmad with their cake to mark one year detained on Samos. October 2017 (Source: Samos Chronicles)
On Tuesday morning I said goodbye to Fatima. At least for the time being. Some time tonight or in the early morning tomorrow she will be taken from Samos to Lesvos and from there to a closed camp in Turkey. As always accurate information is hard to come by if you are a refugee. When I asked the police officer this morning when she would be leaving he replied that he didn’t know yet.
Fatima expected to go Turkey a week ago. Last Monday the police told her that she had to leave her room and come down to the police station with her bags. We went together first having dropped off the keys to her place at the Arsis office. (Arsis is a Greek NGO which acts for UNCHR on housing issues on Samos.) It was all very emotional as she said goodbye to the other refugees who lived nearby as well to the workers in the Arsis centre who had been significant in supporting her over the past 7 months. All her hopes and dreams of finding a new, safe life in Europe had been shattered.
Fatima was kindly met at the police headquarters and unlike the other refugees (men) she was not put in the police cell to await deportation. After 30 minutes however she was told that she would not be leaving for Lesvos the next day and that it could be another week before she was deported. The police did not want the hassle of caring for Fatima for this week and quite rightly told her she would be better off staying in her room and to come back in a week. As one of the duty officers said to me the police cell was a terrible place to be, not least for a single woman. Moreover Fatima posed no risk of escape from Samos.
But for Fatima, the delay was distressing. Fortunately Arsis immediately said that she could return to her house and they took her and her bags back.
So it was that we returned to the police on Monday. This time it was planned that she would leave for Lesvos some time during Tuesday afternoon/night. I went to see her on the Tuesday morning to take her coffee and some breakfast and to say goodbye. As usual I had to be checked in, showing my passport. And for the past month you now have to pass an armed police man on the door who holds some kind of machine gun. Drip drip the screws keep turning. But of course I say nothing. There are no guidelines/rights concerning visiting people held in the police station. You rely on the mood of the police who determine whether you can get in or not.
When I arrived I found her in the reception area, not in the cell and quickly learnt that this was where she spent her entire time. She had been given 4 grey blankets to make her bed on the floor by the chairs in the open reception area. No privacy, no tranquility. There was a toilet but no shower or washing facilities. The breakfast she had been given was untouched. In a small plastic bag there were 4 pieces of stale bread and 2 small portions of strawberry jam. Inedible.
It was impossible for her to sleep. Not only were there police moving around her ‘bed’ all night, the shouting from the ‘prisoners’ in the cell which is at the other end of the reception area kept her awake. Then she witnessed a refugee being brought in who had cut his arms and there was blood and screaming before he was taken off to the hospital, but only to be returned a few hours later with his arms bandaged and locked up in the cell. It beggars belief that a young man who had self harmed should be detained and abandoned in such a hell hole.
Fatima was desperate for some company not only to get by during her stay in the police station but also to share her deep anxieties about returning to Turkey. So we were both upset and dismayed when after 30 minuted the officer in charge called me over and said I had to leave. My time was up.
Now it is 7.45 am on Wednesday 13th December and for the last hour Fatima and I have been exchanging whatsapp messages. They took her and 2 others at 3.30am and she is now en route to Lesvos. She has no idea of how long she will be held there before going on to Turkey. I don’t think she has eaten or slept since Monday morning. She is exhausted and frightened.
Fatima does not want to go to Turkey. “For six years we lived with the war in Idlib. Of course we thought about leaving for Turkey but we knew enough to know that there was no future there for us”. It was only after their house was destroyed by bombs in early 2016 that forced them on to the refugee road.
There is only one reason for Fatima’s decision to return to Turkey. A decision which meant she had to abandon her application for asylum in Greece even though she had successfully got through the most important first phase of the process and had been given permission to leave Samos. She is giving all this up in order to rejoin her husband, Ahmad, who was deported last week to Turkey from Samos. They had been together on Samos for over one year. In this time she had two miscarriages. After the first miscarriage UNCHR moved them from the Camp and into a house in Samos town.
Fatima is not prepared to live without Ahmad.
Unlike Fatima, Ahmad’s application for asylum had been rejected two times. As far as the authorities and many of the NGOs are concerned that is the end of the line. In Ahmad’s case that involved Arsis telling him that he would have to leave the house he shared with his wife, and the lawyer from Metradassi (Greek NGO) saying that his case was now closed and there was no more legal support on offer. He refused to leave Fatima and the house and though no attempt was made to evict him Ahmad was in constant fear of being arrested and deported. For the next two months Ahmad rarely left the house. He felt completely abandoned and with no idea of what to do. This all worsened after the high court’s decision in Athens in late September which confirmed that Turkey should be considered a safe place for returning Syrian refugees. Ahmad felt sure now he would be taken even though he knew of no Syrian refugee who had been deported. Then misfortune struck when on one of the few occasions he went into the town centre with Fatima he was stopped, arrested and taken into administrative detention in the police station. This was 2 weeks ago.
It was the last straw for Ahmad. As soon as he was detained he told the police he wanted to be deported to Turkey. As Fatima told me, after one year on Samos “he has no patience left. He cannot continue in Samos. He is being destroyed”. For nine days Ahmad had to endure the prison cell in the police station. There was no risk that he would escape from Samos. He was volunteering for deportation. But he was held and Fatima suffered the forced separation only able to see Ahmad through the gates of the cell for a few minutes each evening.
Throughout all their time on Samos Ahmad and Fatima were never formally acknowledged as a married couple. This had many implications such as dealing with the their asylum applications as if they were totally separate and hence the incomprehensible decision to admit Fatima’s application but refuse Ahmad. As far as Ahmad and Fatima were concerned the fact that their household consisted of 2 wives and 4 children which according to Fatima is not uncommon in Syria was simply of no concern to the asylum authorities. For them, Ahmad could have only one wife – the one still in Syria with their four children, and not Fatima. That Ahmad and Fatima’s marriage had been formally acknowledged and documented by the mosque had no bearing.
Ahmad is convinced that his marital status was a main factor in his asylum rejection. He told me that he was made to feel uncomfortable and anxious whenever this was raised and he never felt relaxed to discuss his household. Quite simply all these experiences were hitting Ahmad especially hard. He was going crazy.
Now it is Thursday morning. I lost contact with Fatima last night. I am not sure where she is at the moment except that she has no access to the internet. Ahmad is now in Istanbul. He was held in the
Adiyaman Camp in Adana Turkey for just 3 days before being released and so able to travel to Istanbul to stay with his brother. Fatima hopes to be with him shortly.
UPDATE:
It is now 9 pm on Thursday, 14 December and a few minutes ago I received this message from Fatima:
“Hi, I am now in a prison in Lesvos. The situation is very bad. The prison is very bad. The bed is made of stone and there is no mattress. The blankets smell foul. There is no light at night. And many insects. It is very scary.”
Having been born in a coal and steel company town but destiny delivered, as an adult, to reside, during extended intervals, in the East and West Coast cities of Los Angeles and New York City, and, at present, the continent of Europe, I have come to conclude, people born into situations providing economic advantage, both liberals and conservatives alike, experience difficulty, more often than not, envisaging the lives of those born into a labouring class existence. Worse, a willful obtuseness, in combination with a supercilious posture is, all too often, evinced, by reflex, towards those scorned as “hillbillies,” “trailer trash,” and “genetic retreads.”
Among groups possessing economic advantage, a lack of curiosity prevails as to the nature of the lives of individuals who have spent their lifetime subjected to the life-defying tyrannies of full-spectrum, company town capitalism. Life circumstances, under the present, neoliberal order, that are, in all but rare cases, intractable; wherein, the meagre and fraught with economic instability livelihoods earned as a mine, mill, factory worker, and, in the service industry economy in the US wage and debt slave archipelago of fast food outlets, Big Box retailers and Dollar Discount stores, and as a domestic worker, presents, for the vast majority of workers, the degrading, anxiety-inducing option of submitting to low pay, no benefits, long hours of tedious, vastly under-compensated labor or facing homelessness and hunger.
I was born in the foothills of Appalachia. I know, bones to brain, the painful plight of the labouring class. I will go so far as to say, the transforming, I would even suggest, redemptive element, in my life was a house stocked with books and an indomitable yearning to seek out the music indigenous to the region.
My family, later, moved to the then small, Piedmont region city of Atlanta, Georgia. Shortly thereafter, in the living room of a musician, science fiction writer, and general Beat polymath my father had befriended, I swooned — was, I suspect, transformed– when a guest in the home (where a young Bob Dylan used to crash when in Atlanta — which was, at the time, a rundown, mafia-owned apartment house but where, decades earlier, Margaret Mitchell had penned Gone With The Wind — North Georgia-born folksinger and activist Hedy West played her most famous song, “500 Miles Away from Home” also known as “Railroaders’ Lament.”
During childhood, a period of life in which one is transmigrating through a wilderness of archetypes, for me, the experience of being in West’s presence felt as if I had been transported to glens and gardens inhabited by a veritable muse.
In the year, 1970, in the summer I turned 14, in Piedmont Park, in Atlanta, Georgia, the Allman Brothers, among other bands, would perform free, impromptu concerts for a tie-dye-clad, reefer-reeking, bell-bottoms-caressing-the-Georgia-red-dirt gatherings of “freaks” — which was the preferred tribalist term, as opposed to the media-created, socially pejorative – hippies … which, when bandied among counterculture insiders, was generally applied ironically.
Although the park was located only a few miles from my family’s home, undertaking the trip presented a degree of peril. To make one’s way to the park included traversing a tough, in-town, White working class neighborhood (now a gentrified into soul-sucking blandness, yuppie enclave) where, from the perspective of its denizens, their world, and all they held in reverence and reference, was under siege.
And, although inchoate, their animus was instantly distilled, simply upon a glimpse of the untamed tresses of a singular, thin of wrist, dirty hippie, commie faggot — whose mere presence was considered an affront to their pomade-crowned, muscle car-thundering parcel of redneck paradise.
Accordingly, the locals were pledged to do their part to fight the scourge … by increasing their intake of PBRs and Jack Daniels, and, upon sight of said dirty hippie interlopers, bestowing ass-stompings — and for no-extra-charge — involuntary haircuts upon errant longhairs caught in their midst.
Yet as the era progressed, the savage dance between hippie freak and redneck belligerent changed in tone and tempo, an extemporaneous type of metaphysical jujitsu occurred, in which the predator was subdued and seduced by the prey … as if by cultural contact buzz, redneck fury yielded to counterculture insouciance.
“When the individual feels, the community reels” … Aldous Huxley
Briefly, this was the anatomy of the seduction: In their pursuit of fleeing freaks into the park, the young males of the cracker tribe happened upon a few of the things of this vast and vivid world even more compelling than the possibility of ass-kicking … in the form of attractive young women.
Yet to the young men, the hippie sphinxes, sirens, waifs and gypsy queens were baffling, unapproachable; these women were less than taken by their greasy, pompadoured forelocks and aggressive bearing.
In short, and to appropriate the parlance of the era, the hippie chicks didn’t get off on these young men’s “bad vibes … it, like, really harshed their high.”
But these great, great grandsons of the Lost Cause proved much more malleable in countenance than the ossified in memory, now enshrined in marble statuary, of their confederate forefathers.
Consequently, a kind of cracker Lysistrata started to unfold. The pomade lacquer faded from stiff pompadours, yielding to lank, draping locks of hippie plumage. The habit of rebel bellicosity was sublimated into an avidity to “boogie.” The zealots of ass-kicking became the acolytes of acid and devotees of the gospels of kicking back and getting down.
As time passed, on weekends, as the Allman Brothers preached Sunday sermons vis-a-vis guitar and drum solos, these newly minted freaks could be found in positions of repose and reflection upon the grassy hills of the park, eating Orange Sunshine and drawling, “aw mahn, Dwayne’s guitar is shootin’ sparks into mah brain…”
Or as Marcel Proust put it,
“The real act of discovery consists not in finding new lands but in seeing with new eyes.”
If the US is great in any regard, it is not because of the psychotic belief in its own exceptionalism or its risible grandiosity involving the claim to be the one and only “indispensable nation.” Conversely, its best quality is evinced in the voices of the country’s economically bereft rabble, as expressed in the blues, in jazz, folk, country/western, and hip hop music, in which the powerless find a voice that moves the heart by inducing the soul to be able to penetrate the thick walls of shame that the class-based capitalist prison state imposes on the laboring class.
Waylon Jennings rendition of Billy Joe Shaver’s outlaw country classic, and its Cracker Zen philosophy of: The more adept one becomes at growing down — even composting — one’s pride, ego, pretensions, and careerist striving the richer the soil of the soul grows.
(Billy Joe Shaver’s mother, eight months pregnant with him, was severely beaten by her husband and left for dead in a ditch. Later spotted labouring in the scorching heat of an east Texas cotton field, a child harness to her back, young Billy at her side, by a recruiter for local honky-tonks scouting the area to fill waitress positions. Shaver’s red-haired mother’s good looks proved providential for exposing him to venues of country/western music.)
The early 1980s. I am attempting to navigate, and failing on a psychical basis, the vales and canyons of Los Angeles. It is the advent of the Reagan years. The idiot stare of the encompassing dome of the LA sky is too much for my Appalachian Hill country psyche. There is no green-on-green canopy to filter the relentless sheen of sunlight. It renders me manic, angst-ridden, and sleepless.
The damp evening air envelops one at sundown in LA. It gets damn cold. A clinging chill wafts from the Pacific Ocean. But the phenomenon is not weather related; instead, the cold is the embrace of the ghosts of the dead dreams of the city’s inhabitants.
X captures in tone and limns in lyric the effects of the atomised LA landscape upon my besieged psyche…I slouch in the direction of The Whiskey to catch them.
This song, by Elizabeth Cotten, here, interpreted by Rhiannon Middens, seems to me, concerns the type of release borne of lament, whereas one has lost everything and made every attempt to right oneself with circumstance and fate but to no avail. Every worldly possession is in hock…but destitution has not been dodged.
Oh Lordy me, didn’t I shake sugaree
Everything I got is done and pawned
Everything I got is done and pawned
Yet a stark, painfully beautiful, indomitable truth rises up from the soul. I am still here. My voice still rises heavenward. The deathless heart of my song endures in the face of misfortune and grief.
Wallace Stevens captures the sentiment in verse: Excerpted from his poem: A Weak Mind in the Mountains:
Yet there was a man within me
Could have risen to the clouds,
Could have touched these winds,
Bent and broken them down,
Could have stood up sharply in the sky.
One can imitate, with virtuoso precision, musical and poetic technique — but the verities garnered from life lived cannot be counterfeited, no matter how perfect the mimicry. The performance will remain at surface level.
Conversely, as is the case with Roscoe Holcomb, the sublimity of his exquisite rawness arrives from the authenticity of his experience. Listening, at least in my case to his Appalachian cadences, causes my wounded heart to bleed lambent light.
As I write these words, it has been dark for hours here in Munich, Germany, as, collectively, we, in the Northern Hemisphere trudge into the long, dark nights of the dying year. Short daylight hours, haunted with grim and grisly news. Our era, lit up but not illuminated, by twenty four/seven artificial light. Perpetual media distractions at our finger tips. Nature banished. Communal experience atomised.
We attempt to grieve, but remain empty, by means of the same Mephistophelian illusion that has left us estranged from the beating heart of earthly life. Conversely, the US blues/gospel/folk tradition captures the cadences of grief wrought by the knowledge of the vastness of creation, within which unfolds the tragic dance between the fragility of human life and the reality of ever present human folly.
This ballad by the Carter Family defines the form and reveals what has been scoured away by Mephistophelian light. (As a general rule, songs about trains are about anything but trains.)
Pete Seeger, a few years before his death, told me and a small group of others this anecdote about he and Woody Guthrie. The two of them were playing a gig for striking coal miners, deep in the Ozarks. Because no one present could afford babysitters, the union hall was filled with women and small children. A short time into their performance, a squad of large, brutal company goons, wearing long coats concealing clubs and other weapons, entered the hall.
Pete inquired of Woody as to how they should respond. Woody told him to keep playing, and play for all they were worth, which they did. They continued their show and no trouble came to pass that night. Afterwards, one of the members of the goon squad approached Woody and Pete and confessed to them. “We came here to bust up the meeting. But what was going on was not what we were told. You seem like good people.”
Pete related, Woody, much taken with the declaration, returned to their quarters and wrote his song Union Maid, in a single sitting. That is what Woody meant by, “this machine kills fascists.” His music and that of other inspired troubadours kills the soul-dead ideology of fascism with the life-vivifying veracity of truth.
The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) declared East Jerusalem the capital of Palestine “under occupation” and urged the U.S. to withdraw from the peace process and back down from its Jerusalem decision in a statement issued following an extraordinary summit in Istanbul on Wednesday.
The OIC also called on other countries to recognize East Jerusalem as the Palestinian capital.
Following the summit, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and OIC Secretary General Dr. Yousef bin Ahmad Al-Othaimeen held a joint press conference to announce its results.
Abbas said that Palestinians can no longer accept the U.S. as mediator in the peace process since it has lost impartiality.
“We will apply to the UN Security Council for the annulment of US decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital,” Abbas said, noting that all 14 member countries of the UNSC other than the U.S. support Palestine’s position.
As the final leader speaking in the summit, Erdoğan bitterly criticized the U.S. and Israel for reckless decisions placing themselves above the international law.
“I believe that with this historic summit we have shown the world that Jerusalem is not abandoned,” Erdoğan said and thanked all leaders for convening in such a short notice. “I think this portrait of unity on Jerusalem should set an example, lesson and warning for everyone,” he added.
Invited by Erdoğan, leaders and representatives of 57 Muslim countries gathered in Istanbul in response to last week’s U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, a decision believed to be pushed by President Donald Trump.
“Trump, do you stand behind this Israel? There is occupation, torture, terror there. Do you defend this Israel? But I find it normal since the [same] Trump mentality that used terrorist YPG/PYD against Daesh also does this,” said Erdoğan while condemning Israeli security forces for the violence against protesters.
Erdoğan once again urged all countries which have not already done so to recognize the State of Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Jordanian King Abdullah II and Lebanese President Michel Aoun are among the heads of state attending the emergency summit in Istanbul, as well as the emirs of Qatar and Kuwait and presidents of Afghanistan and Indonesia.
Trump’s announcement drew widespread international rejection and condemnation and sparked a wave of protests across the Muslim world.
Tension has particularly mounted in the Palestinian territories. Israeli security forces have so far killed two Palestinians and injured several hundred during demonstrations against the declaration.
Jerusalem remains at the heart of the Israel-Palestine conflict, with Palestinians hoping that East Jerusalem — illegally occupied by Israel since 1967 — might eventually serve as the capital of a Palestinian state.
This file photo dated Nov. 9, 2017 shows President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan speaking during the 1st Science and Technology Summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Astana, Kazakhstan. (AA Photo)
According to the final communique of the summit in Istanbul, the OIC members agreed to:
1. Reject and condemn in the strongest terms the unilateral decision by the President of the United States America recognizing Al-Quds as the so-called capital of Israel, the occupying Power; reject it as null and void legally, and consider it an attack on the historical, legal, natural and national rights of the Palestinian people, a deliberate undermining of all peace efforts, an impetus to of extremism and terrorism, and a threat to international peace and security; and call upon all member states to give high priority for the Palestinian question in their daily discourses and foreign policy agenda, especially in their dealing with counterparts in other parts of the world;
2. Reaffirm the centrality of the Cause of Palestine and Al-Quds Ash-Sharif to the Muslim Ummah; renew our principled support for the Palestinian people in their pursuit to attain their inalienable national rights, including their right to self-determination and the establishment of their independent and sovereign Palestinian State on the borders of 4 June 1967, with Al-Quds Ash-Sharif as its capital; assert the status of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif in the hearts and minds of the Muslim and Christian peoples throughout the world because it has the first of the two qiblas, the third holy mosque, where Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, started his Mi’raj (Ascension to Heaven), and the birthplace of Jesus Christ, peace be upon him; and resolve to confront any steps that would affect the historical, legal, religious or status of the or political City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif;
3. Reaffirm our attachment to the just and comprehensive-peace based on the two-state solution with East Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Palestine and consistent with internationally-recognized terms of reference and the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative adopted by the Extraordinary Islamic Summit Conference in Makkah Al-Mukarramah in 2005- as a strategic choice; and call on the international community to act in an effective and serious manner to achieve this solution;
4. Reaffirm our adherence to all resolutions adopted by the regular and extraordinary sessions of the Islamic Summit on the Cause of Palestine and the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif, in particular the Extraordinary Summit in Jakarta, including the affirmation that a comprehensive and just peace will be achieved only by ending the occupation and establishing the independent State of Palestine that has full sovereignty on the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif as its eternal capital;
5. Consider that this dangerous declaration, which aims to change the legal status of the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif, is null and void and lacks any legitimacy, as being a serious violation of the international law, and the Fourth Geneva Convention in particular, and all relevant resolutions of international legitimacy, particularly the U.N. Security Council resolutions No. 478 (1980) and 2334 (2016), the foundations of the peace process that stipulate that City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif as a final status issue, the agreements signed and the undertakings made in this regard by the United States of America, which requires the immediate reversal of this decision;
6. Hold the U.S. Administration fully liable for all the consequences of not retracting from this illegal decision; and regard it as an announcement of the U.S. Administration’s withdrawal from its role as sponsor of peace and its realization among all stakeholders and an encouragement of Israel, the occupying Power, to continue its policy of colonialism, settlement, apartheid and the ethnic cleansing it has been practicing in the occupied Palestinian territory in 1967, and in the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif at its core;
7. Thank regional institutions for their positive stand in favor of the State of Palestine and the status of Al-Quds; and mandate the General Secretariat to mobilize support for the cause of Palestine from all regional organizations.
8. Declare East Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Palestine and invite all countries to recognize the State of Palestine and East Jerusalem as its occupied capital;
9. Assert our continued commitment to protecting the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif, its historic status, its cultural mission, and its legal status, and to take all necessary measures to put an end to the violations committed by the brutal Israeli occupation and any party that supports this occupation and its colonial and racist policies; and condemn in this regard the full and unjustified bias of the U.S. Congress in favor of the imperial and racist policies and practices of Israel, the occupying Power;
10. Welcome the international consensus rejecting the declaration of the U.S. Administration, which violates all resolutions of international legitimacy, because of its serious repercussions on the security and stability in the region and the world; and regard this international consensus as a message of strong support for the rights of the Palestinian people and their just Cause and right to their land, notably the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif;
11. Support all legal and political steps at the national and international levels, which contribute to preserving the historical and legal status of the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif; and support the State of Palestine in its efforts in all international forums to consolidate its sovereignty over Al-Quds Ash-Sharif and the occupied Palestinian territory in general;
12. Call upon all States to continue to fully implement UNSCR 478 of 1980 and in this regard urge all States to: a) refrain from supporting the U.S. decision to recognize Jerusalem as the so-called capital of Israel and; b) not to relocate their Diplomatic Missions to Al-Quds Ash-Sharif;
13. Call on the U.N. Security Council to assume its responsibilities immediately and reaffirm the legal status of the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif, and to end the Israeli occupation of the land of the State of Palestine, to ensure the international protection of the Palestinian people, and to implement and respect all its resolutions on the Palestinian Cause;
14. Affirm its readiness to take up this grave violation in the U.N. General Assembly should the U.N. Security Council fail to act in accordance with the U.N. General Assembly resolution no.377A; the “Uniting for Peace resolution”;
15. Stand for the Cause of Palestine and Al-Quds Ash-Sharif as the main issue in international forums, including Member States’ voting in favor of the relevant resolutions of the Security Council, the General Assembly, the Human Rights Council, the UNESCO and other international organizations and expressing their rejection of any action contrary to this principled position, and any member state taking a different stance shall be considered to have left Islamic unanimity and should therefore be held accountable;
16. Urge strongly all member states to support Bayt Mal Al-Quds Ash-Sharif, the executive arm of Al-Quds Committee chaired by His Majesty King Mohammed VI of Morocco, in order to help the steadfastness of the inhabitants of Al-Quds;
17. Express unequivocal support for the just struggle of the Palestinian people and our condemnation of the Israeli attacks on the peaceful protests of the Palestinian people against the illegal declaration of the U.S. Administration and our full solidarity with the Palestinian people in these difficult circumstances, which require Member States and all peace-loving forces to take urgent action to avoid taking any similar steps and to respond to the imperialist and racist procedures by Israel, the occupying Power, towards the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif;
18. Also affirm commitment to provide the necessary material resources to support the steadfastness of the Palestinian people within the occupied Palestinian territory, particularly in the City of Al-Quds Ash-Sharif, who continue to protect the historic, civilizational and legal identity of the Holy City;
19. Strongly urge all Member States, specialized agencies and non-governmental organizations in the Member States to increase their contributions to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) so as to ease the ongoing financial crises, exacerbated by the current humanitarian situation on the ground, and to support the Agency’s valuable work in assisting the Palestine refugees;
20. Call upon the Member States and relevant OIC bodies to continue to provide all forms of economic, social, technical and material support and assistance to the Palestinian people and the State of Palestine including promotion and facilitation of trade with Palestine, developing capacity building programs and enhancing financial and economic assistance to build up a strong and independent Palestinian national economy and to strengthen the economic and social development of Palestine, including the City of Al-Quds Al-Sharif, as its capital;
21. Call upon the OIC Executive Committee and its Bureau and the Ministerial Contact Group on Al-Quds to act expeditiously and communicate with the governments of world countries and international organizations to raise their awareness of the seriousness of this step and the actions of Muslim countries in this regard and to act preemptively concerning any negative consequences of the declaration of the U.S. Administration;
22. Request IDB to support economic and social development endeavors in Quds Al-Sharif and other occupied territories through the “Islamic Solidarity Fund for Development” by prioritizing Palestine’s projects and formulating special and flexible mechanisms and procedures for them;
23. Assert the need to continue to follow developments in this regard and to take the necessary action accordingly.
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It is widely assumed that the current state of the Syrian economy is very strongly tied to sanctions, hyperinflation, unemployment, and poverty. Meanwhile, the majority could not think about entrepreneurship. However, the sustainable trends have characterized economic growth in the state that really is also surprising and glorious.
Despite the war taken a toll on business, entrepreneurs are thriving and becoming more efficient and more effective, adapting to the changing circumstances of our times. And even more surprising is that many of them are women, and businessmen are looking particularly at start-ups.
Ahmad Sufyan Bayram, a Syrian researcher and social entrepreneur compiled the report from interviews with 268 experts and Syrian entrepreneurs. A report this year suggests that 17.6 percent of entrepreneurs tried to work on new startup ideas in 2016, and the figure climbed to 31.2 percent in 2017. In addition, women now comprise 22.4 percent of entrepreneurs in Syria, compared with only 4.4 percent in 2009.
Possibly this increase was triggered by the growing role that Syrian women have been playing in society as breadwinners and supporters of their families, while many of the men have been forced to either flee or join the armed conflict. This is despite the fact that Syrian entrepreneurs face some of the world’s toughest business conditions.
“Unlike with entrepreneurs in other parts of the world, building a startup for Syrians isn’t all about making a fortune. In a country that has had enough bloodshed as a result of foreign intervention, ISIS, and terror, entrepreneurs look at entrepreneurship as the only way to keep their dreams alive and restore their hopes of a better future,” Bayram stressed.
The entrepreneur gave also some examples of successful start-ups. Some of the thriving enterprises in Syria are Remmaz, a platform that teaches coding in Arabic; Li-Beiroot, the Syrian alternative of Uber that operates between Damascus and Beirut; and Mujeeb, an artificial intelligence platform that builds customer support chat-bots in Arabic.
The thing is that few Syrian entrepreneurs possess advanced technical skills, which is why some Syrian startups are technology-based but are mostly micro and small businesses. Modern trends include food and travel services, as well as a variety of artistic hobbies-turned-startups.
In addition to the statistics and start-up’s analysis, his report identified up to 10 challenges that most entrepreneurs encounter in starting a business — insecurity and political instability in opposition-controlled areas, scarcity of financial support, limited access to international markets, collapsing infrastructure on the territory previously controlled by ISIS, sanctions and payment restrictions, increasing economic burdens, dwindling human skills, and diminishing market size.
At the same time, the researcher expressed his hope for improving the investment climate in the country. It would be nice, said Ahmad Bairam, if the U.S. and Western countries [unlikely], as well as China, India, Russia, and Japan, would directly participate in the speedy restoration of the Syrian economy. Such an approach would not only lay a solid foundation for Syria’s prosperity in the future but also provided an opportunity to earn serious profits in the rapidly developing markets of the country.
Sophie Mangal is a special investigative correspondent at Inside Syria Media Center where this article was originally published.
The FCC is under attack—and so too is the First Amendment. As the primary regulator of how media and information gets to our nation’s citizens, the Federal Communications Commission has a critical role to play in protecting the open Internet, free speech, and free press in our democracy. Though the agency has always enjoyed a cozy relationship with the industries it regulates, ever since the Trump administration arrived in Washington, the FCC’s mission to preserve the public commons has been threatened, assaulted and torn asunder. And like a bad horror movie cliché, these calls to eviscerate the FCC have been coming from inside the agency.
Repealing net neutrality has drawn a huge amount of public visibility—and rightly so—but that decision is just the latest in a string of ominous, industry-friendly giveaways by the Trump administration’s FCC. It has also rolled back local TV station ownership limits on media giants like Sinclair Broadcasting Group and rescinded the longtime “main studio” rule that required local stations to maintain community newsrooms and fostered more local journalism. And the agency’s leadership has begun a campaign to actively abdicate its enforcement mission and pass it over to the smaller, less well-funded Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which lacks the FCC’s deep industry knowledge and proactive regulatory power.
“This is the worst FCC I can remember,” says Michael Copps, bluntly.
Copps, who served as FCC commissioner from 2001 to 2011 and now advises Common Cause’s Media and Democracy Reform Initiative, says he has watched new FCC chair Ajit Pai’s leadership with growing alarm.
“There’s an audacity to it, a lack of process. It’s just God-awful,” Copps says of the agency’s breakneck pursuit of a reactionary, “market-based” agenda. “This FCC is on an outright tear to wreak untold damage on our media ecosystem, on our news and information, free speech, democracy and self-government.”
Death of the Open Internet?
The FCC’s 3–2 vote to repeal net neutrality—with the two Democratic commissioners dissenting—is the most high-profile and controversial step the agency has taken in the Trump era. It reverses a rule passed by the Obama administration FCC in February 2015 that put internet traffic under the “Common Carrier” protections of Title II of the Communications Act of 1934. In effect, net neutrality means the government prohibits cable companies and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) from blocking, slowing or otherwise discriminating against the web traffic of their users. Much like a public utility, all content to the consumer must be treated the same—hence, net neutrality. Right-wing opponents of the rule—which included then-Commissioner Pai, who voted against net neutrality—complained it was a case of unnecessary government overreach, and made a series of apocalyptic claims about its potential impact.
“One of the things that’s really outlandish about how this FCC has gone about its net neutrality proceeding is that Pai has just straight-up ignored all the available evidence of the impact of the rule,” explains Craig Aaron, president and CEO of the media industry watchdog group Free Press:
Net neutrality opponents talked about how internet infrastructure will suffer. But if you actually look at what the phone and cable companies are reporting to their own investors since 2015: They’re bragging about deployment, they’re talking about all the faster speeds they’re providing, they’re talking about doing more with less money.
In endorsing a return to the “light touch” status quo ante—which is itself a misreading of the agency’s regulatory history—Pai cites studies that show a slight dip in broadband investment since 2015. But that proof is notably funded by the telecom industry, and other reporting on companies like Comcast contradicts his claims. So, like the widespread passage of draconian voter ID laws to combat a nonexistent epidemic of vote fraud, the Trump administration FCC’s justification for killing net neutrality is a right-wing “solution” to a phony problem. Aaron chalks up this FCC’s unwillingness to accept the truth as proof they don’t really care about consumers or the public interest. “To them, it really comes down to regulation is bad, and regulations passed by the Obama administration are worse.”
Even if motivated by partisan spite, the impact of losing net neutrality could be devastating for all news consumers and a free and independent press. With no legal or regulatory prohibitions stopping them, telecom companies and ISPs would feel emboldened—spurred on by their shareholders—to start picking and choosing one kind of content over another to maximize profits.
Comcast‘s net neutrality pledge, before and after the day (4/26/17) the FCC’s Ajit Pai announced his plan to scale back net neutrality requirements. (Ars Technica, 11/29/17)
Coincidentally, on the same day Pai announced his plan to roll back net neutrality last April, Comcast, the nation’s largest cable company and the owner of NBCUniversal, was caught subtly changing the language of its online net neutrality pledge. Before, the company promised to never offer “paid prioritization” (fast lanes) of Internet traffic; now it merely said it would not engage in “anti-competitive prioritization.” That vague, legalistic language amounts to a semi truck-sized loophole, ripe for abuse.
“There’s just so much incentive for a Comcast, which owns all these channels and movie studios, to give their own content a leg up and they can do it in ways that, as an end user, you might not know what’s going on,” Aaron points out.
For example, you might try to watch a Democracy Now!broadcast and you get that spinning wheel of death. It’s not loading, so unless you’re really committed to seeing it, you’ll probably go somewhere else, like NBC News, that loads quicker. That’s the kind of advantage they want. It’s like a big horserace, except they own the track and can give themselves a head start, and even if it’s only a few seconds in load time or a certain percentage in quality difference, that’s a big deal.
The backlash to the repeal has been ferocious. Just between Pai’s announcement in April and the end of August, the FCC received nearly 22 million public comments about the rule change. Most of these comments opposed the repeal: a Pew analysis found six out of the seven most prevalent comments supported net neutrality. And public polling also finds a majority of Americans prefer to keep net neutrality.
Part of the overwhelming response can be attributed to comedian John Oliver, whose May segment in support of net neutrality went viral and has garnered more than 6 million views online. But the resistance runs far deeper than that.
Reddit‘s front page, devoted to pointing out lawmakers who supported net neutrality–or sold it out. (image: Cory Doctorow, 1/11/17)
An open letter signed by more than 50 mayors of US cities, from New York City to Salem, Virginia, called on the FCC to abandon its repeal. On the same day Michael Flynn pleaded guilty, the entire front page of Reddit was devoted to supporting net neutrality and expressing outrage at industry-funded lawmakers who failed to support it. (Even in the r/NASCAR subreddit, the most upvoted story ever is now about the need to protect net neutrality.) Members of Congress have been deluged with calls and comments as well. During the week of Thanksgiving, Illinois Congressman Mike Quigley reported 4,204 constituent calls supporting net neutrality, 0 against. Even the “father of the Internet,” Vint Cerf, and numerous other tech leaders have spoken out in support of net neutrality.
“Net neutrality has become a new third rail,” Aaron says. “This is very much a political issue now.”
Despite the broad grassroots opposition, not to mention the unanswered questions about the legitimacy of some of the FCC comments, Pai and his fellow Republicans on the commission pushed ahead and voted to end net neutrality anyway.
Gutting Big Media Accountability
“What Pai is doing is moving us to an anti-competitive, ‘pay to play’ system of the internet, one that makes it harder for citizen journalists who have a camera or a phone to report and compete with big media companies,” explains Phillip Berenbroick, senior policy counsel for the open internet advocacy group Public Knowledge.
And a mostly overlooked element of this plan, Berenbroick adds, is Pai’s push to strip the FCC of its regulatory and enforcement duties.
“In effect, the FCC is trying to dump enforcement of the Internet onto the FTC, which is already overtaxed,” Berenbroick explains.
Pai justifies this move as a step toward more accountability, and he often calls the FTC, which oversees everything from diapers to airlines, the “nation’s premier civil law enforcement agency.” This tough talk is just a ruse, however, and glosses over the fundamental weaknesses inherent in dumping the FCC’s enforcement responsibilities onto another agency. Even FTC commissioner Terrell McSweenyacknowledged back in April that his agency would not be as capable as the FCC at policing internet blocking or tiered-content prioritization.
First of all, Berenbroick points out that the FTC lacks deep institutional knowledge of the communications industry, making it unlikely to effectively deal with technical or legal issues that could lead to anti-competitive behavior by massive media corporations. The agency also has roughly 550 fewer employees than the FCC, and Trump has just proposed cutting its fiscal year 2018 budget to $306 million, $16 million less than the FCC’s.
Most importantly, the FTC can only enforce “unfair and deceptive trade practices.” In effect, it can only police companies after the fact for failing to live up to their own voluntary commitments. With legions of lawyers at their disposal, giant media corporations are unlikely to be swayed by consumer complaints of internet traffic discrimination when these same companies are able to write (and rewrite) the rules they’re supposed to follow.
Not really, says Trump telecom policy advisor Mark Jamison (AEIdeas, 10/21/16).
Of course, the Trump FCC’s abdication of its regulatory duties is not surprising. One of Trump’s early telecom policy advisors, Mark Jamison, talked openly about eliminating the agency during last year’s presidential transition period. Just weeks before Trump’s election, Jamison had written an op-ed for the right-wing American Enterprise Institute, not-so-subtly titled: “Do We Need the FCC?” (Of note: Jamison previously advised cell phone corporation Sprint on regulatory issues.) In the post, Jamison claims one reason the FCC is no longer necessary is that “telecommunications network providers and ISPs are rarely, if ever, monopolies.” In fact, Pai’s predecessor, former FCC chair Tom Wheeler, pointed out in 2014 that four out of five Americans had only one choice for an ISP at basic broadband speeds of 25Mbps.
“The FCC, as the expert regulator of the communications industry, is far better positioned to deal with internet regulation, because it has the authority to write rules that prohibit bad behavior from happening in the first place,” Berenbroick notes. “If I were a cable company [Pai’s plan] is exactly what I would want.”
For his part, Pai, a former lawyer for telecom giant Verizon, seems unconcerned about the appearance of bias. In fact, at a telecom industry dinner last week—hosted by Sinclair—the FCC chair joked about his “love” of his former company.
Wheeler, who led the fight to pass net neutrality, has likewise criticized the FCC’s efforts to dump enforcement on the FTC, calling it an “abomination.” In an op-ed last week, Wheeler noted the irony of such a move, since telecom giant AT&Trecently won a court case where it successfully argued that the FTC had no jurisdiction over its internet traffic activity.
Sensing the fury aimed at this naked surrender to industry, Pai released a joint Memorandum of Understanding just two days before the repeal about how the FCC and FTC would work together to monitor the internet. But the substance of the plan was little changed; it was little more than a blatant attempt at damage control. Democratic FCC commissioner Mignon Clyburn blasted it as a “confusing, lackluster, reactionary afterthought.” The repeal vote still happened, however. Because in the Trump era FCC, the prospect that multi-billion-dollar media conglomerates could fall through the cracks, and their online control over the nation’s news and information could go essentially unregulated, is more a feature than a bug.
Undermining Local Journalism
The damage wrought by this FCC doesn’t stop with repealing net neutrality, though. As that more public battle has raged, the agency quietly gutted media ownership rules last month, opening the door to even more local TV consolidation, which could have a catastrophic impact on news diversity and local journalism.
“Net neutrality has gotten more attention, because consumers can better understand the idea of my Netflix feed slowing down and buffering if I don’t pay Verizon more for video streaming,” notes University of Delaware public policy professor Danilo Yanich. “But media consolidation suffers because it is an abstract concern for news consumers; it’s hard for viewers to be outraged about the stories your new local TV station doesn’t cover.”
Local TV, which just a few years ago was considered a dying backwater, has become among the hottest properties in the media industry recently. Between 2013 and 2016, the local TV news industry saw more than $20 billion in mergers and acquisitions deals, with hundreds of stations changing hands. As a result, several dominant players, among them Sinclair Broadcasting and Nexstar, have emerged. According to a Pew Research Center analysis of BIA Kelsey data, by the time 2017 arrived, five companies owned 37 percent of all full-power local TV stations in the country. This has translated into $2 billion in additional revenue for these companies since 2014.
Companies like Sinclair, Gray and Nexstar have bought up hundreds of TV stations since 2004. (Chart: Pew, 5/11/17)
“The mantra from these big media groups now is ‘go big or go home,’” says Yanich.
Mergers create more leverage for local TV media groups to charge broadcasters and cable companies more money for retransmission. And the reason they can say that is because they now control dozens or hundreds of stations across the country.
But local TV has also turned into a lucrative cash cow thanks to the radically changed landscape of political advertising in the wake of the 2011 Citizens United ruling, he explains. After analyzing the finances of seven major TV station corporations, a Pew report found that their combined political ad revenue jumped from $574 million in 2012 to $696 million in 2014 to $843 million last year. And those numbers are projected to grow even more in the future.
“Local TV news remains an extremely important vehicle for political communication,” Yanich explains. That is, in part, because local journalism is the most trusted form of news. Currently, Yanich is working on a book studying the relationship between political ads and news content in the 2016 election. He notes that this trust factor, plus the fact that local TV reaches a large number of voters who aren’t hardened partisans, makes it an appealing target for political influencers. “So a lot of money will keep going into local TV for political ads in 2020, because that’s the best way to get the message across to these undecided voters.”
Greater media consolidation may be good for the bottom lines of local TV conglomerates, but it’s not good for journalism. “This has huge implications, and it’s going on in the backyards of America, but most folks don’t know it because it’s simply not covered,” Yanich says.
It’s certainly not covered in depth in the mainstream press. It might be covered by FAIR or industry journals, but a local TV station in Philadelphia is certainly not going to tell you about the duopoly it has with another local station. What it instead says is: “We are extending the reach of the primary station.”
That’s why the FCC’s under-the-radar accompanying decision to rescind the “main studio” rule is so damaging. Previously, local TV stations were required to maintain a newsroom in the communities they covered, the goal being to keep their journalism centered on local issues. But with the rule lifted, local TV giants are now free to gobble up more and more stations, and then shut down those newly acquired local newsrooms to pad their profits. They can then pipe in pre-packaged news produced in faraway studios to save even more money.
“You end up with the same anchors, same videos, same narrative,” Yanich explains. “Coupled with the move to end net neutrality, more media consolidation will have the effect of squelching dissent, whether for ideological or commercial reasons.”
Indeed, greater local media consolidation will make it much easier to manipulate the news to fit the agenda of a corporate parent. Nowhere is this more apparent than at Sinclair Broadcasting, the largest TV station owner in the country, which has a well-established track record of coloring its news to favor right-wing ideology. A recent example: Back in May, when Montana Republican Congressional candidate Greg Gianforte physically attacked a reporter on the eve of a special election, the local Sinclair affiliate refused to cover the story, even though numerous other news outlets did and a Fox affiliate witnessed and had an audio recording of the assault. Even more egregious, Sinclair forces its affiliates to run long, pro-Trump commentaries in its news broadcasts as many as nine times a week. Now Sinclair wants to bring this kind of broadcast mindset to even more of the country—in May, it proposed a massive acquisition of the fifth-largest local TV company, Tribune Media, which would give it more than 200 stations nationwide, and broadcast access to three out of four American homes.
The consequences for the homogenization and hollowing out of local and independent news are ominous. “As a viewer in a community, I’m better served if there are multiple newsrooms trying to hold public officials accountable. You want competing sources of information, different viewpoints and voices,” Free Press’s Aaron points out:
But if it’s all under the same corporate roof and literally produced by the same people, you can’t have that. In multiple communities right now, if you’re clicking through on Election Night, your local outlets might be simulcasting the same content on multiple channels.
The Fight Ahead
While this flagrant rollback of media consolidation rules looks unlikely to be reversed anytime soon under the Trump administration, net neutrality stands a better chance of being preserved. The political pressure on Congress to protect Title II internet regulation shows little signs of stopping. And numerous free press and civil liberties groups plan on suing the FCC to temporarily halt and, ultimately, reverse the repeal.
“We think this FCC completely botched the process. It has just ignored the public and never addressed the apparent fraud happening in the comments,” Aaron says. Likewise, the FCC’s public review simply disappeared the more than 50,000 consumer complaints lodged against internet providers since net neutrality went into effect. Notes Aaron:
When it comes to the FCC and administrative law, the fact that there is a new president, in and of itself, is not a winning argument for changing rules. There was a 10-year fight to get net neutrality, and then the decision was upheld in court. So here comes Ajit Pai who says, “Sorry, new sheriff in town, we don’t need any of it.” There’s a legal burden there to prove that. We will sue him, it will go to federal court and we like our chances.
That legal fight could take more than a year to reach a final resolution, almost guaranteeing that net neutrality will be a key campaign issue in the 2018 midterm elections. Republican Sen. John Thune has been at the forefront of this issue, publicly calling for a bipartisan, congressional fix to settle the open internet issue once and for all. Some media giants, like AT&T, have echoed his call for a legislative solution as well. But upon closer inspection, these Republican and corporate definitions of “open internet” would still shortchange consumers and make it harder on the independent press. No Democrats have signed on to sponsor his bill.
“We shouldn’t fall for a compromise that is 5 percent less awful than what the FCC is doing,” Aaron warns:
Senator Thune’s bill codifies basic internet protections, but strips the FCC of any ability to adjust or adapt to new abuses or tactics. It will also prohibit tactics the telecom and media companies don’t have any intention of doing anyway. They will call it “net neutrality,” but it will be a toothless version.
Getting the American public more involved in a real, transparent debate over net neutrality—along with a broader discussion of what kind of media and news environment we want to encourage—is critically important to the future of our country, says former FCC commissioner Copps. And it would stand in stark contrast to Pai’s cloistered approach, where he rarely ventures outside a friendly bubble of conservative think tanks and the airwaves of Fox News to tout his industry-first policies.
“The American people need to know what he wants to do, and he needs to really hear what the American people think,” Copps says of Pai. The former FCC commissioner points to two dark forces at work right now gaining ever greater control over our national discourse: the power of big money and big media, and an extreme, right-wing ideology that thinks an unfettered free market is the cure for all evils.
“We have this technology that has the potential to be the town square of our democracy, but this FCC is setting up fewer and fewer, huge gatekeepers to that,” he says.
As a result, cherished ideals like freedom of expression and freedom of the press are now under threat from a Trump administration that prioritizes multinational telecom and corporate media profits above all else.
“Big media sees you and me and all the people in the United States not as citizens,” Copps says, “but as products to be delivered to advertisers.”
Reed Richardson is a media critic and writer whose work has appeared in The Nation, AlterNet, Harvard University’s Nieman Reports and the textbook Media Ethics (Current Controversies).
The U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union at the time it broke up and many other experts have said that the West promised Gorbachev that – if the USSR allowed German re-unification – NATO wouldn’t move “one inch closer” to Russia.
While Western leaders have long denied the promise, newly-declassified documents now prove this.
The National Security Archive at George Washington University reported Tuesday:
U.S. Secretary of State James Baker’s famous “not one inch eastward” assurance about NATO expansion in his meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on February 9, 1990, was part of a cascade of assurances about Soviet security given by Western leaders to Gorbachev and other Soviet officials throughout the process of German unification in 1990 and on into 1991, according to declassified U.S., Soviet, German, British and French documents posted today by the National Security Archive at George Washington University (http://nsarchive.gwu.edu).
The documents show that multiple national leaders were considering and rejecting Central and Eastern European membership in NATO as of early 1990 and through 1991, that discussions of NATO in the context of German unification negotiations in 1990 were not at all narrowly limited to the status of East German territory, and that subsequent Soviet and Russian complaints about being misled about NATO expansion were founded in written contemporaneous memcons and telcons at the highest levels.
The documents reinforce former CIA Director Robert Gates’s criticism of “pressing ahead with expansion of NATO eastward [in the 1990s], when Gorbachev and others were led to believe that wouldn’t happen.”The key phrase, buttressed by the documents, is “led to believe.”
***
The first concrete assurances by Western leaders on NATO began on January 31, 1990, when West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher opened the bidding with a major public speech at Tutzing, in Bavaria, on German unification. The U.S. Embassy in Bonn (see Document 1) informed Washington that Genscher made clear “that the changes in Eastern Europe and the German unification process must not lead to an ‘impairment of Soviet security interests.’ Therefore, NATO should rule out an ‘expansion of its territory towards the east, i.e. moving it closer to the Soviet borders.’” The Bonn cable also noted Genscher’s proposal to leave the East German territory out of NATO military structures even in a unified Germany in NATO.
This latter idea of special status for the GDR territory was codified in the final German unification treaty signed on September 12, 1990, by the Two-Plus-Four foreign ministers (see Document 25). The former idea about “closer to the Soviet borders” is written down not in treaties but in multiple memoranda of conversation between the Soviets and the highest-level Western interlocutors (Genscher, Kohl, Baker, Gates, Bush, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Major, Woerner, and others) offering assurances throughout 1990 and into 1991 about protecting Soviet security interests and including the USSR in new European security structures. The two issues were related but not the same. Subsequent analysis sometimes conflated the two and argued that the discussion did not involve all of Europe. The documents published below show clearly that it did.
The “Tutzing formula” immediately became the center of a flurry of important diplomatic discussions over the next 10 days in 1990, leading to the crucial February 10, 1990, meeting in Moscow between Kohl and Gorbachev when the West German leader achieved Soviet assent in principle to German unification in NATO, as long as NATO did not expand to the east.
***
The conversations before Kohl’s assurance involved explicit discussion of NATO expansion, the Central and East European countries, and how to convince the Soviets to accept unification. For example, on February 6, 1990, when Genscher met with British Foreign Minister Douglas Hurd, the British record showed Genscher saying, “The Russians must have some assurance that if, for example, the Polish Government left the Warsaw Pact one day, they would not join NATO the next.” (See Document 2)
Having met with Genscher on his way into discussions with the Soviets, Baker repeated exactly the Genscher formulation in his meeting with Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze on February 9, 1990, (see Document 4); and even more importantly, face to face with Gorbachev.
Not once, but three times, Baker tried out the “not one inch eastward” formula with Gorbachev in the February 9, 1990, meeting. He agreed with Gorbachev’s statement in response to the assurances that “NATO expansion is unacceptable.” Baker assured Gorbachev that “neither the President nor I intend to extract any unilateral advantages from the processes that are taking place,” and that the Americans understood that “not only for the Soviet Union but for other European countries as well it is important to have guarantees that if the United States keeps its presence in Germany within the framework of NATO, not an inch of NATO’s present military jurisdiction will spread in an eastern direction.” (See Document 6).
Baker reported: “And then I put the following question to him [Gorbachev]. Would you prefer to see a united Germany outside of NATO, independent and with no U.S. forces or would you prefer a unified Germany to be tied to NATO, with assurances that NATO’s jurisdiction would not shift one inch eastward from its present position? He answered that the Soviet leadership was giving real thought to all such options [….] He then added,‘Certainly any extension of the zone of NATO would be unacceptable.’” Baker added in parentheses, for Kohl’s benefit, “By implication, NATO in its current zone might be acceptable.” (See Document 8)
Well-briefed by the American secretary of state, the West German chancellorunderstood a key Soviet bottom line, and assured Gorbachev on February 10, 1990: “We believe that NATO should not expand the sphere of its activity.” (See Document 9).
All the Western foreign ministers were on board with Genscher, Kohl, and Baker. Next came the British foreign minister, Douglas Hurd, on April 11, 1990.
***
Hurd reinforced the Baker-Genscher-Kohl message in his meeting with Gorbachev in Moscow, April 11, 1990, saying that Britain clearly “recognized the importance of doing nothing to prejudice Soviet interests and dignity.” (See Document 15)
The Baker conversation with Shevardnadze on May 4, 1990, as Baker described it in his own report to President Bush, most eloquently described what Western leaders were telling Gorbachev exactly at the moment: “I used your speech and our recognition of the need to adapt NATO, politically and militarily, and to develop CSCE to reassure Shevardnadze that the process would not yield winners and losers. Instead, it would produce a new legitimate European structure – one that would be inclusive, not exclusive.” (See Document 17)
Baker said it again, directly to Gorbachev on May 18, 1990 in Moscow, giving Gorbachev his “nine points,” which included the transformation of NATO, strengthening European structures, keeping Germany non-nuclear, and taking Soviet security interests into account. Baker started off his remarks, “Before saying a few words about the German issue, I wanted to emphasize that our policies are not aimed at separating Eastern Europe from the Soviet Union. We had that policy before. But today we are interested in building a stable Europe, and doing it together with you.” (See Document 18)
The French leader Francois Mitterrand … continued the cascade of assurances by saying the West must “create security conditions for you, as well as European security as a whole.” (See Document 19) Mitterrand immediately wrote Bush in a “cher George” letter about his conversation with the Soviet leader, that “we would certainly not refuse to detail the guarantees that he would have a right to expect for his country’s security.” (See Document 20)
At the Washington summit on May 31, 1990, Bush went out of his way to assure Gorbachev that Germany in NATO would never be directed at the USSR: “Believe me, we are not pushing Germany towards unification, and it is not us who determines the pace of this process. And of course, we have no intention, even in our thoughts, to harm the Soviet Union in any fashion. That is why we are speaking in favor of German unification in NATO without ignoring the wider context of the CSCE, taking the traditional economic ties between the two German states into consideration. Such a model, in our view, corresponds to the Soviet interests as well.” (See Document 21)
The “Iron Lady” also pitched in, after the Washington summit, in her meeting with Gorbachev in London on June 8, 1990. Thatcher anticipated the moves the Americans (with her support) would take in the early July NATO conference to support Gorbachev with descriptions of the transformation of NATO towards a more political, less militarily threatening, alliance. She said to Gorbachev: “We must find ways to give the Soviet Union confidence that its security would be assured…. CSCE could be an umbrella for all this, as well as being the forum which brought the Soviet Union fully into discussion about the future of Europe.” (See Document 22)
The NATO London Declaration on July 5, 1990 had quite a positive effect on deliberations in Moscow, according to most accounts, giving Gorbachev significant ammunition to counter his hardliners at the Party Congress which was taking place at that moment.
***
As Kohl said to Gorbachev in Moscow on July 15, 1990, as they worked out the final deal on German unification: “We know what awaits NATO in the future, and I think you are now in the know as well,” referring to the NATO London Declaration. (See Document 23)
In his phone call to Gorbachev on July 17, Bush meant to reinforce the success of the Kohl-Gorbachev talks and the message of the London Declaration. Bush explained: “So what we tried to do was to take account of your concerns expressed to me and others, and we did it in the following ways: by our joint declaration on non-aggression; in our invitation to you to come to NATO; in our agreement to open NATO to regular diplomatic contact with your government and those of the Eastern European countries; and our offer on assurances on the future size of the armed forces of a united Germany – an issue I know you discussed with Helmut Kohl. We also fundamentally changed our military approach on conventional and nuclear forces. We conveyed the idea of an expanded, stronger CSCE with new institutions in which the USSR can share and be part of the new Europe.” (See Document 24)
The documents show that Gorbachev agreed to German unification in NATO as the result of this cascade of assurances, and on the basis of his own analysis that the future of the Soviet Union depended on its integration into Europe, for which Germany would be the decisive actor. He and most of his allies believed that some version of the common European home was still possible and would develop alongside the transformation of NATO to lead to a more inclusive and integrated European space, that the post-Cold War settlement would take account of the Soviet security interests. The alliance with Germany would not only overcome the Cold War but also turn on its head the legacy of the Great Patriotic War.
But inside the U.S. government, a different discussion continued, a debate about relations between NATO and Eastern Europe. Opinions differed, but the suggestion from the Defense Department as of October 25, 1990 was to leave “the door ajar” for East European membership in NATO. (See Document 27)
***
As late as March 1991, according to the diary of the British ambassador to Moscow, British Prime Minister John Major personally assured Gorbachev, “We are not talking about the strengthening of NATO.” Subsequently, when Soviet defense minister Marshal Dmitri Yazov asked Major about East European leaders’ interest in NATO membership, the British leader responded, “Nothing of the sort will happen.” (See Document 28)
When Russian Supreme Soviet deputies came to Brussels to see NATO and meet with NATO secretary-general Manfred Woerner in July 1991, Woerner told the Russians that “We should not allow […] the isolation of the USSR from the European community.” According to the Russian memorandum of conversation, “Woerner stressed that the NATO Council and he are against the expansion of NATO (13 of 16 NATO members support this point of view).” (See Document 30)
Thus, Gorbachev went to the end of the Soviet Union assured that the West was not threatening his security and was not expanding NATO.
The U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union at the time it broke up and many other experts have said that the West promised Gorbachev that – if the USSR allowed German re-unification – NATO wouldn’t move “one inch closer” to Russia.
While Western leaders have long denied the promise, newly-declassified documents now prove this.
The National Security Archive at George Washington University reported Tuesday:
U.S. Secretary of State James Baker’s famous “not one inch eastward” assurance about NATO expansion in his meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on February 9, 1990, was part of a cascade of assurances about Soviet security given by Western leaders to Gorbachev and other Soviet officials throughout the process of German unification in 1990 and on into 1991, according to declassified U.S., Soviet, German, British and French documents posted today by the National Security Archive at George Washington University (http://nsarchive.gwu.edu).
The documents show that multiple national leaders were considering and rejecting Central and Eastern European membership in NATO as of early 1990 and through 1991, that discussions of NATO in the context of German unification negotiations in 1990 were not at all narrowly limited to the status of East German territory, and that subsequentSoviet and Russian complaints about being misled about NATO expansion were founded in written contemporaneous memcons and telcons at the highest levels.
The documents reinforce former CIA Director Robert Gates’s criticism of “pressing ahead with expansion of NATO eastward [in the 1990s], when Gorbachev and others were led to believe that wouldn’t happen.”The key phrase, buttressed by the documents, is “led to believe.”
***
The first concrete assurances by Western leaders on NATO began on January 31, 1990, when West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher opened the bidding with a major public speech at Tutzing, in Bavaria, on German unification. The U.S. Embassy in Bonn (see Document 1) informed Washington that Genscher made clear “that the changes in Eastern Europe and the German unification process must not lead to an ‘impairment of Soviet security interests.’ Therefore, NATO should rule out an ‘expansion of its territory towards the east, i.e. moving it closer to the Soviet borders.’” The Bonn cable also noted Genscher’s proposal to leave the East German territory out of NATO military structures even in a unified Germany in NATO.
This latter idea of special status for the GDR territory was codified in the final German unification treaty signed on September 12, 1990, by the Two-Plus-Four foreign ministers (see Document 25). The former idea about “closer to the Soviet borders” is written down not in treaties but in multiple memoranda of conversation between the Soviets and the highest-level Western interlocutors (Genscher, Kohl, Baker, Gates, Bush, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Major, Woerner, and others) offering assurances throughout 1990 and into 1991 about protecting Soviet security interests and including the USSR in new European security structures. The two issues were related but not the same. Subsequent analysis sometimes conflated the two and argued that the discussion did not involve all of Europe. The documents published below show clearly that it did.
The “Tutzing formula” immediately became the center of a flurry of important diplomatic discussions over the next 10 days in 1990, leading to the crucial February 10, 1990, meeting in Moscow between Kohl and Gorbachev when the West German leader achieved Soviet assent in principle to German unification in NATO, as long as NATO did not expand to the east.
***
The conversations before Kohl’s assurance involved explicit discussion of NATO expansion, the Central and East European countries, and how to convince the Soviets to accept unification. For example, on February 6, 1990, when Genscher met with British Foreign Minister Douglas Hurd, the British record showed Genscher saying, “The Russians must have some assurance that if, for example, the Polish Government left the Warsaw Pact one day, they would not join NATO the next.” (See Document 2)
Having met with Genscher on his way into discussions with the Soviets, Baker repeated exactly the Genscher formulation in his meeting with Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze on February 9, 1990, (see Document 4); and even more importantly, face to face with Gorbachev.
Not once, but three times, Baker tried out the “not one inch eastward” formula with Gorbachev in the February 9, 1990, meeting. He agreed with Gorbachev’s statement in response to the assurances that “NATO expansion is unacceptable.” Baker assured Gorbachev that “neither the President nor I intend to extract any unilateral advantages from the processes that are taking place,” and that the Americans understood that “not only for the Soviet Union but for other European countries as well it is important to have guarantees that if the United States keeps its presence in Germany within the framework of NATO, not an inch of NATO’s present military jurisdiction will spread in an eastern direction.” (See Document 6).
Baker reported: “And then I put the following question to him [Gorbachev]. Would you prefer to see a united Germany outside of NATO, independent and with no U.S. forces or would you prefer a unified Germany to be tied to NATO, with assurances that NATO’s jurisdiction would not shift one inch eastward from its present position? He answered that the Soviet leadership was giving real thought to all such options [….] He then added,‘Certainly any extension of the zone of NATO would be unacceptable.’” Baker added in parentheses, for Kohl’s benefit, “By implication, NATO in its current zone might be acceptable.” (See Document 8)
Well-briefed by the American secretary of state, the West German chancellorunderstood a key Soviet bottom line, and assured Gorbachev on February 10, 1990: “We believe that NATO should not expand the sphere of its activity.” (See Document 9).
All the Western foreign ministers were on board with Genscher, Kohl, and Baker. Next came the British foreign minister, Douglas Hurd, on April 11, 1990.
***
Hurd reinforced the Baker-Genscher-Kohl message in his meeting with Gorbachev in Moscow, April 11, 1990, saying that Britain clearly “recognized the importance of doing nothing to prejudice Soviet interests and dignity.” (See Document 15)
The Baker conversation with Shevardnadze on May 4, 1990, as Baker described it in his own report to President Bush, most eloquently described what Western leaders were telling Gorbachev exactly at the moment: “I used your speech and our recognition of the need to adapt NATO, politically and militarily, and to develop CSCE to reassure Shevardnadze that the process would not yield winners and losers. Instead, it would produce a new legitimate European structure – one that would be inclusive, not exclusive.” (See Document 17)
Baker said it again, directly to Gorbachev on May 18, 1990 in Moscow, giving Gorbachev his “nine points,” which included the transformation of NATO, strengthening European structures, keeping Germany non-nuclear, and taking Soviet security interests into account. Baker started off his remarks, “Before saying a few words about the German issue, I wanted to emphasize that our policies are not aimed at separating Eastern Europe from the Soviet Union. We had that policy before. But today we are interested in building a stable Europe, and doing it together with you.” (See Document 18)
The French leader Francois Mitterrand … continued the cascade of assurances by saying the West must “create security conditions for you, as well as European security as a whole.” (See Document 19) Mitterrand immediately wrote Bush in a “cher George” letter about his conversation with the Soviet leader, that “we would certainly not refuse to detail the guarantees that he would have a right to expect for his country’s security.” (See Document 20)
At the Washington summit on May 31, 1990, Bush went out of his way to assure Gorbachev that Germany in NATO would never be directed at the USSR: “Believe me, we are not pushing Germany towards unification, and it is not us who determines the pace of this process. And of course, we have no intention, even in our thoughts, to harm the Soviet Union in any fashion. That is why we are speaking in favor of German unification in NATO without ignoring the wider context of the CSCE, taking the traditional economic ties between the two German states into consideration. Such a model, in our view, corresponds to the Soviet interests as well.” (See Document 21)
The “Iron Lady” also pitched in, after the Washington summit, in her meeting with Gorbachev in London on June 8, 1990. Thatcher anticipated the moves the Americans (with her support) would take in the early July NATO conference to support Gorbachev with descriptions of the transformation of NATO towards a more political, less militarily threatening, alliance. She said to Gorbachev: “We must find ways to give the Soviet Union confidence that its security would be assured…. CSCE could be an umbrella for all this, as well as being the forum which brought the Soviet Union fully into discussion about the future of Europe.” (See Document 22)
The NATO London Declaration on July 5, 1990 had quite a positive effect on deliberations in Moscow, according to most accounts, giving Gorbachev significant ammunition to counter his hardliners at the Party Congress which was taking place at that moment.
***
As Kohl said to Gorbachev in Moscow on July 15, 1990, as they worked out the final deal on German unification: “We know what awaits NATO in the future, and I think you are now in the know as well,” referring to the NATO London Declaration. (See Document 23)
In his phone call to Gorbachev on July 17, Bush meant to reinforce the success of the Kohl-Gorbachev talks and the message of the London Declaration. Bush explained: “So what we tried to do was to take account of your concerns expressed to me and others, and we did it in the following ways: by our joint declaration on non-aggression; in our invitation to you to come to NATO; in our agreement to open NATO to regular diplomatic contact with your government and those of the Eastern European countries; and our offer on assurances on the future size of the armed forces of a united Germany – an issue I know you discussed with Helmut Kohl. We also fundamentally changed our military approach on conventional and nuclear forces. We conveyed the idea of an expanded, stronger CSCE with new institutions in which the USSR can share and be part of the new Europe.” (See Document 24)
The documents show that Gorbachev agreed to German unification in NATO as the result of this cascade of assurances, and on the basis of his own analysis that the future of the Soviet Union depended on its integration into Europe, for which Germany would be the decisive actor. He and most of his allies believed that some version of the common European home was still possible and would develop alongside the transformation of NATO to lead to a more inclusive and integrated European space, that the post-Cold War settlement would take account of the Soviet security interests. The alliance with Germany would not only overcome the Cold War but also turn on its head the legacy of the Great Patriotic War.
But inside the U.S. government, a different discussion continued, a debate about relations between NATO and Eastern Europe. Opinions differed, but the suggestion from the Defense Department as of October 25, 1990 was to leave “the door ajar” for East European membership in NATO. (See Document 27)
***
As late as March 1991, according to the diary of the British ambassador to Moscow, British Prime Minister John Major personally assured Gorbachev, “We are not talking about the strengthening of NATO.” Subsequently, when Soviet defense minister Marshal Dmitri Yazov asked Major about East European leaders’ interest in NATO membership, the British leader responded, “Nothing of the sort will happen.” (See Document 28)
When Russian Supreme Soviet deputies came to Brussels to see NATO and meet with NATO secretary-general Manfred Woerner in July 1991, Woerner told the Russians that “We should not allow […] the isolation of the USSR from the European community.” According to the Russian memorandum of conversation, “Woerner stressed that the NATO Council and he are against the expansion of NATO (13 of 16 NATO members support this point of view).” (See Document 30)
Thus, Gorbachev went to the end of the Soviet Union assured that the West was not threatening his security and was not expanding NATO.
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The nonpartisan First Amendment advocacy group Free Press vowed to take the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to court Thursday after the Republican-controlled panel moved to gut net neutrality protections that prohibit internet service providers (ISPs) from charging for and discriminating against content, in a 3-2 vote along party lines.
Without equal access online, ISP giants Comcast, Charter, AT&T, Verizon, Cox and others can establish toll roads or premium lanes, charge extra for speed and free and easy access, control content, as well as stifle dissent and independent thought.
If you’ve heard the term “net neutrality,” is it something you imagine only internet fanatics can grasp? Not at all. It simply refers to baseline protection ensuring that no internet service provider can “interfere with or block web traffic, or favor their own services at the expense of smaller rivals.” As such, it is integral to democratic dialogue. To abolish it, explains Craig Aaron, president and CEO of the media advocacy group Free Press, “would end the open nature of the internet and leave activists, media makers and all the rest of us at the mercy of the biggest phone and cable companies.”
If the FCC adopts Pai’s proposal to overturn these rules, internet users will be exposed to blocking, throttling and paid prioritization of online content by the handful of ISPs that control access in the United States.
Google is escalating its campaign of internet censorship, announcing that it will expand its workforce of human censors to over 10,000, the internet giant announced on December 4. The censors’ primary focus will be videos and other content on YouTube, its video-sharing platform, but will work across Google to censor content and train its automated systems, which remove videos at a rate four times faster than its human employees.
Social Media and Search engines are being used to Spy on Americans! But not only on Americans. The process of personal data collection is worldwide. What is at stake, however, is not only the issue of “Privacy”. The online search engines also constitute an instrument of online media censorship.
Though the agency has always enjoyed a cozy relationship with the industries it regulates, ever since the Trump administration arrived in Washington, the FCC’s mission to preserve the public commons has been threatened, assaulted and torn asunder. And like a bad horror movie cliché, these calls to eviscerate the FCC have been coming from inside the agency.
The White House has quickly undercut suggestions by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Tuesday that Washington was willing to start talks with North Korea without preconditions. The latest differences emerge amid growing signs that the Trump administration is preparing to wage war against the Pyongyang regime in the coming months unless it capitulates completely to US demands.
Tillerson’s remarks to the Atlantic Council appear to be a last ditch attempt to start talks to try to prevent a conflict that could spiral out of control.
“It is not realistic to say we’re only going to talk if you come to the table ready to give up your [nuclear] program,” he said, contradicting the more aggressive stance taken by Trump.
With a note of desperation, Tillerson continued:
“We’re ready to have the first meeting without preconditions. Let’s just meet. We can talk about weather if you want. We can talk about whether there is gonna be a square table or a round table if that’s what you’re excited about. But can we at least sit down and see each other face to face.”
North Korea, however, is well aware that the US demands remain—to scrap its limited nuclear arsenal and abandon all related nuclear and missile programs. Moreover, such a step would involve an ever-more intrusive inspection prying into all aspects of its military and security apparatus.
Tillerson’s assurances that the US is not looking for a pretext to attack North Korea and not seeking regime-change in Pyongyang are belied by Trump’s threats to “totally destroy” the country. North Korea has hinted that it would be willing to take part in negotiations, but as they have not been forthcoming, appears to have concluded that its nuclear arsenal is its only means of defence. Pyongyang has pointed to the fate of Iraq and Libya—which bowed to US demands over their weapons of mass destruction—only to be attacked.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders scotched any suggestion that Trump’s views on North Korea had changed. While Tillerson claimed he had Trump’s support for his initiative, the president issued a public rebuke to the secretary of state in October, tweeting that he was “wasting his time” trying to negotiate with “Rocket Man”—Trump’s derogatory term for North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
An unnamed White House official more explicitly repudiated Tillerson’s comments, declaring that
“clearly right now is not the time” for talks, given North Korea’s most recent missile test. “The administration is united in insisting that any negotiations with North Korea must wait until the regime fundamentally improves its behaviour.”
Tillerson’s comments are another warning that the US war drive against North Korea is accelerating.
“Our military preparedness is strong… the president has ordered our military planners to have a full range of contingencies, and they are ready,” he told the Atlantic Council.
“As I’ve told people many times, I will continue our diplomatic efforts until the first bomb drops,” Tillerson said. “I’m confident that we’re gonna be successful. But I’m also confident that [US Defence] Secretary Mattis will be successful if it ends up being his turn.”
The US and South Korea have held, one after another, the largest-ever joint military exercises this year that are, in reality, rehearsals for war with North Korea. Last week, some 12,000 military personnel and more than 200 warplanes, including B-1B strategic bombers and the latest F-35 stealth fighters took part in major air drills. This week the US, South Korea and Japan were engaged in testing anti-missile systems.
While declaring that Washington’s aim was not regime-change, Tillerson again put pressure on China, saying:
“The president would like to see China cut off the oil [to North Korea]. The last time the North Koreans came to the table was because China cut off the oil.”
Under strong-arming from Washington, China has already agreed to harsh UN sanctions that block most North Korean exports and limit energy imports. The top UN human rights official Zeid Ra’ad al Hussein told a UN Security Council on Tuesday that the punitive measures had already compounded the humanitarian crisis in North Korea.
An estimated 18 million North Koreans, or 70 percent of the population, suffer from acute food shortages and aid agencies provide “literally a lifeline” for 13 million of them, al Hussein said. Food prices have shot up 160 percent since April. The sanctions are also impeding the efforts of aid organisations to provide adequate relief.
The Trump administration’s policy of “maximum pressure and engagement” is clearly aimed at forcing the North Korean regime to its knees or provoking an economic and political crisis that causes it to implode. China, which has desperately sought to prevent an implosion in Pyongyang, is now preparing for the worst. The New York Times reported that a Chinese county bordering North Korea has begun establishing camps for refugees that could flood into China.
More ominously, a provincial newspaper in the border area—the state-owned Jilin Daily —issued a full-page advisory last week entitled “General Knowledge about Nuclear Weapons and Protection.” Concerned at the prospect of a nuclear war on its doorstop, the provincial air defence office explained the article was part of “national defence education.”
Speaking to the Atlantic Council, Tillerson indicated that the US already has plans to intervene militarily in North Korea in the event that its government collapses—on the pretext of securing the country’s nuclear weapons. He said that the US had offered assurances to China that any American troops that crossed the border into North Korea would be withdrawn.
Such guarantees are unlikely to convince Beijing, which is deeply concerned at the possibility of the US installing a puppet regime in Pyongyang.
A top UN official—political chief Jeffrey Feltman—made a rare visit to North Korea last week amid the rising danger of war in a bid to defuse tensions and initiate talks, but to no avail. After a close briefing on his return, Sweden’s deputy UN ambassador Carl Skau pessimistically declared:
“Nothing was said that left us less worried than we were before.”
As for Tillerson’s offer of talks without preconditions, it will only continue to fuel widespread speculation that Trump will replace him with a hard-line warmonger.
On 21 August 1969, an Australian citizen called Denis Rohan set fire to an 800-year-old wooden pulpit, a gift to al-Aqsa mosque from the Islamic hero Saladin (1137-1193), who led the military campaign against the Crusaders.
Apart from being considered mentally ill, Rohan thought he was acting on divine instructions. These were to enable the Jews to build the temple on the ruins of the mosque, thus hastening the second coming of Jesus Christ.
A galvanising effect
The arson attack which destroyed the ancient pulpit and part of the roof had a galvanising effect. A month later, 24 leaders and representatives of Muslim countries met in Rabat and created the precursor of a group now known as the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).
This group, now 57 nations strong, met in Istanbul on Wednesday. Just as it had 48 years ago, Al Aqsa galvanised them – once again – into action. Instead of being attacked by an Evangelical Christian from Australia, Al Aqsa was threatened by a US president pandering to similar messianic Christians in America.
This move sets a heavy diplomatic ball rolling around the world, one that will roll independently of Israel’s or America’s will. It could roll all through Asia, Latin America and Africa. And it will make it more difficult for other nations to quietly move their embassies to the city.
Today the US vice president Mike Pence delayed his visit to Israel.
The summit placed Palestine once again in the centre of the Muslim world after seven years of the Arab Spring, the wave of popular uprising that swept across the region in 2011, and the reign of Islamic State group (IS) in both Iraq and Syria. As a result the seminal Israel-Palestine conflict receded from view.
Erdogan, flanked by Kuwait’s emir, Sabah, Abdullah of Jordan and Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, at the OIC conference (AA)
It also sidelined the conference which Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman laid on for Donald Trump in Riyadh last May.
A US president lecturing Muslim leaders on Islamic extremism was superseded by one in which Muslim leaders lectured him on his own fundamentalists. Realising they were about to be upstaged, the Saudis panicked.
They sent a junior minister of Islamic affairs to Istanbul, excised all coverage of the event from their own media, and fed another story in the works about Al Jazeera’s coverage of Jerusalem protests acting as an incitement to violence.
No blank cheques
More importantly, Istanbul laid the foundations for a realignment of Arab states. It showcased a rebellion by two key pro-Western Arab leaders, King Abdullah of Jordan and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, against their traditional allies in Washington.
The former is the head of the second Arab country to recognise Israel, the latter is the Palestinian leader who has devoted his life to negotiating the now-defunct two-state solution.
Realising the importance of what was about to happen in Istanbul, Saudi Arabia and Egypt made strenuous efforts to stop Abdullah and Abbas from going.
As has been reported, Abdullah and Abbas were summoned for an urgent meeting in Cairo. Only Abbas turned up.
I am told by well-informed sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi put pressure on Abbas so as not to head the Palestinian delegation to Istanbul and thus downgrade the importance of the conference.
To help him decline his invitation to Istanbul, fake news was spread that Abbas had had a stroke. Abbas ignored this.
Meanwhile King Abdullah was summoned to Riyadh, and there again I am informed, he was told not to attend Istanbul. King Abdullah stayed for a few hours in Riyadh and then left for Istanbul.
Their attendance at the conference sent a message to Saudi Arabia as well as to the US: Riyadh’s deal with Trump is not accepted by Jordan and Palestine and in this they are supported by Muslim countries. In other words: You have no blank cheque to negotiate with Israel over our heads.
Both men made a public display of their defiance and anger by standing shoulder to shoulder with the fire-breathing Islamist-leaning Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the group photograph.
Abdullah vigorously nodded as Erdogan said:
“I repeat Jerusalem is our red line. The Noble Sanctuary will forever belong to Muslims. We will never give up on our demand for a sovereign and independent Palestine. We cannot be spectators in this situation because it impacts all our futures.”
Abbas then gave the speech of his life. He tore into America for wrecking his life’s work of pushing for a two-state solution. Jerusalem, he said, crossed all red lines. He revealed he had a gentleman’s agreement with Washington on not seeking full statehood and membership of all international organisations before a lasting peace was signed, and proceeded to tear that up.
This means Palestine will be free to launch a case against Israel in the International Criminal Court. And thirdly he would take a complaint against the US before the UN Security Council for violating one of its own resolutions, a procedure against which the US itself cannot vote, Abbas claimed.
An act of betrayal
Neither men are natural allies of Erdogan. Two years ago, Abdullah flew to Washington to brief Congressional leaders about the dangers posed by the Turkish president to regional order.
Abbas feels the rivalry of Hamas keenly and has repeatedly attempted to pull Fatah out of the unity government. What force propelled the two men to Istanbul, and to a conference they knew could change the alignment of the entire region?
It had to be something powerful to overcome their natural disinclination to stand with Islamists.
Both turned to the man who, according to the latest Pew poll, is considered the most popular in the region and to the country, Turkey, which is looked at as the most influential regional power, after Russia.
Domestic politics played its part. Both knew anger on their own streets was intense. Amman saw the biggest street protests in decades. More than half of Jordanians are Palestinian refugees, including those displaced from Jerusalem after the 1967 war. And the majority of Amman residents are either Palestinian refugees or Palestinians with Jordanian citizenship.
Both saw Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel as an act of political betrayal. For Abbas, it betrayed an unwritten agreement he had with Washington not to press Palestine’s case in the International Criminal Court until a final settlement was reached.
For Abdullah, betrayal was no less real. Jordan’s role as custodian of Al Aqsa is not casual. It’s written into peace treaties, notably the Wadi Araba treaty King Hussein signed with Yitzhak Rabin of Israel in 1994.
Similarly, when King Hussein announced in 1988 the disengagement between Jordan and the West Bank, recognising the PLO as the sole representative of the Palestinian people, the king insisted Jordan would keep the custodianship of Al Aqsa.
It’s personal
But the third reason for the offence both Abbas and Abdullah have taken is the most interesting of all. It’s personal. Their anger is genuine. In Abbas’ eyes, Trump betrayed decades of work towards the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Abbas played patsy to an expanding Israel, and paid the price daily for that by doing Israel’s law enforcement for it in territory it would never leave.
For Abdullah, it’s an insult to his family – a Hashemite, not a Palestinian one. I became convinced of this after a long conversation with a member of the royal household. The Hashemites still remember the time when they were custodians of all three holy sites of Islam – Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem.
This was in 1924, when Hussein bin Ali al-Hashimi, the Arab leader who proclaimed the Great Arab Revolution against the Ottomans, held Mecca and Medina under his control. In the same year, the people of Jerusalem gave him the right to control their city.
However late in the same year he lost his kingdom, Hijaz, to the Saudi Sultan Abdulaziz bin Saud.
Jordan is all that remains of what is still called the Great Arab Revolution sparked by the great grandfather of Abdullah. The only source of religious legitimacy for his family is the custodianship of the Al Aqsa.
When the 32-year-old upstart Saudi crown prince tells Abbas to forget Jerusalem and the right of return, history is repeating itself in Hashemite consciousness. They have not forgotten their feud with the House of Saud and their loss of two of the three holy places all those years ago. It still rankles.
Jerusalem, then, is not just a foreign issue in a foreign country. It’s a test of their very legitimacy as rulers in their own country. Family history tells Abdullah that when they let a fundamental element of their legitimacy as rulers slip from their grasp, it is lost for ever.
The losing side?
Abdullah’s choice carries its own risks. Sceptics may say he could just have chosen the losing side, once again. All the wealth, most of the military power and high technology are controlled by the opposing camp of Saudis, Emiratis, Israel and America. Together they make a strong force.
But he will also remember how his father King Hussein rejected the winning side three times in his long reign, heeding to his instincts as an Arab.
In 1967, the Israelis warned Hussein not to get involved, but he did anyway. Hussein reconciled with his old enemy, Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser. “It wasn’t possible for Hussein to opt out [of] this war. If he had, everyone would have blamed him for the defeat,” Leila Sharaf, a former Jordanian information minister told an Al Jazeera documentary.
In 1973, Hussein sent troops to help Syria in the Golan Heights to fight in the war launched by Anwar Sadat and Hafez Assad. Hussein supported the Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf war in 1991.
Each time, Jordan consciously sided with fellow Arabs even though it knew they were headed for defeat. Hussein did not foresee the extent of that defeat in 1967 but he did know Jordan would be defeated. Why? Because to do otherwise would be to incur even greater, possibly existential risk. This is the position that Abdullah now finds himself in.
The worst part of Trump’s statement for Jordan was the US president’s insistence that recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital reflected reality. Trump was not bothered by legality, international law, treaties, UN resolutions, all refusing to accept Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem.
It was the transformation of Jerusalem into another “fact on the ground” that Israel had established through conquest and settlement that made it impossible to accept.
For once, and I never thought I would write this, King Abdullah and President Abbas have earned their position as Arab leaders.
David Hearst is editor-in-chief of Middle East Eye. He was chief foreign leader writer of The Guardian, former Associate Foreign Editor, European Editor, Moscow Bureau Chief, European Correspondent, and Ireland Correspondent. He joined The Guardian from The Scotsman, where he was education correspondent.
All images in this article are from the author unless otherwise stated.
Two recent major decisions by United States President Donald Trump and his advisors have rendered the 45th head-of-state much weaker in the opinion of the majority of the American people. The visit to Jackson, Mississippi for the inauguration of a museum honoring African American leaders and the president’s endorsement of Judge Roy Moore in his senate bid, have both been disastrous.
Moore, an ultra-conservative was facing allegations of sexual misconduct with minors while he was in his 30s. So confident that he would prevail in the hotly-contested race against Democrat Doug Jones, upon losing Moore refused to concede defeat.
Trump’s visit to the opening of a Civil Rights Museum in Jackson, Mississippi on December 9 was met with broad rejection by the African American people of the state and the throughout the country. Many viewed the effort as a cynical and hypocritical attempt to shed the stain of racism which has permeated his electoral campaign and administrative policies. Several African American elected officials refused to attend the event including Congressman John Lewis of Georgia, the former Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in mid-1960s.
Jackson, Mississippi, the capital of one of the poorest states in the U.S., has been a focal point in the struggle of the African American people since the conclusion of the Civil War. During the Reconstruction period from 1865 through the successive decades, African Americans took a pro-active posture through the organization of political and economic initiatives which were inevitably crushed through force of arms by white law-enforcement agents, the judicial system and vigilante groups such as the Ku Klux Klan.
One of the most prominent of these politicians in Mississippi in the Reconstruction era was Blanche Bruce who held various positions including Bolivar County sheriff, tax collector, supervisor of education as well as being sergeant-at-arms for the Mississippi state senate in 1870, a state senator in 1874 and U.S. Senator from 1875-1881. Bruce was eventually exiled from the state and later took up residence in Washington, D.C. where he held several public positions.
Violent retribution for political activity among African Americans was illustrated clearly through events in the Yazoo Delta region area of Leflore County in 1889. African American farmers had organized the Colored Farmers’ Alliance under the leadership of the charismatic and articulate Oliver Cromwell. The Alliance sought to bypass local avaricious white merchants through a cooperative effort to trade with each other.
This effort raised the alarm of the state government at the time led by Governor Robert Lowry who sent an all-white militia to ostensibly maintain order in Leflore County. Lowry directed the militia to “always uphold the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon race.”
In carrying out its duties the whites detained forty leaders of the Alliance and later lynched 25 of them. For several days other members of the Alliance were pursued resulting in the deaths of several other African Americans.
Since the 1950s, Mississippi has been a center of racial violence involving the quest for Civil Rights. Numerous African Americans and whites were detained, beaten, killed and driven out of the state. The lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till in August 1955 for supposedly insulting a white woman sparked the modern struggle for African American equality and self-determination.
During the Freedom Summer campaign of 1964, aimed at registering disenfranchised African Americans to vote, three Civil Rights workers Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman were brutally murdered by the Ku Klux Klan, some of whom were members of local law-enforcement agencies in Neshoba County. These youth joined others who met a similar fate including George W. Lee (1955), Herbert Lee (1961) and Vernon Dahmer (1966), to only name a few.
Alabama and the Roy Moore Albatross
Allegations of sexual misconduct against Judge Roy Moore of Alabama forced many conservative Republicans to withdraw support from his candidacy for the U.S. Senate. Moore denied all of the allegations and sought to cast aspersion on the accusers who were teenagers during the time of the purported attacks.
Moore has made several statements that reinforced his reputation as a conservative Christian opposed to the rights of women and LGBTQ people. He blamed the lack of Christian adherence for the mass shootings which have taken place with increased frequency throughout the U.S.
In July 2015 Moore said:
“I’m sorry, but this country was not founded on Muhammad. It was not founded on Buddha. It was not founded on secular humanism. It was founded on God.”
Earlier in 2002, he emphasized that:
“The common law designates homosexuality as an inherent evil, and if a person openly engages in such a practice, that fact alone would render him or her (as) an unfit parent.”
In regard to African enslavement in North America, an economic system which lasted for nearly 250 years from 1619 to the defeat of the Confederacy in 1865, Moore was quoted as saying:
“I think it was great at the time when families were united—even though we had slavery—they cared for one another. Our families were strong, our country had a direction.” (Newsweek, Dec. 9)
Trump traveled to Pensacola, Florida on December 8 for a rally which was in effect a get out the vote gathering for Judge Moore. At the Pensacola meeting, just 25 miles from the Alabama border, Trump urged participants to vote for Moore on December 12.
This event was held in the aftermath of a visit by Trump’s chief strategist Steve Bannon to the state of Alabama to campaign for Moore. Bannon, who left the White House in recent months, returned to the alt-right publication Breitbart News.
Doug Jones as a U.S. Attorney appointed by former President Bill Clinton during the 1990s prosecuted two of the four men who were responsible for the Ku Klux Klan bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church which killed four African American girls on September 15, 1963. Victims of the bombing, which took place less than three weeks after the historic March on Washington, were Denise McNair, 11; Carole Robertson, 14; Addie Mae Collins, 14; and Cynthia Wesley, 14.
Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr., was convicted in 2001 and Bobby Frank Cherry in 2002. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) under former director J. Edgar Hoover had documented evidence to prove that Blanton and Cherry were involved in the conspiracy to bomb the church. Yet this information remained classified for decades after the incident.
Herman Frank Cash, another assailant, had already died by the time of the trial in the early 2000s. The first conviction was handed down against Robert Edward Chambliss in 1977 some fourteen years after the bombing. Jones had attended the Chambliss trial as a law student.
African American voters played a pivotal role in the defeat of Moore. The division within the white electorate and the overwhelming support of African Americans and Latino voters resulted in the narrow victory by Jones of approximately 1.5 percent.
Which Road towards African American Liberation?
Of course with the recent defeats by Republican candidates in Virginia and Alabama, the Democratic electorate has been reinvigorated. However, this will not automatically translate into a greater commitment on the part of the U.S. ruling class and state structures for the full realization of the demands of the African American people
Interestingly enough initial reports indicate that a larger percentage of African Americans turned out to vote for Jones than did Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential race which brought Trump to power. Clinton was unable to inspire the necessary enthusiasm among nationally oppressed groups resulting in her monumental defeat within the Electoral College.
Consequently, an independent political direction is still required for further progress aimed at full equality and self-determination. Even with Trump’s blatant racist pandering to an ever shrinking political base where his approval rating has sunk to an abysmal 32 percent, the Democratic Party as a whole is providing no real program to mobilize the African American people.
Another telling incident occurred just one day after the defeat of Moore in Alabama. Omarosa Manigault, an African American aide to Trump, was dropped from the staff of the administration in what was said to be either a resignation or termination. Although early claims conveyed that Manigault had resigned, other reports indicated that she was walked out of the White House at the aegis of Chief of Staff General John Kelly.
At any rate, Trump is being revealed as a failed president. Even the conservative USA Today newspaper in an editorial published on December 14 said that he is unfit for office.
Moreover, as it relates to the overall status of the African American people, bloc voting, direct action and mass mobilizations as tactics have been used effectively since the middle 20th century to achieve short term goals both on a symbolic and substantive level. However, the strategic objectives aimed at total freedom require a far deeper institution building methodology. The necessity for fundamental transformation of the economy and political superstructure can only be achieved through independent revolutionary organization designed to create a new social order based on the acquisition of a genuinely egalitarian society.
Featured image: FCC commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Mignon Clyburn joined protesters outside the panel’s headquarters on Thursday before issuing a dissent to Republican chair Ajit Pai’s proposal to end net neutrality protections. The repeal was passed with a 3-2 vote. (Source: Free Press/Flickr/cc)
The nonpartisan First Amendment advocacy group Free Press vowed to take the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to court Thursday after the Republican-controlled panel moved to gut net neutrality protections that prohibit internet service providers (ISPs) from charging for and discriminating against content, in a 3-2 vote along party lines.
The FCC just voted to repeal #NetNeutrality but the fight is NOT over. Tell Congress to use a "resolution of disapproval" to overturn the FCC's vote: https://t.co/GU5IfEZOFr
The ACLU released a statement calling the “misguided” decision “a radical departure that risks erosion of the biggest free speech platform the world has ever known.”
“Today’s loss means that telecommunications companies will start intruding more on how people use the internet. Internet service providers will become much more aggressive in their efforts to make money off their role as online gatekeepers,” said Jay Stanley, senior policy analyst for the group.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) also denounced the ruling:
Once again, the Trump administration has sided with big money and against the interests of the American people. The FCC’s vote to end net neutrality is an egregious attack on our democracy. With this decision the internet and its free exchange of information as we have come to know it will cease to exist. The end of net neutrality protections means that the internet will be for sale to the highest bidder, instead of everyone having the same access regardless of whether they are rich or poor, a big corporation or small business, a multimedia conglomerate or a small online publication. At a time when our democratic institutions are already in peril, we must do everything we can to stop this decision from taking effect.
Free Press and their many allies rallied outside the FCC headquarters in Washington, D.C. as the five commissioners prepared to vote on FCC chair Ajit Pai’s proposal to roll back the Obama-era protections. The protest represented the final push to stop the vote in its tracks, following hundreds of demonstrations outside Verizon stores across the country last week, Fight for the Future’s “Break the Internet” action earlier this week, and thousands of calls to members of Congress.
The two Democratic commissioners on the panel, Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel, met with protesters outside and issued powerful dissents ahead of the vote, with Clyburn noting,
“The fight to save net neutrality does not end today. This agency does not have, the final word. Thank goodness.”
In addition to Free Press’s plan to sue the FCC, the group urged supporters to push Congress to nullify Pai’s plan using the Congressional Review Act (CRA), which allows representatives and senators to review new regulations and overrule them by passing a joint resolution.
Forty senators, including one Republican, have voiced opposition to the net neutrality rollback, while a handful of Republican representatives have said they disagree with Pai’s plan. But the loudest opposition so far has come from the public and groups like Free Press and Fight for the Future.
“Why are we witnessing such an unprecedented groundswell of public support” for net neutrality, asked Clyburn in her dissent. “Because the public can plainly see a soon-to-be-toothless FCC is handing the keys to the Internet to a handful of multi-billion dollar corporations.”
With the vote, ISPs like Verizon—Pai’s former employer—will no longer be prohibited from blocking or slowing down certain websites and content, and will be able to charge fees to web companies that can afford to pay them for access to an internet “fast lane,” leaving smaller sites struggling to reach audiences.
Despite comments from millions of Americans who spoke out in favor of the protections, Pai did not mention the widespread opposition to net neutrality in his order to repeal the rules. Last week, he refused to release documents related to potentially fraudulent comments left on the FCC’s public comment website.
“That speaks volumes about the direction the FCC is heading,” said Clyburn. That speaks volumes about just who is being heard.”
“I dissent from this rash decision to roll back net neutrality rules,” added Rosenworcel. “I dissent from the corrupt process that has brought us to this point. And I dissent from the contempt this agency has shown our citizens in pursuing this path today.”
Online, open internet defenders reacted to the ruling.
The Trump administration lets down internet-users worldwide by scrapping #netneutrality This decision is a historic mistake, we need a level playing field, more fair competition on the open internet, more protection of consumers and more freedom of speech online!
BREAKING: The FCC just voted to gut all existing #NetNeutrality protections, allowing ISPs to control what we see and do online with new fees, throttling, and censorship. BUT THIS IS NOT OVER. We can overturn the FCC's decision in Congress. Here's how: https://t.co/xSJHbLq2Wn
“Gunfire aimed at protesters on Kiev’s Independence Square, also known as the Maidan, was delivered in winter 2014 by the mercenaries who had arrived in Kiev for the purpose of organizing disorders,” lawyer Alexander Goroshinsky told 112.Ukraina channel on Tuesday, as reported in Tass on December 13th.
In a dramatic development in the trial in Kiev of several Berkut police officers accused of shooting civilians in the Maidan demonstrations in February 2014, the defence has produced two Georgians who confirm that the murders were committed by foreign snipers, at least 50 of them, operating in teams. The two Georgians, Alexander Revazishvili and Koba Nergadze have agreed to testify by video from Tbilisi, if permitted, as they feared for their lives if brought to Kiev.
The defence lawyer stated,
“The eyewitnesses said they had seen with their own eyes a group of people who had received weapons and cartridges and who would deliver fire afterwards from the building of the Conservatoire. Nergadze also saw snipers at the roof of Hotel Ukraine. They know the individuals personally. Besides, they know the organizers and clients and are ready to give their names, as well as the names of the perpetrators.”
“In all, about fifty mercenaries arrived in Kiev then and they were involved in the events on the Maidan afterwards and fired at the protesters on February 20,” Goroshinsky went on. “The mercenaries split into groups of ten men each and were dispatched to different spots where from they delivered fire.”
“Each of them [the mercenaries] received $5,000 for the job done,” he said. “In other words, these people had been brought [to Kiev] with a well-specified task to create a conflict.”
This dramatic and explosive evidence was first brought to light by the Italian journalist Gian Micalessin on November 16 in an article in the Italian journal Il Giornale and is again brought to the world’s attention by a lawyer with some courage picking up on that report and speaking with the witnesses himself. These witnesses stated to Gian Micalessin, even more explosively, that the American Army was directly involved in the murders.
The clear objective of the Maidan massacre in Kiev on February 20, 2014 was to sow chaos and reap the fall of the democratically elected, pro-Russian Yanukovych government. People were slaughtered for no other reason than to destroy a government the NATO powers, especially the United States and Germany, wanted removed because of its opposition to NATO, the EU, and their hegemonic drive to open Ukraine and Russia to American and German economic expansion. In other words, it was about money and the making of money.
The western media and leaders quickly blamed the Yanukovych government for the killings during the Maidan demonstrations, but more evidence has become available indicating that the massacre in Kiev of police and civilians – which led to the escalation of protests, leading to the overthrow of the Yanukovych government – was the work of snipers working on orders of government opponents and their NATO controllers using the protests as a cover for a coup.
One of the snipers already admitted to this in February 2015, thereby confirming what had become common knowledge just a few days after the massacre in Kiev and in a secretly recorded telephone call, the Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet reported to the EU head of Foreign Policy, Catherine Ashton, in early March 2014, that there was widespread suspicion that “someone from the new coalition” in the Kiev government may have ordered the sniper murders. In February 2016, Maidan activist Ivan Bubenchik confessed that in the course of the massacre, he had shot Ukrainian police officers. Bubenchik confirmed this in a film that gained wide attention.
Map of the Maidan square in Kiev and surrounding buildings (Source: Oriental Review)
In the September 2015 issue of Oriental Review, Dr. Ivan Katchanovski, at the University of Ottawa, published a devastating paper on the Maidan killings setting out in extensive detail the conclusive evidence that it was a false flag operation and that members of the present Kiev regime, including Poroshenko himself were involved in the murders, not the government forces. His paper contains all you need to know and I highly recommend it. Here is a summary of his findings:
“The paper analyzes a large amount of evidence from different publicly available sources concerning this massacre and killings of specific protestors…“This academic investigation concludes that the massacre was a false flag operation, which was rationally planned and carried out with a goal of the overthrow of the government and seizure of power. It found various evidence of the involvement of an alliance of the far right organizations, specifically the Right Sector and Svoboda, and oligarchic parties, such as Fatherland. Concealed shooters and spotters were located in at least 20 Maidan-controlled buildings or areas. The various evidence that the protesters were killed from these locations include some 70 testimonies, primarily by Maidan protesters, several videos of “snipers” targeting protesters from these buildings, comparisons of positions of the specific protesters at the time of their killing and their entry wounds, and bullet impact signs. The study uncovered various videos and photos of armed Maidan “snipers” and spotters in many of these buildings.
Dr. Katchanovski makes a very pertinent point in his conclusion:
No reliableevidence about “third force” foreign snipers or organizers of the massacrehas been found… Because of various evidence of US government backing of the Maidan opposition, itsinvolvement in the Maidan government selection and policy decisions, and its past record of supporting or organizing regime change in other countries, additional research is needed to examine if there was any involvement of the US government in the violent overthrow of theUkrainian government.“
Well, now we have that evidence.
In the November 16 article in the Italian journal Il Giornale, and repeated on Italian TV Canale 5, journalist Gian Micalessin revealed that 3 Georgians, all trained army snipers, and with links to Mikheil Saakashvili and Georgian security forces were ordered to travel to Kiev from Tbilisi during the Maidan events. It is two of these men that are now being called to testify in Kiev.
On the 18th of February they were given weapons and two of them took up positions at the Hotel Ukraina overlooking Maidan Square while the third was positioned in the Conservatory. Other snipers were positioned in other buildings to fire into the square. Prior to that they met with, among other people, an American soldier in uniform, a claimed “former” member of the US Army’s 101st Airborne Division, who gave them orders on what to do, which it turned out to be was to shoot into Maidan Square randomly targeting people, protestors and police alike, to create fear and confusion, to implicate the government forces as the shooters, to create the chaos necessary in order to undermine the government of President Yanukovych, who fled shortly after the event realising his own life was in danger. The name of the American soldier, or the alias he used, was Brian Christopher Boyenger. He showed up later as an adviser to the Ukrainian Georgian Legion. One of the snipers stated,
“Once, I guess around February 15, Mamulashvili personally visited our tent. There was another guy with him wearing a uniform. Mamulashvili introduced him to us and told us he was an American military guy and will be our instructor.”
Another stated,
“This American was Brian Christopher Boyenger, a “former” soldier, a sniper, from the 101st Airborne Division.”
“He was the one who gave us orders.”
Questions naturally arise on how this “former” American soldier entered the country and took command of a murderous sniper unit and it is highly probable that the word “former” was used to give the Americans plausible deniability if their men were found out, as has now occurred. No one can seriously doubt that his presence was known to the US ambassador in Kiev, Geoffrey Pyatt, who, according to then Vice President Joe Biden, was in hourly contact with Andriy Parubiy, the Ukrainian fascist who was in charge of “self defence units” made of heavily armed fascist thugs at Maidan. According to the Italian report, Parubiy was going in and out of the Hotel Ukraina from where many shots were fired and was aware of the presence of the American soldier so the American ambassador must have been aware and his government. The Americans have yet to explain Boyenger’s presence or what rank he held in the US Army. Parubiy’s role in the events has never been explained either but Poroshenko appointed this mass murderer as head of Ukraine security and intelligence forces after the coup and he now sits as President of Ukraine’s parliament since April 14, 2016, in which position he can use to give the Germans and Americans the cooperation they want.
The massacre at Maidan, therefore, is revealed to be a carefully planned military operation organised in detail, with teams of snipers brought in from various NATO allied countries, unknown to each other, but organised on arrival, given orders and assignments and each sniper team being assigned spotters to help in their deadly work. This is the tactic military sniper teams use so it has to be assumed that each of the sniper teams was controlled by the same people as the team the Italians talked to, that is by American soldiers trained in these techniques and who themselves operate in teams. This operation therefore had to be planned and organised on a high level by the American forces and allied NATO governments.
It is an extraordinary video to watch, as these men matter of factly talk about what they did, for whom they did it; to watch them pull back the veil so that we can see what callous brutality the NATO alliance is capable of. We have seen this of course in all their wars. They are deliberately brutal and always ruthless. But in the interviews with these men we are shown the capacity of US military machine-and here I mean the entire NATO alliance and all its allies and agents-to randomly murder ordinary people, to murder them as if they were stepping on ants, and with the same feeling of sadistic satisfaction.
The western media has so far ignored the Italian interviews, as they have Dr. Katachanovski’s detailed paper and all the other evidence that exists; as it must or face the prospect of the entire anti-Russian propaganda campaign from unravelling. For now it is clear that the entire justification of the Kiev regime for its existence, that it got rid of Yanukovych to get rid of killers, is now proved to be a cover for the fact that it is the very members of the present Kiev regime who were complicit in the killings and directed them.
But as these developments further evolve the international mafia known as NATO that is responsible for the Maidan Square massacre have not stopped slaughtering civilians. In Ukraine to this day the fascist riddled, NATO -backed Kiev regime continues it siege of the Donbass republics in violation of the laws of war and custom, in violation of all humanity, while the British and American intelligence services put out false stories about the shooting down of Flight MH17, using NATO connected websites like Bellingcat, which only serves to add to evidence that it is NATO and its Kiev allies that are responsible for that slaughter as well. For why make up stories except to cover yourself? The more they shift the blame the more it falls on them.
But the reality is that the new evidence reported by the Italian press will change nothing in the narrative of the general western media which will conspire to suppress or better, ignore this evidence. In fact no other media, anywhere, has included the crucial information of the presence of American soldiers in Maidan in their coverage of the Italian report, a fact which itself is more than curious.
The International Criminal Court should investigate this new evidence, lead where it may. They have jurisdiction. But we can expect nothing from the ICC even if a countervailing pressure is put on the prosecutor by the world public demanding that she act on this information. We know whose interests the ICC serves. No, justice for those murdered in Ukraine will have to wait for the return of true democracy in Ukraine, a Ukraine no longer under the control of the US, Germany and their allies, a Ukraine that is no longer a puppet state of the west, and no longer used as a pawn in the long war against Russia. For that is the ultimate objective, Russia.
Poroshenko at Heavenly Hundred memorial in 2014 (Source: Oriental Review)
Hybrid warfare, war without limits, is accelerating against her. Last week Russia was banished from the Olympics to damage her prestige, and the bizarre allegations about rigging the US elections continue. To add to the insults, the Third Committee of the UN General Assembly voted a few days ago on a resolution condemning “violations of human rights in Crimea;” a resolution demanded by Petro Poroshenko, one of those implicated in the murders in Maidan Square. You have to give it to them. They’ve got a lot of nerve.
But Russia is not alone. She has allies. When the Poroshenko resolution came up for a vote the EU and NATO allied countries obeyed orders and supported the resolution but 77 countries abstained and 25 voted against it including the BRICs and Iran, Syria, North Korea, Armenia, Belarus, Philippines, Venezuela, Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Burundi, Cuba, Eritrea, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Nicaragua, Uganda, Sudan, Serbia, Uzbekistan, and Bolivia.
Russia is going to need these allies because the evidence, now coming in a flood, about what the NATO forces did in Kiev on February 20, 2014 show us that they are capable of anything, and will stop at nothing.
Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto. He is known for a number of high-profile war crimes cases and recently published his novel “Beneath the Clouds. He writes essays on international law, politics and world events, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”
Industrial agriculture isn’t the efficient beast it’s made out to be. Peasant farming, not industrial food production, is the way to feed the world, argue Pat Mooney and Nnimmo Bassey.
Time is running out if the world is going to slash greenhouse gas emissions enough to keep us below a 1.5°c temperature rise by 2100, an aspiration set by the Paris climate accords.
Two conferences this autumn tackled different ends of the problem, in splendid isolation from each other. The UN Committee on World Food Security held its annual meeting in Rome in mid-October, alarmed that the number of hungry people on the planet has suddenly climbed by 40 million in the past year – much of it due to the direct and indirect effects of climate change – and fearful that an unpredictable climate will cut global food production still more sharply in the decades ahead.
Meanwhile, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP23) met in Bonn and high on its agenda was the need to cut agriculture’s GHG emissions which experts say account for anywhere from one third to more than half of global warming. So, what for Rome delegates is a problem of food security is for Bonn delegates a problem of climate security.
The solution for both climate and food sovereignty is to dismantle the global industrial agri-food system (which we call the ‘industrial food chain’) and for governments to give more space to the already growing and resilient ‘peasant food web’ – the interlinked network of small-scale farmers, livestock-keepers, pastoralists, hunters and gatherers, fishers and urban producers who, our research shows, already feed most of the world.
Global land use and food production: industrial agriculture and peasant farming compared. Picture: New Internationalist. Data: ETC Group, Who Will Feed Us? Report
In our report delivered to policymakers in both Rome and Bonn, Who Will Feed Us?, ETC Group (the Action Group on Erosion, Technology and Concentration) provides original data about the importance of peasant food systems and the real economic, environmental and social cost of industrial agriculture.
The industrial food chain is using at least 75 per cent of the world’s agricultural land and most of agriculture’s fossil fuel and freshwater resources to feed barely 30 per cent of the world’s population. Conversely, more than 500 million peasant farms around the world are using less than 25 per cent of the land – and almost no fossil fuels or chemicals – to feed 70 per cent of humanity.
Aside from burning vast quantities of fossil carbon, industry is also wasting money that could be directed to supporting equitable agroecological production while still lowering food prices for the world’s marginalized consumers.
The statistics are staggering. Consumers pay $7.5 trillion each year for industrially produced food. But between a third and half of this production is wasted along the way to the consumer or at the table: spoiled in the field or in transport, rejected from grocers because of blemishes, or left on the plate because of over-serving.
Conversely, households in OECD countries consume about a quarter more food than is needed – leading to obesity and related health problems.
The total food overproduced each year is worth $3.8 trillion – a combination of $2.49 trillion worth of food waste and $1.26 trillion of over-consumption (see footnote 191 of the report). Burgeoning waists worldwide also have both human and economic costs.
When the wider environmental damages – including contaminated soils and water, greenhouse gas emissions – are added to the health and social impacts, the harm done by the industrial food chain is almost $5 trillion (see footnote 193). For every dollar consumers spent in supermarkets, health and environmental damages cost two dollars more.
Added to the amount spent by consumers, this makes the real cost of industrial food $12.4 trillion annually.
Policymakers negotiating the future of food and climate may wonder if it is possible to make such a dramatic change in our food production. Peasants may feed 70 per cent of the world’s population now but can they adapt quickly enough to climate change to feed us in 2100? Which system, the industrial food chain or the peasant food web, has the track record, innovative capacity, speed and flexibility needed to get us through the unparalleled threat of an unpredictable climate?
The answer is clear. Take experience: over the last century, the industrial food chain has not introduced a single new crop or livestock species to production but has cut the genetic diversity of our crops by 75 per cent, reduced the number of species by about one third, and reduced the nutritional value of our crops by up to 40 per cent. The peasant web has introduced 2.1 million new plant varieties where industrial agriculture has only introduced 100,000 over the same time frame.
The industrial food chain works with only 137 crop species and five main livestock species. Stunningly, 45 per cent of the industry’s research and development targets just one crop: maize. By contrast, the peasant web is breeding and growing 7,000 different crop species and 34 livestock species – like the alpaca, ñandu, and guinea pig.
Peasants also have the track record of dealing with new conditions quickly and effectively. Recent history is replete with evidence that peasant producers – before there were telegraphs or telephones or railways – have adapted new food species (through selective breeding) to an extraordinary range of different climatic conditions within the span of only a few human generations.
This process of seed and knowledge sharing from farmer to farmer is how maize spread across most of the regions of Africa and how sweet potatoes were planted everywhere in Papua New Guinea from mangrove swamps to mountain tops – all in less than a century – and how immigrants brought seeds from Europe that were growing across the Western Hemisphere within a generation.
When we compare the track record of the industrial food chain to the peasant food web we must conclude that our century-long experience with the chain shows that it is just too expensive, and it can’t scale up. Meanwhile, with almost no support from governments, the peasant food web is already feeding 70 per cent of us (see page 12) – and could do much more, while producing drastically less greenhouse gas emissions than industrial methods.
To be clear, ‘peasant farming as usual’ is not an option. Climate change will mean our over 10,000 years of agriculture has to deal with growing conditions that the world hasn’t seen for three million years.
There is no reason to be sanguine about the problems ahead.
Peasants can scale up if the industrial chain gets off their backs. Governments must recognize peasants’ rights to their land and seeds and support fair, peasant-led rural development and trade policies. We need to cut waste and shift our financial resources to strengthening the peasant food web and both tackling climate change and ensuring food sovereignty.
Featured image: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis meets with troops stationed at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, April 21, 2017. (DoD photo by Air Force Tech. Sgt. Brigitte N. Brantley)
The other day we learned that there are four times more U.S. troops in Syria than any earlier official figure had acknowledged. The discrepancy did not get much public attention, perhaps because the numbers are small compared to some other U.S. military deployments: about 2,000 troops in Syria, with the earlier official figure being 500.
The incomplete count evidently had omitted personnel on short-term assignments and some others performing sensitive missions. A Pentagon spokesman said that release of the newer, more complete figure is part of an effort by Secretary of Defense James Mattis to be more transparent.
Less transparent than the new data about numbers of U.S. troops is the reason any of those troops are staying in Syria. The one uncontested rationale for the deployment in Syria has been to combat the so-called Islamic State (ISIS), which is an unconventional non-state actor but presented conventional sorts of military targets when it established a state-like entity occupying significant territory in Syria and Iraq.
The ISIS mini-state is now all but eliminated. Nonetheless, the U.S. military presence in Syria, although down from its peak strength, shows no sign of ending. Mattis has said that the United States “won’t just walk away” from its efforts in Syria.
Signs of Mission Creep
The United States is exhibiting mission creep in Syria, with new rationales being spun to replace the mission of armed combat against the ISIS caliphate. Underlying the mission creep are some familiar patterns of thinking that have been behind other U.S. military expeditions as well. Donald Trump did not originate these patterns but his administration has slid into them.
Mattis’s comment about not walking away from where the United States already has been involved points to one of those American habits of thought, which is to believe that the United States is best equipped, and should be most responsible, for setting right any troubled country in which the United States has had more than a passing interest. To believe this about Syria goes well beyond the mission of combating ISIS and gets into pacification and even some elements of nation-building.
Other patterns of thinking about the Syrian case entail amnesia about recent relevant experiences and the lessons that should have been drawn from them but evidently weren’t. American attitudes toward ISIS, the Syrian regime, and Syria’s Russian and Iranian allies are all involved.
The dominant American perspective toward counterterrorism, and thus toward ISIS, has been a heavily militarized one inherent in the notion of a “war on terror.” Use of the military instrument has been appropriate insofar as ISIS, as a mini-state, presented military targets. But ISIS, which lives on as more of a clandestine movement and ideology, no longer presents many such targets. Non-military counterterrorist instruments are now relatively more important.
Too often forgotten is how much war itself, and specifically the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, was a boon to ISIS. Also too often forgotten is how much the collateral casualties and damage that are almost unavoidable byproducts of U.S. military action in complicated conflicts tend to boost rather than reduce anti-U.S. extremism, including extremism that takes the form of international terrorism.
‘Regime Change’ Dreams
One habitual thought about ISIS has been that Assad must be toppled if there is to be any hope of killing off ISIS. Max Abrahms and John Glasercatalog the many iterations, voiced over the past two years, of the theme that defeating ISIS would require defeating Assad. Today’s situation, with the ISIS caliphate extinguished while Assad remains ensconced in Damascus, demonstrates how erroneous that argument was.
Many who propounded the argument are among those now pushing for continuation and expansion of the U.S. military expedition in Syria, with no acknowledgment of how wrong was their earlier assessment. This demonstrates anew how little accountability there is for faulty policy analysis among the Washington chattering classes.
The dream of felling Assad does not die, even though with the help of his friends he does not appear to be going anywhere in the foreseeable future. Persistence of the dream involves more amnesia, in at least two respects. One is to forget the consequences of earlier U.S. or U.S.-backed efforts at regime change in the region. These include the invasion of Iraq in 2003, which gave birth to the group that we later came to know as ISIS, and the chaos-fomenting ouster of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya.
There also seems to be forgetfulness of how long the Assads — including the father Hafez, who put down internal opposition at least as brutally as his son Bashar — have been in power. Forty-seven years, to be exact. Anyone arguing that continuation of Bashar Assad in power is intolerable needs to answer the question “why now?” and to explain how the world and U.S. interests somehow have survived nearly a half century of the Assads.
As for Bashar Assad’s Russian and Iranian friends, the dominant American perspective is the zero-sum assumption that any presence or influence of either Iran or Russia is ipso facto bad and contrary to U.S. interests. This perspective makes no effort to sort out the respects in which Russian or Iranian actions conflict with U.S. interests, parallel U.S. interests, or are irrelevant to those interests.
This absence of effort persists despite the glaring example (not just in Syria, but also in Iraq and beyond), of the fight against ISIS as a parallel interest. Joined to this habitual perspective is the also habitual use of the misleading vacuum metaphor, according to which not just U.S. involvement but physical and preferably military involvement to fill a space is needed to counter bad-by-definition Iranian or Russian influence in that same space.
These habits of thinking, taken together, close off an escape route from Syria. They imply no end to the U.S. military expedition there. They preclude declaring victory (that is, a military victory against ISIS) and going home. Vladimir Putin, more conscious than most American pundits are of the hazards of indefinitely being stuck in Syria, is doing that now.
Thus Syria is becoming one more place, like Afghanistan, in which the United States endlessly wages a war. Meanwhile the Russians will keep reminding everyone that they were there at the invitation of the incumbent government and the United States is not. The Turks will keep getting angry about U.S. tactical cooperation with Kurds. Sunni extremists will keep exploiting for propaganda and recruitment any damage done by the United States or its local clients. And the Pentagon may or may not tell us how many U.S. troops are actually there.
Paul R. Pillar, in his 28 years at the Central Intelligence Agency, rose to be one of the agency’s top analysts. He is author most recently of Why America Misunderstands the World. (This article first appeared as a blog post at The National Interest’s Web site. Reprinted with author’s permission.)
The inaugural World Inequality Report published on Thursday by economists Thomas Piketty, Emmanuel Saez, Gabriel Zucman, Facundo Alvaredo and Lucas Chancel documents the rise in global income and wealth inequality since 1980.
The report covers up to 2016, leaving out the last year, in which the stock market has soared on the expectation that the US will enact massive tax cuts, providing yet another windfall for the rich.
The report found that between 1980 and 2016 the world’s richest one percent captured twice the income growth as the bottom half of the world’s population, contributing to a significant rise in global inequality.
Top 1 percent vs. Bottom 50 percent national income shares in the US 1980–2016
The data shows that the world’s top 0.1 percent alone captured as much growth as the bottom half, and the top 0.001 percent, just 76,000 people worldwide, received 4 percent of global income growth. Meanwhile those in the 50th to 99th percentiles worldwide, which the report refers to as the “squeezed bottom 90 percent in the US and Western Europe,” encompassing the working class in the world’s advanced economies, experienced anemic growth rates.
The report is based on tax data and other financial information collected for the World Wealth and Income Database by more than 100 researchers in 70 countries. It shows that income inequality has either risen or remained stable in every country.
Additionally, the report found that concentration of wealth in the hands of the top one percent has risen sharply, particularly in the US, Russia and China. In the US, the wealth share monopolized by the top one percent rose from 22 percent in 1980 to 39 percent; in China it doubled from 15 percent to 30 percent; and in Russia it went from 22 percent to 43 percent.
In terms of income, the top ten percent captured 37 percent of national income in Europe, 41 percent in China, 47 percent in the United States-Canada, 54 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa, 55 percent in Brazil and India, and 61 percent in the Middle East.
Top 1 percent wealth shares across the world, 1913–2015
Notably, Russia, when it was still part of the Soviet Union, had the lowest level of inequality in 1980, with the top ten percent accounting for 20 percent of income. There was a sharp spike in inequality following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1990-91, with half of all national income going to the top ten percent in less than five years. Russia has now reached parity with the United States, returning to levels of inequality that prevailed a century ago under the rule of the tsar.
The report also shows that there has been a significant divergence in inequality levels between the United States and Europe since 1980, when the top one percent claimed 10 percent of income in both regions. As of 2016, the top one percent in Europe claimed 12 percent of income, while in the United States its share had doubled to 20 percent.
The top one percent and the bottom half of the American population have essentially flipped positions. While the bottom 50 percent received 20 percent of national income in 1980, that figure declined steadily to just 13 percent by 2016. Conversely, the top one percent steadily increased their claim on national income, from 10 percent to 20 percent in less than two generations.
Average annual income for the bottom half of the US population, adjusted for inflation, has remained at $16,500 for the last 40 years, while the top one percent have seen their average income triple from $430,000 to $1.3 million.
Top 10 percent income shares across the world, 1980–2016
The report’s authors note in an op-ed published in the Guardian that the United States is an outlier among the advanced economies, with a surge in income and wealth inequality over the last four decades that has developed into a “second Gilded Age.”
The authors attribute the dramatic difference between the US and Europe to a “perfect storm of radical policy changes” in the US. They argue that the growth of inequality in the US has been exacerbated by a number of factors, including a tax system that has become less progressive over time, a federal minimum wage that has not kept up with inflation, shrinking unions, deregulation of the finance industry and increasingly unequal access to higher education. They warn that the Republican tax cuts will “turbocharge” the further rise of inequality.
Despite its explosive content, the latest report on inequality was buried by the media, relegated to a small headline in the Business Day section of the New York Times and posted well down the Guardian’s front page in the world news section. The vast and ever-growing level of social inequality around the world is not what the ruling classes in the US, Europe and elsewhere want to talk about.
Social inequality in the United States is being ignored and covered up by the political system. The Democrats are entirely focused on issues of sex and the anti-Russia campaign, even as the Republicans are pushing to finalize tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy by the end of the year.
However, under the surface of official life, class conflict is growing. The World Inequality Report reveals that the contradictions of the capitalist system find expression in every country.
In concluding their report, the authors refer to policy decisions that could be adopted to reverse the growth of social inequality, promoting the illusion that a fair distribution of resources can be achieved under capitalism through various liberal reform measures and appeals to capitalist governments to enact progressive tax measures.
There is, however, no “reform” faction in the ruling class. The growth of inequality in the US has been carried out under both Democrats and Republicans, aided and abetted by the trade unions. In Europe, the ruling elite is moving rapidly to catch up to the United States through the implementation of labor “reform” measures, the destruction of social programs and the redistribution of wealth to the rich.
The response of the ruling class to growing social opposition is not reform, but repression. A movement against inequality requires the building of a socialist movement of the international working class on the basis of a socialist program to appropriate the wealth of the corporate and financial oligarchy, transform the banks and giant corporations into democratically controlled public utilities, and reorganize economic life on the basis of social need.
That’s what Net Neutrality is all about – the principle that ISPs must treat online content equally, the essence of a free and open Internet, the last frontier of digital democracy.
Without equal access online, ISP giants Comcast, Charter, AT&T, Verizon, Cox and others can establish toll roads or premium lanes, charge extra for speed and free and easy access, control content, as well as stifle dissent and independent thought.
They can make Internet access unaffordable for low income households, control what’s available online, block content diverging from the official narrative at their discretion.
They can transform the Internet into another corporate-controlled swamp of disinformation and fake news, matching the rubbish major media provide, a deplorable prospect.
The FCC ruling bans states from imposing their own Net Neutrality rules, forbidding them from overriding federal regulations.
It reverses Title II classification of ISPs, classifying them as common carriers, restricting their actions, preventing them from halting, slowing, or otherwise tampering with online communications.
An “information service” classification replaces the current status, weakening consumer protections.
Net Neutrality means speech and media freedom. Without it, they’re gravely jeopardized.
On Thursday, an important battle was lost. The fight to preserve a free and open Internet continues – ahead in Congress and the courts.
It remains a major challenge with Republicans controlling the House and Senate, along with a corporatist president hostile to consumer rights.
The Congressional Review Act lets lawmakers reverse regulatory actions within 60 legislative days of their enactment. It’s crucial for Americans to press their House and Senate representatives, demanding reversal of the FCC order.
Free Press.net said the following in response to Thursday’s ruling:
It “abdicat(ed) FCC authority over internet service providers…clearing the way for blocking, throttling and discrimination by the nation’s largest phone and cable companies.”
“Free Press will take the FCC to court to challenge its reversal on the proper definition of broadband, the accuracy of its contentious justifications for tossing out the rules, and the many process fouls that have plagued the FCC proceeding since it began earlier this year.”
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman intends suing against what he called an “illegal” ruling. Other states intend to sue, the ACLU, Electronic Frontier Foundation, and other consumer groups likely to follow suit or file amicus briefs supporting litigation against the FCC ruling.
“We’ll have plenty to say in court about the legal mistakes littered throughout this decision. It’s willfully gullible and downright deceptive to suggest that nondiscrimination rules are no longer needed – despite the massive power of the cable and phone companies that control broadband access in this country.”
“Net neutrality is internet freedom. I support that freedom. I dissent from this rash decision to roll back net neutrality rules.”
“I dissent from the corrupt process that has brought us to this point. And I dissent from the contempt this agency has shown our citizens in pursuing this path today.”
“This decision puts the Federal Communications Commission on the wrong side of history, the wrong side of the law, and the wrong side of the American public.”
“The future of the internet is the future of everything. That is because there is nothing in our commercial, social, and civic lives that has been untouched by its influence or unmoved by its power.”
“I believe it is essential that we sustain this foundation of openness – and that is why I support net neutrality.”
“(O)ur…net neutrality policies have passed court muster. They are wildly popular. But today we wipe away this work, destroy this progress, and burn down time-tested values…”
“As a result of today’s misguided action, our broadband providers will get extraordinary new power from this agency.”
“They will have the power to block websites, throttle services, and censor online content. They will have the right to discriminate and favor the internet traffic of those companies with whom they have pay-for-play arrangements and the right to consign all others to a slow and bumpy road.”
“…I worry that this decision and the process that brought us to this point is ugly.”
“It’s ugly in the cavalier disregard this agency has demonstrated to the public, the contempt it has shown for citizens who speak up, and the disdain it has for popular opinion.”
“Unlike its predecessors, this FCC has not held a single public hearing on net neutrality. There is no shortage of people who believe Washington is not listening to their concerns, their fears, and their desires.”
“If the arc of history is long, we are going to bend this toward a more just outcome. In the courts. In Congress. Wherever we need to go to ensure that net neutrality stays the law of the land.”
“Because if you are conservative or progressive, you benefit from internet openness. If you come from a small town or big city, you benefit from internet openness.”
“If you are a company or non- profit, you benefit from internet openness. If you are a start-up or an established business, you benefit from internet openness.”
“If you are a consumer or a creator, you benefit from internet openness. If you believe in democracy, you benefit from internet openness.”
“So let’s persist. Let’s fight. Let’s not stop here or now. It’s too important. The future depends on it.”
Powerful words from a rare voice of the people in Washington, sadly way outnumbered by powerful dark forces, representing privileged interests exclusively.
The battle to save a free and open Internet goes on – in Congress, the courts, and on streets across America.
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research based in Chicago.
December 12, 2017, marks the anniversary of the liberation – the West called it fall – of Aleppo in Syria. What happened is conveniently forgotten today by the West.
Some of us can’t and won’t forget what was both world, regional and local history.
Important for Syria, for the West and for the future world order – for at least 5 reasons.
1. The Western mainstream media’s deceptive – constructed, ignorant, or both – narrative since 2011 was debunked.
Perspectives that media and political decision-makers deliberately omitted (remember omitted stuff is more important than fake):
• History and the colonialists’ role in Syria.
• The immense complexity of the Syrian society.
• Syria as a 7000 year-old civilisation and as end of the Silk Road.
• The decades-long conflicts underlying the violence, since CIA’s coup in 1949.
• The Western-driven regime change policies years since before 2011.
• Other causes of the conflicts than “Assad the dictator and his regime” such as environmental crisis, oil and gas, and its being partly occupied since 1967 by Israel.
• That nothing of the conflict complexity can de facto be reduced to a matter of one man’s role – like it couldn’t with Milosevic (now exonerated), Saddam, or Ghadafi;
• That this may have been a civil war for about a week but then almost 7 years of international aggression by thousands of foreign groups, Western governments/arm suppliers and their Saudi-led allies.
• Syria’s right under such circumstances to self-defence according to Article 51 of the UN Charter.
• The major role in the utter destruction of Syria played by NATO countries, Turkey particularly when it comes to Aleppo, and Western allies such as Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states; all was simply ”the dictator/regime killing his own people”…
• That Russia and Iran was the only foreign powers legitimately present according to international law.
• That the UN was sidelined – again – and tasked with the impossible role of making peace out of such member state policies.
• The media interest in Syria disappeared immediately after Aleppo’s liberation as if orchestrated by one conductor. Silence.
• And Facebook and Google Search changes algorithms…
The media coverage stopped there and then – like musicians under a conductor, obeying the tiniest move.
2. It marked the end of the West’s attempt at regime change since 2012
It had started formally on Dec 12, 2012 – on the day four years earlier, in Marrakesh. “Friends (!) of Syria” declared Assad’s government illegitimate and set up a Syrian National Council – without, of course, asking the Syrian people it was supposed to represent. Here’s AlJazeera’s/AFP’s coverage of that cruel decision.
3. It was the turning point in the international aggression on Syria
With Aleppo lost, the RIOTs – Rebels-Insurgency-Opposition-Terrorists – lost momentum. The Free-this-and-that ran away, dispersed or killed each other. And the West’s beloved White Helmets – with their stolen name doing humanitarian work only among terrorists – were nowhere to be seen in Aleppo on December 12.
Anybody in a NATO Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “intelligence agency” or state-financed research institute could have found out on the Internet what that organisation in reality was. They did not. For obvious reasons. But I could and did in November 2016.
4. One more Western interventionist war lost
After Vietnam, Somalia, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya etc. this was one more international law-defying military intervention to impose – allegedly – the best of the Western values in its Mission Civilisatrice but predictably lost, one more contribution to the decline and fall of the West, the US Empire and NATO in particular. And one more positioning on the wrong side of history.
5. One more example of the inability to feel empathy with the human suffering in the wake of our policies.
300 000-400 000 innocent civilians dead, millions displaced and barely surviving outside Syria. History and civilisation destroyed directly or by militant, terrorist proxies – Western supported RIOTs.
And civil society of course was never a player in any negotiations – only the killing groups and countries have met at tables: Complete conflict and peace illiteracy at best or a cruel wish to just destroy and conquer.
Also, it never occurred to the media and politics that you could side with the innocent, non-killing Syrian people. No, you either sided with “the regime” or with the West and its allies against it.
If truth is the first casualty in war, conflict understanding and respect for complexity is the second and third. Our own complicity the fourth.
Has any Western politician or government expressed regret?
Has any leading media apologised for its coverage?
Did the so-called Left, labour unions or workers around the world express solidarity with the 30 000 workers and their families whose lives were destroyed in Aleppo’s Sheikh Najjar Industrial Zone that produced 5% of the industrial goods in Syria and was the second largest industrial zone in the Middle East?
Does anyone talk about reconciliation with Syria, about a History and Reconciliation Commission for all the war and not just some politicised “Commissions” to investigate single attacks – so the blame game can go on?
Or – as repentant gesture – about a huge program for re-building Syria?
No. There is no shame.
And we expect people in the Middle East to love us, right?
But China is connecting the vast Eurasian continent with a constructive new Silk Belt and Road from Beijing to Serbia.
And Syria.
Positive energy, big vision, potentially peace-promoting like nothing else at the moment.
A Cold War perspective
Some 25 years ago the First Cold War ended. The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact fell. Militarised to death and stuck in Afghanistan. Today we could have had a much better, peaceful West and good relations with Russia. We don’t.
Now the West has been in Afghanistan for more than twice the time Russia was – unfortunately it has nobody even remotely comparable to Gorbachev, the last SU President. Instead the West fought wars all over the place and expanded NATO – against all promised made to Gorbachev – when it should have dissolved and a new security structure been built.
NATO allies blindly following the US – their Master’s Voice – without one independent or doubtful thought.
That Second Cold War will be lost by the US and NATO countries, the West.
And for the Syrian people, for those who never touched a gun?
As sad as can be.
And Assad can now be – says Washington. The conductor…
We caused the world’s largest humanitarian crisis (at the time) since 1945 for nothing. Perhaps 400 000 died and millions are internally displaced or refugees in neighbouring states.
Better forget it. And move on to new wars – North Korea, Iran…who’s next?
Shamelessly.
Personal reflections
I’ve seen much destruction during my years of work in conflict and war zones. But nothing like Aleppo East, the old City and Aleppo’s industrial zone. Square kilometer after kilometer of destruction – only 5-7% of it from the air, for those who want to know, the rest done by house-to-house fighting. Trillions of bullets.
I’ve seen the suffering – but also the joy – of the people in the East and those who came over to the West to get help – the only helpers present there on December 10-14 were the Red Crescent, Russian field doctors and hospitals, the Syrian Arab Army and volunteers from Aleppo’s University. Shocking.
And deeply deeply moving. Never to leave my memory.
No normal person who has seen what I saw would be able thereafter to defend war as a tool to achieve any political goal whatsoever. Decision-makers and media outside Syria simply won’t get it. Distance and psychic numbing, the shields around the corridors of power kill.
Period.
I don’t blame them for not risking their lives going there. I blame them for their colonialist mentality and their belief in their own exceptionalist moral superiority.
The next shock I experiened – perhaps due to my belief in decency and professionalism but anyhow proving naive – happened at my attempts to reach media with what I had seen.
TFF PressInfo reaches, among others, some 3000-4000 media and journalists worldwide, including many hundreds in the Nordic countries.
Not one reaction was expressive of an interest in what I had seen in a place where I was the only one from the Nordic countries and Western media had been present but had left before December 12, 2016.
But writing in safety from Beirut, Istanbul, Paris, Berlin and Washington they knewthat with Aleppo’s ”fall” the next thing would be Assad’s genocide on its inhabitants – who somewhat surprisingly to them, I reported, cried of happiness to have come out from under 4,5 years of terror occupation, danced, drank and celebrated in the streets.
I talked freely with anyone in those streets and was not embedded – but did get military protection in and out of Aleppo’s war zones at a time when all the fighting had not died down yet. I was grateful for that, necessary in such a dangerous environment.
During my work in Yugoslavia’s dissolution wars, in Georgia, in Iraq – there was always some media somewhere that said: OK, he has been there, he knows about conflict analysis, he has talked with people on all sides and represents no government. He’s independent, let’s hear what he has to say.
So, there were not even the tiniest crack in the massive media wall – media that could have seen interviewing me as a kind of scoop since they had nobody there.
Also not in my regional, leading media such as Dagens Nyheter, Sydsvenskan, Politiken, Berlingske, 24/7, Deadline – you name them. Their responses are all documented here.
And the liberal The Nation, the oldest political magazine in the US, asked me to summarise three articles they had read into one – only to tell me that they had rather suddenly “changed editorial priorities” and would, therefore, not publish my manuscript but pay me a honorarium (which I had not even asked for).
In short, there were only two kinds of responses:
No response or ”we can do an interview with you about how it is for a peace researcher to be embedded with the Syrian regime/dictator and his army” – that is, only an interest in framing. No interest in what I had seen and heard.
Has anyone ever been framed for going to the capitals of Western aggressors say Washington or Brussels?
I was framed for risking my life going to Damascus and Aleppo to try to understand that side too, the side that has not gotten a fair hearing.
So much for the free Western media – proving excellently their place as the second M in the MIMAC – the Military-Industrial-Media-Academic Complex – that is always ready to promote violence and omit or marginalise the voices of conflict understanding and peace.
The overthrow of iniquitous power relations is a point many would celebrate. But such overthrows are themselves marked by the contradiction of their origins. Any revolution must, by its very nature, suffer inconsistency, defeats and weaknesses.
In the United States, a different sort of sexual revolution is taking place. It is not linked to liberation in the way sex was linked to the emancipation of the body in previous decades. There is something distinctly sombre, calculating, and determinedly forceful about the movement to wrest control from men who generally have had it good in the power stakes. Cloaks and covers are being blown.
Those being placed on the pyre for burning are now so numerous as to warrant a multitude of scrapbooks and scribbles. From across the political spectrum, the casualties are accumulating in the media, political and publicity circuit. Figures considered creature of good repute have been cast to the wolves. A total inversion seems to be taking place, from the newspaper cycle to the White House.
The problem with such matters is that the allegation has started to assume a substitute force of conviction. It has become sufficient for individuals to lose their positions because allegations, untested by the wearing rigour of cross-examination and investigation, have assumed the force of de facto law.
Even within this accelerating movement, there are disagreements about how far one should go in dismembering the order and its attributes. Are some of the figures being scalped in this business receiving unjust attention?
Take last month’s disagreement shown by Lena Dunham and Jenni Konner behind the series Girls, both taking to the barricades defending a friend and writer on the show, Murray Miller, against the accusations of Aurora Perrineau.
To be fair to Perrineau, she has not left it at a mere accusation, hoping to get away with easy gain. According to Deputy Charles Moore of the LA County Sheriff’s Department, she has gone so far as to file a police report against Miller citing sexual assault.
Miller, through his lawyer, rubbished the claims, deeming them “outrageous”. But the point of interest here, at least from the heady consequences arising from Me Too righteousness, is the disagreement it has caused those who would otherwise have taken the torches to the bundles.
Dunham and Konner are careful to pay appropriate tribute. “During the windfall of deeply necessary accusations over the last few months in Hollywood, we have been thrilled to see so many women’s voices heard and dark experiences in this industry justified.”
As with every feminist, claimed the co-showrunners, the occasion was of celebration. But there came a danger with too much conviction as with “every time of change there are also incidences of the culture, in its enthusiasm and zeal, taking down the wrong targets.”
The risks from moving from a selective, judicious targeting of deserving targets – those men who have been resting on crumpled laurels for decades, drawing benefits from a system that has, within it, its own apologetics – to a totalitarian presumption: that all in the various industries must, by virtue of being there, necessarily assault or abuse, are considerable. To that end, they trigger a sense of power dynamics that should require testing and investigation rather than unquestioned, dogmatic acceptance.
For Dunham and Konner, the case against Miller was full proof. (The point here is interesting, in so far as it presumes a certainty untested in the courts.) “While our first instinct is to listen to every woman’s story, our insider knowledge of Murray’s situation makes us confident that sadly this accusation is one of the 3 percent of assault cases that are misreported every year.” The figure is itself suggestive, extracted from a realm of unreliability.
Dunham, after being subjected to a predictable salvo of baying critics, subsequently issued a statement claiming how she “naively believed it was important to share my perspective on my friend’s situation as it transpired behind the scenes over the last few months.”
That she had even assumed such a position of scepticism immediately catapulted her into the circles of fire. Gilliam B. White, writing for The Atlantic, simply assumed a robotically programmed position in favour of Miller’s accuser, using a predictable cocktail of identity politics to undermine a defence. “Intentionally or not, Dunham’s initial call to scrutinize Perrineau, a biracial actress, but not Miller, fed into an implicit message that believability, sympathy, and public rage are reserved only for certain women.”
Rather daftly, such a stance repudiates evidence of conduct in favour of identity as truth, a point that is equally flawed from whichever racial perspective one punts for. Perrineau should hardly deserve exceptional treatment in the stakes of proving claims because she is biracial, a sort of exotic assumption of credibility. But the culture of complaint, as Robert Hughes termed it, has no limits the hyperventilating circles of US identity politics.
Instances of such overtaxing zeal are starting to grow. Proportion and evidence were certainly left wanting regarding an accusation (note the singular) against the Australian actor, Geoffrey Rush. The Australian paper, The Daily Telegraph, sniffed a story that the Sydney Theatre Company had received a complaint “alleging that Mr. Geoffrey Rush had engaged in inappropriate behaviour.”
Not being a paper known for its attention to detail, it ran a headline claiming Rush to be “KING LEER”. This was a howler other papers, notably the companion Herald Sun, refused to run with. “The Tele are running with a yarn,” went a text message to the paper’s staff, “which is highly libellous.”
Rush responded in kind, launching a defamation suit. “It is an action I am taking in order to redress the slurs, innuendo and hyperbole they have created around my standing in the entertainment industry and greater community.”
Detached from probative fields of inquiry, the sexual accusation becomes dynamite and dirt. It destroys the public image, fracturing the brand. Many a figure would no doubt deserve it, but equally, such a figure would surely be entitled to that concept that lacks currency so often in public debate: natural justice.
Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMITUniversity, Melbourne. Email: [email protected]
Democracy lives or dies on the quality of public conversation. “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government,” Thomas Jefferson wrote, “I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”
Today it doesn’t take the smarts of a Jefferson to realize that our public conversation, filtered through corporate-controlled, often-fractured media, is faltering. While analyzing how to fix our broken news system, from the promotion of public broadcasting to eliminating fake news, is complex, right now is a critical moment to hold the line. If we hope to reinvigorate our media, today democracy defenders are called upon to play defense—and quickly.
Earlier this month, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai proposed a plan to dismantle net neutrality, an extremely worrying move—one that has provoked the ire of organizations and citizens across the country. And this Thursday, the commission will vote on the plan.
If you’ve heard the term “net neutrality,” is it something you imagine only internet fanatics can grasp? Not at all. It simply refers to baseline protection ensuring that no internet service provider can “interfere with or block web traffic, or favor their own services at the expense of smaller rivals.” As such, it is integral to democratic dialogue. To abolish it, explains Craig Aaron, president and CEO of the media advocacy group Free Press, “would end the open nature of the internet and leave activists, media makers and all the rest of us at the mercy of the biggest phone and cable companies.”
Needless to say, given the current composition of the FCC, the fate of net neutrality looks bleak.
Yet, the recent history of net neutrality offers an encouraging story of the power of the people to protect the core democratic principle of free exchange and shows that even if things look bad, grassroots pressure holds the key to saving the internet as we know it.
The story starts in 2010. That December, the FCC passed what those most concerned considered pretty weak half-measures prohibiting internet service providers from blocking websites or imposing limits on users, Aaron says. And by 2014, a federal lawsuit brought by Verizon succeeded in striking down even this half-measure. Verizon’s hubris ignited a massive call for the FCC to fight back. Protests demanded even stronger rules to reclassify internet service providers as “common carriers,” requiring them to act as neutral gatekeepers to the internet and to protect access for all.
By May 2014, inspired by the Occupy Wall Street protests, concerned citizens had set up camp in Washington, D.C., at the FCC headquarters. It had all started with a protest organized by Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese. Flowers, a pediatrician who cut her teeth in the fight for universal health care, and Zeese, a lawyer who fought injustices in the 1980s’ war on drugs, announced at the protest’s end that they were not going to leave. The duo rolled out their sleeping bags on the grass, stayed the night, and before they knew it, the occupation grew drastically. Fellow concerned citizens flooded in with tents and banners. One day followed the next, each to the tune of passing cars honking in solidarity. Not only did employees of the FCC come out to thank the occupiers, but three of the five FCC commissioners came to meet Flowers and Zeese.
A week later, then-FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler put out a “notice of proposed rule-making” that asked the public, “What is the right public policy to ensure that the internet remains open?” The preferred solution put forward by the FCC, outlined in the notice, would have left the door ajar for a “two-tiered internet” plan, wherein internet service providers could sell content providers priority access to their subscribers at rates only big companies could afford. Citizen reformers couldn’t and wouldn’t get behind this proposal.
But the notice also sought public comment on whether the FCC should “reclassify” the internet as a common carrier under the law. Doing so would give the FCC greater legal authority over providers to fully and truly keep the internet open. This request for comments gave citizens, especially those emboldened by the FCC occupation, an opening.
For months citizens continued protesting and spreading awareness about the importance of net neutrality. Leading up to the closing of the comment period in September 2014, the activist group Fight for the Future parked a Jumbotron outside FCC headquarters. The giant video billboard played videos of fellow citizens explaining why net neutrality mattered to them. Later, reformers performed a skit outside the FCC, a “Save the Internet Musical Action.” The musical’s chorus—“Which side are you on, Tom? Which side are you on?”—would soon be answered.
These courageous public actions built on the momentum sparked by the FCC occupiers. Together, they galvanized citizens to submit 4 million comments to the FCC. The FCC chairman reversed his position, endorsed strong rules, and moved to restore the agency’s authority. In February 2015, the FCC announced it would reclassify internet service providers as common carriers. Wheeler called it “the proudest day of my public policy life.” Another FCC commissioner called it “democracy in action.”
The victory taught one very important lesson. As Flowers put it, “it showed we don’t have to compromise. We can actually stay true to what we are fighting for and win.” For that win, a broad coalition of citizen power united folks ranging from the tech industry—such as Netflix and Tumblr—to the Black Lives Matter movement. They all understood the democratic value of a free internet on which independent media is kept accessible and online grassroots organizing is made possible. “This cross-generational and multi-issue movement was critical in pressuring the FCC commissioners and lawmakers to support net neutrality,” Aaron says.
The situation in which we find ourselves today is different from how it was in 2014. The composition of the FCC has changed, and, after a year of resisting President Trump’s agenda, many perceive grassroots activists to be tired. Yet, the takeaway from the above story is that citizens have untold political power and, when they effectively wield it, can influence even politically removed bureaucrats to win major democratic victories.
This grassroots pressure will have to be sustained and significantly expanded to save the internet. And even if the FCC votes to repeal net neutrality, the fight must continue. Concerned Americans will have to pressure Congress to pass a bill to overturn the FCC decision. The fate of democracy depends on it.
This article was written for YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas and practical actions. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.
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