Global Research

Though old as history itself, thou art fresh as the breath of spring, blooming as thine own rose bud, and fragrant as thine own orange flower, Damascus, pearl of the East.” -Mark Twain “The Innocents Abroad”

The first thing you notice while driving over Mount Lebanon is how close Beirut and Damascus are, and yet their respective situations could not be further apart. 

Last month, the war on Syria entered its sixth year. However, thirty years ago, Lebanon was where Syria finds itself today – embroiled in a painful and protracted not-so-civil ‘civil war,’ with numerous regional and global powers angling for influence, each pressing for their own agenda.

There’s a noticeable difference once you pass from Lebanon into Syria – the highway is paved and smooth, concrete bollards are neatly arranged, and there are no manhole ditches to avoid in the middle of the road. Images of Bashar and his father Hafiz are prominently displayed along the Damascus Road.

As one would expect in a country at war, checkpoints are numerous and security is extremely tight along the rural highways, as well as in the city. Still, life goes on in the capital. Couples are walking, mothers are shopping, children playing and the restaurants are serving.

This is Easter week in Syria. In normal times, the week following Palm Sunday would see major processions and festivities, as families take off work and get together to celebrate over an extended weekend. That’s still happening, but with an air of caution. Church volunteers are still out displaying their Easter decorations, and you can hear the voice of choir hymns gently echoing through the narrow streets of the Old City. Even with the cloud of conflict looming over the city, the spiritual vibration is still undeniable.

This is my first time in Syria, so it’s more than a bit surreal to be having a morning tea while hearing shells exploding only one and a half kilometres away as fierce fighting continues between Syrian government forces and Tahrir al Sham (the latest incarnation in the endless rebranding campaign of Al Nusra Front, aka Al Qaeda in Syria) terrorists (dispensing with the west’s regime change pc lexicon, they are not rebels, they are terrorists) in Jobar.

Last night, we went to sleep with the sounds of artillery and mortars, and awoke by more of the same at about 4:00am. The shelling is loud enough that the bedroom wall vibrates, with a few seconds delay between the sound of firing and the impact. Later today, we’ll get updates and perhaps learn exactly what landed and where, or maybe not. Unfortunately, after 24 hours of continuous random shelling, it becomes background noise. But it also serves as a pungent reminder that anyone’s fortunes can change in a split second.

Some residents intimated that in comparison to 2012 and 2013, the last two years have seen a relative peace for Damascus residents, but that apparent lull in fighting ended last month. Certainly, the tension is palpable. The city is on high alert after intense fighting broke out in the Damascus district of Jobar, and in Quaboun, and in the suburb of Ghouta.

Over the last five weeks, the west’s proxy column commonly known in US and UK media circles and by Senator John McCain, as “moderate rebels,” unleashed what American analyst Andrew Korybko cannily described last month as a Takfiri Tet Offensive. Not surprisingly, the Syrian government forces’ response to the Takfiri offensive in terrorist-occupied places like Jobar has been hard and swift. Syria is not like any other urban conflict. As in East Aleppo, terrorists in Jobar have been operating from a a series of underground tunnels and bunkers which have been dug and developed over the last five years.

The purpose of this terrorist surge was twofold: to derail international peace talks, and to further destablize previously stable areas, like Damascus, but also to try and stretch the Syrian Army’s resources, in effect handicapping attempts to regain control of pivotal control lines like Deir ez Zor. Meanwhile, an increasingly motley international conclave continues to huddle around the ISIS stronghold of Raqqa in preparation for the big show.

In the same way that Israeli airstrikes in Syria have coincided with al Nusra and ISIS movements on the ground, the timing of this recent terrorist offensive in conjunction with US military operations should not be ignored either. The fact remains that terrorist militants continue to benefit from the US-led Coalition and Israeli sorties, including after the recent US Tomahawk missile strike on Shayrat Air Base in Syria ordered by President Trump. The US President claims the US was “talking out” Syria’s ‘chemical weapon facilities’ in response to the alleged chemical weapons incident in Khan Sheikhoun in Idlib province last week. In his infinite wisdom, what Trump really did was take out a Syrian air base which was responsible for roughly 75% of air sorties launched against ISIS. Like Obama before him, Trump’s claim that Washington’s illegal US operation in Syria is all about fighting ISIS – still rings as hollow as ever.

So it’s not outrageous to say that there are no more coincidences  in this war.

There are a number of ‘moderate rebel’ mortar strikes left in the pavement along a busy shopping thoroughfare in the Old City (Photo: Patrick Henningsen)

In the Old City, you can see where Al Nusra mortar fire landed in the market souks. Despite the fighting, these are areas busy with city residents going about their daily business; shopping, having tea and coffee at cafes, and going to church and mosque. It’s fairly obvious that militants backed by the US, UK, Israel and the Gulf states do not care much for the people of Syria – a conclusion which becomes self-evident by the fact that in every instance where there is fighting in the country, terrorists routinely and as a matter of policy randomly launch mortar and artillery attacks into civilians areas. What else is not reported by western media outlets and what anyone here will tell you, is that the only inhabitants remaining in terrorist-held areas are terrorist fighters, possibly their families, and residents who are not allowed to leave under threat of violence.

Certainly this was the case in East Aleppo, but for an area like Jobar, it’s highly unlikely very many ‘normal’ civilians remain, as militants continue to bait government forces with ‘hit and hide’ mortar attacks while taking refuge in their ever-expanding network of tunnels below street level. Of course, you won’t hear that from any western mainstream media outlet. For any US or UK politician or pundit to try and characterize this as ‘fighting for freedom’ is ludicrous to the extreme and yet, this is how low the level of discourse has sunk thanks to the efforts of Washington and London’s chief propagandists who fill the ranks of what can only be described as forward military operations and information warfare run out of CNN, followed by the BBC, NBC and equivalent outlets.

Simply put, what CNN and its mainstream cohorts have been doing on a daily basis since 2011 is projecting their own self-styled, fictional narratives, tailored for a virtual sixth grade reading level audience. To suggest that somehow the terrorist occupations of Damascus neighborhoods is an outgrowth of the Arab Spring should be treated as fake news on an epic scale.

In the Old City, you can follow in the literal footsteps of St. Paul in the heart of Damascus (Photo: Patrick Henningsen)

‘Jewel of the Middle East’

First impressions are of a bustling landlocked Middle Eastern megatropolis, with the modern utility of Tehran’s social housing on the outskirts, but with some artisan motifs of Beirut. But none of this really means much in comparison to the time travel portal one steps through when entering one of the Seven Gates of Damascus into the Old City.

Here, history and tradition is preserved on a scale which hardly exists elsewhere.

Various Christian churches are busy preparing for Easter throughout Syria. Earlier today we visited Mar Boulos Syrian Catholic Church in the Old City of Damascus (Photo: Patrick Henningsen)

A point which has been made by journalists and travel writers who visit Damascus is that you can often see a church located next door to a mosque. It’s a point worth reiterating – especially as western politicians and numerous ‘experts’ on Middle Eastern affairs continue to flood US television screens and talk radio, droning on endlessly about how sectarianism prevents differing communities from living together in countries like Iraq and Syria. It’s simply not true, but for some macabre reason, western experts seem to want it to be so.

Despite the war, Damascus still remains as an important reminder that the western sectarian narrative is political sophistry projected to the public in order to reinforce a distinctly western brand of divide and conquer geopolitics. Different religious sects have, and will continue to thrive side by side – despite Washington and London’s best efforts to set them against each other.

One of the largest and oldest mosques in the world, the Umayyad Mosque, in Old City, Damascus (Photo: Patrick Henningsen)

Patrick Henningsen is a global affairs analyst and founder of the independent news and analysis site 21st Century Wire as well as a regular guest commentator for the UK Column News, RT International, host of the SUNDAY WIRE weekly radio show broadcast globally over the Alternate Current Radio Network (ACR).

CENÁRIO UM: Imagine que está a bordo de um navio a afundar-se lentamente. Não há terra à vista e o seu transmissor de rádio não está a funcionar. Há várias pessoas a bordo e quer mesmo salvá-las. Você não quer que seja o fim de “tudo”.

O que é que faz?

1. A) Reserva para si uma boa porção de arroz frito com camarões.
2. B) Liga a televisão, que ainda está a funcionar milagrosamente, e vê as notícias sobre o futuro referendo escocês ou sobre o BREXIT.
3. C) Salta de imediato para a água, tenta identificar o dano, e tenta fazer algo impensável com suas capacidades e ferramentas simples: salvar o navio.

Imagine outro cenário:

CENÁRIO DOIS: Por engano, a sua esposa ingere dois tubos inteiros de comprimidos para dormir, supostamente confundindo-os com uma nova linha de doces. Quando a encontra no chão, ela parece estar inconsciente e seu rosto está azulado.

Qual seria a sua reação?

1. A) Depois de perceber que os saltos altos não combinam com a cor da meia-calça dela, você corre para o armário à procura de um par de sapatos mais condizentes.
2. B) Leva-a sem demora para o quarto de banho, bombeia-lhe o estômago e tenta ressuscitá-la, ao mesmo tempo que chama o 112 usando a função de alta voz do seu telemóvel.
3. C) Você recorda-se do momento em que se conheceram, sente-se nostálgico e dirige-se apressadamente para a biblioteca da sala de estar, à procura de um livro de sonetos de amor de Pablo Neruda, que recita para ela, emocionado, ajoelhado no tapete.

Agora prepare-se para ter uma grande surpresa. Se não escolher C) no cenário UM, e B) no cenário DOIS, ainda assim você poderá ser realmente considerado absolutamente “normal” de acordo com os padrões dominantes, quer nos EUA quer na Europa.

E se optar por C) ou B), respetivamente, pode facilmente passar por extremista, um fanático ideológico e um esquerdista radical.

**

O Ocidente conduziu o mundo para perto do colapso total, mas os cidadãos, mesmo os intelectuais, continuam teimosamente a recusar-se a entender essa evidência. Como avestruzes, muitos estão a esconder a cabeça na areia. Outros, estão a portar-se como um cirurgião que opta por tratar o doente de um pequeno corte no dedo, ignorando que ele está realmente a morrer, devido a um terrível ferimento causado por uma bala no peito.

Parece haver uma ausência enorme de pensamento racional e, especialmente, da capacidade das pessoas compreenderem, em toda a sua dimensão, as ocorrências e eventos de âmbito mundial. Há anos que venho a defender que a destruição da capacidade de comparar e ver as coisas a partir de uma perspetiva universal tem sido uma das diligências mais bem-sucedidas levadas a cabo pelas instituições de doutrinação ocidentais (através da educação, média/desinformação e “cultura”). Elas têm efetivamente influenciado e pacificado tanto as pessoas no Ocidente como as que vivem nas suas colónias, atuais e antigas, (particularmente as “elites” locais e os seus descendentes).

Parece não haver nenhuma capacidade de comparar e analisar consistentemente, por exemplo, as ações certamente desagradáveis, mas principalmente defensivas tomadas pelos governos e países revolucionários, com os crimes mais horríveis e terríveis cometidos pelos regimes colonialistas do Ocidente em toda a Ásia, América, Médio Oriente e África, que ocorreram quase na mesma época histórica.

Não é só a história que é vista no Ocidente através de lentes totalmente distorcidas e “fora de foco”, é também o presente, que tem sido percebido e “analisado” de uma maneira fora do contexto e sem se aplicar praticamente nenhuma comparação racional. Os países rebeldes e independentes da Ásia, da América Latina, da África e do Médio Oriente (a maioria deles foram realmente forçados a defender-se de ataques extremamente brutais e a opor-se a campanhas de subversão impulsionadas pelo Ocidente) foram criticados, mesmo nos chamados círculos “progressistas” do Ocidente, usando padrões muito mais severos do que aqueles que são aplicados tanto à Europa como à América do Norte, duas partes do mundo que têm espalhado continuamente o terror, e infligido a destruição e sofrimentos inimagináveis a pessoas de todos os cantos do mundo.

A maioria dos crimes cometidos pelas revoluções de esquerda foram cometidos em resposta direta a invasões, subversões, provocações e outros ataques vindos do Ocidente. Quase todos os crimes mais terríveis cometidos pelo Ocidente foram cometidos no exterior e foram dirigidos contra pessoas escravizadas, exploradas, completamente saqueadas e indefesas em quase todas as partes do mundo.

Agora, de acordo com muitos, o “fim do jogo” está a aproximar-se. Os oceanos em ascensão estão a engolir países inteiros, como testemunhei em várias partes da Oceânia. É uma visão horrível, indescritível!

Milhões de pessoas, em numerosos países governados por regimes pró-Ocidente, estão a sair dos seus países, enquanto algumas nações estão basicamente deixando de existir, como a Papua ou Caxemira, para dar apenas dois exemplos óbvios.

O meio ambiente está completamente arruinado nas zonas onde,  há apenas algumas décadas atrás, os “pulmões” do mundo costumavam funcionar, mantendo o planeta saudável.

Dezenas de milhões de pessoas estão agora em movimento, já que os seus países foram completamente arruinados pelos jogos geopolíticos ocidentais. Em vez de influenciar e ajudar a guiar a Humanidade, culturas tão antigas como as do Iraque, Afeganistão e Síria são agora forçadas a produzir milhões de refugiados desesperados. Estão  apenas a tentar sobreviver, humilhadas e pouco relevantes.

Os grupos religiosos extremistas (de todas as religiões e, definitivamente, não apenas pertencentes à religião muçulmana) estão a ser preparados pelos ideólogos e estrategas maquiavélicos ocidentais, e estão espalhados por todos os cantos do globo: Ásia do Sul, Médio Oriente, China, América Latina, África e até na Oceânia.

O imperialismo conseguiu reduzir nossa Humanidade a uma desgraça total.

A maior parte do mundo está realmente a tentar funcionar “normalmente”, “democraticamente”, seguindo seus instintos naturais, que são baseados no simples humanismo. Mas acaba repetidamente por descarrilar, atacado e atormentado pela brutal, monstruosa e impiedosa hidra – o expansionismo ocidental e a sua “cultura” ou niilismo, ganância, cinismo e escravidão.

É óbvio para onde estamos a caminhar enquanto raça humana.

Nós queremos voar, queremos liberdade, otimismo e beleza para governar as nossas vidas. Queremos sonhar e criar algo profundo, significativo, feliz e amável. Mas há aqueles pesos horríveis que nos penduram nos pés. Há correntes que restringem as nossas ações. Há um medo constante, que nos está  a levar a trair todos os nossos ideais, assim como a trair-nos uns aos outros,  uma e outra vez; medo que nos faz, a nós seres humanos, agir como covardes e egoístas sem vergonha. Como resultado, não voamos, estamos apenas a rastejar, e nem mesmo para a frente, mas em elipses e círculos bizarros, irracionais.

Ainda assim, não acredito que o “fim do jogo” seja inevitável!

Há muitos anos que faço advertências, tenho escrito, mostrado e apresentado milhares de terríveis imagens de destruição, do colapso irreversível, da barbárie.

Praticamente, não guardei nada para mim. Utilizei os frutos do meu trabalho, dos meus filmes e livros, em novas viagens para os abismos mais escuros do nosso mundo. Não recebi quase nenhum apoio de terceiros. Mas não posso parar: o que tenho testemunhado, o perigo para o planeta e a devastação total, forçam-me a nunca desistir da luta. Sempre que foi necessário, e na maioria das vezes, eu estive sozinho. Passei muito tempo na América Latina; não posso desistir. Aprendi muito com Cuba e em tantos outros lugares maravilhosos; senti que não tinha o direito de me render.

Sempre que os horrores de que nosso planeta está sofrendo me sobrecarregam, posso ‘colapsar’, como aconteceu no ano passado. Então enterro-me em algum lugar por um curto período de tempo, reúno-me comigo mesmo, levanto-me e continuo o meu trabalho e a minha luta. Nunca deixei de confiar nas pessoas. Alguns vêm cheios de entusiasmo inicial, oferecem muito, depois traem-me e saem. Ainda assim, nunca perdi a fé nos seres humanos. Este ano, em vez de desacelerar, eu ‘adotei’ mais um lugar, que está em agonia – o Afeganistão.

O meu único pedido, a minha única exigência foi, que o mundo escutasse, que visse, que tentasse compreender, antes que seja tarde demais. Este meu pedido provou ser, percebo-o agora, tido também como “exigente”, e “radical”.

Às vezes pergunto: consegui muito? Abri os olhos a muita gente? Consegui construir muitas pontes entre as diferentes partes do mundo em luta? Como um internacionalista tenho de questionar as minhas próprias ações, a minha eficácia.

Tenho que admitir, honestamente: não sei as respostas para minhas próprias perguntas. Mas continuo a trabalhar e a lutar.

**

O mundo parece diferente se observado e analisado a partir de um pub na Europa ou na América do Norte, ou se alguém estiver de pé num daqueles atóis no meio do Pacífico Sul (Oceânia) que estão sob o assalto constante da maré das ondas, pontilhadas com raízes das palmeiras mortas que apontavam de forma acusadora para o céu. Essas ilhotas estão na vanguarda da batalha pela sobrevivência do nosso planeta, e estão obviamente a ser derrotadas.

Tudo também parece ser muito mais urgente, mas também “real”, quando observado a partir das planícies negras e desoladas das ilhas indonésias, desesperadamente alagadas, de Bornéu/Kalimantan e Sumatra.

Eu costumava relatar nos meus ensaios, apenas para os leitores ficarem a saber, como ficavam as aldeias nalguns lugares, como em Goma na República Democrática do Congo (RDC), e como se sentiam as pessoas, após os assassinatos perpetrados por assassinos pró-Ruanda e, portanto, pró-Ocidente. Milícias. Era importante para mim explicar como as coisas são “no meio delas”, no terreno. Eu costumava escrever sobre estupros e mutilações em massa, sobre a carne queimada, a tortura terrível…Parei há algum tempo. Ou se testemunha tudo isso pelo menos uma vez ou simplesmente não se testemunha. Se se testemunha, sabe-se o que é, o que se sente e a que cheira…ou então nunca se poderá imaginar, por muitos livros e relatórios que se leia, por muitas imagens que se vejam.

Tenho tentado falar sobre tudo isto com as pessoas no Ocidente, em conferências, universidades, ou mesmo através dos meus filmes e livros. Elas escutam, principalmente com respeito. Elas mostram-se educadamente indignadas e ‘horrorizadas’, elas ficam (como é “esperado” que fiquem). Alguns dizem: ‘Eu quero fazer alguma coisa’. A maioria não faz absolutamente nada, mas mesmo quando decidem agir, é geralmente para si mesmos, apenas para se sentirem bem, para se sentirem melhor, para convencerem a própria consciência de que realmente “fizeram pelo menos algo pela Humanidade”.

Eu costumava culpá-los. Já não o faço. É assim que o mundo está organizado. No entanto, tenho reduzido drasticamente as visitas de trabalho tanto à América do Norte como à Europa. Eu não sinto empatia com as pessoas nesses lugares. Não pensamos da mesma maneira, não sentimos o mesmo, e mesmo a nossa lógica e razão são diametralmente diferentes.

A minha recente estadia de três semanas na Europa revelou-me claramente o quão pouco há de comum entre o estado mental do Ocidente e a realidade em que a grande maioria do mundo tem vivido.

**

No passado, antes que os impérios ocidentais e o único “Império”, tivessem esvaziado os povos da maior parte da sua determinação e do seu entusiasmo, os seres humanos mais talentosos não faziam distinção entre as vidas pessoais, a sua criatividade e o seu implacável trabalho e dever para com a Humanidade.

Em vários lugares, incluindo Cuba, é assim que muitas pessoas ainda vivem.

No Ocidente, todos e tudo está agora fragmentado e a própria vida tornou-se objetivamente sem sentido: há um tempo distinto para trabalhar (satisfazer a carreira pessoal, garantir a sobrevivência, avançar “prestígio” e ego), um tempo para brincar e a vida familiar… e ocasionalmente há tempo para pensar sobre a Humanidade ou, muito raramente, sobre a sobrevivência do nosso planeta.

Escusado será dizer que, essa abordagem egoísta falhou na ajuda necessária para fazer avançar o mundo. E também fracassou diretamente quando se tratou de parar, pelo menos algumas, das monstruosidades cometidas pelo imperialismo ocidental.

Quando vou à ópera ou a algum grande concerto de música clássica, é para obter uma inspiração profunda, para me entusiasmar com o meu trabalho, para reciclar a beleza que exprimo nos meus romances e filmes, peças de teatro e até relatórios políticos. Nunca vou para ficar simplesmente “entretido”. Nunca é, pelas minhas próprias necessidades, somente.

Também é essencial para mim trabalhar em estreita colaboração com as pessoas que amo, incluindo a minha mãe, que já tem 82 anos.

É porque eu sei que não há absolutamente nenhum tempo para desperdiçar. E também porque tudo é, e deve estar entrelaçado na vida: amor, trabalho, dever, luta pela sobrevivência e progresso do nosso mundo.

**

Posso ser rotulado como fanático, mas estou decididamente a escolher as opções C) e B) dos “dilemas” que descrevi acima.

Estou a escolher a racionalidade, agora que a “armada” dos EUA repleta de armas nucleares está a navegar em direção à China e à Coreia do Norte, agora que os mísseis Tomahawk caíram sobre a Síria, agora que o Ocidente vai enviar mais milhares de mercenários para um dos países mais devastados da Terra – o Afeganistão.

Sobrevivência e, em seguida, o avanço do mundo deve ser o nosso maior objetivo. Eu acredito nisso e fico de pé. Em tempos de crises absolutas, que estamos vivenciando agora, é irresponsável, quase grotesco, simplesmente ‘continuarmos a viver a nossa vida diária’.

O imperialismo tem que ser travado de uma vez por todas, por todos os meios. No momento em que a sobrevivência da Humanidade está em jogo, o fim justifica todos os meios. Ou, como reza o lema do Chile: “Por razão ou por força”.

Naturalmente, se aqueles “que sabem” não agirem, se forem covardes e oportunisticamente não fizerem nada, de uma perspetiva universal, nada de muito significativo acontecerá: um pequeno planeta numa de tantas galáxias simplesmente deixará de existir. Há muitos planetas habitados no universo, muitas civilizações.

No entanto, eu adoro este mundo e este Planeta particular. Eu conheço-o bem, desde a ponta mais ao sul, todo o caminho para o norte. Eu conheço os seus desertos e vales, montanhas e oceanos, as suas criaturas maravilhosas e tocantes, as suas grandes cidades e aldeias abandonadas. Conheço os seus povos. Eles têm muitas falhas; pelas quais em muito os podemos condenar, e muito deve ainda melhorar. Mas acredito que, no entanto, ainda são mais merecedores de admiração do que de denúncia.

Agora é hora de pensar, racional e rapidamente, e então agir. Nenhum remendo pequeno será suficiente, nada de ações para “sentir-se bem”. Apenas uma recomposição total, revisão. Chame-lhe a Revolução, se você quiser, ou simplesmente C) e B). Não importa como você o defina, mas algo terá que vir rapidamente, muito rapidamente, ou em breve não haverá mais nada para amar, defender e trabalhar, nunca mais.

Andre Vltchek

Artigo original em inglês :

Now Only Rational Thinking Can Save the World!

Tradução : Júlio Gomes (Docente na Faculdade de Economia da Universidade de Coimbra, Portugal, atualmente reformado.)

.

Andre Vltchek é um filósofo, romancista, cineasta e jornalista de investigação. Cobriu guerras e conflitos em dezenas de países. Três de seus últimos livros são o romance revolucionário “Aurora”, e dois bestsellers, obras de não-ficção política: Expondo as mentiras do Império e Luta contra o imperialismo ocidental. Veja outros livros aqui. André está fazendo filmes para teleSUR e Al-Mayadeen. Assista a Ruanda Gambit, seu documentário inovador sobre o Ruanda e a República Democrática do Congo. Depois de ter vivido na América Latina, África e Oceânia, Vltchek atualmente reside na Ásia Oriental e no Médio Oriente, e continua a trabalhar em todo o mundo. Ele pode ser contactado através do seu website e pelo Twitter.

Double Standards? Whereas President Donald Trump threatens to wage a preemptive attack against North Korea if Pyongyang goes ahead with its nuclear weapons tests, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the US Air Force have announced the carrying out of tests of America’s controversial state of the art B61-12 gravity nuclear bomb.

In a bitter irony, the announcement of the B61-12 nuclear bomb tests (which took place a month ago at the Tonopah Test Range in Nevada), was made public on exactly the same day (April 13, 2017) as the official (“first time in history”) deployment of  America’s “Mother of All Bombs” (MOAB) as part of a counter-terrorism operation against the ISIS in the remote highlands of Afghanistan (and two days prior to the North Korean tests which, according to Western sources, had been scheduled for April 15-16). 

UPDATE (19.30pm ET): Western media reports quoting South Korean military sources point to a failed DPRK Missile launch. “North Korea attempted to test an unidentified type of missile from [its eastern port of] Sinpo,” the ministry said, adding that the suspected launch on Sunday had “failed”.

The report is unconfirmed. No statement was made by the DPRK authorities. Normally, if this launch had occurred, one would expect that both the ROK and US military and intelligence would have precise information pertaining thereto. 

Apart from the official NNSA release, the “functionality test” pertaining to the US B61-12 Guided Nuclear Gravity Bomb is not the object of media coverage. 

In practice, the deployment of the MOAB in Afghanistan was a de facto “weapons test”, a “dress rehearsal” in disguise for the subsequent deployment of the largest conventional “non-nuclear weapon ever designed” against underground targets in Iran and North Korea. While the deployment of the MOAB received extensive media coverage (focussing on the “war on terrorism”), the testing of the B61-12 nuclear gravity bomb was not considered newsworthy.

Disinformation through omission: While the media has its eyes riveted on the “North Korean Nuclear Threat”, these tests of America’s nuclear arsenal are not considered “front-page news”. Why? Because the U.S. public is led to believe that America is NOT a threat to Global Security.

Meanwhile, the West’s (non-existent) anti-war movement remains  mum; nobody is challenging (or threatening) Washington for testing the functionality of the B61-12 bomb (without the need of a nuclear explosion). The B61-12 is America’s latest addition to its nuclear arsenal of more than 7000 nuclear warheads: The new B61-12 (guided) gravity nuclear bomb is heralded as an instrument of peace and global security. Pre-emptive nuclear war does not constitute a threat to humanity.

Needless to say, the development of the B61-12 is part of a multibillion dollar nuclear weapons modernization program funded by US tax payers.

The B61-11 and 12 are  bunker buster (gravity) bombs with a nuclear warhead, slated to be used on a first strike basis under the doctrine of “pre-emptive” nuclear war against both nuclear and non-nuclear states.

The MOAB is also a high yield  bunker buster bomb, with a conventional warhead and a “non-nuclear” mushroom cloud similar to that of a nuclear bomb. Both the MOAB and the B61-11 (which is actively deployed) are (“officially”) intended to destroy underground military targets (e.g in North Korea and Iran).

According to the NNSA:

The non-nuclear [B61-12] test assembly was dropped from an F-16 based at Nellis Air Force Base. The test evaluated both the weapon’s non-nuclear functions as well as the aircraft’s capability to deliver the weapon.

This event is the first of a series that will be conducted over the next three years to qualify the B61-12 for service.  Three successful development flight tests were conducted in 2015.

Peace-making Bombs

In 2002,  the mini-nukes were recategorized by the US Senate (2001 Nuclear Posture Review), cleared for use in the conventional war theater, thereby foreclosing once and for all the Cold War doctrine of “Mutually Assured Destruction” (MAD) which previously described the use of nukes as part of a doomsday scenario.

The B61 tactical nuclear weapons (mini-nukes) have an explosive capacity varying between one third and 12 times a Hiroshima bomb. Their use, however, following the US Senate’s 2002 “recategorization” would not require the “green light” from the Commander in Chief (aka Donald Trump).

The B61-12 has an explosive yield varying from 0.3 kilotons to 50 kilotons. While the test in Nevada was limited to evaluating the functionality of the B61-12, without the need for a nuclear explosion, this decision is nonetheless both “timely” and “significant”. It’s also an instrument of propaganda directed against the DPRK.

What it implies is that the new B61-12 which is designated to target underground bunker facilities is in the process of being cleared for active deployment.

North Korea versus the United States

US public opinion is routinely led to believe that US nukes are harmless (safe for civilians). The devastating consequences (amply documented) of the use of nuclear weapons is carefully obfuscated.  In contrast to the nukes developed by North Korea, the US Department of Defense considers both the B61-11 and the new B61-12  as”harmless to the surrounding civilian population because the explosion is underground“, according to “scientific opinion” on contract to the Pentagon.

While the DPRK’s nukes are considered as bona fide Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) and a Threat to Global Security, America’s tactical mini-nukes are categorized as “peace-making bombs”. They’re harmless to civilians according to the military manuals; let’s go head and use them as part of a  pre- emptive “humanitarian” war under an R2P mandate  (“Responsibility to Protect”).

Lest we forget, the DPRK has been threatened by the US with nuclear war for more than half a century. Barely a few years after the end of the Korean War (1950-53), the US initiated its deployment of nuclear warheads in South Korea. This deployment in Uijongbu and Anyang-Ni had been envisaged as early as 1956.

Trump-Style Political Insanity

All the safeguards of the Cold War era, which categorized the nuclear bomb as “a weapon of last resort”, have been scrapped. “Offensive” military actions using nuclear warheads are now described as acts of “self-defense”.

In the post Cold war era, US nuclear doctrine was redefined. There is no sanity under the Trump administration as to what is euphemistically called US foreign policy. Trump hasn’t the foggiest idea as to the consequences of nuclear war. Nor does he have an understanding of the workings of US foreign policy.

At no point since the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6th, 1945, has humanity been closer to the unthinkable… (Image of Hiroshima in the wake of the bombing)

Stay informed, spread the word far and wide. To reverse the tide of war, the broader public must be informed. Post on Facebook/Twitter.

Confront the war criminals in high office.

#StandDownMrTrump. What we really need is real “Regime Change in America”.

Click image to order Michel Chossudovsky’s book directly from Global Research

“On August 6, 2003, on Hiroshima Day, commemorating when the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima (August 6 1945), a secret meeting was held behind closed doors at Strategic Command Headquarters at the Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska.

Senior executives from the nuclear industry and the military industrial complex were in attendance. This mingling of defense contractors, scientists and policy-makers was not intended to commemorate Hiroshima. The meeting was intended to set the stage for the development of a new generation of “smaller”, “safer” and “more usable” nuclear weapons, to be used in the “in-theater nuclear wars” of the 21st Century.

In a cruel irony, the participants to this secret meeting, which excluded members of Congress, arrived on the anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing (August 6) and departed on the anniversary of the attack on Nagasaki (August 9).” (Michel Chossudovsky, Towards a World War III Scenario, The Dangers of Nuclear War, Global Research, Montreal, 2012) Click the link above to order directly from Global Research.

We bring to the attention of our readers the complete declassified White House report which accuses the Syrian government of deliberately killing its own people triggering  people. The report is entitled “The Assad Regime’s Use of Chemical Weapons on April 4, 2017”

Click Here to read complete report (PDF)

Excerpt (screenshot of original):

Click Here to read complete report (PDF)

“According to an established tradition, every violation of international law, especially military aggression on the part of the US against sovereign states, is covered up by the Pentagon by the presence of some ‘indisputable’ evidence of atrocities.” 

On April 6th, 2017, on the 100 year anniversary of America’s entry into World War I, Donald Trump launched airstrikes against the Syrian government; in retaliation for a gas attack supposedly perpetrated by Assad. There was no investigation, not even a hack job of a frame up like we had in 2003. The evidence we do have contradicts the official story, and the stakes are much higher this time around.

Then before the dust had even settled, Trump pivoted to Asia. Ratcheting up intimidation tactics, towards North Korea. Threatening regime change and practically begging the already insecure Kim Jong-un to do something stupid. And that’s the point. Provoke a response, and then play the victim.

Video below is an analysis of Trump’s World War 3. For full transcript, see below

With the world still abuzz over the first ever deployment of the GBU-43/B “Mother Of All Bombs” in Afghanistan, where it reportedly killed some 36 ISIS fighters, in a less noticed statement the US National Nuclear Security Administration quietly announced overnight the first successful field test of the modernized, “steerable” B61-12 gravity thermonuclear bomb in Nevada.

It appears that Mike Cernovich, who earlier this week wrote that Trump’s national security advisor, Gen. H.R.McMaster, was planning on sending as many as 150,000 troops to Syria, may have been right again. According to Bloomberg commentator Eli Lake, who has now made a habit of confirming Cernovich “conspiracy theories” (he did so previously with the Susan Rice scoop), Trump may be on the verge of escalating the proxy war in Syria by sending anywhere between 10,000 and 50,000 troops on the ground, and – if Cernovich is indeed correct – as much as three times more.

Per Lake, after U-turning on attacking Syria last week and on a variety of economic policies yesterday, the Donald Trump‘s “biggest foreign policy surprise may be yet to come.” Specifically, he says that McMaster, has been quietly pressing his colleagues to question the underlying assumptions of a draft war plan against the Islamic State that would maintain only a light U.S. ground troop presence in Syria. “McMaster’s critics inside the administration say he wants to send tens of thousands of ground troops to the Euphrates River Valley. His supporters insist he is only trying to facilitate a better inter-agency process to develop Trump’s new strategy to defeat the self-described caliphate that controls territory in Iraq and Syria.”

To be sure, there have been ground troops, typically special forces, in Syria since 2014, when Barack Obama famously flipflopped on his own promise of “no more boots on the ground”, first in Iraq and then the broader region. However, the U.S. presence on the ground has been much smaller and quieter than more traditional military campaigns, particularly for Syria. As Lake puts it,

“It’s the difference between boots on the ground and slippers on the ground.”

Well, the boots are coming, even if that means Trump gets to flip on yet another promise: Trump told Fox Business this week that that would not be his approach to fighting the Syrian regime:

“We’re not going into Syria,” he said.

According to Gen. McMaster “we are”, and it’s only a matter of time.

As Lake explains, McMaster himself has found resistance to a more robust ground troop presence in Syria. In two meetings since the end of February of Trump’s national security cabinet, known as the principals’ committee, Trump’s top advisers have failed to reach consensus on the Islamic State strategy. The White House and administration officials say Secretary of Defense James Mattis, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford and General Joseph Votel, who is in charge of U.S. Central Command, oppose sending more conventional forces into Syria.

An interesting aside: according to a Lake source, Stephen Bannon had “derided” McMaster to his colleagues as trying to start a new Iraq War. Bannon’s opposition to yet another US conflict – one which would have the clear goal of replacing the Assad regime – may explain why the former Breitbart head is on his way out.

* * *

So where in the process is the McMaster “ground war” plan currently? Lake reports that it is still in its early stages.

Because Trump’s national security cabinet has not reached consensus, the Islamic State war plan is now being debated at the policy coordinating committee, the inter-agency group hosted at the State Department of subject matter experts that prepares issues for the principals’ committee and deputies’ committee, after which a question reaches the president’s desk for a decision.

While focus regarding the Syrian conflict has shifted almost exclusively to recent US cruise missile strikes, what the strikes are designed to lay the groundwork for holds much larger implications. Particular attention should be focused on US forces operating both within Syrian territory and along Syria’s borders.

Normalizing the use of stand-off weapons like cruise missiles makes it easier and more likely that similar attacks will unfold in the near future – particularly if Syria and its allies fail to demonstrate a significant deterrence against future attacks.

The use of stand-off weapons by the United States and the routine use of airstrikes by US allies including Israel within Syrian territory will likely open the door to wider and more direct military intervention against the Syrian government.

Punitive strikes will shift incrementally to a concerted effort to dismantle Syria’s fighting capacity, inviting either US proxies to overthrow the Syrian government, or for US forces to do so directly – or likely a combination of both.

Preparing for just such an escalation are not only US forces continuously expanding the scale and scope of their presence in eastern Syria and NATO-member Turkey’s forces in northern Syria, but also a US-led proxy army being staged in and operated from, for years now, in Jordan.

Jordan: The Other “Turkey”

It was from Jordan that a rumored column of US armored vehicles recently entered Syrian territory. CNN, in an article titled, “Coalition and Syrian opposition forces repel ISIS attack,” would report that:

Anti-ISIS coalition troops and allied Syrian opposition forces have repelled an attack by the terrorist group on a joint base in southern Syria, according to the coalition. 

The US-led coalition said ISIS initiated a complex attack on Saturday at the At Tanf Garrison on the Syrian-Jordanian border using a vehicle-borne IED, and 20-30 fighters followed with a ground assault and suicide vests.

CNN would also report that:

Some American forces were at the base at the time of the assault, the official said.

Additionally, for years, US policymakers and media platforms have discussed both potential plans for staging an invading force in Jordan, as well as ongoing efforts to stand up a proxy force in Jordan before moving it into Syrian territory.

In 2015, the Guardian in an article titled, “US begins training Syrian rebels in Jordan to become anti-Isis force,” would report:

Jordanian officials told reporters on Thursday that coalition forces have begun training prescreened rebels at a site inside the Middle Eastern kingdom. Training locations are also expected to begin operation in Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

A 2016 article by the Washington Post titled, “Revamped U.S. training program, with new goals, has trained fewer than 100 Syrians so far,” would report:

U.S. military officials are considering ways to ramp up training of Syrian fighters against the Islamic State as the Pentagon moves cautiously forward with a revamped program to create an effective local ground force.

The series of setbacks hindering the creation of an “opposition army” from scratch, and even setbacks in training and effectively utilizing existing militant and terrorist groups may be why the US has also sought to create its own large and growing military presence in Jordan.

In 2013, the Heritage Foundation would publish an article titled, “Hagel Announces Deployment of U.S. Troops to Jordan in Response to Worsening Syria Crisis,” claiming:

Although initially tasked with playing a support role in assisting Jordan in developing contingency plans for mitigating the destabilizing spillover effects of Syria’s civil war, the troops could “potentially form a joint task force for military operations, if ordered.” The headquarters staff will lay the foundation for a formal U.S. military presence that could grow to 20,000 troops or more, if the Obama Administration activates contingency plans for a major U.S. military intervention.

According to most estimates from across the Western media, approximately 1,000-2,000 US service members are currently stationed in Jordan. Expanding that number to 20,000 or more would surely be noticed by Syrian, Russian, and Iranian intelligence agencies. Likewise, the creation and deployment of a full-scale invasion force created by America’s Persian Gulf allies or NATO-member Turkey would likewise be noticed long before having a chance to storm Syrian territory.

Invasion or Further Balkanization?

Instead of a full-scale invasion, what is more likely is the incremental Balkanization of Syria, with Turkey already holding significant territory in the north, Israel maintaining its long-term occupation of the Golan Heights in the west, US troops occupying Syrian territory in east, alongside Persian Gulf sponsored terrorists holding both the eastern city of Raqqa and the northern city of Idlib.

A US-led incursion into southern Syria could likewise carve off territory even if such an incursion falls short of reaching Damascus or toppling the government presiding there.

With focus elsewhere – particularly along Syria’s border with Turkey and amid operations aimed at taking back both Raqqa and Idlib – Jordan has enjoyed relative obscurity amid geopolitical analysis. However – as the endgame approaches and the US increasingly becomes desperate – Jordan’s role as a staging point and potential vector into Syria for additional US troops and for the carving out of additional Syrian territory should be noted and brought to the public’s attention.

Additionally, it is important for the public to understand that America’s “new policy” toward Syria is simply a redux of years – even decades – of attempts to use both proxy and direct military force against the Syrian state to depose its government and create either a proxy or a failed state to take its place. While many personal and political motivations will be assigned to US President Donald Trump for why “he” is pursuing expanded aggression against Syria, it should be noted that the plans “he” is now executing sat on former President Barack Obama’s desk for years waiting for the right moment to be implemented – only to be complicated by Syrian resilience and Russia’s 2015 intervention.

With this in mind, and with pressure on the Jordanian government, Jordan may rein in US forces operating from its territory, hindering, even if ever so slightly, US ambitions to further compound Syria’s tragic, ongoing conflict.

Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”. 

“Vested interests deflect from the facts that WikiLeaks publishes by demonizing its brave staff and me.”
Julian Assange, The Washington Post, Apr 11, 2017

On April 11th, the White House released a “declassified four-page report” on the alleged chemical weapons attack in the village of Khan Shaykhun in the Syrian province of Idlib.

The United States accuses the Syrian and Russian governments of providing disinformation and “false narratives” regarding the attack, adding that Washington is sure that the Assad government is responsible for the attack.

However, the report provides only a “summary” of the United States’ version of the situation. According to this version, the US possesses intelligence and evidence of the attack but cannot reveal it because of security classifications.

It is stated in the report that the Syrian government maintains the capability to conduct a chemical weapons attack to prevent “the loss of territory deemed critical to its survival”. Then, the “declassified” report just retells the story provided by hard-core “pro-opposition” media outlets and activists -in other words, supporters of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) and Ahrar al-Sham (a radical Islamist group that had cooperated with ISIS until 2014). It should be noted that the report added some “fresh” facts to the opposition story – for example, it argues that some “personnel historically associated with Syria’s chemical weapons program” were at the Shayarat military airfield. However, this part lacks evidence.

Additionally, if the guys from the White House really believe that the “Assad regime” suffered some notable setbacks across the country or in northern Hama itself in early April, then they are hardly aware of current situational maps of the area.

By April 4th, pro-government forces had reversed nearly all gains of the “opposition forces” led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham in northern Hama, a detail curiously omitted from the report. Since then, the situation has been more or less stable. Furthermore, Khan Shaykhun is far away from the current frontline. However, the report promotes the idea that the Syrian government was pushed to use some “chemical weapons” to save itself.

Then, the report once again refers to videos posted by the “opposition” and reports provided by “human rights organizations.” The document emphasizes that “the opposition could not have fabricated all of the videos and other reporting of chemical attacks” because it is too complicated. We recall that the so-called White Helmets and media activists linked with them are the primary source of the initial reports.

The rest of the paper is dedicated to the blaming and shaming of Syria and Russia for a wide range of issues: from conducting a chemical attack to pushing false narratives about the attack. It’s interesting to note that the document, as well as US diplomats, say nothing about the need of investigation of the incident by the international community. The proper investigation of the incident is especially important amid contradictory claims made by various sides interested in pushing their own agendas regarding the issue.

It is clear that the whole pretext and explanation of the Syrian government’s desperate need to use chemical weapons against some target far away from the frontline, as well as the inability to provide any real confirmation of allegations as to who actually conducted the attack, looks very questionable.

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Si chiama «Liberty Passion» (Passione per la Libertà). È una modernissima, enorme nave statunitense di tipo Ro/Ro (progettata per trasportare veicoli e carichi su ruote): lunga 200 metri, ha 12 ponti con una superficie totale di oltre 50000 m², sufficienti al trasporto di un carico equivalente a 6500 automobili.

La nave, appartenente alla compagnia statunitense «Liberty Global Logistics», ha fatto il suo primo scalo il 24 marzo nel porto di Livorno. Prende così via ufficialmente un collegamento regolare tra Livorno e i porti di Aqaba in Giordania e Gedda in Arabia Saudita, effettuato mensilmente dalla «Liberty Passion» e dalle sue consorelle «Liberty Pride» (Orgoglio di Libertà) e «Liberty Promise» (Promessa di Libertà). L’apertura di tale servizio è stata celebrata come «una festa per il porto di Livorno».

Nessuno dice, però, perché la compagnia statunitense abbia scelto proprio lo scalo toscano. Lo spiega un comunicato dell’Amministrazione marittima Usa (4 marzo 2017): la «Liberty Passion» e le altre due navi, che effettuano il collegamento Livorno-Aqaba-Gedda, fanno parte del «Programma di sicurezza marittima» che, attraverso una partnership tra pubblico e privato, «fornisce al Dipartimento della difesa una potente, mobile flotta di proprietà privata, con bandiera ed equipaggio statunitensi». Le tre navi hanno ciascuna «la capacità di trasportare centinaia di veicoli da combattimento e da sppoggio, tra cui carrarmati, veicoli per il trasporto truppe, elicotteri ed equipaggiamenti per le unità militari».

È dunque chiaro perché, per il collegamento con i due porti mediorientali, la compagnia statunitense abbia scelto il porto di Livorno. Esso è collegato a Camp Darby, la limitrofa base logistica dello U.S. Army, che rifornisce le forze terrestri e aeree Usa nell’area mediterranea, mediorientale, africana e oltre. E’ l’unico sito dell’esercito Usa in cui il materiale preposizionato (carrarmati, ecc.) è collocato insieme alle munizioni: nei suoi 125 bunker vi è l’intero equipaggiamento di due battaglioni corazzati e due di fanteria meccanizzata. Vi sono stoccate anche enormi quantità di bombe e missili per aerei, insieme ai «kit di montaggio» per costruire rapidamente aeroporti in zone di guerra. Questi e altri materiali bellici possono essere rapidamente inviati in zona di operazione attraverso il porto di Livorno, collegato alla base dal Canale dei Navicelli recentemente allargato, e attraverso l’aeroporto militare di Pisa. Da qui sono partite le bombe usate nelle guerre contro l’Iraq, la Jugoslavia e la Libia.

Nel suo viaggio inaugurale – riportano documentate fonti (AsiaNews e altre) – la «Liberty Passion» ha trasportato 250 veicoli militari da Livorno al porto giordano di Aqaba dove, attraversato il Canale di Suez, è arrivata il 7 aprile. Due giorni prima, a Washington, il presidente Trump riceveva re Abdullah, per la seconda volta da febbraio, ribadendo l’appoggio statunitense alla Giordania di fronte alla minaccia terroristica proveniente dalla Siria. Mentre proprio in Giordania sono stati addestrati per anni – da istruttori statunitensi, britannici e francesi – militanti dell’«Esercito libero siriano» per attacchi terroristici in Siria.

Vari rapporti indicano crescenti movimenti di truppe Usa, dotate di carrarmati e veicoli corazzati, al confine giordano-siriano. L’obiettivo sarebbe quello di impadronirsi, usando anche truppe giordane, della fascia meridionale del territorio siriano, dove operano forze speciali statunitensi e britanniche a sostegno dell’«Esercito libero siriano» che si scontra con l’Isis. Già in febbraio il presidente Trump aveva discusso con re Abdullah «la possibilità di stabilire zone sicure in Siria». In altre parole, la possibilità di balcanizzare la Siria vista l’impossibilità di controllare l’intero suo territorio, in seguito all’intervento russo.

A questa e altre operazioni belliche, tra cui la guerra saudita che fa strage di civili nello Yemen, servono le armi Usa che partono da Livorno. Città dove, su invito del sindaco Nogarin (Movimento 5 Stelle), verrà probabilmente in visita Papa Francesco, che ieri ha di nuovo denunciato «i trafficanti di armi che guadagnano con il sangue degli uomini e delle donne». Mentre a Livorno si festeggia il fatto che il porto toscano sia stato scelto come scalo della «Liberty Global Logistics», con grandi prospettive di sviluppo. Finché c’è guerra, c’è speranza.

 Manlio Dinucci

Article first published on Global Research on March 13, 2017

“And you know, we have this mad guy [Kim Jong-un], I guess he’s mad, either he’s mad or he’s a genius, one or the other, but he’s actually more unstable, even than his father, …” (Donald Trump, August 2016 during election campaign)

Screenshot CNN

According to the Heritage Foundation:

“The rogue regime in North Korea poses one of the most dangerous threats to U.S. national security interests. Pyongyang presents a multifaceted military threat to peace and stability in Asia as well as a global proliferation risk.

Pyongyang responds by saying that the US (including 29,000 troops stationed in South Korea) constitutes a threat to the DPRK’s  national security, and they must defend themselves.

America, a threat to their national security?

They have no right to self defense.

The North Koreans are absolutely nuts.

Or are they?

General Curtis LeMay who coordinated the bombing raids against North Korea during the Korean War (1950-53) acknowledged that:

We went over there and fought the war and eventually burned down every town in North Korea anyway, someway or another, and some in South Korea too.… Over a period of three years or so, we killed off — what — twenty percent of the population of Korea as direct casualties of war, or from starvation and exposure?  Strategic Air Warfare: An Interview with Generals (1988)

Article first published on Global Research on March 13, 2017

“And you know, we have this mad guy [Kim Jong-un], I guess he’s mad, either he’s mad or he’s a genius, one or the other, but he’s actually more unstable, even than his father, …” (Donald Trump, August 2016 during election campaign)

Screenshot CNN

According to the Heritage Foundation:

“The rogue regime in North Korea poses one of the most dangerous threats to U.S. national security interests. Pyongyang presents a multifaceted military threat to peace and stability in Asia as well as a global proliferation risk.

Pyongyang responds by saying that the US (including 29,000 troops stationed in South Korea) constitutes a threat to the DPRK’s  national security, and they must defend themselves.

America, a threat to their national security?

They have no right to self defense.

The North Koreans are absolutely nuts.

Or are they?

General Curtis LeMay who coordinated the bombing raids against North Korea during the Korean War (1950-53) acknowledged that:

We went over there and fought the war and eventually burned down every town in North Korea anyway, someway or another, and some in South Korea too.… Over a period of three years or so, we killed off — what — twenty percent of the population of Korea as direct casualties of war, or from starvation and exposure?  Strategic Air Warfare: An Interview with Generals (1988)

North Korea: If We are Attacked, “We Will Not Keep our Arms Crossed … We are Fully Prepared”

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, April 14 2017

The Money-Quote From the Postol Report on the Recent Gas Attack in Syria

By Eric Zuesse, April 14 2017

The U.S. ‘news’media hid from the public Dr. Postol’s disproof of the Obama regime’s still-continuing assertions that the 21 August 2013 sarin attack was from Syria’s government instead of from the ‘moderate rebels’ (jihadists) whom the U.S. supported. Will they hide from the U.S. public his disproof of the U.S. regime’s latest such scam backing the actual perpetrators of a war-crime — will they do now as they did then?

China and Russia Veto UN Security Council Resolution on Syria – No Carte Blanche for Chapter VII

By Dr. Christof Lehmann, April 14 2017

Permanent UN Security Council member Russia, on Wednesday, used its veto right to block the adoption of a resolution on Syria that would have condemned the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria and called on the Syrian government to cooperate with an investigation into the incident.

The “Terrorism of Money” and the Global War On Cash: Target India

By Shelley Kasli, April 14 2017

Geopolitics is a field alien to financial economics. Thus when economists need to step outside the frame of finance theory to consider larger implications they are confronted with the messier world of geopolitics; the world that operates on a totally different set of rules than financial economics. In this report we explore these geopolitical forces and provide an insight into the chain of events that led us to this juncture.

Electronic Weapons, Radio Frequency Radiation, Remote Manipulation of the Human Nervous System

By Mojmir Babacek, April 13 2017

OPEN LETTER TO THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION: We are missing a legislation which would ban the purposeful remote manipulation of the human nervous system and organism including remote killing of people.

 

Scenario ONE: Imagine that you are on board a ship, which is slowly sinking. There is no land in sight, and your radio transmitter is not functioning properly. There are several people on board and you care for them, deeply. You don’t want this to be the end of ‘everything’.

What do you do?

A) You fix for yourself a nice portion of fried rice with prawns

B) You turn on the TV set, which is still somehow miraculously working, and watch the news about the future Scottish referendum or on BREXIT

C) You jump into the water immediately, try to identify the damage, and then attempt to do something unthinkable with your simple tools and capabilities: to save the ship

Imagine another scenario:

SCENARIO TWO: By mistake, your wife eats two full tubes of sleeping pills, supposedly confusing them with anew line of candies. As you find her on the floor, she appears to be unconscious and her face looks rather bluish.

What would your course of action be?

A) After you realize that her high heels do not match the color of her pantyhose, you run to the closet in search of a much better pair of shoes to achieve the balance

B) You carry her without delay to the bathroom, pump out her stomach, and try to resuscitate her while calling the ambulance using the speakerphone function

C) You recall how you first met, get nostalgic, and rush to your living room library in order to find a book of love sonnets by Pablo Neruda, which you then recite to her kneeling on the carpet

Now brace yourself for a great surprise. Unless you choose C) for scenario one, and B) for scenario two, you can actually consider yourself absolutely “normal” by most North American and European standards.

However, if you opt for C) or B) respectively, you could easily pass off for an extremist, a radical and ideological left-wing fanatic.

*

The West has brought the world to the brink of total collapse, but its citizens, even its intellectuals, are stubbornly refusing to grasp the urgency. Like ostriches, many are hiding their heads in the sand. Others are behaving like a surgeon who opts for treating a small cut on a finger of his patient who is actually dying from a terrible gunshot wound.

There seems to be an acute lack of rational thinking, and especially of people’s ability to grasp the proportions of global occurrences and events. For years I have been arguing that destroying the ability to compare and to see things from the universal perspective has been one of the most successful endeavors of the Western indoctrination drive (dispersed through education, media/disinformation and ‘culture’). It has effectively influenced and pacified both, the people in the West itself, and those living in its present and former colonies (particularly the local ‘elites’and their offspring).

There seems to be no capacity to compare and consistently analyze, for instance, those certainly unsavory but mainly defensive actions taken by the revolutionary governments and countries, with the most horrid and appalling crimes committed by the colonialist regimes of the West all over Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa,which took place in approximately the same historical era.

It is not only history that is seen in the West through totally crooked and ‘out of focus’ lenses, it is also the present, which has been perceived and ‘analyzed’ in an out of context way and without applying hardly any rational comparisons. Rebellious and independent-minded countries in Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East (most of them have been actually forced to defend themselves against the extremely brutal attacks and subversion campaigns administered by the West) have been slammed, even in the so-called ‘progressive’ circles of the West, with much tougher standards than those that are being applied towards both Europe and North America, two parts of the world that have been continuously spreading terror, destruction and unimaginable suffering among the people inhabiting all corners of the globe.

Most crimes committed by the left-wing revolutions were in direct response to invasions, subversions, provocations and other attacks coming from the West. Almost all the most terrible crimes committed by the West were committed abroad, and were directed against enslaved, exploited, thoroughly plunderedand defenseless people in almost all parts of the world.

Now, according to many, the endgame is approaching. Rising oceans are swallowing entire countries, as I witnessed in several parts of Oceania. It is a horrid, indescribable sight!

People in numerous countries governed by pro-Western regimes are shedding millions of their inhabitants, while some nations are basically ceasing to exist, like Papua or Kashmir, to give just two obvious examples.

The environment is thoroughly ruined where the ‘lungs’ of the world used to work hard, just a few decades ago, making our planet healthy.

Tens of millions of people are now on the move, their countries thoroughly ruined by Western geopolitical games. Instead of influencing and helping to guide humanity, such great cultures as those of Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria are now forced to disgorge millions of desperate refugees. They are barely surviving, humiliated and hardly relevant.

Extremist religious groups (of all faiths, and definitely not only belonging to the Muslim religion) are being groomed by the Western Machiavellian ideologues and strategists, then dispersed to all corners of the globe: South Asia, the Middle East, China, Latin America, Africa, and even Oceania.

It is a total disgrace what imperialism has managed to reduce our humanity to.

Most of the world is actually trying to function ‘normally’, ‘democratically’, following its natural instincts, which are based on simple humanism. But it is being constantly derailed, attacked and tormented by the brutal monstrous and merciless hydra – the Western expansionism and its ‘culture’ or nihilism, greed, cynicism and slavery.

It is so obvious where we are going as a human race.

We want to fly, we want freedom and optimism and beauty to govern our lives. We want to dream and to create something deep, meaningful, happy and kind. But there are those horrible weights hanging from our feet. There are chains restraining our actions. There is constant fear, which is making us betray all our ideals, as well as each other, again and again; fear that makes us, humans,act like shameless cowards and egoists. As a result we are not flying, we are only crawling, and not even forward, but in bizarre, irrational ellipses and circles.

Still, I do not believe that the endgame is inevitable!

*

For many years I have been sending warnings, I have been writing and showing and presenting thousands of terrible images of destruction, of the irreversible collapse, of barbarity.

I have generally kept nothing to myself. I have recycled my work, my films and books, into new journeys into the darkest abysses of our world. I have received hardly any support from the outside world. But I couldn’t stop: what I have been witnessing, the danger to the planet and total devastation, have forced me to never give up the struggle. If necessary and most of the time, I have done it alone. I spent too much time in Latin America; I could not give up. I learned too much from Cuba and so many other wonderful places; I felt I had no right to surrender.

Whenever the horrors from which our planet is suffering would overwhelm me, I’d ‘collapse’, as I did last year. Then I’d bury myself somewhere for a short period of time, collect myself together, get up and continue with my work and my struggle. I have never ceased to trust people. Some would come full of initial enthusiasm, offering much, then betray me, and leave. Still, I have never lost faith in human beings. This year, instead of slowing down, I ‘adopted’ one more place,which is in agony – Afghanistan.

My only request, my only demand has been, that the world listens, that it sees, that it tries to comprehend, before it is too late. This request of mine has proven to be, I realize now, too ‘demanding’, and too ‘radical’.

Sometimes I ask: have I achieved much? Have I opened many eyes? Have I managed to build many bridges between the different struggling parts of the world? As an internationalist I have to question my own actions, my effectiveness.

I have to admit, honestly: I don’t know the answers to my own questions. But I keep working and struggling.

*

The world looks different if observed and analyzed from a pub in Europe or North America, or if you are actually standing on one of those atolls in the middle of the South Pacific (Oceania) that are under the constant assault of tidal waves, dotted with dead stumps of palm trees pointing accusatively towards the sky. These islets are at the forefront of the battle for the survival of our planet, and they are obviously losing.

Everything also appears to be much more urgent but also ‘real’, when observed from the black and desolate plains of the hopelessly logged out Indonesian islands of Borneo/Kalimantan and Sumatra.

I used to recount in my essays, just for my readers to know, what the villages somewhere like Gomain the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), look and feel like, after the murderous assaults by the pro-Rwandese, and therefore pro-Western, militias. It was important for me to explain how things are ‘right in the middle of it’, on the ground. I used to write about mass rapes and mutilations, about the burning flesh, terrible torture… I stopped some time ago. You at least once witness all this or you simply didn’t. If you did then you know what it all looks like, what it feels like and smells like… or you could never imagine it, no matter how many books and reports you read, no matter how many images you consume.

I have been trying to speak about all this to the people in the West, at conferences, universities, or even through my films and books. They do listen, mostly respectfully. They do show politely how outraged and ‘horrified’ they are (it is ‘expected’ of them). Some say: ‘I want to do something’. Most of them do absolutely nothing, but even if they decide to take action, it is usually for themselves,just to feel good, to feel better, to convince their own conscience that they have actually ‘done at least something for the humanity’.

I used to blame them. I don’t, anymore. This is how the world is arranged. However, I have sharply reduced my work-visits to both North America and Europe. I don’t feel that I click with the people in those places. We don’t think the same way, we don’t feel the same, and even our logic and rationale are diametrically different.

My recent three-week stay in Europe clearly revealed to me, how little there is in common between the West’s state of mind and the reality in which the great majority of the world has been living.

*

In the past, before the Western empires and the sole“Empire” took most of determination and enthusiasm away from the people, the most talented of human beings used to make no distinction between their personal lives, their creativity and their relentless work and duty towards humanity.

In several places including Cuba, it is how many people still live.

In the West, everyone and everything is now fragmented and life itself became objectively meaningless: there is distinct time to work (satisfying one’s personal career, guaranteeing survival, advancing ‘prestige’ and ego), there is time to play, and for family life… and there is occasionally time to think about humanity or, very rarely, about the survival of our planet.

Needless to say, this selfish approach has failed in helping to advance the world. It has also squarely failed when it comes to stopping at least some of the monstrosities committed by Western imperialism.

When I go to the opera house or some great classical music concert, it is in order to get some deep inspiration, to get fired up about my work, to recycle the beauty that I’m expressing in my novels and films, theatre plays and even political reports. I never go to get simply ‘entertained’. It is never for my own needs only.

It is also essential for me to work closely with the people that I love, including my own mother who is already 82 years old.

It is because I know there is absolutely no time to waste. And also because everything is and should be intertwined in life: love, work, duty, and the struggle for the survival and progress of our world.

*

I may be labeled as a fanatic, but I am decisively choosing those C) and B) options from the ‘dilemmas’ I depicted above.

I am choosing rationality, now that the US ‘armada’ packed with the nuclear weapons is sailing towards both China and North Korea, now that the Tomahawk missiles have rained down on Syria, now that the West will be sending thousands more mercenaries to one of the most devastated countries on Earth – Afghanistan.

Survival and then the advancement of the world should be our greatest goal. I believe it and I stand by it. In time of absolute crises, which we are experiencing right now, it is irresponsible, almost grotesque, to simply ‘continue to live our daily lives’.

Imperialism has to be stopped, once and for all, by all means. At the moment when the survival of humanity is at stake, the end justifies all means. Or as the motto of Chile goes: “By Reason Or By Force”.

Of course, if those ‘who know’ do not act, if they are cowardly and opportunistically do nothing, from a universal perspective, nothing much will happen: one small planet in one of the so many galaxies will simply cease to exist.Most likely there are many inhabited planets in the universe, many civilizations.

However, I happen to love this world and this particular Planet. I know it well, from the Southernmost tip all the way to the north. I know its deserts and valleys, mountains and oceans, its marvelous and touching creatures, its great cities as well as god-forsaken villages. I know its people. They have many faults; and much that could be condemned in them, and much that should be improved. But I still believe that there is more that could be admired in them than denounced.

Now it is time to think, rationally and quickly, and then to act. No small patches will do, no ‘feel good’ actions. Only a total reset, overhaul. Call it the Revolution if you will, or simply C) and B). No matter how you define it, it would have to come rapidly, very rapidly, or there soon will be nothing to love, to defend, and to work for, anymore.

*

Andre Vltchek is a philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He has covered wars and conflicts in dozens of countries. Three of his latest books are revolutionary novel “Aurora” and two bestselling works of political non-fiction: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire” and  “Fighting Against Western Imperialism”. View his other books here. Andre is making films for teleSUR and Al-Mayadeen. Watch Rwanda Gambit, his groundbreaking documentary about Rwanda and DRCongo. After having lived in Latin America, Africa and Oceania, Vltchek presently resides in East Asia and the Middle East, and continues to work around the world. He can be reached through his website and his Twitter.

Misunderstanding prevails regarding the threat of a US preemptive strike against North Korea. The intentions of the Pentagon are unclear. Moreover, Washington does not have the firm endorsement of its regional allies including South Korea and Japan. In the wake of ROK President Park’s impeachment, grassroots opposition has been building up within South Korea against US military presence in the region. 

Dangerous crossroads: The DPRK has intimated in no uncertain terms that it will forcefully retaliate if is attacked by the US. 

Meanwhile Beijing has warned Washington. China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, intimated that:  “one has the feeling that a conflict could break out at any moment”.

“We call on all parties to refrain from provoking and threatening each other, whether in words or actions, and not to let the situation get to an irreversible and unmanageable stage,”

“We urge all parties to refrain from inflammatory or threatening statements and deeds to prevent the situation on the Korean Peninsula from becoming irreversible,” Wang said when meeting with the press following talks with French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault. (Xinhua, April 14, 2017)

There is no intent on the part of China, following the Donald Trump Xi Jinping encounter at the Mar-a-Lago Florida resort last week to support or in any way endorse a US preemptive attack against the DPRK.  In fact quite the opposite.

It should be noted that the deployment of the THAAD missiles in South Korea although officially envisaged for the DPRK is targeted at China.

And there is no indication that China would in any way compromise its military alliance with Russia under the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). In this regard, China is also firmly aligned with Russia (e.g at the UN Security Council) in relation to the evolving crisis in Syria.

Moreover, Russia has a border with North Korea and Vladivostok is a strategic military hub hosting Russia’s Pacific Fleet.

According to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson:

“President Trump indicated to President Xi that . . . we would be happy to work with them, but we understand it creates unique problems for them and challenges and that we would, and are, prepared to chart our own course if this is something China is just unable to co-ordinate with us,” (Financial Times, April 7, 2017

Visibly, Beijing does not want to work with Washington.

Washington’s actions and intentions can be summarized as follows:

1. The USS Carl Vinson nuclear aircraft carrier group (image above) is moving towards the Korean coastline. Japan’s naval participation in this operation is unconfirmed.

2.  “the US Navy has deployed two destroyers with Tomahawk cruise missiles some 500 kilometres from the North Korean nuclear test site”.

3. Of significance, on April 13, the US dropped a MOAB (Mother of all Bombs) in Afghanistan allegedly against the ISIS.  The MOAB has been described as “a powerful new bomb aimed squarely at the underground nuclear facilities of Iran and North Korea”. 

What’s the purpose of dropping it in a remote area of Afghanistan as part of an alleged “counter-terrorism” operation against ISIS? Is this MOAB bomb test in Afghanistan a “dress rehearsal”, prior to its actual military use (e.g. against North Korea) ? The explosion of a conventional monster MOAB bomb would result in a nuclear mushroom cloud similar to that of a tactical nuclear weapon.

4. The official annoucements by the Pentagon remain notoriously ambiguous. There is no confirmation of a preemptive attack against North Korea, despite NBC TV’s report that the US was ready to wage a strike against North Korea’s military facilities in response to Pyongyang nuclear tests scheduled for the weekend of April 15-16.

“International security analysts have cast doubt on reports that the United States may be considering a preemptive military strike against North Korea, warning such action could have huge consequences on a key U.S. ally and upset a carefully managed balance of power between Kim Jong Un and the West. (Nick Visser, Huffington Post, April 14, 2017)

Keystone XL Pipeline is a long-controversial proposed Canadian pipeline project through the U.S. north to south, from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, to trans-ship the world’s most global-warming filthiest oil, from Canada’s tar-sands, to be burnt and used in Europe.

On March 24^th, U.S. President Trump informed the to-be-owner of the Keystone XL Pipeline project, that he gives them the go-ahead to build it, after U.S. President Barack Obama had, near the end of his Presidency, prohibited it. Obama had wanted it built (and had pressured the EU to accept the oil that would be shipped to them from the proposed Pipeline’s southern terminus in Galveston, to sell this Canadian oil in Europe), but the EU said no; they wouldn’t relax their anti-global-warming standards to accept the world’s dirtiest oil, and this refusal by them eased Obama’s decision to give Ms. Clinton’s campaign the boost it needed by his simply nixing the project altogether. He nixed it in order to show Democratic voters that the Democratic Party cares about the environment, so as not to depress the electoral turnout for Hillary Clinton (who was actually a big supporter of fossil-fuels) on Election Day November 8^th. But not only did the EU say no; the voters said no, to Clinton, too. So, this was a double disappointment to Obama; he had turned the Pipeline down for nothing — nothing that he had wanted, anyway, because global warming never seriously mattered to him (and therefore what he was doing about it in secret was supportive of the gas-and-oil industries).

Clinton had done all she could to rig the Environmental Impact Statements to favor construction of Keystone: The State Department needed to go through three draft versions before even one of them — the final one, which was released by her successor, Secretary of State Kerry — included any estimate at all of the impact that the Pipeline would have on global warming. Until the third (the Clinton-Kerry) version, all that it estimated was the impact that global warming would have on the Pipeline (and other such trivia — and loads of such distractions, so that the press didn’t even recognize that the «State Dept. Keystone XL Study Ignores Climate Impact», as I headlined my original report on the first of the three): the Clinton State Department reported that the pipeline would have no such global-warming impacts at all, but only good impacts (such as trivial increases in employment). They were puff-pieces for the Pipeline. No climatologist was on any of the three teams that prepared the three drafts.

This had not been an oversight; it was intentional, so as to make politically palatable for Obama to approve the project (which he wanted to do), and for him to be able to do it far enough in advance of the 2016 Presidential campaign so as not to impede the election of a Democratic President following him. But the EPA balked at both of the first two drafts, and these delays caused Obama’s decision to come too close to the 2016 elections, for his comfort; so, it was, for him, a politically forced «No».

What, then, will be the likely impact, upon the climate, if the Pipeline is ultimately built and operated? Though the two all-Clinton Environmental Impact Statements said nothing whatsoever about the global-warming impact, the Clinton-Kerry one did; and — because, like the first two, it was prepared by oil-industry contractors (instead of by the U.S. State Department or any other federal workers), who had bigger and private fish to fry (oil-industry contracts) than to worry about the global climate — they vastly underestimated its Green House Gas emission (GHGe) impact.

Even as of the present time, no thorough climatological impact assessment has yet been performed of the proposed Pipeline; but, on 10 August 2014, a serious but very limited (called therefore «a simple model to understand the implications of the pipeline for greenhouse gas emissions») was finally published, by two Seattle climatologists, at the Stockholm Environment Institute, in NATURE: Climate Science, and it made note of the fact that not even the final one of the State Department’s three Environmental Impact Statement versions had so much as even just considered (much less calculated) the likely impact that the usage of such a pipeline would have on the petroleum market (which, after all, was the reason why it was being proposed to be built), and on the global prices for petroleum as a fuel competing against other fuels. These two climatologists stated:

Here, we apply a simple model to understand the implications of the pipeline for greenhouse gas emissions as a function of any resulting increase in oil sands production. … Our analysis suggests incremental GHGemissions of 100110Mt CO2e, or four times the upper State Department estimate. The sole reason for this difference is that we account for the changes in global oil consumption resulting from increasing oil sands production levels, whereas the State Department does not. … Our simple model shows that, to the extent that Keystone XL leads to greater oil sands production, the pipeline’s effect on oil prices could substantially increase its total GHG impact.

After the extensive ‘news’ coverage that had been done of the Keystone XL issue, there was, finally, an at least elementary scientific analysis of the proposed Pipeline’s impact upon global warming, but there was little press coverage of this, and none of those few news-reports linked to the scientific article itself (as I just did here), and one of those ‘news’ reports even misstated that, «The study also says the pipeline could reduce oil prices to $3 a barrel,» which it did not say: it said that XL might reduce the price by up to $3 a barrel — there’s, of course, a big difference. (And, furthermore, the Keystone XL Pipeline would increase the price of gasoline in the center of the United States; the price-decreases would be for the export-markets.) What’s critically important, however, is that all of that price-lowering would be price-lowering on the most CO2-intensive of all oils, tar-sands oils, which require around an extra $12/barrel to process because of the extra expenses to remove the sand from it. That’s where the extra CO₂-emissions would be coming from, that extra processing: the replacement of relatively clean oil, by relatively dirty oil. This is something that almost all of the ‘news’ reports on Keystone XL have ignored entirely — but it is also the reason why the Koch brothers and other major owners of the tar-sands are desperate to get their product to market as inexpensively as possible. And the Keystone XL Pipeline would be by far the cheapest way to do that. The petro-gas billionaires don’t care about whether our grandchildren will be living on a dying, scorching, planet; they want their extra billions of dollars while they’re alive to enjoy it. And our Presidents are serving today’s billionaires; certainly not serving future generations of us.

Here are some of my other, prior, articles on Keystone XL:

«Keystone XL Pipeline Would Double the Kochs’ Net Worth, Says New Report»

«Hillary Clinton’s Bought-And-Paid-For Favors for Keystone XL Deal»

«John Kerry vs. Hillary Clinton on the Keystone XL Report»

«Keystone XL Pipeline Corruption With State Department Should Not Be Legal»

«Obama Is Desperately Trying To Find A Way To Approve The Keystone Pipeline»

«The Kochs Have Bet Big That The Earth Is Doomed»

«TransCanada’s $15 Billion Lawsuit Against U.S. on Keystone XL Presents Strong Case»

«Elizabeth Warren Comes Down Hard Against Keystone XL Pipeline While Hillary Clinton’s Allies Push It Ahead»

The Keystone XL story is a perfect example to confirm, thus far, what Jimmy Carter said of U.S. federal politics, Washington DC:

Now it’s just an oligarchy with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or being elected president. And the same thing applies to governors, and U.S. Senators and congress members.

And anyone who thinks that Trump is any different from Obama, other than being far less intelligent and not nearly as slick, should see this from Political Wire, reporting that Trump doesn’t even care what health care bill he passes, but only that he signs one into law. Whatever the corrupt Congress can pass, he will sign. If that doesn’t display total psychopathy, then the term «psychopath» has no meaning. The whole thing is a con; that’s all the top level of the U.S. federal government now is.

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of  CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.

Permanent UN Security Council member Russia, on Wednesday, used its veto right to block the adoption of a resolution on Syria that would have condemned the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria and called on the Syrian government to cooperate with an investigation into the incident.

Ten of the fifteen members of the Council voted in favor of the draft resolution. However, permanent Security Council members China and Russia as well as Ethiopia and Kazakhstan voted against. The “no” of the two permanent Council members China and Russia, who have veto right, prevented the adoption of the document.

The proposed resolution had been drafted by permanent Council members France, the United Kingdom and the United States. The document would have strongly condemned “the reported use of chemical weapons in the Syrian Arab Republic, in particular the attack on Khan Shaykhun,” the site of last week’s incident that has drawn increasing global attention.

Some passages of the document implied that the government of the Syrian Arab Republic was responsible for the attack while others implied that the government of the Syrian Arab Republic refused to fully cooperate with relevant previous resolutions and the Organization for the prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

The text would, in other words, have implied an authorization of the use of Chapter 7 and military force against the government and military of the Syrian Arab Republic due to its “alleged” non-compliance with regard to chemical weapons, in an “alleged” chemical weapons attack, “allegedly” carried out by Syrian Arab Air Forces.

2013 – The Syrian Arab Army seized 281 barrels with chemicals from insurgents at a farm in Banias, Tartus.

The adoption of the proposed draft resolution would have delivered a carte blanche for a military intervention against Syria. Despite much propaganda to the contrary, a reading of UNSC Resolution 2118 (2013) clearly shows that the resolution from 2013 stipulates that the Security Council:

Decides, in the event of non-compliance with this resolution, including unauthorized transfer of chemical weapons, or any use of chemical weapons by anyone in the Syrian Arab Republic, to impose measures under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter.

Taking all of the above mentioned problems with UNSC Resolution 2118 (2013) into account, this paragraph can only be compared to a hair-trigger. There is dangerously much room for interpretation in this sentence. Two, equally correct interpretations are possible.

1. By adopting UNSC Resolution 2118 (2013), the Security Council has made the unanimous decision, that measures under the UN Charter´s Chapter VII will be imposed against Syria. In other words, failure to comply will trigger the use of military force.
2. By adopting UNSC Resolution 2118 (2013), the Security Council has made the unanimous decision, that the Security Council shall discuss the matter and decide whether the alleged non-compliance should trigger the use of military force against Syria under the UN Charter´s Chapter VII.

More relevant details and problems with Resolution 2018 (2013) have been described in this author’s article entitled “A Critical Review of Security Council Resolution 2118 (2013) on Syria” from September 2013. A reading of this article will explain why UNSC Resolution 2118 (2013) is relevant for the French, British and U.S. American draft resolution and why China and Russia, on April 12, 2017, used their veto right.

Implying that the Syrian government was in non-compliance, the draft resolution would have called on the Syrian Government to comply with relevant recommendations of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapon’s (OPCW) Fact Finding Mission (FFM) and the OPCW-UN Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM).

In February, Russia and China vetoed a measure that would have imposed sanctions on a number of individuals and entities linked to the “alleged” use of chemical weapons in cases where responsibility “allegedly” was established by the OPCW-UN Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM).

It is noteworthy that UN investigators who investigated the chemical weapons use in East Ghouta in August 2013 worked under the “protection” of exactly those who according to an in-depth investigation by this author were directly responsible for the use of the chemical weapons.

This author has  in his article entitled “Top US and Saudi Officials responsible for Chemical Weapons in Syria” from October 2013 published the results of this in-depth investigation and proven that this author, two months prior to the attack warned that the attack was being planned on highest levels, with Liwa-al-Islam and Saudi intelligence asset Zahran Alloush acting as field commander.

The Trump White House published three and a half pages of accusations against the governments of Syria and Russia. These are simple white pages with no header or footer, no date, no classification or declassification marks, no issuing agency and no signatures. It is indiscernible who has written them.

U.S. media call this a Declassified U.S. Report on Chemical Weapons Attack. It is no such thing.

It starts with

“The United States is confident that the Syrian government conducted a chemical weapon attack, …”

The U.S. (who exactly is that?) “is confident”, it does not “know”, it does not have “proof” – it is just “confident”.

The whole paper contains only seven paragraphs that are allegedly a “Summary of the U.S. intelligence community assessment” on the issue. The seven paragraphs are followed by eight(!) paragraphs that try to refute the Russian and Syrian statements on the issue. Some political fluff makes up the sorry rest.

That “intelligence community assessment” chapter title is likely already a false claim. Even a fast tracked, preliminary National Intelligence Assessment, for which all seventeen U.S. intelligence agencies must be heard, takes at least two to three weeks to create. A “long track” full assessment takes two month or more. These are official documents issued by the Director of National Intelligence. The summary assessment the White House releases has no such heritage. It is likely a well massaged fast write up of some flunky in the National Security Council. The release was backgrounded by dubious statements of an anonymous “Senior Administration Officials” (not by “Intelligence Officials” as has been the case on other such issues.)

The claimed assessment starts with definitely wrong or at least very misleading point:

“We assess that Damascus launched this chemical attack in response to an opposition offensive in Hama province that threatened key infrastructure.”

The Hama offensive had failed two weeks ago. Since then the Syrian army has regained all areas the al-Qaeda “opposition” had captured during the first few days. (Al-Qaeda in Syria renamed itself several times and now calls itself “Jabhat Fateh Al-Sham”.) Key infrastructure had never been seriously threatened by it. Over 2,000 al-Qaeda fighters were killed in the endeavor.

Peto Lucem, a well known and reliable media source for accurate maps of the war on Syria, posted on March 31, four days before the chemical incident:

Peto Lucem @PetoLucem

NEW MAP: “Rebel” frontline in #Hama is collapsing, #SAA reverses most #AlQaeda gains made in first days of their failed offensive. #Syria

See bigger picture here

The attack in Hama had already failed days before the chemical incident in Khan Shaykhun happened. Khan Shaykhun is not on the front line. The incident and the failed al-Qaeda attack in Hama can not possibly be related. It makes no sense at all to launch a militarily useless incident in a place far away “in response” to a defeat of the enemy elsewhere – this in a moment where the global political and military situation had turned in favor of the Syrian government. (The Defense Intelligence Agency surely never signed off on such an illogical claim.)

The following paragraphs of the released paper reveal that the assessment is largely based on a “significant body” of “open source reporting” which “indicates” this or that. This means that the White House relied on pictures and videos posted by people who are allowed to operate freely in the al-Qaeda ruled Khan Shaykhun. (Khan Shaikhun had been in the hands of an Islamic State associated group Liwa Al-Aqsa until mid February. The group moved out after fighting al-Qaeda and after slaughtering some 150 of its fighters. Al-Qaeda since moved in and now rules the town and surrounding areas.)

Several of the released video were introduced and commented by Dr. Shajul Islam who has been removed from the British medical registry and had been indicted in the UK for his role in kidnapping “western” journalists in Syria. He fled back to Syria. One of the journalists kidnapped with the help of Dr. Shajul Islam, James Foley, was later murdered on camera by the Islamic State.  The videos the “doctor” distributed of “rescue” of casualties of the chemical incidents were not of real emergencies but staged. Under who’s conditions and directions where the many other pictures and videos taken and published? Why are no female children or young women among the emergency patients and casualties? Why is there no picture or video of where the people were hit by gas and were found? All videos are from “aid stations”, none from “the wild”.

Other videos and photos are by the White Helmets “rescuers”, a U.S./UK financed propaganda prop, which is so “neutral” that it works with ISIS (vid) and al-Qaeda but not in government held areas where the actual Syrian population lives.

The Hama offensive by “the opposition” was personally planned and directed by the founder and head of al-Qaeda in Syria al-Joliani. Photos of the planing sessions were published by “opposition” agencies and widely distributed.

See bigger picture here

The White House paper only talks of “the opposition”. How can there be an “intelligence assessment” (and reporting about it) that does not note that the incident in question took place in an area where AL-QAEDA rules and that the allegedly related (but defeated) offensive was launched by AL-QAEDA. Is AL-QAEDA now officially the “Syrian opposition” the U.S. supports? The neoconned former General Petraeus lobbied for an open U.S. alliance with al-Qaeda since 2015. The new National Security Advisor to Trump, General McMaster, is a Petraeus protege. He, together with Petraeus, screwed up Iraq. Is the Petraeus alliance now in place?

The next step then will be for the U.S. to informally ally with the Islamic State. The New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman is already arguing for that:

We could simply back off fighting territorial ISIS in Syria and make it entirely a problem for Iran, Russia, Hezbollah and Assad. After all, they’re the ones overextended in Syria, not us. Make them fight a two-front war — the moderate rebels on one side and ISIS on the other. If we defeat territorial ISIS in Syria now, we will only reduce the pressure on Assad, Iran, Russia and Hezbollah and enable them to devote all their resources to crushing the last moderate rebels in Idlib, not sharing power with them.

The U.S., Friedman says, should let ISIS run free so it can help al-Qaeda which is ruling in Idleb governate. Friedman talks of “moderate rebels in Idleb” but these are unicorns. They do not exist. There is al-Qaeda and there is the smaller Ahrar al Sham which compares itself with the Taliban. All other opposition fighters in Idleb have joined these two or are now dead.

But why not use these gangs of sectarian mass murderers against the Syrian government and others? Hey, Israel wants us to do just that. And why don’t we hand out anti-air missiles to them, Friedman asks, and lend them air-support. This at the same time. Surely the combination will do well.

In Syria, Trump should let ISIS be Assad’s, Iran’s, Hezbollah’s and Russia’s headache — the same way we encouraged the mujahedeen fighters to bleed Russia in Afghanistan.

Well, you know, that mujahedeen thing worked out so well that nearly forty years later the U.S. is mulling again to send additional troops to Afghanistan to defeat them. Do we really want a repeat of that at the borders of Europe?

Lunacy has truly taken over the White House but even more so the U.S. media. How can sanity be brought back to town?

UPDATE:

Professor emeritus at MIT Theodor Postol, a former science adviser to U.S. Navy command and missile expert, has analyzed the “evidence” the White House presented. The short, preliminary report is available here. (I have verified that this is the original one.)

Postol finds nothing in the White House assessment that lets him believe the incident was from an air attack. He finds signs that the incident that was launched on the ground by intentional exploding some container of 122mm ammunition with some other explosives.

He calls the White House assessment amateurish and not properly vetted by competent intelligence analysts who, Postol says, would not have signed off on it in is current form (just as I said above.)

Postol presumes that the incident was with Sarin. He makes no analysis of that White House claim (it is not his field). I don’t agree with the Sarin claim. Many other organophosphate substances (pesticides) would  be “consistent with” the symptoms displayed or played in the videos and pictures. Some symptoms expected with Sarin, for example heavy convulsions, spontaneous defecation, are no visible in any of the videos or pictures.

I do not concur with Postol on the picture of the alleged impact crater of the “attack”. I have seen several “versions” of the impact crater on social nets with different metal parts, or none, placed in it. Postol seems to have only seen one version. His conclusions from that version seem right. But the crater “evidence” is tainted and to make overall conclusions from it is not easy. I concur though that the crater is not from an air impact but from a ground event. I am not sure though that it is related to the incident at all.

The big bankers of the world, who practice the terrorism of money, are more powerful than kings and field marshals, even more than the Pope of Rome himself. They never dirty their hands. They kill no-one: they limit themselves to applauding the show. Their officials, international technocrats, rule our countries: they are neither presidents nor ministers, they have not been elected, but they decide the level of salaries and public expenditure, investments and divestments, prices, taxes, interest rates, subsidies, when the sun rises and how frequently it rains. However, they don’t concern themselves with the prisons or torture chambers or concentration camps or extermination centers, although these house the inevitable consequences of their acts. The technocrats claim the privilege of irresponsibility: ‘We’re neutral’ they say. 

Galeano (1991) Professional Life/3 p. 108; As cited in: Paul Farmer (2005) Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor.. p. 10

The above quote by Eduardo Hughes Galeano, an Uruguayan literary giant aptly captures the mood in regards to the recent decision to demonetize Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes and introduce Rs 2000 notes. While there were many questions raised, analyses made, theories put forward and allegations leveled in the ensuing confusion, almost all stuck to the domain of financial economics. None were able to examine the geopolitical forces that shaped the situation under which the decision was made. Geopolitics is a field alien to financial economics. Thus when economists need to step outside the frame of finance theory to consider larger implications they are confronted with the messier world of geopolitics; the world that operates on a totally different set of rules than financial economics. In this report we explore these geopolitical forces and provide an insight into the chain of events that led us to this juncture.

Covered in this report:

• Reaganomics
• Global Liquidity Crisis
• Global Crackdown on Black Money
• India’s Informal Economy
• Season of Bailouts
• Crisis Comes Home
• Crash Course in Demonetization
• The Global War On Cash
• The Great Indian Bailout
• PARA – A Centralized Bad Bank
• Once Upon A Time

Reaganomics

The seeds for the current economic situation in India were sown in the 80s by the 40th President of the United States of America Ronald Reagan. He implemented economic reforms on the belief that tax policies that benefit the wealthy will create a “trickle-down” effect to the poor, labeled by his critics as “trickle-down economics” or voodoo economics also known as Reaganomics. The fundamentals of Reaganomics were to cut back spending on the social sectors of the economy, prevent the working people from demanding higher wages even through trade union activity, scale back safety and health standards for workers, relax rules for environmental protection. These were strategies born of the Cold War and Reagan’s 1983 “Evil Empire” speech set the tone for a more aggressive US posture against the Soviet Union. The result was a series of top-secret national security decision directives (NSDDs).

NSDD-66 stated that it would be U.S. policy to disrupt the Soviet economy by attacking a “strategic triad” of critical resources–financial credits, high technology, and natural gas. The directive was tantamount to a “secret declaration of economic war on the Soviet Union.”

These policies when adopted by the Russians as what is known as Glasnost and Perestroika (liberalization and privatization) rang the death knell for the Soviet Union. Those policies have since been exported to the rest of the world and have been espoused by the political and economic elites of many countries. It destroyed every country where they were implemented. The scandals involving Harshad Mehta in India, the pyramid schemes in Albania, the BCCI collapse, the collapse of security houses in Japan, Britain and so on are products of these policies. However, like a double edged sword Reaganomics also destroyed the American middle class and the American Dream itself.

Global Liquidity Crisis

Reaganomics gave rise to a new type of banking now known as the Originate and Distribute (ORD) model. Historically, banks used deposits to fund loans that they then kept on their balance sheets until maturity. Under this new principle, the bank was no longer an institution focused on taking deposits and giving out loans. Instead it became a competitive financier seeking to maximize fee and commission income from its assets. Supposed old-style prudent banking was ridiculed as boring and conservative, while the risk takers were considered sophisticated, innovative and shrewd. With the use of such quasi-legal investment techniques and outright swindling, a trend of a Ponzi scheme prevailed. This paved the way for subprime lending (making loans below 0% interest rates to people who may have difficulty repaying it back) and securitization of debt (selling housing mortgages as bank-backed tradable stocks) first in Wall Street then everywhere in the world. This process is called derivative markets.

Only in 2008 when the German banks wanted to offload some of their US real-estate investment it was a revelation for the US regulator about the extent of fraud committed by the US banks, insurance companies and Wall Street brokerage firms; leading to what we know now as US Meltdown of 2008 and Eurozone Crisis of 2012 and if not prudent will be called the Indian Crisis of 2020.

As against world’s total GDP of $50 trillion a whopping $150 trillion derivative market came to life. As a result a global liquidity crisis set in. Liquidity crisis refers to an acute shortage or “drying up” of liquidity or in simple terms lack of cash flow. The crisis cost the US economy at least $12.8 trillion which is a very conservative estimate, other reports put it at $14 trillion – almost an entire year’s worth of US economic activity. Everything from the economy to housing, from health care to warfare, from energy to security; everything came in a state of “crisis”.

NASA’s $230 billion Constellation program designed to get humans to Mars saw a massive budget cut and suddenly Mars seemed too far and too expensive in comparison to our nearby friendly Moon. Unfortunately the entire project had to be scraped, to an extent that US has to hitch a ride on a Russian rocket to even get to the International Space Station. Even to spy on Russians the US needs Russian rocket engines. And with the launch of the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), informally known as Mangalayaan at a cost 11% of NASA’s own Mars mission India has also entered this $5.4 billion satellite-launching industry with a bang.

The Chinese on the other hand are increasingly buying in on stakes of European and U.S. businesses, including industrial enterprises that are available at a low price due to the global recession; acquiring natural-resource deals across the world, securing supplies of oil and minerals. The biggest American companies are now owned by the Chinese. One such is Legendary Pictures, the studio that gave us the Batman Series and Interstellar that soon would be releasing its new production The Great Wall. The Chinese are also changing the European football scene with its acquisition of A.C. Milan one of the wealthiest and most valuable football club in the world. There are now more than 100 state-run Confucius Institutes promoting Chinese culture across Europe. Such soft power come in handy for instance teaching Chinese to French workers at the Chinese telecoms company ZTE in Poitiers. These are just pieces of the giant Chinese jigsaw called the New Silk Route or the One Belt, One Road Initiative. Experts have termed it the Chinese Century.

Western-European economies are still reeling under the pressure of this financial crisis and the Chinese together with the Russians are pushing them further into recession. As recently as in January this year the global elite met at the World Economic Forum in Davos expressing their fears about the global liquidity crunch and the implications it may have on their economies. What they fear is that the meltdown may spell the end of the supremacy of the banking houses of London and New York as financial centers.

It is here that India comes into picture.

Shelley Kasli is the Founder & Editor of GreatGameIndia – India’s only quarterly journal on Geopolitics & International Affairs. He can be reached at [email protected]

Here’s how the U.S. actually makes decisions on when to go to war:

First. Decisions are made based – not upon defense – but upon gaining economic and geostrategic advantage.

For example, America has a policy of using the military to contain China’s growing economic influence – and of considering economic rivalry to be a basis for war.

And many recent battles are really pipeline wars.

Second. A massive propaganda and demonization campaign is launched in order to drum up support for the war.

There doesn’t need to be a shred of truth underlying the campaign. The p.r. flacks just have to come up with catchy slogans, and the mainstream megaphone is guaranteed to trumpet it into every living room in America.

Third. We pull the trigger, reap whatever economic/geo-strategic benefits are to be gained, and ignore the rest.

If this sounds over-the-top, remember that reducing terrorism and increasing our national security is pretty straightforward. It’s not rocket science.

The fact that we’re doing the exact opposite shows that there are other motives in play.

Postscript: I’m not picking on the U.S. I would imagine that all late-stage empires make decisions of war and peace the same way.

After detailed decimation of President Trump’s ‘intelligence’ ‘justifying’ his invasion of Syria, the MIT specialist on such intelligence-analysis, Dr. Theodore Postol, concludes:

I have worked with the intelligence community in the past, and I have grave concerns about the politicization of intelligence that seems to be occurring with more frequency in recent times – but I know that the intelligence community has highly capable analysts in it. And if those analysts were properly consulted about the claims in the White House document they would have not approved the document going forward.

I am available to expand on these comments substantially. I have only had a few hours to quickly review the alleged White House intelligence report. But a quick perusal shows without a lot of analysis that this report cannot be correct, and it also appears that this report was not properly vetted by the intelligence community.

This is a very serious matter.

President Obama was initially misinformed about supposed intelligence evidence that Syria was the perpetrator of the August 21, 2013 nerve agent attack in Damascus. This is a matter of public record.

President Obama stated that his initially false understanding was that the intelligence clearly showed that Syria was the source of the nerve agent attack. This false information was corrected when the then Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, interrupted the President while he was in an intelligence briefing. According to President Obama, Mr. Clapper told the President that the intelligence that Syria was the perpetrator of the attack was “not a slamdunk.”

The question that needs to be answered by our nation is how was the president initially misled about such a profoundly important intelligence finding?

The U.S. ‘news’media hid from the public Dr. Postol’s disproof of the Obama regime’s still-continuing assertions that the 21 August 2013 sarin attack was from Syria’s government instead of from the ‘moderate rebels’ (jihadists) whom the U.S. supported. Will they hide from the U.S. public his disproof of the U.S. regime’s latest such scam backing the actual perpetrators of a war-crime — will they do now as they did then?

This issue presents a challenge to the U.S. ‘news’media, to finally show some integrity, some honor, and expose the operations of the gang at the U.S. government’s top, instead of simply continuing to pump that gang’s propaganda. Without the continuing cooperation of America’s ‘news’media, we would not now be heading toward World War III — global nuclear war. What would be the time when these ‘news’media will do their job, instead of do what they’re being paid to do, if that time is not now. 

If not now, then when?

Will this report by Dr. Postol receive the attention from America’s ‘news’media that they denied to his previous report demonstrating the gangsterism at the top of America’s federal government? (It exposed Obama’s lie, which America’s ‘news’media simply continued to trumpet.)

This news report-and-commentary is being submitted free-of-charge for publication, to all of America’s major media. It is a challenge to all of them.

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of  CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity.

After making the provocative and dangerous charge that Russia is covering up Syria’s use of chemical weapons, the Trump administration withheld key evidence to support its core charge that a Syrian warplane dropped sarin on a northern Syrian town on April 4.

A four-page white paper, prepared by President Trump’s National Security Council staff and released by the White House on Tuesday, claimed that U.S. intelligence has proof that the plane carrying the sarin gas left from the Syrian military airfield that Trump ordered hit by Tomahawk missiles on April 6.

The paper asserted that

“we have signals intelligence and geospatial intelligence,” but then added that “we cannot publicly release all available intelligence on this attack due to the need to protect sources and methods.”

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis welcomes Saudi Deputy Crown Prince and Defense Minister Mohammed bin Salman to the Pentagon, March 16, 2017. (DoD photo by Sgt. Amber I. Smith)

I’m told that the key evidence was satellite surveillance of the area, a body of material that U.S. intelligence analysts were reviewing late last week even after the Trump-ordered bombardment of 59 Tomahawk missiles that, according to Syrian media reports, killed seven or eight Syrian soldiers and nine civilians, including four children.

Yet, it is unclear why releasing these overhead videos would be so detrimental to “sources and methods” since everyone knows the U.S. has this capability and the issue at hand – if it gets further out of hand – could lead to a nuclear confrontation with Russia.

In similarly tense situations in the past, U.S. Presidents have released sensitive intelligence to buttress U.S. government assertions, including John F. Kennedy’s disclosure of U-2 spy flights in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and Ronald Reagan revealing electronic intercepts after the Soviet shoot-down of Korean Airlines Flight 007 in 1983.

Yet, in this current case, as U.S.-Russian relations spiral downward into what is potentially an extermination event for the human species, Trump’s White House insists that the world must trust it despite its record of consistently misstating facts.

In the case of the April 4 chemical-weapons incident in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, which reportedly killed scores of people including young children, I was told that initially the U.S. analysts couldn’t see any warplanes over the area in Idlib province at the suspected time of the poison gas attack but later they detected a drone that they thought might have delivered the bomb.

A Drone Mystery

President Trump at a news conference with Jordan’s King Abdullah II on April 5, 2017, at which the President commented on the crisis in Syria. (Screen shot from whitehouse.gov)

According to a source, the analysts struggled to identify whose drone it was and where it originated. Despite some technical difficulties in tracing its flight path, analysts eventually came to believe that the flight was launched in Jordan from a Saudi-Israeli special operations base for supporting Syrian rebels, the source said, adding that the suspected reason for the poison gas was to create an incident that would reverse the Trump administration’s announcement in late March that it was no longer seeking the removal of President Bashar al-Assad.

If indeed that was the motive — and if the source’s information is correct — the operation would have been successful, since the Trump administration has now reversed itself and is pressing Russia to join in ousting Assad who is getting blamed for the latest chemical-weapons incident.

Presumably, however, the “geospatial intelligence” cited in the four-page dossier could disprove this and other contentions if the Trump administration would only make its evidence publicly available.

The dossier stated,

“Our information indicates that the chemical agent was delivered by regime Su-22 fixed-wing aircraft that took off from the regime-controlled Shayrat Airfield. These aircraft were in the vicinity of Khan Shaykhun approximately 20 minutes before reports of the chemical attack began and vacated the area shortly after the attack.”

So, that would mean – assuming that the dossier is correct – that U.S. intelligence analysts were able to trace the delivery of the poison gas to Assad’s aircraft and to the airfield that Trump ordered attacked on April 6.

Still, it remains a mystery why this intelligence assessment is not coming directly from President Trump’s intelligence chiefs as is normally the case, either with an official Intelligence Estimate or a report issued by the Director of National Intelligence.

The White House photo released late last week showing the President and a dozen senior advisers monitoring the April 6 missile strike from a room at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida was noteworthy in that neither CIA Director Mike Pompeo nor Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats was in the frame.

Now, it is the White House that has released the four-page dossier supposedly summing up the assessment of the “intelligence community.”

An Argumentative Dossier

The photograph released by the White House of President Trump meeting with his advisers at his estate in Mar-a-Lago on April 6, 2017, regarding his decision to launch missile strikes against Syria.

The dossier also seems argumentative in that it assumes that Russian officials – and presumably others – who have suggested different possible explanations for the incident at Khan Sheikdoun did so in a willful cover-up, when any normal investigation seeks to evaluate different scenarios before settling on one.

It is common amid the “fog of war” for people outside the line of command – and even sometimes inside the line of command – to not understand what happened and to struggle for an explanation.

On April 6, before Trump’s missile strike, I and others received word from U.S. military intelligence officials in the Middle East that they, too, shared the belief that the poison gas may have resulted from a conventional bombing raid that ruptured containers stored by the rebels, who – in Idlib province – are dominated by Al Qaeda’s affiliate and its allies.

Those reports were cited by former U.S. intelligence officials, including more than two dozen who produced a memo to President Trump urging him to undertake a careful investigation of the incident before letting this crisis exacerbate U.S.-Russia relations.

The memo said “our U.S. Army contacts in the area” were disputing the official story of a chemical weapons attack. “Instead, a Syrian aircraft bombed an al-Qaeda-in-Syria ammunition depot that turned out to be full of noxious chemicals and a strong wind blew the chemical-laden cloud over a nearby village where many consequently died,” the memo said.

In other words, to suggest possible alternative scenarios is not evidence of a “cover-up,” even if the theories are later shown to be erroneous. It is the normal process of sorting through often conflicting initial reports.

Russian President Vladimir Putin addressing the audience at a concert for Palmyra, Syria, via a satellite link on May 5, 2016, after the ancient city was liberated from the Islamic State. (Image from RT’s live-streaming of the event)

Even in the four-page dossier, Trump’s NSC officials contradicted what other U.S. government sources have told The New York Times and other mainstream news outlets about the Syrian government’s supposed motive for launching the chemical-weapons attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun.

According to the earlier accounts, the Syrian government either was trying to terrorize the population in a remote rebel-controlled area or was celebrating its impunity after the Trump administration had announced that it was no longer seeking Assad’s removal.

But the dossier said,

“We assess that Damascus launched this chemical attack in response to an opposition offensive in northern Hamah Province that threatened key infrastructure.”

Although Khan Sheikhoun was not near the fighting, the dossier presented the town as an area of support for the offensive.

Assuming this assessment is correct, does that mean that the earlier explanations were part of a cover-up or a propaganda operation? The reality is that in such complex situations, the analyses should continue to be refined as more information becomes available. It should not be assumed that every false lead or discarded theory is proof of a “cover-up,” yet that is what we see here.

“The Syrian regime and its primary backer, Russia, have sought to confuse the world community about who is responsible for using chemical weapons against the Syrian people in this and earlier attacks,” the dossier declared.

But the larger point is that – given President Trump’s spotty record for getting facts straight – he and his administration should go the extra mile in presenting irrefutable evidence to support its assessments, not simply insisting that the world must “trust us.”

[In a separate analysis of the four-page dossier, Theodore Postol, a national security specialist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, concluded that the White House claims were clearly bogus, writing:

“I have reviewed the document carefully, and I believe it can be shown, without doubt, that the document does not provide any evidence whatsoever that the US government has concrete knowledge that the government of Syria was the source of the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria at roughly 6 to 7 a.m. on April 4, 2017. 

“In fact, a main piece of evidence that is cited in the document points to an attack that was executed by individuals on the ground, not from an aircraft, on the morning of April 4. This conclusion is based on an assumption made by the White House when it cited the source of the sarin release and the photographs of that source. My own assessment, is that the source was very likely tampered with or staged, so no serious conclusion could be made from the photographs cited by the White House.”]

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).

President Bashar al-Assad gave an interview to AFP in which he said what happened in Khan Shaikhoun is a fabricated story, stressing that Syria does not possess a chemical arsenal and that even if it has such an arsenal, it will not use it.

He made it clear that Syria can only allow any investigation in the Khan Sheikhoun incident when it’s impartial.

The President said that the United States is not serious in achieving any political solution.

He stressed that Syria’s firepower, our ability to attack the terrorists hasn’t been affected by this strike.

Following is the full text of the interview;

Question 1: Mr. President, first I want to thank you very much to receive me for an interview. Mr. President, did you give an order to strike Khan Sheikhoun with chemical weapons last Tuesday?

President Assad: Actually, no-one has investigated what happened that day in Khan Sheikhoun till the moment. As you know, Khan Sheikhoun is under the control of al-Nusra Front, which is a branch of Al Qaeda, so the only information the world have had till this moment is published by Al Qaeda branch. No-one has any other information. We don’t know if the whole pictures or videos that we’ve been seeing are true or fabricated. That’s why we asked for an investigation to what happened in Khan Sheikhoun. This is first.

Second, Al Qaeda sources said that the attack happened at 6, 6:30 in the morning, while the Syrian attack in the same area was around noon, between 11:30 to 12. So, they’re talking about two different stories or events. So, there was no order to make any attack, we don’t have any chemical weapons, we gave up our arsenal a few years ago. Even if we have them, we wouldn’t use them, and we have never used our chemical arsenal in our history.

Question 2: So what happened this day?

President Assad: As I said, the only source is Al Qaeda, we cannot take it seriously. But our impression is that the West, mainly the United States, is hand in glove with the terrorists. They fabricated the whole story in order to have a pretext for the attack, It wasn’t an attack because of what happened in khan Sheikhoun. It’s one event, its stage one is the play that we saw on the social networking and on TVs, and the propaganda, and the stage two is the military attack. That’s what we believe is happening because it’s only few days – two days, 48 hours – between the play and the attacks, and no investigations, no concrete evidence about anything, the only thing were allegations and propaganda, and then strike.

Complete Video of Interview

Question 3: So, who according to you is responsible about this alleged chemical attack?

President Assad: The allegation itself was by Al Qaeda, al-Nusra Front, so we don’t have to investigate who, they announced it, it’s under their control, no-one else. About the attack, as I said, it’s not clear whether it happened or not, because how can you verify a video? You have a lot of fake videos now, and you have the proof that those videos were fake, like the White Helmets for example, they are Al Qaeda, they are al-Nusra Front who shaved their beards, wore white hats, and appeared as humanitarian heroes, which is not the case. The same people were killing Syrian soldiers, and you have the proof on the internet anyway. So, the same thing for that chemical attack, we don’t know whether those dead children were killed in Khan Sheikhoun? Were they dead at all? Who committed the attack if there was an attack? What’s the material? You have no information at all, nothing at all, no-one investigated.

Question 4: So you think it’s a fabrication?

President Assad: Definitely, a hundred percent for us, it’s fabrication. We don’t have an arsenal, we’re not going to use it. And you have many indications if you don’t have proof, because no-one has concrete information or evidences, but you have indications. For example, less than two weeks, around ten days before that attack, the terrorists were advancing in many fronts, including the suburbs of Damascus and Hama which is not far from Khan Sheikhoun, let’s suppose we have this arsenal, and let’s suppose that we have the will to use it, why didn’t we use it when we were retreating and the terrorists were advancing? Actually, the timing of that attack or alleged attack was when the Syrian Army was advancing very fast, and actually the terrorists were collapsing. So, why to use it, if you have it and if you have the will, why to use it at that timing, not when you were in a difficult situation, logically? This is first.

Second, if you want to use it, if you have it and if you want to use it – again, this is if we suppose – why to use it against civilians, not to use it against the terrorists that we are fighting? Third, in that area, we don’t have army, we don’t have battles, we don’t have any, let’s say, object in Khan Sheikhoun, and it’s not a strategic area. Why to attack it? What’s the reason? Militarily, I’m talking from a military point of view. Of course, the foundation for us, morally, we wouldn’t do it if we have it, we wouldn’t have the will, because morally this is not acceptable. We won’t have the support of the public. So, every indication is against the whole story, so you can say that this play that they staged doesn’t hold together. The story is not convincing by any means.

Question 5: With the US airstrike, Trump seems to have changed his position on you and Syria drastically. Do you have the feeling that you lost what you have called a potential partner?

President Assad: I said “if”. It was conditional. If they are serious in fighting terrorists, we’re going to be partners, and I said not only the United States; whoever wants to fight the terrorists, we are partners. This is basic for us, basic principle, let’s say. Actually, what has been proven recently, as I said earlier, that they are hand in glove with those terrorists, the United States and the West, they’re not serious in fighting the terrorists, and yesterday some of their statesmen were defending ISIS. They were saying that ISIS doesn’t have chemical weapons. They are defending ISIS against the Syrian government and the Syrian Army. So, actually, you cannot talk about partnership between us who work against the terrorists and who fight the terrorism and the others who are supporting explicitly the terrorists.

Question 6: So, can we say that the US strike changed your opinion on Trump?

President Assad: Anyway, I was very cautious in saying any opinion regarding him before he became President and after. I always say let’s see what he’s going to do, we wouldn’t comment on statements. So, actually, this is the first proof that it’s not about the President in the United State; it’s about the regime and the deep state or the deep regime in the United States is still the same, it doesn’t change. The President is only one of the performers on their theatre, if he wants to be a leader, he cannot, because as some say he wanted to be a leader, Trump wanted to be a leader, but every President there, if he wants to be a real leader, later he’s going to eat his words, swallow his pride if he has pride at all, and make a 180 degree U-turn, otherwise he would pay the price politically.

Question 7: But do you think that there will be another attack?

President Assad: As long as the United States is being governed by this complex of military industrial complex, the financial companies, banks, and what you call deep regime, and works for the vested interest of those groups, of course. It could happen anytime, anywhere, not only in Syria.

Question 8: And, your army or the Russians will retaliate if it happens again?

President Assad: Actually, if you want to talk about retaliation, we are talking about missiles coming from hundreds of miles, which is out of our reach, but actually the real war in Syria is not about those missiles; it’s about supporting the terrorists. This is the most dangerous part of this war, and our response is going to be what we started from the very first day: is smashing the terrorists everywhere in Syria. When we get rid of the terrorists, we wouldn’t worry about anything else at that time. So, this is our response. It’s a response, not reaction.

Question 9: So, what you say means that retaliation by the Syrian Army or by the Russians will be very difficult, because the boats are very far?

President Assad: For us, as a small country, yeah, of course it is, everybody knows that. It’s out of reach. I mean, they can have missiles from another continent. We all know that. They are a great power, we’re not a great power. Talking about the Russians, this is another issue.

Question 10: Would you accept the findings of OPCW investigation?

President Assad: Since the very first time, when we had in 2013, I think, the first attacks by the terrorists on the Syrian Army by chemical missiles at that time, we asked for investigation. We were the ones who asked for investigations every time there was chemical attacks or allegations about chemical attacks. We asked. And this time, we were discussing with the Russians yesterday and during the last few days after the strike that we’re going to work with them on international investigation. But it should be impartial. We can only allow any investigation when it’s impartial, when we make sure that unbiased countries will participate in this delegation in order to make sure that they won’t use it for politicized purposes.

Question 11: And, if they accuse the government, would you step down?

President Assad: If they accuse, or if they prove? There’s a big difference. No, they are already accusing the government, and if you mean by “them” the West, no, we don’t care about the West. If you mean the chemical agency, if they can prove that there’s an attack, we have to investigate who gave the order to that attack. But a hundred percent, as Syrian Army, we don’t have, and we cannot – even if we want, we cannot – we don’t have the means to commit such attack, and we don’t have the will.

Question 12: So, you mean that you don’t have chemical weapons?

President Assad: No, no, definitely, a few years ago, in 2013, we gave up all our arsenal, and the chemical agency announced that Syria is free of any chemical materials.

Question 13: Because the Pentagon said that there are chemical weapons in the airbase, you deny it?

President Assad: They attacked that airbase, and they destroyed the depots of different materials, and there was no sarin gas. How? If they said that we launched the sarin attack from that airbase, what happened to the sarin when they attacked the depots? Did we hear about any sarin? Our Chief of Staff was there a few hours later, how could he go there if there was sarin gas? How could you only have six martyrs if you have hundreds of soldiers and officers working there, but there was sarin, and they didn’t die. The same fabricated videos that we’ve been seeing about Khan Sheikhoun, when the rescuers tried to rescue the victims or the supposedly dead people or inflicted people, but actually they weren’t wearing any masks or any gloves. How? Where’s the sarin? They should be affected, right away. So, this is all allegation. I mean, this attack and these allegations is another proof that it was fabricated and there was no sarin anywhere.

Question 14: If you say that you didn’t give any order, it is possible that the chemical attack could have been carried out by a rogue or fringe element from the army?

President Assad: Even if you have a rogue element, the army doesn’t have chemical materials. This is first. Second, a rogue army cannot send an airplane at their will, even if they want. It’s an airplane, it’s not a small car to take it from place to place or a small machinegun to use it. You can talk about somebody who has been using his pistol on his behalf the way he wants and break the law, that could happen anywhere in the world, but not an airplane. This is second.

Third, the Syrian Army is a regular army, it’s not a militia. It’s a regular army, it has hierarchy, it has very clear way of orders, so this kind of “rough personnel tried to do something against the will of the leadership of the army” never happened during the last six years of the war in Syria.

Question 15: Did the Russians warn you before the US attack? And were they present in the airbase?

President Assad: No, they didn’t warn us because they didn’t have the time to warn, because the Americans called them maybe a few minutes before the launching, or some say after the launching, because it takes time to reach the base. But actually, we had indications that there was something that was going to happen, and we took many measures in that regard.

Question 16: Do you confirm that 20% of your air force has been destroyed in this attack as the Americans said?

President Assad: I don’t know what’s the criteria, what’s the reference of 20%, what’s the hundred percent for them? Is it the number of airplanes? Is it the quality? Is it, how to say, the active airplanes and stored airplanes? I don’t know what do they mean by this. No, actually, what we and the Russians announced about a few airplanes being destroyed, most of them are the old ones, some of them were not active anyway. This is the reality, and the proof is that, since the strike, we haven’t stopped attacking terrorists all over Syria. So, we didn’t feel that we are really affected. Our firepower, our ability to attack the terrorists hasn’t been affected by this strike.

Question 17: You know, your government said in the beginning that you hit a chemical weapon depot. Is it true?

President Assad: It was a possibility, because when you attack any target related to the terrorists, you don’t know what’s in it. You know that this a target; it could be a store, it could be warehouse, it could be a depot, it could be a camp, it could be a headquarter, we don’t know. But you know that the terrorists are using this place and you attack it, like any other place, and that’s what we’ve been doing since the beginning of the war on daily bases, on hourly bases sometimes, but you cannot tell what’s within this. So, that was one of the possibilities that the airstrikes attacked a depot of chemical materials, but this is conflicting again with the timing of the announcement, not because only the terrorists announced it in the morning, but because their media, their pages on Twitter and on the internet announced the attack a few hours before the alleged one, which is 4 in the mourning. 4 in the morning, they announced that there’s going to be a chemical attack, we have to be ready. How did they know about it?

Question 18: Don’t you see that Khan Sheikhoun is a huge setback for you? For the first time in six years, the US attack your army and yesterday after a brief honeymoon, yesterday Tillerson said that reign of Assad family is coming to the end, don’t you think that Khan Sheikhoun is a huge setback for you?

President Assad: There is no reign of Assad family anyway in Syria. He’s dreaming, or let’s say, he’s hallucinating, so, we don’t waste our time with his statement. In reality, no. Actually, during the last six years, The US was directly involved in supporting the terrorists everywhere in Syria, including ISIS, including al-Nusra, including all the other like-minded factions in Syria, this is clear, and this is proven in Syria. While if you want to talk about the direct attacks, actually only a few months ago, there was a more dangerous attack than the recent one, just before Obama left, I think a few weeks before he left, it was in Deir Ezzor in the eastern part of Syria when they attacked a very strategic mountain, it was a Syrian base, a regular Syrian Army base, and that helped ISIS to take over that mountain, and if the Syrian Army wasn’t resilient and strong enough to repel ISIS, the city of Deir Ezzor would have been now in the hands of ISIS, means a direct link between Deir Ezzor and Mosul in Iraq, which would have been a very strategic gain to ISIS. So, actually, no, the American government was directly involved. But this time, why did they attack directly? Because, as I said, the terrorists in that area were collapsing. So, the Unites States didn’t have any other choice to support their proxies, the terrorists, but to directly attack the Syrian Army because they sent them all kinds of armaments and it didn’t work.

Question 19: So, for you, it’s not a huge setback?

President Assad: No, no, it’s actually part of the context, the same context for six years; it took different shapes, but the core of the American policy and the Western policy towards what’s happening in Syria, it hasn’t changed at all. Forget about the statements; sometimes we have high-pitch statements, sometimes you have low-pitch statements, but it’s the same policy.

Question 20: You have gradually pushed most of the rebels into Idleb, do you plan to attack it next?

President Assad: We’re going to attack terrorists anywhere in Syria, Idleb or any other place. What’s the timing, what’s the priority, this is a military issue and should be discussed on the military level.

Question 21: You said before that Raqqa is a priority for your government, but the forces advancing on the city are mostly US-backed Kurds, aren’t you afraid of being excluded from the liberation of Raqqa?

President Assad: No, we support whoever wants to liberate any city from the terrorists, but that doesn’t mean to be liberated from terrorists and being occupied by American forces, for example, or by another proxy, or another terrorists. So, it’s not clear who is going to liberate Raqqa. Is it really Syrian forces that are going to hand it over to the Syrian Army? Is it going to be in cooperation with the Syrian Army? It’s not clear yet. But what we hear is only allegations about liberating Raqqa. We’ve been hearing that for nearly a year now, or less than a year, but nothing happened on the ground. So, it’s just, let’s say, a hypothetical question, because there is nothing concrete on the ground.

Question 22: The US and Russia are the co-sponsors of Geneva process. Because of the tension between the two countries, do you think that this process can continue?

President Assad: Look, there’s a big difference between the process being active, which could happen anytime, to reactivate the process and to be effective. Till this moment, its’ not effective. Why? Because the United States is not serious in achieving any political solution. They want to use it as an umbrella for the terrorists, or they want to get in this forum what they didn’t get on the ground in the battlefield. That’s why it wasn’t effective at all. Now, it’s the same situation, we don’t see this administration serious in that regard, because they still support the same terrorists. So, we can say yes, it could be reactivated, but we cannot say we expect it to be effective or productive. No.

Question 23: After six years, Mr. President, aren’t you tired?

President Assad: Actually, the only thing that could make pressure on you is not the political situation, not the military situation; actually the human situation in Syria, the daily blood-letting, the daily blood-shedding, the suffering and the hardship that inflicted every house in Syria, this is the only painful thing that could make you feel tired- if it is accurate to say “tired”- while if you talk about the war, about the politics, about the relation with the West, no, I don’t feel tired at all, because we are defending our country, and we’re not going to get tired at all in that regard.

Question 24: What makes you lose sleep?

President Assad: Again, the suffering of the Syrian people. The humanitarian interaction between me and every Syrian family directly or indirectly, this is the only thing that could deprive me from sleep from time to time, but not the Western statements and not the threat of the support of the terrorists.

Question 25: Today, there are people from Foua’a and Kefraya who will move from their village to Damascus and to Aleppo. You are not afraid that in fact it will be a displacement of population, that the Syria after the war will not be the same Syria as before?

President Assad: The displacement in that context is compulsory. We didn’t choose it. We wish that everyone could stay in his village and his city, but those people like many other civilians in different areas were surrounded and besieged by the terrorists, and they’ve been killed on daily basis, so they had to leave. But of course they’re going to go back to their cities after the liberation; that happened in many other areas where the people are going back to their homes. So, it’s temporary. Talking about demographic changes is not in the sake or in the interest of the Syrian society when it’s permanent. As long as it’s temporary, we wouldn’t worry about it.

Journalist: Mr. President, I want to thank you very much for this interview.

President Assad: Thank you.

Journalist: It was very interesting, and thank you very much for talking with me.

President Assad: Thank you.

Assad finally gives his thoughts on the Idlib province chemical attack. Assad is calm, measured, and his comments are intelligent and coherent.

Here is what Assad told the BBC…

“We gave up our arsenal 3 years ago. Even if we had them we wouldn’t use them. We have never used our chemical arsenal in our history.”

“Our information, that the West, mainly the United States, is hand in glove with the terrorists. They fabricated the whole story in order to have a pretext for the attack.”

“There was no investigation, no complete evidence about anything, the only things were allegations, and propaganda and they struck.”

You can watch the video here.

Zerohedge adds…

Following yesterday’s icy meeting in Moscow between Rex Tillerson and Russian diplomat Sergey Lavrov, the propaganda campaigns between the U.S., Syria and Russia seem to be ratcheting up to full force.

Speaking with the BBC earlier this morning, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said the U.S. account of the recent chemical weapons ‘attack’ in Syria was a “100% fabrication” which can only lead him to the conclusion that the West must be working “hand and glove with the terrorists.”

The article below  first published in May 2013 focussed on the Mother of all Bombs (MOAB).

Breaking News, April 13, 2017: the US Air Force has used a MOAB officially “for the first time in history”.

According to the Pentagon, the MOAB  bomb was dropped over an area in Nangarhar province, Afghanistan bordering onto Pakistan “where ISIS forces are suspected of holding a series of tunnels and buildings.”

The Massive Ordinance Air Blast bomb or “Mother Of All Bombs” is the largest conventional “non-nuclear weapon ever designed.”

These are WMDs in the true sense of the word. The not so hidden objective of the “mother of all bombs” (MOAB) is “mass destruction” and mass civilian casualties with a view to instilling fear and despair.

It has never been deployed in an active war theater according to the Pentagon. What is not mentioned in recent reports is that it had been envisaged for use against Iran and North Korea.

What’s the purpose of dropping it in a remote area of Afghanistan as part of an alleged “counter-terrorism” operation against ISIS?

Is this MOAB bomb test in Afghanistan a “dress rehearsal”, prior to its actual military use?  

It’s all for a good cause, savings civilian lives, going after the terrorists

See details and analysis below  as to the nature of the MOAB.

The explosion of a conventional monster MOAB bomb would result in a nuclear mushroom cloud similar to that of a tactical nuclear weapon.

The MOAB was slated to be used against both Iran and North Korea.

Michel Chossudovsky, April 13, 2017.

  *    *    *

Under the title Pentagon bulks up ‘bunker buster’ bomb to combat Iran: U.S. Upgrades Weapon to Penetrate Key Nuclear Site; Push to Persuade Israelis,  The Wall Street Journal reports that the US military is planning to use its “biggest” conventional bunker buster bombs against Iran:

The Pentagon has redesigned its biggest “bunker buster” bomb with more advanced features intended to enable it to destroy Iran’s most heavily fortified and defended nuclear site.

The newest version of what is the Pentagon’s largest conventional bomb, the 30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or MOP, has adjusted fuses to maximize its burrowing power, upgraded guidance systems to improve its precision and high-tech equipment intended to allow it to evade Iranian air defenses in order to reach and destroy the Fordow nuclear enrichment complex, which is buried under a mountain near the Iranian city of Qom. […]

The improvements are meant to address U.S. and Israeli concerns that Fordow couldn’t be destroyed from the air. […] Fordow has long been thought to be a target that would be difficult if not impossible for the U.S. to destroy with conventional weapons. (WSJ, May 3, 2013)

The official explanation for the possible use of the MOP bomb is that Israel does not have the military capabilities within its own weapons arsenal to permanently disable Iran’s nuclear facilities:

“U.S. officials see development of the weapon as critical to convincing Israel that the U.S. has the ability to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear bomb if diplomacy fails, and also that Israel’s military can’t do that on its own.” (op cit)

The Mother of All Bombs” (MOAB) 

The MOP Massive Ordinance Penetrator is nicknamed the “mother of all bombs”. Its use would inevitably trigger an an out war against Iran with a scenario of military escalation.

The GBU-43/B or Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb (MOAB) version was categorized in 2003 “as the most powerful non-nuclear weapon ever designed” with the the largest yield in the US conventional arsenal.  The earlier 21,500 pound MOAB bomb was first tested in March 2003 before being deployed to the Iraq war theater.

According to US military sources, The Joint Chiefs of Staff  had advised the government of  Saddam Hussein prior to launching the 2003 that the “mother of all bombs” was to be used against Iraq. (There were unconfirmed reports that it had been used in Iraq).

“The Department has an Urgent Operational Need (UON) for the capability to strike hard and deeply buried targets in high threat environments. The MOP [Mother of All Bombs] is the weapon of choice to meet the requirements of the UON [Urgent Operational Need].” It further states that the request is endorsed by Pacific Command (which has responsibility over North Korea) and Central Command (which has responsibility over Iran).” (ABC News,  op cit, emphasis added). To consult the reprogramming request (pdf) click here

More years ago, at the outset of the Obama administration, the Pentagon confirmed (October 2009) that it intends to use the “Mother of All Bombs” (MOAB) against Iran.

The MOAB is said to be  ”ideally suited to hit deeply buried nuclear facilities such as Natanz or Qom in Iran” (Jonathan Karl, Is the U.S. Preparing to Bomb Iran? ABC News, October 9, 2009). The truth of the matter is that the MOAB, given its explosive capacity, would result in extremely large civilian casualties. It is a conventional “killing machine” with a nuclear type mushroom cloud.  The latest version of 30,000 pounds is substantially large than the earlier version.

“Mother of All Bombs” (MOAB)

GBU-57A/B Mass Ordnance Penetrator (MOP)

MOAB: screen shots of test: explosion and mushroom cloud (right)

The broader issue of civilian casualties is not mentioned. The explosion of a conventional monster MOAB bomb would result in nuclear mushroom cloud similar to that of a tactical nuclear bomb.

The MOP is described as “a powerful new bomb aimed squarely at the underground nuclear facilities of Iran and North Korea. The gargantuan bomb—longer than 11 persons standing shoulder-to-shoulder [see image above] or more than 20 feet base to nose” (See Edwin Black, “Super Bunker-Buster Bombs Fast-Tracked for Possible Use Against Iran and North Korea Nuclear Programs”, Cutting Edge, September 21 2009, emphasis added)

These are WMDs in the true sense of the word.

The not so hidden objective of the “mother of all bombs” (MOAB) is “mass destruction” and mass civilian casualties with a view to instilling fear and despair.

OPEN LETTER TO THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION

We are missing a legislation which would ban the purposeful remote manipulation of the human nervous system and organism including remote killing of people.

Secretariat-General 

European Commission
Rue de la Loi 200/ Wetstraat 200
1049 Bruxelles/Brussel
Belgium

In mid March 2016 the Polish defense minister Antoni Macierewicz visited the University of Father Tadeusz Rydzyk to participate in the discussion on problems of contemporary politics, armed conflicts and terrorism. One of the listeners asked him, whether Poland has got a strategy, how to solve illegal experiments with electromagnetic weapons on unwitting Polish citizens. Antoni Macieriwicz replied that his ministry is conducting an analysis on this subject and that he is going to establish a commission, which will investigate the complaints of Polish citizens.

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgVs4-m0lNY#t=33

http://www.dziennikzachodni.pl/polska-i-swiat/a/minister-macierewicz-o-broni-elektromagnetycznej-zdjecia-wideo-raport-juz-wkrotce,9741513/).

In this way the Polish minister of defense admitted that there exist electromagnetic weapons, capable to interfere with the functioning of human organism and that it may be used on Polish citizens.

The fact that the major European media did not report on this event, rose our suspicion that the European Union Member States are bound to keep those weapons secret and even bound not to legislate against their use. This our suspicion was confirmed by the Polish weekly NIE, when its journalists were asking the Polish Defense Ministry why it did not fulfill its promise and did not establish a commission which was supposed to investigate complaints of Polish citizens that they are exposed to electromagnetic attacks and the defense ministry replied that this topic is subjected to national security information connected with  the defense of the nation

(http://nie.com.pl/artykul-str-glowna-12/macierewicz-zdalnie-sterowany/#more-38883).

Evidently this sequence of events connects to the fact stated in the document Crowd Control Technologies, published in 2000 and initiated by the European Parliament, which says that the NATO Member states have accepted the American doctrine of non-lethal weapons, which includes “systems which can directly interact with the human nervous system”

(http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/etudes/stoa/2000/168394/DG-4-STOA_ET%282000%29168394_EN%28PAR02%29.pdf).

Now it seems to be clear that the European Union Member States have in their arsenal a classified military technology, which can be used for electromagnetic attacks on people. Apparent classification of this issue explains as well your evasive replies to our previous letters on this subject.

Water makes up significant portion of the human body – 55 – 70%. Large portions of this water contain particles which have either accepted or lost an electron and therefore, they have either a positive or negative charge. Those particles may be atoms, molecules or clusters of atoms or molecules. They are called ions. Since liquids in the human body are full of those ions, they can be compared to electrolytes or liquids which conduct electrical current. The most important part in the activity of the human nervous system represent  electrical currents, which are occurring as flows of those charged particles in the nerve fibres. While in electrical wires the electrical current is a flow of free electrons, in the human body and the human nervous system it is a flow of charged ions.

The sources of electrical currents in the nerve fibres are neuronal membranes. The electrical currents start to flow in the nervous fibres, as a result of a change of voltage between the inner and outer surface of neuronal membranes. This change of voltage, on the other hand, is principally caused by electrical currents in the electrolyte which is inside nerve fibres.

In 2014, Chinese scientists published the results of an experiment in which they searched for microwave conductivity of electrolyte solutions. In the introduction they stressed that their experiment “plays an important role in investigating the interaction between electromagnetic waves and biological tissues that have high water content and a significant concentration of ions”. They used a solution of salt for their experiment. The chemical formula of salt is NaCl. It means it contains atoms of sodium and chloride. Ions of both of those atoms play an important role in the firing of nerve cells. The experiment proved that this electrolyte is conductive for microwaves up to 20 gigahertz frequency. For the solutions with higher contents of salt the conductivity of electrolytes was higher with microwaves than with direct current

(http://piers.org/piersproceedings/download.php?file=cGllcnMyMDE0R3Vhbmd6aG91fDJBMF8wNjcwLnBkZnwxNDAzMTgwNDU1MDE=).

In other words, the microwaves produced electrical currents in electrolytes, which means that if microwaves penetrate into the electrolyte which is inside the nerve fibres, they will produce electrical currents in there.

The nervous system is controled by neurons called axons. Their membranes react to the electrical currents in the electrolyte which fills their nerve fibres by producing electrical currents. This will then trigger the spreading of the nervous signal in the nervous system.

If a human being is supposed to feel something, do something or think about something, it is necessary that large quantities of neurons start firing at the same frequency. The chance for the effectiveness of the manipulation of the human nervous system with pulsed microwaves is secured by the fact that the variations of the activity of the human nervous system for various perceptions, reactions, emotions, actions and thoughts are expressed in different frequencies or sequels of frequencies. Walter J. Freeman, who studied for decades the electrical activity of the human brain simultaneously introducing multitudes of microelectrodes into different parts of the brain, wrote that in the brain “transmission occurs at some characteristic frequency, and… reception occurs in… sets tuned to that frequency”.

Scientists experimenting with pulsed microwaves reported that electroencephalographic recordings of animal’s brain activities got synchronized with the pulsing of microwaves transmitted into their brains

(http://www.mapcruzin.com/radiofrequency/henry_lai1.htm).

So, if the electrolytes in the nerve fibres are reached by microwaves, which are pulsed in the nervous activity’s frequencies, the membranes of axons which control the nervous system’s activity and react to electrical voltage’s changes by initiating nerve firing, will react to inflow-frequencies of electrical currents. These currents will be produced by frequencies in which microwaves will be pulsed. In this way, the electrolytes in the nervous tissue will function as antennas and the human nervous system will be controlled by pulsed microwaves, targeting the human body.

The American MCS America organisation, which fights against pollution, confirms this conclusion in its study on Electromagnetic Fields Sensitivity. The study states:

“The body can collect the signal and turn it into electric currents just like the antenna of a radio set or a cell phone. These currents are carried by ions… flowing through the living tissues and in the blood vessels (a system of tubes full of an electrically-conducting salty fluid that connect almost every part of the body) when these currents impinge on cell membranes, which are normally electrically charged, they try to vibrate in time with the current” http://mcs-america.org/index_files/EHS.htm

(let us note that a neuron is a cell as well). The study goes on stating:

“The mechanism of demodulation is controversial, but there is no doubt that it occurs. The best explanation is that the multitude of minute ion channels found in cell membranes act as electrically biased point contact diodes… these can rectify and demodulate the signal even at microwave frequencies… A cell phone signal, when demodulated in this way, generates a whole family of low frequency components, some of which are biologically-active and cause membrane leakage. One consequence of this leakage is to make the sensory cells of electrosensitive individuals give a whole range of false sensations”.

The reason why the cell phone radiation produces false sensations in some individuals is that the information transfer in cell phone systems is carried out by low frequency microwave pulses which reach the electrolyte in electrosensitive individuals’ nervous systems. Since the nervous activity takes place in low frequencies, it is triggered or incited by those pulses.

Published experiments dedicated to the effects of microwaves on the human nervous system used microwave frequencies which did not exceed much more than one Gigahertz, thus complying with the findings of Chinese scientists on the conductivity of electrolyte for microwaves. In his experiments, Ross Adey in the  1980’s used the 450 Mhz frequency, pulsed at 16 Hz, thus causing calcium efflux from nerve cells which reduces human beings’ ability to concentrate. The experiment was replicated many times with the same results.

(http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a242515.pdf),

Allen H. Frey – as early in the year 1961! – managed to transmit sound perceptions into the human brain by using pulsed frequencies ranging from 425 to 1310 Megahertz. People described the microwave sound as “buzz, clicking, hiss or knocking, depending on several transmitter parameters, i.e., pulse width and pulse repetition rate”, in other words, on the frequency of pulses. When varying the transmitter parameters, Allen H. Frey was able to produce in human beings “the perception of severe buffeting of the head” or “pins and needles sensation”

(http://jap.physiology.org/content/17/4/689).

His experiment was replicated many times with the same results. It was, therefore, proved that it is possible to repeatedly produce the same delusions in the human brain, when microwaves are pulsed in frequencies which mimic the human brain’s neuronal activity.

In 1975, Don R. Justesen, neuropsychologist and Director of Neuropsychology and Behavioral Radiology Research Laboratories with the Veterans Administration Medical Center, published in “The American Psychologist Journal” an experiment, where recordings of pronounced digits from one to ten were transmitted into the human brain via pulsed microwaves and where the subject of the experiment could hear and recognize the digits.

(https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B3V8FIUj7brsMzJhOTY4ZWItMGI5OC00MzkzLWJjMDQtMDM0OGE1ZDFhOGFm/edit?authkey=CKnE554O&hl=en&pli=1).

This experiment proved not only feasibility of remote manipulation of the human nervous system but as well feasibility of manipulation of human mind.

When encoding human speech into pulsed microwaves – the procedure is similar to radio broadcasting (human speech only needs to be converted to pulsed microwaves) – it is possible to transmit either audible or inaudible (ultrasound) messages into the human brain. A human being cannot hear ultrasound messages, but the brain perceives them and a person’s behaviour can be controlled and manipulated in this way. The density of electromagnetic energy needed to remotely control the activity of the human nervous system does not exceed the standards set by the European Union. Let’s just remember that cellphone signals can penetrate into the human brain.

A skillful radioamateur is capable to produce a transmitter able to remotely control the activity of the human nervous system for criminal groups which could then endanger the mental and physical health of people in their surroundings. They could easily put drivers to sleep by pulsing microwaves into the sleep frequencies or with more sophisticated pulsing, they could stop a person’s heart beat and make him or she die. It is known that Allen H. Frey produced heart attacks in frogs with pulsed microwaves.

At the same time a growing number of people worldwide complain that they are exposed to such harmful radiations, but do not have any means of defense against their use. Among the main symptoms, they claim to have, are burns on their bodies or burning sensations, pins and needles sensations, feelings of being stabbed or squashed, violent vomiting, cramps going as far as reaching temporary paralyses, remotely controlled movements of their body parts, breath shortness sometimes reaching heart arrest, nausea, voice-hearings and manipulations of their thoughts and emotions. They usually end up showing depression and suicidal tendencies. When complaining about the symptoms and claiming that they are caused by electromagnetic radiation, they are frequently sent to psychiatric hospitals, without any expert investigations of their complaints.

This makes plausible the idea that the military and government agencies operators of those weapons are practising their skills in the use of those weapons on unwitting citizens, to be able to use those acquired skills in possible future wars or to use them in the case of massive civil disobedience against citizens of their countries.

Since government agencies, and possibly organized crime, are capable to remotely manipulate the human nervous system and cause physical torture, mental confusion or death of people, without leaving any evidence of the committed crime, it is necessary to introduce a legislation, which would prosecute such activities. Part of the legislation should also be the prohibition of the use of those technologies for the state security agencies, because their possession of such technologies would be in sharp contradiction with the democratic constitutions of European Union Member States. We are willing to participate in the preparation of this legislation.

Any technology, which would produce in the human nervous system the flows of electric currents with the frequencies of its activity, can be used to control remotely the activity of the human brain and  body. At the present time pulsed microwaves are the only technology known to be fit to produce this effect, but easily, with contemporary fast advances of the scientific research, especially in quantum physics, other technologies can be developed or already have been developed. Therefore, the legislation should ban as well the use of so far unknown or unpublished technologies which enable the remote manipulation of electrical currents in the human brain and body.

Because of the fact that at least  the European NATO  member states are apparently bound by an agreement to keep those weapons secret, it is evident, that the legislation we are proposing, can be enacted in the European Union Member states only if it is recommended to them by the European Commission and if the EU member states act together  – or even if the principle of subsidiarity is bypassed and the legislation is passed directly by the European Parliament.

We still have confidence that you will not support the criminal use of electromagnetic or other energetic fields against the citizens of the European Union Member States and that you will recommend  to the European Union Member States and to the European Parliament to enact legislations, which will protect the citizens of the European Union Member States against such attacks establish harsh sentences for the perpetrators of such attacks and which will create agencies specialized in the detection of attacks using the remote manipulation of the functioning of the human nervous system to produce symptoms of mental illness or to torture or kill people without leaving evidence of the committed crime.

We still believe as well that you are aware of the crisis of democracy created by the governments’ secret possession of means enabling them to remotely manipulate the minds of their citizens. This is in frightening conflict with the constitutions of the European Union Member States.

We still hope that you will stick to the values of respect for human dignity, freedom and democracy embedded in the Treaty on European Union and will work for the ban of the use of technologies which make it possible to deprive people of their personal freedom and freedom of thought creating thus totalitarian regimes of a new type.

More scientific information on those weapons of mass destruction, much more dangerous than chemical or biological weapons, which are already subjected to international ban, readers may find in the book “Discovery of Mind Control and History of Psychotronic War” – electronic copy of the book can be ordered at the address [email protected] for $9.99

The petition to the European Parliament you can sign at the address below:    http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/ben-remote-attacks-on-the-human-nervous-system

Signed by Mojmir Babacek, citizen of the Czech Republic, Chairman of The Citizen’s Association for the Ban of Manipulation of Human Nervous System by Radiofrequency Radiation (Spolek za zákaz manipulace lidské nervové soustavy radiforekvenčním zářením) residing at the address.

Also signed by:

International Coalition Against Electronic Torture and Robotisation of Living Beings (ICATOR)
Chairwoman: Melanie Vritschan

STOPEG Foundation – Stop Electronic Weapons and Gang Stalking – Netherlands
Chairman: Peter Mooring

IGEF – Initiative Gegen Elektromagnetische Folter – Deutschland
Chairman: Harald Brems

STOPZET – Stowarzyszenie, Stop Zorganizowanym Elektronicznym Torturom   –  Poland
Chairwoman: Zofia Filipiak

ADVHER – Association de Défense des Victimes de Harcèlement Electromagnétique et en Réseau – France  
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ACOFOINMENEF
Associazione contro ogni forma di controllo ed interferenza mentale e neurofisiologica – Italia
Chairman: Paolo Dorigo

European Coalition against Covert Harassment
Legal advisor: Henning Witte

Globalthaeb – Great Britain
Chairman: David Bromhall

LESAT – London End Stalking Action Group – Great Britain
Chairman: Paolo Fiora, e-mail

I recently awoke from a rather pleasant dream in which members of Congress and the President embraced the unique proposition that they had been elected to serve the People of the United States.

Congress had determined that healthcare was a matter of right (by simply reducing the age at which a person qualified for Medicare to birth) and that every child should have free access to a college education.

Having thus dedicated the fortunes of the Nation to the future of its children, the members of Congress—conservatives, liberals, and independents alike—collaborated on how to best pay for these commitments and to reform the income tax system. In their wisdom, they decided to transform the taxation system into a tiny financial toll tax on the movement of all money in the economy, effectively transferring the tax burden from workers and small business owners to the wealthy, large corporations, and financial institutions.

THE PROBLEM

Presently, one-quarter of all large U.S. corporations, two-thirds of all small corporations, and most foreign companies doing business in the United States pay no federal income tax—even though they book trillions of dollars in receipts every year and take advantage of America’s courts and infrastructure to make their profits.

Estimated tax revenues for the 2018 fiscal year are $3.6 trillion, most of which will be paid by ordinary taxpayers. Income taxes are $1.88 trillion; Social Security contributions are $878 billion; Medicare payments equal $268 billion; and $56 billion are withheld for unemployment insurance. Customs and import tariffs will amount to $144 billion, while corporations will only pay $478 billion. Individual income taxes and payroll taxes presently account for four out of every five federal revenue dollars!

Even with all of this revenue, the United States will not balance its budget. Because of deficit spending, government debt now amounts to more than $20 trillion. Of this debt, $1.3 trillion is owed to China, and $5.5 trillion is owed to the government itself, including almost $3 trillion to the Social Security Trust Fund. At the current rate, the Congressional Budget Office projects that the debt will amount to 150 percent of the Gross Domestic Product by 2047.

The Internal Revenue Service reports the voluntary compliance rate of Americans who pay their taxes is 81.7 percent; however, it estimates that more than $458 billion in legitimately owed taxes are criminally evaded each year. The attorney-client “Panama Papers” leaked in 2015 demonstrated how easily wealthy individuals, including politicians, use offshore companies to hide money from tax authorities.

It is difficult for workers, whose income taxes are withheld from their paychecks, and small business owners, who have to file and pay quarterly, to avoid taxes. However, with the federal tax code presently consisting of 74,608 pages, it is easy for the wealthy and large corporations to rely on attorneys, and the loopholes created for their benefit, to avoid paying their fair share of federal taxes. Present “reforms” under consideration by the President and Congress will further shift the burden of taxation to workers and small business owners.

Writing in the Fourth Century BCE, the Greek philosopher Plato said,

“When there is an income tax, the just man will pay more and the unjust less on the same amount of income.”

Nothing has changed, nor will it, unless something different is done.

THE SOLUTION

Following the collapse of the banking industry in 2008, proposals were made to target a special tax on financial transactions—not only to raise tax revenues to help pay for the bailout—but to restrain the insane financial gambling that caused the crash. Taking into account the amount of stocks, bonds, commodities, currencies, and futures that are bought and sold every day, the shuffling of funds between banks, and the massive trading of over-the-counter derivatives, trillions and trillions of dollars are being gambled in an economic casino that has little to do with the efforts of most working people and small business owners. It does, however, have everything to do with their lives, their economic stability, and the future happiness of their children.

Many, if not most, of these financial transactions escape all taxation, as they are not defined as “income.” This is true, even though the banks are gambling with sophisticated trading software that allows them to place high-speed bets that cheat ordinary investors and destabilize the markets.

A financial transaction tax was proposed in 1972 by James Tobin, a Yale professor who won the Nobel Prize for economics. It was Dr. Tobin’s view that the world economy was being disrupted by currency speculation in which money moved around the world as bets on the fluctuations in exchange rates. He believed that the imposition of a small tax on every currency transaction would disrupt the currency gamblers, while imposing a trivial burden on those legitimately engaged in foreign trade or long-term investment.

Expanding on the idea of a currency speculation tax, wouldn’t it be more sensible and much fairer to simply tax the movement of all money in the U.S. economy—instead of taxing personal and corporate income? Not a sales tax, not a value-added tax, not a flat income tax, not even a speculation tax, but rather a simple toll on every single financial transaction that occurs within the economic system. Not just every time someone buys a pack of chewing gum, but every time stocks and bonds are bought and sold, every time currencies and derivatives are traded, and every time General Motors buys a new robot to replace its assembly-line workers.

In one year (2012), the Chicago Board of Trade processed nearly three billion contracts that were worth approximately $1 quadrillion in notional value. In 2013, the daily trading value of transactions at the New York Stock Exchange exceeded $169 billion, or $42.5 trillion during the year. In order to maintain liquidity requirements, banks make overnight short-term loans to each other amounting to approximately $200 billion each day, or $50.4 trillion each year. One percent of these transactions—alone—would amount to almost $11 trillion dollars a year.

Since the working-, middle- and small-business-classes have far fewer and much smaller financial transactions, the wealthy and the multinational corporations—who spend a lot of money to avoid having any “taxable” income—would have to share proportionally in paying the toll for their traffic on the economic highway and their use of the People’s courts and institutions to enforce their contracts and to facilitate their profits. Why should so many of the largest corporations completely escape the payment of any taxes?

It is likely that the federal government could operate on the revenues produced by a simple transaction tax of far less than five percent on the movement of all money. As a result, the payment of taxes would shift from individuals and small businesses to large corporations, and from the laboring poor to the wealthy elite.

Envision the effect of a slight touch every time money moves, a tiny ka-ching in the U.S. Treasury’s cash register, which in the aggregate could quickly add up to trillions of dollars each year. How nice it would be to have Congress to first decide what the People of the United States need from their government and to then calculate what the toll tax rate should be to produce the revenue required to pay for it. The result would be significant; public debt could be eliminated, and the United States could finally achieve a balanced budget every year.

Imagine that most people would only have to pay an annual tax rate of a few percent on their spending (income). Of course, the transaction tax would result in a small increase in the overall cost of the goods and services people purchase; however, the toll would apply to all financial transactions, including the purchase of limousines, helicopters, and mansions by the wealthy—who rely on every imaginable scheme to avoid having any “income” upon which to pay taxes.

Those who enjoy luxuries would pay more for them, and those who gamble in the money markets would have to pay for their visit to the economic casino.

In a regulatory sense, a universal financial toll tax would operate somewhat like the income tax in that individuals and corporations would have to prepare an annual tax report, rather than as a sales tax where the revenue is collected at the point of purchase. For most individuals, small businesses, and corporations, the preparation of tax returns would be greatly simplified.

A transaction tax was believed to pose impossible accounting problems when first proposed by James Tobin 40 years ago; however, computer technology now allows for the instantaneous calculation and posting of all financial transactions. Just as the income tax contributions of workers are withheld from their payroll checks every week, it should be possible for the tax on corporate financial transactions be paid every single day at the close of business.

CONCLUSION

The People do not have to willing endure corrupt government and unfair taxation. Those who pay the taxes must make the essential decisions about the methods of taxation and the level of payment. Otherwise, the People live in slavery and any freedoms are illusionary.

According to the Syrian News Agency SANA, the US led Coalition has carried out targeted airstrikes against a chemical weapons depot in Hatla, east of Deir Ezzor. The depot is held by ISIS-Daesh  terrorists:  

 The  General Command of the Army and Armed Forces said that the aircrafts of the so-called “US-led International Alliance” on Wednesday between the hour 17:30 and 17:50 carried out an airstrike against a position of ISIS terrorists that includes a large number of foreign mercenaries in the village of Hatla to the east of Deir Ezzor, causing a white cloud that became yellow as a result of the explosion of a huge store that includes a large amount of toxic materials.

Several hundred deaths were recorded:

In a statement issued Thursday, the Army General Command  stressed that the airstrike of the “US-led International Alliance” killed hundreds, including large numbers of civilians, due to the suffocation resulted from inhaling toxic substances.

Sofar, the Western media has not reported this tragic incident, the details of which remain to be fully corroborated.

The report issued by the Syrian military confirms that the ISIS-Daesh “rebels” (who are supported covertly by the Western military alliance and its Middle East allies including Saudi Arabia and Qatar) are in possession of toxic chemical weapons.

Previous media reports (CNN) confirm that they Syrian opposition rebels were trained on contract to the Pentagon by Western specialists in the use of chemical weapons. A comprehensive 2013 UN report confirms that the opposition rebels used chemical weapons against SAA soldiers and civilians.

It is worth noting that a large number of foreign mercenaries were reported in the area targeted by US-led coalition airstrikes.

The Thursday attack followed Russia’s veto on Wednesday of a U.N. Security Council resolution regarding the April 4 chemical weapons  attack. The vote on the Security Council resolution drafted by Britain, France and the United States was 10 in favor, Russia and Bolivia against, with China, Kazakhstan and Ethiopia abstaining.

It is worth noting that the casualties resulting from Thursday’s airstrikes are far more serious, according to the initial Syrian government report, than those pertaining to the April 4 CW attack.

While there is no proof yet either way, there are good reasons to at least consider the prospect that the sarin gas attack on civilians in Syria this week could have been a “false flag” operation. The last time Syrian president Bashar al Assad supposedly used chemical weapons, the story quickly collapsed under scrutiny. The more likely scenario, according to United Nations investigators and virtually every credible analyst who looked at the 2013 crime, was that globalist-backed jihadist “rebels” used the chemicals in a “false-flag” scheme. The goal: Blame Syrian authorities in a bid to trigger U.S. government intervention against Assad.

Foreign officials and more than a few prominent analysts have suggested the same deception may have just played out once again, albeit more successfully this time. Former Congressman and longtime non-interventionist Ron Paul, for example, declared that there was “zero chance” that Assad had ordered the chemical attack. “It doesn’t make any sense for Assad under these conditions to all of a sudden use poisonous gases,” he said, noting that the situation for Assad and his regime was looking better until the chemical attack this week. In a tweet that sparked headlines around the world, Paul called the attack a “false flag.”

Syrian officials were among the first to allege that a false-flag operation was underway in the chemical attack that killed over 100 civilians in northern Syria this week. In a statement released by the Assad regime’s Foreign Ministry, authorities denied responsibility for the deadly attack. Instead, the regime said the gruesome killings with banned weapons were actually a “premeditated action that aimed to justify the launching of a U.S. attack on the Syrian army.” The regime claims it destroyed all its WMDs under United Nations supervision years ago. Russian authorities, allied with Assad, agreed.

Of course, even if Damascus did use chemical weapons on civilians, it would be unlikely to admit that. But a simple analysis of motives — a basic first step in any serious investigation — would suggest that Assad had every reason to avoid the use of chemical weapons at all costs. On the other hand, jihadist rebels on the verge of annihilation had every reason to use them. After years of fighting globalist-backed jihadists and terrorists, the dictatorship in Damascus was reportedly close to victory — at least until Trump intervened by firing dozens of missiles at Syrian targets.

Russian authorities, which have stood by Assad in the war against jihadist groups backed by Western governments and Sunni dictatorships, echoed the claims of Syrian officials and blasted certain globalist governments for being “obsessed” with regime change in Syria. Kremlin officials suggested that a strike by Assad’s war planes in the rebel-held area hit a jihadist weapons-production depot that was manufacturing chemical weapons for terrorists in the region. That explanation would appear to make more sense, multiple analysts said.

Russian officials, also citing intelligence, were unequivocal in explaining what happened.

“Yesterday [Tuesday], from 11:30am to 12:30pm local time, Syrian aviation made a strike on a large terrorist ammunition depot and a concentration of military hardware in the eastern outskirts of Khan Sheikhoun town,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konoshenkov was quoted as saying in media reports. “On the territory of the depot there were workshops which produced chemical warfare munitions.”

Western governments and supposed “experts” trotted out by establishment propaganda organs promptly ridiculed the claims. Instead, they claimed to have alleged “intelligence” that supposedly showed Assad was guilty. Despite the non-stop videos on TV of dying children likely played for emotional manipulation, the alleged intelligence proving Assad’s guilt was not released to the public. First, the attack had Assad’s “fingerprints” on it, alleged “anonymous” and potentially fake “U.S. intelligence” sources were quoted as saying. Then, there was “no doubt.”

However, when Obama cited alleged “intelligence” purporting to blame Assad for a similar 2013 attack, a very similar situation unfolded. Top Obama officials claimed with certainty that their “intelligence” proved Assad was guilty. But as the days, weeks, and months went on, it quickly became evident to virtually every credible analyst that it was, in fact, the Obama-backed jihadist rebels who had used chemical weapons in a bid to set up Assad’s regime for elimination via international intervention. Only a massive outcry by Americans and Congress stopped the plot.

But the evidence showing what really happened was clear. A 2014 MIT report and analysis on that attack the year prior, for example, offered evidence that the Obama administration almost certainly used deception and bogus “intelligence” in its failed bid to more deeply embroil the United States and its military in Syria’s ongoing war. Entitled “Possible Implications of Faulty U.S. Technical Intelligence,” the report found the nerve-agent attack in Syria “could not possibly” have come from the center or even the Eastern edge of regime-controlled territory. Other evidence also showed that the rebels, not the regime, deployed the chemical weapons.

Citing “egregious errors in the intelligence,” the explosive MIT report warned that the process by which those errors were made must be rectified to avoid future tragedy.

“If the source of these errors is not identified, the procedures that led to this intelligence failure will go uncorrected, and the chances of a future policy disaster will grow with certainty,” concluded the authors, former United Nations weapons inspector Richard Lloyd and MIT Science, Technology, and National Security Policy Professor Theodore Postol.

It seems likely that the warning went unheeded, and many of the same “Deep State” operatives behind the previous scam remain employed in the federal bureaucracy.

U.S. officials already knew that the jihadist “rebels” had access to chemical weapons at the time of that 2013 attack, too. A classified U.S. military document obtained by WND the month after the attack confirmed that al-Qaeda-led fighters with the “rebel” Jabhat al-Nusra Front in Syria, which top officials admitted was supported and armed by Obama’s “coalition,” were in possession of sarin gas. U.S. officials knew that because about five pounds of the toxic gas was confiscated from the terror group earlier that same year by authorities in Turkey.

And after the previous use of chemical weapons in Syria, which Obama claimed was perpetrated by Assad, even UN investigators concluded “rebels” were responsible.

“Our investigators have been in neighboring countries interviewing victims, doctors and field hospitals and, according to their report of last week which I have seen, there are strong, concrete suspicions but not yet incontrovertible proof of the use of Sarin gas, from the way the victims were treated,” said Carla Del Ponte, the former attorney general of Switzerland and a member of the UN independent commission of inquiry on Syria. “This was use on the part of the opposition, the rebels, not by the government authorities.”

According to a January 29, 2013, article published by leading British newspaper the Daily Mail, the Obama administration actually backed a scheme to have jihadist rebels use chemical weapons — and then blame it on Assad. The article, which received widespread publicity at the time but has since been deleted for reasons that remain unclear, pointed to an alleged leaked e-mail from defense contractor Britam. The December, 2012, document in question refers to chemical weapons and claims the scheme is “approved by Washington.”

Ironically, certain Western governments, as well as establishment and globalist war propaganda organs, pretended to be shocked at the mere mention of the term false flag following the latest attack. However, more than a few establishment sources suggested the recent terrorist attack in St. Petersburg, Russia, may have been just such an event. Putin‘s regime has previously been accused — credibly — of having staged such attacks as a pretext to advance certain policies. But the double standard is glaring. How establishment propaganda organs can be so sure that designated terror groups and jihadists — or rogue Western bureaucrats — would not perpetrate a false flag was not explained.

Just last month, though, left-wing extremist Noam Chomsky suggested President Trump might stage a false-flag terrorist attack to rally his supporters and distract from his failure to follow through on his promises.

“We shouldn’t put aside the possibility that there would be some kind of staged or alleged terrorist act, which can change the country instantly,” Chomsky declared, with establishment media voices dutifully reporting the remarks by the “left-wing intellectual” as if they were perfectly sane and reasonable.

A false-flag attack by an embattled jihadist terror group in Syria with nothing left to lose is almost certainly a more likely possibility than a false flag by Trump to rally supporters.

Already, smoking-gun evidence exists proving that the globalist establishment was willing to facilitate unspeakable crimes to remove Assad from power. In fact, the Obama administration, Sunni Muslim dictators, and others were so determined to achieve regime change that they were willing to support a rebellion that they knew was led by al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood, according to a 2012 U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency document. That same document outlines an illegal plot to help create a “salafist principality” — known today as the Islamic State, or ISIS — in Eastern Syria to destabilize Assad. Trump is well aware of this scheme. And top Obama officials admitted it in public.

Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.), among America’s most prominent lawmakers, has taken what may be the most sensible approach to the issue: Demanding to see the evidence. Speaking of Assad, Paul said

“he’s either the dumbest dictator in the world, or it may be more confusing.”

Speaking on The Laura Ingraham Show, the senator noted the obvious: It would not make sense for Assad to use such weapons when he was winning the war, had strong Russian support, and had already learned that the Trump administration was abandoning the Obama administration’s failed “regime change” scheming. “I would like to see the evidence,” Paul added, saying he did not dispute it but would like to see it.

To the horror of some of Trump’s most loyal and important supporters, many of the same establishment-globalist institutions such as the Council on Foreign Relations that dominated Obama’s warmongering administration have burrowed their way into Trump’s administration, too. And that is despite Trump’s oft-repeated promise to fight against globalism, the warmongering establishment, and other evils. The Trump administration should present whatever evidence it has about the source of the latest attack to Congress and the public. That way, Americans and their representatives can judge the facts for themselves instead of relying on warmongering “deep state” bureaucrats and their discredited propagandists in the establishment media.

Alex Newman, a foreign correspondent for The New American, is normally based in Europe. Follow him on Twitter @ALEXNEWMAN_JOU or on Facebook. He can be reached at [email protected].

The Trump administration accuses the Syrian government of using chemical weapons, and claims this is a rare occurrence from a rogue government.

Not only did Sean Spicer say that Hitler never used chemical weapons, but Secretary of Defense Mattis said:

Even in World War II chemical weapons were not used on battlefields. Even in World War II, chemical weapons were not used on battlefields. Even in the Korean War, they were not used on battlefields.

***

Since World War I there’s been an international convention on this.

But U.S. used chemical weapons against civilians in Iraq in 2004. Evidence here, here, here, here, here, here.  The use of those weapons greatly increased the rate of birth defects.

The U.S. armed and supported Iraq after it invaded Iran and engaged in a long, bloody war which included the use of chemical weapons. The U.S. provided chemical weapons to Saddam Hussein to use against Iran.

Here is former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld meeting with Saddam in the 1980’s, several months after Saddam had used chemical weapons in a massacre:

Moreover, the U.S. and Britain have been dropping depleted uranium in virtually every country they fight, which causes severe health problems. See this, this, this and this.

University of California at Irvine professor of Middle Eastern history Mark LeVine writes:

Not only did the US aid the use of chemical weapons by the former Iraqi government, it also used chemical weapons on a large scale during its 1991 and 2003 invasions of Iraq, in the form of depleted-uranium (DU) ammunition.

As Dahr Jamail’s reporting for Al Jazeera has shown, the use of DU by the US and UK has very likely been the cause not only of many cases of Gulf War Syndrome suffered by Iraq war veterans, but also of thousands of instances of birth defects, cancer and other diseases – causing a “large-scale public health disaster” and the “highest rate of genetic damage in any population ever studied” – suffered by Iraqis in areas subjected to frequent and intense attacks by US and allied occupation forces.

And Israel has been accused of using depleted uranium in Syria.

Israeli also used white phosphorous in 2009 during “Operation Cast Lead” (and perhaps subsequently).  Israel ratified Protocol III of Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (“Protocol III”) – which outlaws the use of incendiary devices in war – in 2007. So this was a war crime.

Moreover, the 1925 Geneva Protocol (which is different from Protocol III) prohibits “the use in war of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases”.

The use of White phosphorus (“WP”) may also be a war crime under other international treaties and domestic U.S. laws. For example, the Battle Book, published by the U.S. Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, contains the following sentence: “It is against the law of land warfare to employ WP against personnel targets.”

The U.S. National Safety Council states that “White phosphorus is a poison . . . If its combustion occurs in a confined space, white phosphorus will remove the oxygen from the air and render the air unfit to support life . . . It is considered a dangerous disaster hazard because it emits highly toxic fumes”. The EPA has listed white phosphorus as a Hazardous Air Pollutant.

Indeed, it is interesting to note that the U.S. previously called white phosphorous a chemical weapon when Saddam used it against the Kurds.

And Saudi Arabia is currently using U.S. supplied white phosphorous in Yemen.

It is therefore hypocritical for the U.S., Britain or Israel to say that we should bomb Syria because the government allegedly used chemical weapons.

Postscript: Ironically, many intelligence and military officials say that Syrian government did not use chemical weapons.

On the other hand, two Turkish Parliament members said that Turkey provided chemical weapons to Islamic jihadists for the 2013 chemical weapons attack which was blamed on the Syrian government.

And see this.

The Trump /Syria Conundrum: Will Trump Deliver Deep State’s World War?

By Larry Chin, April 12 2017

In appearance, Trump’s April 6, 2017 missile attack on Syria is the first step towards a regime change, a massive regional conquest, and possibly World War III. The event marked a point of no return for Trump’s presidency. We have entered uncharted territory, with the future of humanity at stake.

Canada’s Support for Terrorism in Syria

By Mark Taliano, April 12 2017

Canadians like to think of themselves as “progressive”.  They think that President Assad gasses his own people, and they think that Assad must go. We already know what happens in terrorist-occupied areas of Syria, so presumably Canadians support this as well.

Australia Beckons a War with China

By John Pilger, April 12 2017

Australia is sleep-walking into a confrontation with China. Wars can happen suddenly in an atmosphere of mistrust and provocation, especially if a minor power, like Australia, abandons its independence for an “alliance” with an unstable superpower.

Rwanda’s President Kagame’s Jobs Program: War

By Etienne Masozera, April 12 2017

The Rwandan political opposition coalition would like to condemn in the strongest terms possible the sickening cynicism of Rwandan Gen. Mubarak towards vulnerable people, like survivors of genocide, his sectarianism and incitement to hatred against survivors of genocide as well as the thinly veiled policy of regional destabilization and expansionist policies.

Historical Origins of the State: Barbarians at the Gate

By Arthur D. Robbins, April 12 2017

War has indeed become perpetual and peace no longer even a fleeting wish nor a distant memory. We have become habituated to the rumblings of war and the steady drum beat of propaganda about war’s necessity and the noble motives that inspire it. We will close hospitals. We will close schools. We will close libraries and museums. We will sell off our parklands and water supply. People will sleep on the streets and go hungry. The war machine will go on. What are we to do?

It is not possible to overstate the impact on U.S. and global politics of Trump’s unilateral, surprise cruise missile strikes on Syria at the very moment that he was having dinner with China’s President Xi Jinping.

War has indeed become perpetual and peace no longer even a fleeting wish nor a distant memory. We have become habituated to the rumblings of war and the steady drum beat of propaganda about war’s necessity and the noble motives that inspire it. We will close hospitals. We will close schools. We will close libraries and museums. We will sell off our parklands and water supply. People will sleep on the streets and go hungry. The war machine will go on.

What are we to do? The following text is Part III of  a broader analysis entitled War and the State: Business as Usual.

Link to War and the State: Part 1

Link to War and the State: Part 2

The State is a modern invention. It was conceived in violence and has been true to its origins ever since. Rome was in its decline. The barbarians were at the gates. Beginning in the 5th century, Germanic tribes descended from the North, via Scandinavia.  Germanic tribes with names like Franks, Angles, Saxons, Lombards, Burgundians, Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Vandals plundered their way across Europe, destroying and killing at will, lending their names to the plots where they settled. “From these raw, belligerent kingdoms rose the first modern nation-states…”(Simons, 13). Their society was a simple one, “explicitly organized for one activity, the making of war.” (Simons, 16)

These are our ancestors, wantonly laying waste the land, giddy with rapine and the glory of conquest, whooping it up with yelps and war cries, the wandering herds tearing into each other with gusto, as do their modern counterparts. These are our ancestors and it is on their bones that our modern civilization (sic) has been erected. War is not incidental to modern society. It is at its core, inscribed in its DNA.

THE FRANKS

The Franks were one of the more civilized tribes, showing signs of Roman influence. However, they were persistent in asserting their power and establishing dominion. To them we owe the birth of the State. In 481, Clovis (of Merovingian lineage) became King of the Franks. “Brutal, ignorant and totally amoral, he stole treasure, split skulls and collected concubines with alarming gusto.” (Simons, 59) Shrewd, nonetheless, he took a Catholic bride and had himself baptized. Joining violence and faith, perhaps for the first time, Clovis succeeded in subduing the Visigoths, guilty of the Arian heresy, 1 driving them out of Gaul (latter day France) and thus endearing himself to the Catholic Church.

The Merovingians slipped into decline, “a dismal catalogue of treachery, murder and mutiliation” (Simons, 60) and were replaced by the Carolingians whose mighty leader, “big, bull-necked and pot-bellied,” (Simons, 101) inherited the throne in 768, expanded the Frankish realm to include much of Western Europe and ruled for forty-six years as Charlemagne (Charles the Great).

Next came the Vikings “who descended upon the continent in a wild orgy of plunder and mayhem” (Simons, 125). The Danes, Swedes and Norwegians were even scarier and more ferocious than the Germanic tribes whom they repeatedly crushed.  With leaders like Eric Bloodax, Harald Bluetooth, Ivar the Boneless, the Norsemen terrorized the population who found no escape and no reprieve. Carolingian rulers proved unequal to the task. In 987, Hugh Capet ascended to the throne. The House of Capet held power until 1328, to be replaced by the House of Valois (1328-1589).

In September of 1494 the French barbarian known to history as Charles VIII got it into his head to invade Italy. Ostensibly this adventure had as its purpose Charles’ wish to lay claim to a throne that he believed was legitimately his. In simpler terms Charles had time on his hands and was looking for some excitement, which, as is often the case, entailed killing off anyone who got in his way. He decimated the countryside and destabilized governments as he went. This is personal whim. It is sport, like hunting fox.

Over the next six decades, under three different kings, France invaded Italy six times. “The violence wreaked on Italy devastated its countryside and destabilized its city-states, which became hapless pawns in a vast chess game beyond their playing abilities (Porter, 41), with major consequences for Italian political development over the following four hundred years.

Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain were incensed about what was going on in Italy and so put their iron in the fire. Eventually England joined the fray. So, in essence, we had our first World War, which is why 1494 is considered to be the birth date of the modern era, the era of incessant warfare.

The modern era of warfare meant longer wars, wars waged at a distance, entailing the mobilization of men and equipment far from home and the killing of a lot of people in a short period of time. At Ravenna in 1512, a single cannon ball felled thirty-three men. In Novara in 1513, cannon fire killed seven hundred men in three minutes (Porter, 41).

The French extended their Statist reach via The House of Bourbon (1589-1792), which found its most thorough going Statist in the person of Louis XIV (1643-1715). Under Louis XIV power was consolidated and centralized in a way that had never been done before in the Western world. When Louis, “the Sun King” said “l’État, c’est moi,” [“I am the State”] he wasn’t kidding. He ruled for seventy-two years and 110 days, the longest of any major monarch in European history. Single handedly he created the modern State with its standing army, taxation and bureaucracy, its unrelenting quest for dominion and fealty.

THE ANGLES AND THE SAXONS

England —initially settled by Britons sometime in the Iron Age — has a similar barbaric ancestry. The Saxon tribe — renowned for their vicious cruelty —began their invasion in the 5th century. They met up with some stiff resistance, resulting in a piecemeal conquest and the formation of “a number of petty, contentious kingdoms rather than a single realm.” (Simons, 35)

The German tribes were followed by the Vikings — principally Danes — who at first confined themselves to pillaging and then fleeing with their booty. Around the middle of the 9th century they began to settle down in central and eastern England in a territory that came to be known as “Danelaw,” putting themselves in opposition to the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms to the south and west. The outcome was ongoing warfare that lasted for more than century.

“Edward the Confessor” ascended to the throne in 1043 and established “a political unity which could not be matched elsewhere in Europe.” (Barlow, 3) As in France there was a string of Houses — family lines — one replacing the other without substantially betraying their barbaric roots. Up to 1707, there were ten Houses in Britain, starting with the House of Wessex under Alfred the Great in 871, to be followed by Denmark, Normandy, Blois, Anjou, Plantagenet, Lancaster, York, Tudor and Stuart. And there was a gaggle of Edwards, Henrys and Richards to occupy the throne, often one replacing the other by means of treachery and bloodshed. (See Wikipedia, “List of monarchs of the British Isles by cause of death.”)

In 1296, Edward I invaded Scotland, a civilization that predated England’s and exceeded it in intellectual distinction. When the town of Berwick resisted, the town was sacked and its 8000 inhabitants slaughtered.

In 1327 Edward II was supposedly murdered in Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire after a metal tube and a red-hot poker were inserted into his anus. Allegedly by Sir John Maltravers of Dorset.

On December 10, 1394 James I was assassinated by a group of Scots led by Sir Robert Graham.

Henry VI was imprisoned in the Tower of London on December 6, 1421 and there  was murdered.

In 1537, Jane was beheaded.

Mary I was executed on December 8, 1542.

Charles I followed a similar fate on November 19, 1600

Richard II died in captivity in 1400 at Pontefract Castle where he was either murdered or starved to death.

In November 1470, Edward V was imprisoned in the Tower of London and died from unknown causes.

June 3 1865, George V was expedited by lethal injection administered by his doctor.

I don’t know about you but for me this all has a whiff of barbarism about it. But of course this is not even the tip of the proverbial iceberg if barbarism is what we are looking for.

The mentality of entitlement and empire building that characterize the British ruling class can be traced to their barbarian ancestors, of whom they are so proud, competing with each other for whose roots go deeper.

It was the barbarians who began the practice of invading other lands at will, ravaging the countryside and villages, making their own what belonged to someone else. The only justification for such actions was the wish to so behave, the blood lust of the barbaric nomad.

The blood lust of the barbaric nomad became the founding ethos of the British ruling class. After all, the British Empire was not a natural occurrence. Scotland, Ireland, India had to be occupied, resistance crushed, economies transformed to satisfy the wishes of the invading host. “What is yours is mine” is the barbarian mantra as it is of the British ruling class.

THE UNITED STATES IN THE MIDDLE EAST

Not to be outdone by its European ancestors, the United States of America has donned its barbaric mantel with great pride and has become the apotheosis of Statism. The sack of Rome by the Vandals in 410 was civilized when compared with the sack of Baghdad in 2003. (See GPF below) Americans oversaw the destruction and looting of libraries, museums and archaeological sites. About a quarter of the total book collection of the National Library of Baghdad was looted or burned, including rare books and newspapers.  The Central Library of the University of Basra went up in flames, with a loss of at least 70% of its collections.

Thieves looted the National Museum and took 14-15,000 objects altogether, including coins, sculpture, ceramics, metalwork, architectural fragments, cuneiform tablets and most of the Museum’s collection of valuable Sumerian cylindrical seals. Outside Baghdad, looters and thieves attacked the Mosul Museum. They stole hundreds of objects, including sixteen bronze Assyrian door panels from the city gates of Balawat dating back to the 9th century BC. Archaeological sites were destroyed and their contents sold to international dealers who were waiting, prepared for the organized looting that occurred. Some of the greatest Sumerian archaeological sites have disappeared.

The invasion and occupation of Iraq have resulted in the deaths of close to a million and the displacement of as many as four million. Most certainly this would have made Alaric, King of the Vandals quite proud. It is barbarism pure and simple, gratuitous killing, gratuitous destruction of a civilization.

As Patrick Martin observes, “Bush, Rumsfeld and company personify the new barbarians: a ‘leader’ who is himself only semi-literate and wallows in religious backwardness; an administration populated by former corporate CEOs for whom an artifact of ancient Sumer is of more interest as a tax shelter than as a key to the historical and cultural development of mankind.”

Here is another, more recent example of barbarism. In 2011, Presidential aspirant and then Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton unleashed the savage bombing of Libya destroying the country and leading to the ethnic cleansing of a million and a half of Sub-Sahara workers and Black Libyans of sub-Saharan descent.

Libya, once boasting one of the highest standards of living among Middle East and North African countries, has been reduced to a state of lawlessness and violence where terrorists and warlords compete with each other for local power. Ms. Clinton celebrated the death by anal impalement of popularly elected Libyan President, Muammar Gaddafi and the assassination of five of his grandchildren. (Petras, May 17)  Now that is barbarism for ya, the good old fashioned kind.

We have progressed not one micron in the intervening centuries since our barbarian ancestors roamed the planet at will. We are as gratuitously violent and as greedy for booty. And as proud of our weapons as were the barbarians. And yet we are worse, much worse. We lack the courage and daring of our barbarian ancestors. In our pinstriped suits, we strategize from the comfort of our wooden paneled, air conditioned offices. We are armchair warriors. Self-righteous armchair warriors. And so proud of the lives we have taken by the millions and the civilizations we have laid low.

DESCENT INTO HELL

War is about power, personal power. It is made by men with little self-respect and even less in intellectual integrity, with no sense of the meaning or value of a human life. All the rest is propaganda, the most harmful non-mortal effect of war on society. “We have been kneaded so successfully,” says Bourne, “that we approve of what our society approves, desire what our society desires, and add to the group our own passional inertia against change, against the effort of reason, and the adventure of beauty.” (Bourne, 90)

Speaking of WWI, Bourne observes, “The kind of war we are conducting is an enterprise which the American government does not have to carry on with the hearty cooperation of the American people but only with their acquiescence. And that acquiescence seems sufficient to float an indefinitely protracted war for vague or even largely uncomprehended and unaccepted purposes.” (Bourne, 36)

Personal lust for power has taken the lives of hundreds of millions, has decimated the countryside and obliterated civilizations. In the 20th century alone over 100 million have been lost to war and state genocide. 2

Of course, this does not account for the wounded and maimed, whose number is easily twice as large, nor the destructive impact on the economy, civic life, and psychic existence of those who survive “intact.”

In the United States today, we are ruled by power addicts. They will not be sated. They lie relentlessly. They are criminally inclined. They promote war without end. These warriors have been and will be defeated on the battlefield. It changes nothing.

Bertolt Brecht wrote a play entitled, Mother Courage and her Children (1939). It is the story of a woman who tries to support herself and three children by selling sundries and sweets to soldiers in time of war. She moves from one battle scene to the next with her traveling canteen. She befriends a chaplain who has this to say about war:

Well, there’ve always been people going around saying some day the war will end. I say, you can’t be sure the war will ever end. Of course it may have to pause occasionally — for breath, as it were — it can even meet with an accident —nothing on this earth is perfect — a year of which we could say it left nothing to be desired will probably never exist. A war can come to a sudden halt — from unforeseen causes —you can’t think of everything —a little oversight, and the war’s in the hole and someone’s got to pull it out again! The someone is the Emperor or the King or the Pope. They’re such in need, the war has really nothing to worry about, it can look forward to a prosperous future.

One could argue that history is nothing but a vast battle­field after the battle is over—a mountain of the corpses of men, women, and children from around the world and across time who have been slaughtered to satisfy the warriors in their quest for blood and glory.

Finding the true meaning of war beneath the rubble is a difficult chal­lenge, because that meaning is too often obscured by those who write about it. Instead, we are offered endless volumes extolling the “heroes” who did the killing. We are taught to look up to these “great men” and to embrace a history drenched in blood. Very little is written about the dead or about the connection between the “glory” of conquest and its consequences for those who did survive—about its effects on civil soci­ety. That is, very little is written about the battlefield after the battle is over.

5TH CENTURY B.C.: THE GREEKS

We are indebted to the play­wright Aeschylus, who, in The Persians, described the aftermath of the battle of Salamis in 480 B.C.:

The hulls of our ships rolled over, and it was no longer possible to glimpse the sea, strewn as it was with the wrecks of warships and the debris of what had been men. The shores and the reefs were full of our dead, and every ship that had once been part of the fleet now tried to row its way to safety through flight. But just as if our men were tunny-fish or some sort of netted catch, the enemy kept pound­ing them and hacking them with broken oars and the flotsam from the wrecked ships. And so shrieks together with sobbing echoed over the open sea until the face of black night ended the scene. (Hanson, 30-31)

Here is another example, in which Thucydides, writing in the fifth century B.C., portrays the physical suffering and the pathos of war. He is describing the decimation of the Athenians during the course of their invasion of Sicily:

The dead lay unburied, and each man as he recognized a friend among them shuddered with grief and horror; while the living whom they were leaving behind, wounded or sick, were to the living far more shocking than the dead, and more to be pitied than those who had perished. These fell to entreating and bewailing until their friends knew not what to do, begging them to take them and loudly calling to each individual comrade or relative whom they could see, hanging upon the neck of their tent-fel­lows in the act of departure, and following as far as they could, and when their bodily strength failed them, calling again and again upon heaven and shrieking aloud as they were left behind. (Finley, 371)

Crowded in a narrow hole, without any roof to cover them, the heat of the sun and the stifling closeness of the air tormented them during the day, and then the nights, which came on autumnal and chilly, made them ill by the violence of the change; besides, as they had to do everything in the same place for want of room, and the bodies of those who died of their wounds or from the variation in the temperature, or from similar causes, were left heaped together one upon the other, intolerable stenches arose; while hunger and thirst never cease to afflict them, each man during eight months having only half a pint of water and a pint of grain given him daily. In short, no single suffering to be apprehended by men thrust into such a place was spared them. (Finley, 379)

16TH CENTURY: THE SPANISH

Early in the sixteenth century, Spanish conquistadores, led by Hernán Cortés, decided they wanted gold that wasn’t theirs. To get it, they pro­ceeded to destroy the Aztec culture and annihilate the native popula­tion. The capital of Mexico at that time was Tenochtitlan, and therein lay the Aztec treasure and Montezuma, the emperor of the Aztecs. Pedro de Alvarado, second in command, in Cortés’ absence massacred 8,000 unarmed Aztec nobility and was about to get to work on the women and children when Cortés appeared. Here is how a witness described the event:

They attacked all the celebrants, stabbing them, spearing them from behind, and these fell instantly to the ground with their entrails hanging out. Others they beheaded: they cut off their heads, or split their head to pieces. They struck others in the shoulders, and their arms were torn from the bodies. They wounded some in the thigh and some in the calf. They slashed others in the abdomen, and their entrails all spilled to the ground. Some attempted to run away, but their intestines dragged as they ran; they seemed to tangle their feet in their own entrails. [Ref]

Tenochtitlan was under siege from May through August 1521. Cortés described the carnage in a letter to his king, Charles V:

The people of the city had to walk upon their dead while others swam or drowned in the waters of that wide lake where they had their canoes; indeed, so great was their suffering that it was beyond our understand­ing how they could endure it. Countless numbers of men, women and children came toward us, and in their eagerness to escape many were pushed into the water where they drowned amid the multitude of corpses; and it seemed that more than fifty thousand had perished from the salt water they had drunk, their hunger and the vile stench. (Hanson, 192)

About 100,000 Aztecs perished in the fighting. The tally from the two-year struggle for Tenochtitlan was close to a million. Fifty years later, as a consequence of war and disease—the Europeans had brought with them measles, bubonic plague, flu, whooping cough, and mumps— the population of central Mexico had been reduced from 8 million to less than 1 million. The riches seized by the Spaniards were considerable. Between 1500 and 1650, 150 tons of gold and 16,000 tons of silver were shipped from Mexico and Peru to Spain.

19TH CENTURY: THE FRENCH

As the centuries pass, the carnage continues unabated. In 1809, Napoleon bombarded the city of Vienna. On May 21, he entered the city. A vicious battle with the Austrians ensued, just across the Danube. Napoleon got away with 19,000 in casualties, the Austrians with 24,000. In a subsequent battle on July 6, the Austrians lost 40,000, against 34,000 for the French. Thus, within a period of just six weeks, well over 100,000 men had been killed or wounded. Napo­leon’s disastrous Russian adventure of 1812 resulted in almost a million casualties. The battle of Borodino, alone, cost some 30,000 Frenchmen killed or wounded, some 45,000 Russians killed or wounded.

Inspecting the battlefield at Eylau, after what Napoleon counted as a victory, he wrote:

To visualize the scene one must imagine, within the space of three square miles, nine or ten thousand corpses; four of five thousand dead horses; rows upon rows of Russian field packs; the remnants of muskets and swords; the ground covered with cannon balls, shells, and other ammu­nition; and twenty-four artillery pieces, near which could be seen the corpses of the drivers who were killed while trying to move them—all this sharply outlined against a background of snow. (Herold, 182)

And here is the battlefield at Borodino, six weeks after the battle, as described by Count Phillipe-Paul de Ségur:

We all stared around us and saw a field, trampled, devastated, with every tree shorn off a few feet above the earth.… Everywhere the earth was lit­tered with battered helmets and breastplates, broken drums, fragments of weapons, shreds of uniforms, and blood-stained flags. Lying amid this desolation were thirty thousand half-devoured corpses. The scene was dominated by a number of skeletons lying on the crumbled slope of one of the hills; death seemed to have established its throne up there.  (Herold, 352)

The same Ségur described the French troops in retreat across a frozen Russian landscape, during the first heavy snowfall:

Everything in sight became vague, unrecognizable. Objects changed their shape; we walked without knowing where we were or what lay ahead, and anything became an obstacle.… Yet the poor wretches [the soldiers] dragged themselves along, shivering, with chattering teeth, until the snow packed under the soles of their boots, a bit of debris, a branch, or the body of a fallen comrade tripped them and threw them down. Then their moans for help went unheeded. The snow soon cov­ered them up and only low white mounds showed where they lay. Our road was strewn with these hummocks, like a cemetery. (Herold, 352-352)

To warm themselves, the troops would set a whole house afire. Ségur’s description continues:

The light of these conflagrations attracted some poor wretches whom the intensity of the cold and suffering had made delirious. They dashed for­ward in a fury, and with gnashing teeth and demoniacal laughter threw themselves into those raging furnaces, where they perished in dreadful convulsions. Their starving companions watched them die without appar­ent horror. There were even some who laid hold of the bodies disfigured and roasted by the flames, and—incredible as it may seem—ventured to carry this loathsome food to their mouths. (Herold, 356)

19TH CENTURY: THE AMERICANS

The American War of Secession in 1860, in which Northerners — under the command of the much revered Abraham Lincoln — invaded the South and obliterated its culture, destroying farms, lives and homesteads, creating mass migration and starvation, is as a good measure of what the warrior State is capable doing to its own people.

Here is a description by poet William Gilmore Simms of how things came to pass in Columbia, South Carolina.

Daily did long trains of fugitives line the roads, with wives and children, and horses and stock and cattle, seeking refuge from the pursuers . . . Half naked people cowered from the winter under bush-tents in the thickets, under the eaves of houses, under the railroad sheds, and in old cars left them along the route. . . . Habitation after habitation, village after village—one sending up its signal flames to the other, presaging for it the same fate—lighted the winter and midnight sky with crimson horrors. (Masters, 458)

20TH CENTURY: THE GERMANS

With 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles, each armed with over 1,000 pounds of explosives, Donald Trump went from scoundrel-in-chief to national hero, virtually overnight. The corporate media, the neoconservatives and most of Congress hailed Trump as strong and presidential for lobbing bombs into Syria, reportedly killing seven civilians and wounding nine.

“The instant elevation of Trump into a serious and respected war leader was palpable,” wrote Glenn Greenwald. This sends Trump a frightening message: bombing makes you popular.

Two wrongs don’t make a right. The use of chemical weapons is illegal, immoral and intolerable. If it was an intentional attack, it constitutes a war crime. Anyone responsible for the horrific April 4 events in the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun, which killed over 80 people, including at least 20 women and 30 children, should be brought to justice. But Trump’s bombing of Syria, a sovereign nation, was illegal, under both U.S. and international law.

Marine Corps Gen. Joe Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, meets with members of the coalition at a forward operating base near Qayyarah West, Iraq, April 4, 2017. (DoD Photo by Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Dominique A. Pineiro)

Trump and the prevailing U.S. national discourse rushed to judgment about who was responsible for the chemical attack – the Syrian government. An investigation by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention, was ongoing when Trump launched his missiles into Syria two days after the incident. The OPCW’s Fact-Finding Mission was already “in the process of gathering and analysing information from all available sources.”

As former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter pointed out,

“chemical attacks had been occurring inside Syria on a regular basis . . . with some being attributed to the Syrian government (something the Syrian government vehemently denies), and the majority being attributed to the anti-regime fighters, in particular those affiliated with Al Nusra Front, an Al Qaeda affiliate.”

The Assad government has denied responsibility for the Khan Sheikhoun chemical attack, and some U.S. experts are also skeptical of the Trump administration’s supposed certainty that the Syrian military was responsible.

Philip Giraldi, former CIA officer and director of the Council for the National Interest, stated on the Scott Horton show that “military and intelligence personnel” in the Middle East, who are “intimately familiar” with the intelligence, call the allegation that Assad or Russia carried out the attack a “sham.”

Giraldi said the intelligence confirms the Russian account,

“which is that they [attacking aircraft] hit a warehouse where al-Qaeda rebels were storing chemicals of their own and it basically caused an explosion that resulted in the casualties.” Moreover, Giraldi noted, “Assad had no motive for doing this.”

Journalist Robert Parry concurs:

“Assad’s military had gained a decisive advantage over the rebels and he had just scored a major diplomatic victory with the Trump administration’s announcement that the U.S. was no longer seeking ‘regime change’ in Syria. The savvy Assad would know that a chemical weapon attack now would likely result in U.S. retaliation and jeopardize the gains that his military had achieved with Russian and Iranian help.”

Regardless of who is responsible for the Khan Sheikhoun chemical deaths, however, Trump’s response violated both U.S. and international law.

Trump’s Missile Attack Was Illegal

Two days after Trump’s bombing occurred, the President sent a letter to congressional leaders informing them of his attack on Syria. The War Powers Resolution, passed in the wake of the Vietnam War, requires that the President report to Congress within 60 days of initiating the use of military force.

The guided-missile destroyer USS Porter conducts strike operations while in the Mediterranean Sea, April 7, 2017. (Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Ford Williams)

The resolution, however, allows the President to introduce U.S. Armed Forces into hostilities or imminent hostilities in only three situations: First, after Congress has declared war, which has not happened in this case; second, in “a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces,” which has not occurred; third, when there is “specific statutory authorization,” which there is not.

The 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) authorized the President to use force only against those groups and countries that had supported the 9/11 attacks. The bombing in Syria was not authorized by any other act of Congress. Thus, Trump’s missile attack violated the War Powers Resolution. 

Regarding international law, the United Nations Charter prohibits the “use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” There are only two exceptions: when conducted in self-defense after an armed attack, or with the approval of the Security Council.

Syria had not attacked the United States or any other country before Trump ordered the missile strike. “The use of chemical weapons within Syria is not an armed attack on the United States,” said Notre Dame law professor Mary Ellen O’Connell. And the Security Council had not approved Trump’s attack. It therefore violated the Charter. In fact, under the U.N. Charter, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad would have a valid self-defense claim since the U.S. initiated an armed attack on Syria.

So, Trump committed an illegal act of aggression against Syria when he lobbed his missiles. According to U.N. General Assembly Resolution 3314, an “act of aggression” is the use of armed force by a state against the sovereignty, territorial integrity, or political independence of another state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Charter. As stated above, Trump’s attack constituted an unlawful use of force under the Charter.

Moreover, treaties the United States has ratified, including the Charter, are part of domestic U.S. law under the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. That means a violation of the Charter also violates U.S. law.

Marines fast-rope out of an SH-60 Seahawk during an exercise on the USS Bataan at sea, March 29, 2017. The Bataan is supporting maritime security operations and theater security cooperation efforts in the 5th Fleet area of operation. (Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Brianna Gaudi)

In his report to Congress, Trump wrote that he directed the attack to avert “a worsening of the region’s current humanitarian crisis.” So-called “humanitarian intervention” is not a settled norm of international law. As stated above, to be lawful, military force can only be conducted in self-defense or with the blessing of the Security Council. Neither was present in this case.

Trump’s humanitarian claim also does not pass the straight face test, in light of his Muslim Ban excluding all Syrian refugees from entry into the United States (halted by the courts, for now). Since the conflict in Syria began in 2011, more than 400,000 Syrians have been killed. Five million people are refugees. If Trump were indeed motivated by humanitarian concerns, Trump would embrace those seeking to escape the carnage in Syria, which he has emphatically not done.

The 1980 Refugee Act grants the President authority to determine how many refugees may be admitted to the United States. The President must consider whether “the admission of certain refugees in response to the emergency refugee situation is justified by grave humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest.”

When, during the presidential campaign, Trump said he wanted to ban all Syrian refugees from entering the U.S., he was asked if he could then “look children aged five, eight, ten, in the face and tell them they can’t go to school here.” Without skipping a beat, Trump replied,

“I can look in their faces and say, ‘You can’t come’. I’ll look them in the face.” Spoken like a true humanitarian.

Trump’s new-found humanitarian concerns, including his lament about the terrible fate of Khan Sheikhoun’s “small children and even beautiful little babies,” also stand in contrast to the horrific death toll from other U.S.-allied bombings in recent weeks. The U.S.-led coalition in Iraq and Syria killed nearly 1,000 non-combatants in March alone, “a record claim,” according to Airwars.org, a non-profit organization that monitors civilian casualties from airstrikes in the Middle East.

“These reported casualty levels are comparable with some of the worst periods of Russian activity in Syria,” the group said.

The coalition forces’ use of white phosphorous, a chemical weapon that burns to the bone, has been documented in Mosul, Iraq. And the U.S. Central Command confirmed that it has used depleted uranium, arguably a war crime, against ISIS in Syria.

Encouraging Trump to Use Military Force

Trump is obsessed with being liked. So, smarting from the healthcare loss and attacked by the media, the GOP’s right-wing and Democrats, Trump turned the tables. Now that he’s become Bomber-in-Chief, Trump is liked by nearly everybody – or so it seems. And what lesson will he learn from his missile attack? That being a strong, forceful leader makes people like you. And blowing things up makes you a “strong, forceful leader.”

Members of the Trump administration are sending mixed signals about whether they seek to forcibly change the Assad regime in Syria. That would violate the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which the United States has also ratified.

During the U.N. Security Council meeting following Trump’s missile attack, the ambassador from Bolivia declared,

“The United States has not only unilaterally attacked . . . [it] has become that investigator, has become the prosecutor, has become the judge, has become the jury. Whereas the investigation would have allowed us to establish in an objective manner who is responsible for the attacks, this is an extreme violation of international law.”

Marine Corps Cpl. Justin Morrall prepares for night stalking during Korea Marine Exercise Program 17-6 near Camp Mujuk, Pohang, South Korea, March 30, 2017. (Marine Corps photo by Sgt. Ally Beiswanger)

Trump’s missile attack also has put a dangerous strain on U.S. relations with nuclear-armed Russia, which supports the Assad regime in the conflict with various opposition groups, including Al Qaeda’s affiliate and its spinoff, Islamic State or ISIS.

Following the April 6 missile strike, Russia suspended a memorandum of understanding designed to minimize collisions between U.S. and Russian aircraft over Syrian airspace. A statement issued by Russia, Iran and Assad’s forces said,

“What America waged in an aggression on Syria is a crossing of red lines. From now on we will respond with force to any aggressor or any breach of red lines from whoever it is and America knows our ability to respond well.”

With his missile attack, Trump has made the world a much more dangerous place.

“Make no mistake,” Norman Solomon wrote. “With 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons at the ready in the United States and Russia, pushing to heighten tensions between the two countries is playing with thermonuclear fire.”

Where Will Trump Bomb Next?

Meanwhile, Trump is taking provocative measures against nuclear-armed North Korea, deploying an aircraft carrier and several warships to the Korean Peninsula. Trump’s show of force is a response to North Korea’s recent ballistic missile test.

The aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson travels in the South China Sea, April 8, 2017. (Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Matt Brown)

The Trump administration has indicated it may use pre-emptive strikes to prevent North Korea from developing a missile that could carry a nuclear warhead to the United States. Pre-emptive strikes violate the U.N. Charter, which specifies several non-forceful measures, including diplomacy, to maintain or restore international peace and security. But diplomacy doesn’t seem to be in Trump’s toolkit.

North Korea warned of “catastrophic consequences of [the United States’] outrageous actions.” Pyongyang said,

“We will take the toughest counteraction against the provocateurs in order to defend ourselves by powerful force of arms.” A foreign ministry spokesman said North Korea “is ready to react to any mode of war desired by the US.”

When Secretary of State Rex Tillerson appeared on ABC’s “This Week,” he cited the U.S. strike on Syria as a not-so-veiled warning to North Korea:

“The message that any nation can take is if you violate international norms, if you violate international agreements, if you fail to live up to commitments, if you become a threat to others, at some point, a response is likely to be undertaken.”

By logical extension, Trump’s missile attack on Syria makes the United States vulnerable to retaliation from other countries that see the U.S. violating international law and committing acts of aggression.

What can be done to stop the Trump administration’s illegal use of military force in Syria and its dangerous provocation of Russia and North Korea?

Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CodePink, suggests doing things that will be “positive for the Syrian people.” She advocates immediately lifting the ban on Syrian refugees, providing the U.N. with its requested $5 billion to deal with the humanitarian crisis, and demanding that the Trump administration work with Russia toward a ceasefire and a political solution.

Marjorie Cohn is professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, former president of the National Lawyers Guild, and a member of the advisory board of Veterans for Peace. Her most recent book is Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues. Visit her website at http://marjoriecohn.com/ and follow her on Twitter at https://twitter.com/marjoriecohn.

A fresh wave of logging is hitting America’s national forests, writes Brett Haverstick. But this time it’s all for the sake of ‘forest health’ and ‘fire prevention’. It might look like industrial clear-cutting to you and me, but really, it’s in a good cause. And if the forests and precious ecosystems they harbor just happen to perish in the process … well ain’t that just too bad?

National forests across the West are facing dire threats from politicians, the timber industry and the Forest Service.

The public is currently being misled into thinking that our forests are ‘unhealthy’, and that they need to be ‘restored’ due to ‘beetle infestations’ and ‘insects and disease’.

All of this is a euphemism to drastically ramp up logging on the forests.

America’s national forests are not unhealthy. Some people may want forests to look a certain way, but that desire or perception ignores scientific research, which suggests that fungi, bacteria, insects, disease and wildfire are key components of forest function and resiliency. If you want a healthy forest, these natural processes must be allowed to play out.

Efforts to ‘thin the threat’ and use thinning for ‘fire hazard reduction’ across Western landscapes is largely unsubstantiated in scientific literature.

Recent studies suggest forests with stands of ‘dead trees’ are at no more risk of burning – and possibly less – than thinned forests. Dead trees generally burn slower because they do not have oil-rich needles or resins.

To the contrary, thinning ‘live trees’ places fine fuels like needles and cones on the ground, and opens the forest canopy to greater solar penetration and wind, resulting in overall drier forest conditions and flammability.

How did the forests ever survive without logging?

The Forest Service is currently identifying ‘priority areas’ on the national forests that need to be treated (read logged). A provision of the 2014 Farm Bill gives the agency the ability to expedite logging projects, including in roadless areas, designed to reduce fuels and prevent the chance of “uncontrollable wildfires”.

Public involvement is simultaneously being minimized, and robust environmental analysis is unfortunately being short-changed.

Fire frequency and intensity in the West are predominantly climate and weather driven. An overwhelming amount of scientific evidence shows that drought, warm temperatures, low humidity and windy conditions drive wildfire intensity. Tree-density and beetle infestation does not drive fire intensity and behavior.

The predominantly mixed conifer forests of the West have evolved with fire. Wildfires are not ‘catastrophic’ but rather necessary for nutrient cycling, soil productivity and providing habitat for insects, birds and mammals. Wildfire is a natural disturbance event critical to forest function and resiliency. A more accurate term for Western landscapes is ‘fire-scapes’.

Building roads and logging in post-fire landscapes is also unnecessary and harmful. ‘Salvage logging’ impedes forest succession, can increase soil erosion, and impair streams, fish habitat and water quality. Scientists are discovering that ‘snag forests’ are one of the most biologically rich and diverse habitat types, rivaled only by old growth.

The Forest Service’s age-old war on forests

Politicians and the timber industry are assaulting America’s National Forests.

Managed forests are neither healthier, nor more resilient to wildfire. Beetle infestation and fire intensity are mainly climate and weather driven. Fungi, bacteria, insects, disease and wildfire are natural processes important for forest function and resiliency.

The real catastrophe is the Forest Service continues to lead its century-old war on wildfire by supporting commercial logging and fire suppression to the detriment of American taxpayers and forest ecosystems.

Brett Haverstick is education and outreach director for Friends of the Clearwater, a grassroots advocacy group that works to protect the public wildlands, wildlife, and waters in the Clearwater basin of beautiful north-central Idaho.

Amidst intense discussions about a referendum on the independence of northern Iraq’s predominantly Kurdish region, the Kurdistan Ministry of Natural Resources notes that there were no problems with the export of oil via Turkey. The statement comes against the backdrop of a fundamental reorganization of the Middle East.

The Ministry dismissed reports according to which there were political issues that had prompted a halt in the export of oil from Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region via Turkey. A source at the Ministry told reporters that Turkey had informed the Kurdistan regional Government (KRG) that it was going to conduct planned maintenance work on the pipeline that carries the Kurdish oil exports to Turkey’s Ceyhan port.

The routine maintenance was reportedly planned three months ago, and was originally was due in March, but the MNR and the state-owned Turkish company, Botas, that operates the Ceyhan pipeline agreed to “delay” the maintenance to April 10.

The Ministry noted that exports may resume as early as Wednesday and that the scheduled work is expected to take 2 – 3 days. The Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) of the Kurdistan Autonomous Region of Iraq stated on Monday that the NOC, at the same time, is taking the opportunity to repair a technical problem with the Kirkuk pipeline to minimize the disruption of the flow. Between 550,000 to 600,000 barrels of oil are exported through the Kurdistan Region-Ceyhan port in Turkey daily.

The oil business between the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq and the Turkish AKP government prompted a great deal of controversy in recent years. Syrian oil stolen by the self-proclaimed Islamic State in Syria’s Deir Ez-Zor province has been “laundered” via Iraqi Kurdistan before it was pumped to Turkey to finally make it to the international markets via Ceyhan.

Antidote against propaganda-induced ignorance

This financial support of the Islamic State was boosted when the European Union, in 2013, lifted its sanctions against the import of Syrian oil, provided that it comes from “rebel-held territories”.

Ironically, in September 2014 the EU Ambassador to Iraq chastised Iran, Kurdistan and Turkey for financing the so-called Islamic State by facilitating their oil export. Turkey’s Energy Minister Taner Yildiz described such rumors as lies. Nobody appears to recall that the EU lifted its embargo on the import of Syrian oil from rebel-held territories on April 22, 2013.

EU’s Ambassador to Iraq and former European Parliament MP for the Czech Republic, Jana Hybášková, addressed the EU’s foreign affairs committee, chastising Iran, the Kurdish administrated region of Iraq and Turkey for “inadvertently” supporting the so-called Islamic State, a.k.a. ISIS/ISIL/IS by facilitating the “terrorists” export of oil for a net revenue of $3 million per day.

Hybášková demanded that the European Union “exert pressure on Iran, Kurdistan and Turkey in order to stop this trade”, adding that this wasn’t the first time that Turkey had been accused of turning a blind eye to the political situation in Iraq for financial gain.

Turkey’s Energy Minister Taner Yildiz, for his part, denounced allegations about Turkey’s involvement in financing the Islamic State, claiming that such statements aimed at creating controversy about Turkey’s politics.

Yildiz did, however, admit that Turkey is transporting oil from the Kurdish administrated region of Northern Iraq via Turkey, while the Kurdish government described Turkey as reliable partner in that regard. In fact, the export of northern Iraqi oil via Turkey has almost doubled in 2014 and increased to 400,000 barrels per day.

Neither EU Ambassador to Iraq, Jana Hybášková, Turkey’s Energy Minister Taner Yildiz, nor any of the mainstream media in EU and NATO member states, however, appear to recall that the EU legalized the import of Syrian oil from so-called “rebel-held territories”.

On Monday, April 22, 2013, the 27 EU foreign ministers decided to lift the EU’s embargo on the import of Syrian oil from rebel-held territories to support more economic support for the so-called Syrian opposition.

The then UK Foreign Secretary William Hague told reporters that the move aimed at laying the legal groundwork to get the flow of crude oil going as rapidly as possible reported Yahoo News, quoting Hague as saying:

“The security situation is so difficult that much of this will be difficult to do, but it is important for us to send the signal that we are open to helping in other ways, in all the ways possible.”

The then German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle commented on the lift of the oil-import ban:

“We wish for good economic development in the areas controlled by the opposition, therefore we lift the sanctions which hinder the moderate opposition forces work.”

The irony of EU Ambassador Hybášková, chastising Iran, Kurdistan and Turkey was palatable.

Neither the BBC, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, nor the guardian mention the EU’s lifting of the oil-import ban in 2013 in relation to the EU Ambassador’s 2014 criticism of Iraq, Turkey and “Kurdistan”.

Hague’s words about “helping in all ways possible” however, were indeed ominous in more than one sense.

Not to be fooled twice ? Understand the timeline!

• April 22, 2013, the EU lifts the ban on the import of Syrian oil from rebel-held territories”.
• nsnbc warned since June 2013 that a major chemical weapons attack was planned to serve as pretext for a military intervention against Syria.
• August 20, 2013, nsnbc reports that a major offensive in the predominantly Kurdish and oil-rich eastern regions of Syria had begun in the attempt to conquer the Syrian oil fields in the Deir Ez Zour province and the city of Deir Ez-Zor and reiterated the risk of an imminent chemical weapons attack.
• August 21, 2013, Liwa-al-Islam, under the command of the Saudi Arabian intelligence asset and chemical weapons specialist Zahran Alloush, and under direct U.S. orders, launched the chemical weapons attack on the Damascus suburb East Ghouta.
• August 30, 2013, the BBC had to report that British PM David Cameron’s motion to join a U.S.-led military intervention against Syria had been rejected by the UK’s parliament.
• On August 31, U.S. President Obama had to follow suit saying  that he had decided to consult with Congress first, reported the guardian.
• November  22 – 23, 2013, the Atlantic Council convened for an Energy Summit in Turkey’s capital Ankara. Atlantic Council President Frederick Kempe stated before the meeting, that decisions which were about to be made in the nearest future would have a historical bearing on Iran, Turkey, the U.S. and the region, which were comparable to the historic events in 1918 and 1945.
• June 22, 2014, nsnbc international published a report after a meeting with a person from within the inner circle around the former Lebanese PM Saad Hariri. The whistleblower presented evidence in support of his statement that the invasion of Iraq by ISIL had originally been planned for 2013, but that it was called off when the UK parliament voted against bombing Syria.
• The final green light for the invasion of Iraq via ISIL/ISIS or IS was given on the sidelines of the Atlantic Council’s Energy Summit in Ankara, in November 2013, he said, adding that the campaign was managed via the U.S. Embassy in Turkey and that U.S. Ambassador Ricciardone played a central role in the management of the war waged with ISIS as mercenary force that both served as friend and foe.

Note that nsnbc, already in October 2013 reported that the agenda of the Atlantic Council’s Energy Summit was the distribution of Syrian and Northern Iraqi oil to the international markets and the “Balkanization” of Iraq. EU Ambassador Jana Hybášková’s chastising of Iran, Kurdistan and Turkey has, as all statements in politics a function. The question is what function her statement has, especially in the light of the given, although omitted facts.

Watching recent history repeat itself

The most noteworthy recent developments are the push of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces towards Raqqa and U.S. attempts to disrupt the Syrian Arab Army’s attempt to reassert control in Deir Ez-Zor;

The U.S. cruise missile attack following an alleged chemical weapons attack;

Sustained U.S. support for the establishment of an independent Kurdish State in Northern Iraq, thus weakening the role of the federal government in Baghdad and of Iran as a regional actor;

Close U.S. cooperation with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP); The KDP’s support of KDP-I militants who have increased their armed struggle against Iranian Revolutionary Guard units in northwestern Iran since the summer of 2016.

Former U.N weapons inspector Scott Ritter warned before the start of the Iraq war that claims that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction were false.

Sunday, Ritter wrote that current claims that the leader of Syria launched a chemical weapons attack was false:

***

Al Nusra has a long history of manufacturing and employing crude chemical weapons; the 2013 chemical attack on Ghouta made use of low-grade Sarin nerve agent locally synthesized, while attacks in and around Aleppo in 2016 made use of a chlorine/white phosphorous blend.

***

Early on, the anti-Assad opposition media outlets were labeling the Khan Sheikhoun incident as a “Sarin nerve agent” attack; one doctor affiliated with Al Qaeda sent out images and commentary via social media that documented symptoms, such as dilated pupils, that he diagnosed as stemming from exposure to Sarin nerve agent. Sarin, however, is an odorless, colorless material, dispersed as either a liquid or vapor; eyewitnesses speak of a “pungent odor” and “blue-yellow” clouds, more indicative of chlorine gas.

***

There are no images taken of victims at the scene of the attack.

***

The lack of viable protective clothing worn by the “White Helmet” personnel while handling victims is another indication that the chemical in question was not military grade Sarin; if it were, the rescuers would themselves have become victims (some accounts speak of just this phenomena, but this occurred at the site of the attack, where the rescuers were overcome by a “pungent smelling” chemical – again, Sarin is odorless.)

What does the U.S. administration want with regards to Syria?

The elements were clear just a few days ago. The U.S. would split off the east and set up a Kurdish enclave which it would then occupy with the help of proxy forces. It would use the leverage to push for political regime change in western Syria. Israel would occupy another piece of the Golan.

While that looked somewhat favorable for the U.S. in the short term it was bad long term strategy. U.S. forces in the east would be surrounded by hostiles, cut off from the sea and under permanent guerilla attack from various opposing forces. But it looked at least like a viable short term way forward.

The new strategy, which may not be one at all, and the new U.S. commitment is all over the place:

As various officials have described it, the United States will intervene only when chemical weapons are used — or any time innocents are killed. It will push for the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria — or pursue that only after defeating the Islamic State. America’s national interest in Syria is to fight terrorism. Or to ease the humanitarian crisis there. Or to restore stability.

I don’t get it. The cacophony of the last days does not make any sense. There is no viable endgame I see here that would be advantageous for Trump or general U.S. borg policy – neither internationally nor domestically – neither short term nor long term. Trump is now losing the “America First” followers he will need to win another election.

Due to the anti-Russian panic Trump surrendered to the neocons. Suddenly the borg is lauding him for a senseless escalation. The neocons want chaos but chaos is not a plan. There seems to be no plan that will help any cause.

There is no chance that the U.S. can split Syria from its allies, Hizbullah, Iran and Russia. While Russia is under pressure in Kaliningrad, Crimea and Syria it has lived through way worse situation and these have always increased its determination. I don’t see how or why it would fold now.

Trump had an intelligent strategy when he won against Clinton. He deftly use his advantages. There are few advantages that he has and can play with regards to Middle East policy. Use pure military force? That’s not a strategy, just tactical game play. Though the generals who run his cabinet may not be capable to see that. If he destroys Syrian then Lebanon and Jordan will also fall to radicals. Other countries will follow. Iraq would again throw out all U.S. troops. Would the U.S., or Israel, want that? Why?

Whatever one might say about Trump, he is not stupid. He must have some kind of plan.

Help me out. What are his thoughts behind this. Or are there really none at all.

Of the top 100 US newspapers, 47 ran editorials on President Donald Trump’s Syria airstrikes last week: 39 in favor, seven ambiguous and only one opposed to the military attack.

In other words, 83 percent of editorials on the Syria attack supported Trump’s bombing, 15 percent took an ambivalent position and 2 percent said the attack shouldn’t have happened. Polls showed the US public being much more split: Gallup (4/7–8/17) and ABC/Washington Post (4/7–9/17) each had 51 percent supporting the airstrikes and 40 percent opposed, while CBS (4/7–9/17) found 57 percent in favor and 36 percent opposed.

A list of the editorials with quotes showing support or opposition can be seen here. The list of the top 100 editorial boards in the country was taken from a 2016 Hill piece (10/5/16) on presidential election endorsements.

Eight out of the top ten newspapers by circulation backed the airstrikes; the Wall Street Journal (4/7/17), New York Times (4/7/17), USA Today (4/7/17), New York Daily News (4/8/17), Washington Post (4/7/17), New York Post (4/10/17), Chicago Sun-Times (4/7/17) and Denver Post (4/7/17) all supported the strikes with varying degrees of qualification and concern.

The San Jose Mercury News (4/7/17) and LA Times (4/8/17) were ambiguous, highlighting Trump’s past opposition to bombing Syria and insisting, in the Mercury News’ words, that he get “serious about setting policies and pursuing diplomacy.”

The one editorial that expressly opposed the attack, in the 15th-ranked Houston Chronicle (4/7/17), did so mainly on constitutional—not moral or geopolitical—grounds, writing, “As we said a year-and-a-half ago, the president cannot and should not use military force against Syria without a legislative framework.”

The Chronicle—like all of the editorials on the list—accepted the government of Bashar al-Assad’s guilt in the April 4 chemical attack on Khan Shaykhun, omitting qualifiers such as “alleged” or “accused.”

A consistent theme in the bulk of the editorials was that the airstrikes were necessary, but Trump needed a broader strategy as well as a constitutional or congressional “framework.” As FAIR (4/7/17) noted last week, the editorial and op-ed pages of top five newspapers in the country were uniformly in support of the airstrikes in the day after the attack, offering up 18 positive columns and zero critical.

Some spoke in emotional or visceral terms, most notably the New York Times (4/7/17), which insisted “it was hard not to feel some sense of emotional satisfaction” at the attack. “The US decision to launch cruise missiles at Syrian President Bashar Assad’s airfield felt good,“ the Denver Post (4/7/17) wrote.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (4/9/17) seemed giddy to the point of incoherence with Trump’s new tough-guy posture, publishing this string of NatSec bromides:

The message for the Russian and Chinese leaders must be to stop using their murderous little proxies, Syria and North Korea, to poke and prod us. We don’t want any more wars, but we also showed with the attack on the Syrian air base that we will not put up with being trifled with by their little friends doing awful things like killing children with chemical weapons and waving missiles around. Russia and China need to get busy and put the reins on the Syrians and the North Koreans, now. The game is lethal and dangerous, and there is no good reason for it to continue.

The overwhelming support for Trump’s Syria strikes—which open a whole new theater of potential war in the Middle East—is consistent with FAIR’s studies of media reaction to US military action. A 2003 FAIR survey (3/18/03) of television coverage in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, for example, found “just 6 percent of US sources were skeptics about the need for war. Just 3 of 393 sources were identified with anti-war activism.” As the US debated intervening in the civil war in Libya, pro-intervention op-eds outnumbered those opposed to or questioning intervention by 4-to-1 in the New York Times and Washington Post (Extra!, 5/11).

Adam Johnson is a contributing analyst for FAIR.org. You can find him on Twitter at @AdamJohnsonNYC.

Russia and America are geopolitical opposites. Irreconcilable differences separate them.

Good faith isn’t a US tradition. Whether Republicans or Democrats are in charge, negotiating with America diplomatically achieves nothing.

Agreements reached are consistently breached. Washington seeks dominance, not cooperative relations.

Ahead of his arrival in Moscow, Secretary of State Tillerson said Assad’s tenure as Syria’s leader is “coming to an end…(S)teps are underway” to remove him, without further elaboration.

Knowing Syria destroyed its chemical weapons, none remaining, he said

“(w)e do not want the regime’s uncontrolled stockpile of chemical weapons to fall into the hands of ISIS or other terrorist groups who could and want to attack the United States or our allies.”

“Nor can we accept the normalization of the use of chemical weapons by other actors or countries in Syria or elsewhere” – other than in US, NATO, Israeli and other allied rogue state hands.

He warned Russia to end support for Syria, falsely accusing Moscow of covering up last week’s Chemical Weapons attack, something Syria had nothing to do with – Tillerson’s arrogance not likely to go down well in Moscow.

The White House claiming US intelligence has evidence, showing Assad’s responsibility for the Kahn Sheikhoun CW attack is a bald-faced lie.

A fabricated report claimed Damascus and Moscow spread disinformation and “false narratives” about what happened.

Unnamed senior White House officials lied, saying Russia wants Syria’s culpability suppressed. Clearly, its forces had nothing to do with attacking its people with chemical or other toxic agents, or any other weapons – in Kahn Sheikhoun or elsewhere throughout over six years of war.

Especially now it makes no sense. With considerable Russian aerial support, it’s defeating ISIS, al-Nusra and other terrorist groups.

Why would it shoot itself in the foot? Why attack civilians it’s gone all-out to protect? Why give Washington a pretext to terror-bomb its military?

Why do something strategically stupid, aiding terrorist groups it’s combating?

Putin called attacking Kahn Sheikhoun a false flag, erroneously blamed on Assad – likely a CIA-orchestrated incident, terrorist foot soldiers responsible for what happened, more CW incidents coming.

“We have reports from multiple sources that false flags like this one – and I cannot call it otherwise – are being prepared in other parts of Syria, including the southern suburbs of Damascus. They plan to plant some chemical there and accuse the Syrian government of an attack,” Putin explained.

It’s reminiscent of events preceding Bush/Cheney’s 2003 Iraq war – based on Big Lies, new ones setting up Assad for likely greater US aggression to come.

Press secretary Spicer practically announced it, saying “we hold open the possibility of future action.” It’s virtually certain, given Washington’s rage to topple Assad, isolate Iran and target its government the same way.

It’s part of longterm US strategy for unchallenged global dominance, raping and destroying one sovereign independent state at a time to achieve it.

As long as this agenda continues, eventual nuclear war looks inevitable – the ultimate doomsday scenario.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. 

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

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

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Australia is sleep-walking into a confrontation with China. Wars can happen suddenly in an atmosphere of mistrust and provocation, especially if a minor power, like Australia, abandons its independence for an “alliance” with an unstable superpower.

The United States is at a critical moment. Having exported its all-powerful manufacturing base, run down its industry and reduced millions of its once-hopeful people to poverty, principal American power today is brute force. When Donald Trump launched his missile attack on Syria — following his bombing of a mosque and a school — he was having dinner in Florida with the President of China, Xi Jinping.

Trumps attack on Syria had little to do with chemical weapons. It was, above all, to show his detractors and doubters in Washington’s war-making  institutions — the Pentagon, the CIA, the Congress — how tough he was and prepared to risk a war with Russia. He had spilled blood in Syria, a Russian protectorate; he was surely now on the team. The attack was also meant to say directly to President Xi, his dinner guest: this is how we deal with those who challenge the top dog.

China has long received this message. In its rise as the world’s biggest trader and manufacturer, China has been encircled by 400 US military bases — a provocation described by a former Pentagon strategist as “a perfect noose”.

This is not Trump’s doing. In 2011, President Barack Obama flew to Australia to declare, in an address to parliament, what became known as the “pivot to Asia”: the biggest build-up of US air and naval forces in the Asia Pacific region since the Second World War. The target was China. America had a new and entirely unnecessary enemy. Today, low-draft US warships, missiles, bombers, drones operate on China’s doorstep.

In July, one of the biggest US-led naval exercises ever staged, the biennial Operation Talisman Sabre, will rehearse a blockade of the sea lanes through which run China’s commercial lifelines. Based on a Air-Sea Battle Plan for war with China, which prescribes a preemptive “blinding” attack, this “war game” will be played by Australia.

This is not urgent news. Rather, the news is the “threat” that China poses to “freedom of navigation” in the South China Sea by building airstrips on disputed reefs and islets. The reason why — the “noose” — is almost never mentioned.  

Australia in the 21st century has no enemies. Not even a melancholy colonial imagination that conjured Asia falling down on us as if by the force of gravity can conjure a single contemporary enemy. No one wants to bomb or occupy Australia. Well, not yet.

As Australian political, military and intelligence establishments are integrated into the war plans of a growing American obsession — the shift of trading, banking and development power to the east — Australia is making an enemy it never bargained for. A frontline has already been marked at Pine Gap, the spy base the CIA set up near Alice Springs in the 1960s, which targets America’s enemies, beckoning, of course, massive retaliation.  

Last October, the opposition Labor Party’s defence spokesman, Richard Marles, delighted the US admirals and generals at a conference in Hawaii by demanding that Australian naval commanders should have the authority to provoke nuclear-armed China in the disputed South China Sea. What is it about some Australian politicians whose obsequiousness takes charge of their senses?

While the coalition government of Malcolm Turnbull has resisted such a clear and present danger, at least for now, it is building a $195 billion war arsenal, one of the biggest on earth — including more than $15 billion to be spent on American F-35 fighters already distinguished as hi-tech turkeys. Clearly, this is aimed at China.

This view of Australia’s region is shrouded by silence. Dissenters are few, or frightened. Anti-China witch hunts are not uncommon. Indeed, who, apart from former prime minister Paul Keating, speaks out with an unambiguous warning? Who tells Australians that, in response to the “noose” around it, China has almost certainly increased its nuclear weapons posture from low alert to high alert?

And who utters the heresy that Australians should not have to “choose” between America and China: that we should, for the first time in our history, be truly modern and independent of all great power: that we should play a thoughtful, imaginative, non-provocative, diplomatic role to help prevent a catastrophe and so protect “our interests”, which are the lives of people.

John Pilger‘s new film, The Coming War on China, is available in the US from www.bullfrogfilms.com

On April 4 2017 in the Syrian city of Khan Shaykhun, a city controlled by western-backed terrorists, chemical weapons killed more than eighty civilians. Immediately, local and foreign sources (the White Helmets and Syrian Observatory, respectively, dubiously linked to Al Qaeda groups) blamed the Syrian Arab Army, accusing them of employing chemical agents. In the following forty-eight hours, the mainstream media flooded print media and the airwaves with information that alleged that Assad used chemical weapons. As is known, it is not the first time that the legitimate government of Syria has been accused of attacking its own people with weapons of mass destruction.

In all similar events in the past, it has been later discovered that the chemical agents in question were used by the Al Nusra Front and Al Qaeda terrorists. In 2013, Obama tacitly rejected the argument that the Syrian Army used chemical weapons in Ghouta, deciding not to succumb to internal pressure to bomb Syria in response. Donald Trump required little confirmation before taking the initiative to cross the red line, openly attacking the Syrian army, even though his same intelligence community strongly doubted that the chemical attack took place according to the narrative advanced by the media.

There are several hypotheses regarding what may have happened in Khan Shaykhun. The first one points to a false flag by rebels and terrorists supported by Israeli, British, Saudi and Qatari intelligence. Alternatively, it could have simply been an accident. Assad’s forces could have hit a terrorist weapons cache without knowing that it was dedicated to the production and storage of chemical weapons. Another theory offers that foreign intelligence agents may have provided accurate information to the terrorists in Khan Shaykhun about what buildings were going to be targeted by Assad’s air force, thereby allowing them to move chemical weapons into the targeted locations in order to bring about a civilian massacre.

Whatever the case may be, it is unthinkable that Assad and the Syrian army would use chemical agents against their own civilians. There is no rational reason for them to use such weapons which do not guarantee any tactical advantage and which, besides, would incite an obvious, vehement reaction from the international community — a counterproductive move from any way you look at it. This is not to mention that two days before the accident (?), Trump and Tillerson had publicly opened up to Assad, broaching a Syrian future with the president still in office. Once again, the use of chemical weapons proved to be of no tactical gain, spelling full-blown political suicide. From whatever perspective one observes the incident; an intentional chemical attack by Syrian forces is not credible and should be therefore ruled out. Furthermore, Russia saw its request for an independent investigation in the Khan Shaykhun chemical incident blocked by almost all nations belonging to the UN council, with the exception of Syria, Bolivia, China and Russia. What do the US and its allies have to hide? We all know the answer to that.

An important factor to consider in order to understand the events surrounding the incident with chemical gases concerns the immediate American response. The bombardment with cruise missile, which caused a dozen deaths and some slight damage to Shayrat Air Base, needed at least a couple of months of preparation. This consideration helps clarify the scope of the chemical attack along with the attendant rationale and motivations.

Notably, over the past two months, Trump has received all kinds of pressure to continue the neocon-inspired aggression against Syria. The main cheerleaders of this attack certainly fall into that category of players that includes the intelligence community, the military-industrial complex, neoconservatives, the Saudis, the Israelis, the Turks and the Qataris. It is not unthinkable that the chemical attack was an act needed in order to allow a US military response. One must not neglect to consider the very positive outcome of the meeting between Trump and the Saudi prince, the latter of whom is a major supporter of aggression against Syria. The summit between the King of Jordan and the American president the day after the events in Khan Shaykhun ought to be viewed in the same light. At the same time, other events look more than suspicious in terms of timing and motives, such as the permanent exclusion of Trump adviser Steve Bannon in favor of General H. R. McMaster (appointed by Trump). McMaster is a protégé of General Petraeus, a leading exponent of the interests of the neoconservatives. This is not to mention the exclusion of Flynn a month ago, another person who for years has advised against aggression against Syria, mainly thinking of the consequences that such a move would entail at the international level.

Much ambiguity also remains when one considers the absence of members of the American intelligence community in the war room during the bombing of Syria on April 6. Rumors suggest that these American agencies would have recommended that Trump not act on the basis of partial or false information regarding the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun. Trump, contrary to what he stated during the presidential campaign, has dismissed the advice of his intelligence community, preferring instead to act unilaterally under pressure from McMaster and other neocons in the administration.

The bombardment, involving the use of 59 cruise missiles (23 hit the base, others went missing, according to the Russian ministry of defense), caused little damage to the Shayrat Air Base, thanks to the prompt evacuation of Syrian personnel, and no injuries were reported amongst the Russian contingent. The Pentagon claims to have warned the Russians of their intentions, but it is more likely that there were no alternatives, and that this act was mostly political and at no cost. Rather than reading this as a hypothetical US courtesy to the Russians (and the Syrians, because Moscow immediately warned Damascus), we must consider that a few seconds after the launch of the first cruise missile by the two destroyers in the Mediterranean, Russian forces in the area were already fully aware of the path and destination of the missiles, thereby alerting Damascus. It is also possible that the generals close to Trump advised him to alert Moscow because of the danger of a Russian reaction if hit by US missiles.

Some doubts still remain as to the intentions and purpose of the attacks. In recent days, a hypothesis has emerged implying some sort of connivance between Russia and the United States in these attacks, apparently staged to appease the interventionists of the US deep state. There is no evidence to support this hypothesis, and the relatively limited damage to the Shayrat military airport may rest either with the high defense capabilities of the Syrian and Russians, or to the marked inefficiency of Raytheon’s cruise missiles, rather than any purposeful intention to do limited damage. In coming days, with more information available, it will be important to analyze what exactly happened to the cruise missiles that did not hit their target. As many know, it is taboo in the United States to criticize the military-industry complex, given the importance and influence it enjoys. In this sense, it is no surprise that in the United States, the press has been talking about the complete success of the attack, with 58 out of 59 missiles apparently being advertised as hitting their targets.

For Trump it may well be the beginning of the end. The intention may have been to make a once-off attack to appease the deep state, lowering in the process the heat stemming from Russiagate, in order to allow for the implementation of national policies in line with the proclaimed America-First doctrine that has thus far been sabotaged by opponents and detractors. These same detractors now applaud Trump for what they see as his first presidential act, which involves killing civilians with missiles.

What Trump does not appear to understand is that he has opened up a Pandora’s Box that implicitly encourages foreign intelligence and terrorists in Syria to rely on American help by simply playing the chemical-gas-attack card. Trump seems unaware that he is now under the complete control of the media, the intelligence agencies, Al Qaeda, and the neocons, who are all the time working towards the involvement of the United States in ever more wars, such as with the one in Syria. Trump has intentionally sold out to the deep state in the hope of saving his presidency. However, in so doing, he is doomed to becoming a puppet of the deep state. Now let us speculate for a moment about what may happen in the coming weeks.

In response to US aggression, Russia, Syria and Iran will increase cooperation against terrorists in Syria without any further cooperation with the United States. In this regard, we have already seen the suspension of channels of communication between Russia and the United States. The most likely reason for this is to avoid revealing to the United States the whereabouts of Russian troops in Syria. This hopefully causes huge concern for Washington, as the next American attack on Syria may impact on Russian troops. Regardless, it now seems clear that in the case of a new attack on Syria, there will be a firm and proportionate response from Moscow that could even lead to the sinking of the ships that launched the cruise missiles. It constitutes a dangerous escalation that could involve nuclear superpowers. Trump is probably betting that Moscow, in the case of another attack on Syria, would not dare attack American ships. Unfortunately for Trump and the rest of the world, his calculations are dead wrong, pushing the world to the brink of disaster in the event of another American bombardment of Syria. If Russia sinks American naval ships, and Trump does not respond, he is done. If he responds, then the world is done. Let us hope that the US does not do stupid shit (an Obama quote).

In case al Qaeda once again uses chemical weapons, Trump will be requested to answer with force, as he has already done. If he refuses to do so, he will be immediately pilloried as Obama was in 2013, thereby committing political suicide. Trump has already lost his most loyal supporters, who had voted for him to stop US military adventures abroad. By deciding to bomb Syria, he has opened the door to either an early termination of his presidency or for a large-scale conflict. Whatever the case may be, the United States begins a new phase of conflict in the Middle East, in direct contrast to the claims made by Trump throughout the presidential campaign. It represents a 180-degree reversal in policy that reveals the real intentions of the American presidency, namely continuing the preservation of the American unipolar world, in spite of lacking the necessary operational and military capabilities. After all, Obama resisted for six years the pressure to bomb Syria coming from the extremist wing of the deep state. Trump took only eighty days to voluntarily go along with plans to attack Syria. Whatever the hidden truth of these two events, it is clear that from now on that nothing will be as before.

Russia has information of a potential incident similar to the alleged chemical attack in Idlib province, possibly targeting a Damascus suburb, President Vladimir Putin said. The goal is to discredit the government of Syrian President Assad, he added.

“We have reports from multiple sources that false flags like this one – and I cannot call it otherwise – are being prepared in other parts of Syria, including the southern suburbs of Damascus. They plan to plant some chemical there and accuse the Syrian government of an attack,” he said at a joint press conference with Italian President Sergio Mattarella in Moscow.

Damascus denied the allegations, noting that the targeted area may have been hosting chemical weapons stockpiles belonging to Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) or Al-Nusra Front jihadists.

The incident has not been properly investigated as yet, but the US fired dozens of cruise missiles at a Syrian airbase in a demonstration of force over what it labeled a chemical attack by Damascus.

“President Mattarella and I discussed it, and I told him that this reminds me strongly of the events in 2003, when the US representatives demonstrated at the UN Security Council session the presumed chemical weapons found in Iraq. The military campaign was subsequently launched in Iraq and it ended with the devastation of the country, the growth of the terrorist threat and the appearance of Islamic State [IS, formerly ISIS] on the world stage,” he added.

It was the first time the US had targeted Syrian troops deliberately. The White House says it will repeat military action in response to any possible new chemical weapon attacks.

“The sight of people being gassed and blown away by barrel bombs ensures that if we see this kind of action again, we hold open the possibility of future action,” spokesman Sean Spicer said Monday.

Putin reiterated the call to properly investigate what happened in Khan Sheikhoun, saying that the alleged use of chemical weapons demands one.

“We are planning to address the corresponding UN structure in The Hague and call on the international community to thoroughly investigate all those reports and take appropriate action based on the results of such a probe,” he said.

A separate report of a potential false flag operation in Syria came from the Russian General Staff, which said militants were transporting toxic agents into several parts of Syria, including Eastern Ghouta, the site of the 2013 chemical weapons incident.

“These actions are aimed at creating a new pretext for accusing the government of Syria of more chemical weapons attacks and provoking more strikes by the US,” said Colonel General Sergey Rudskoy, the head of Operations.

Just days after launching its criminal cruise missile attack on Syria, the Trump administration has provocatively authorised the US aircraft carrier Carl Vinson, together with its full strike group of guided missile destroyers and a cruiser, to waters off the Korean Peninsula. The move is a direct military threat to North Korea, which was at the top of the agenda in talks last weekend between the US and Chinese presidents.

An unnamed US official told the Financial Times that the deployment was designed to be a “show of force.” The carrier strike group had taken part in joint US-South Korean war games but was heading south for port calls in Australia before being ordered to turn north from Singapore. The Navy Times noted that “announcing carrier movements in advance is rare, and generally done to send a clear message.”

US Pacific Command spokesman Dave Benham declared the decision was “a prudent measure to maintain readiness and presence in the Western Pacific,” then castigated North Korea in blunt terms.

“The number one threat in the region continues to be North Korea,” he said, “due to its reckless, irresponsible and destabilising program of missile tests and pursuit of a nuclear weapons capacity.”

The Navy Times boasted that

“the strike group brings with it a ton of firepower, including the strike- and air-combat capacities of the Hornets [fighter aircraft], early warning radars, electronic-warfare capabilities and more than 300 missile tubes on the carrier’s escorts.”

The dispatch of the Carl Vinson is a deliberate escalation of tensions on the Korean Peninsula following the Trump administration’s completion of a lengthy review of US strategy toward North Korea. NBC revealed last Friday that three military options were under active consideration: the return of US nuclear weapons to the Korean Peninsula, “decapitation” attacks to kill the North Korean leadership and covert operations inside North Korea to sabotage nuclear, military and industrial targets.

Speaking on “Fox News” on Sunday, President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, General H. R. McMaster, justified the deployment of the Carl Vinson as “prudent,” adding:

“This is a rogue regime that is now a nuclear-capable regime. The president has asked [us] to be prepared to give him a full range of options to remove that threat to the American people and to our allies and partners in the region.”

Citing US officials, the Navy Times reported that

“the Pentagon and US Pacific Command have been sharpening plans for military strikes on the North as an option should the administration want to pursue that action.”

All these highly provocative “options” threaten to trigger a devastating war on the Korean Peninsula that could kill millions. The Navy Times suggested that “an all-out regional conflict” would bring “the US and its allies head-to-head with not only North Korea, but perhaps with China”—that is, a conflict between the world’s two largest economies, both nuclear-armed.

Trump undoubtedly exploited the threat of military action against North Korea to pressure Chinese President Xi Jinping to take tougher action against the Pyongyang regime. Speaking after talks between Trump and Xi last weekend, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told CBS’s “Face the Nation” yesterday that Xi “clearly understands … that the situation has intensified and has reached a certain level of threat that action has to be taken.”

Tillerson ruled out any talks with North Korea at present, saying only that “we can work together with the Chinese to change the conditions in the minds of the DPRK [North Korean] leadership.” But if Beijing fails to bully Pyongyang into accepting Washington’s demands, Tillerson left no doubt that the US would take aggressive measures against North Korea. Trump bluntly told the Financial Times last week:

“If China is not going to solve North Korea, we will.”

In an interview yesterday with ABC’s “This Week,” Tillerson was asked whether North Korea’s development of an intercontinental ballistic missile would constitute “a red line.” He answered ominously:

“If we judge that they have perfected that type of delivery system, then that becomes a very serious stage of their further development.”

Drawing a link with last week’s attack on Syria, Tillerson said:

“The message that any nation can take is if you violate international norms, if you violate international agreements, if you fail to live up to commitments, if you become a threat to others, at some point, a response is likely to be undertaken.”

The North Korean regime denounced the US missile strikes on Syria as “an unforgiveable act of aggression,” adding that “the US has been picking only on countries without nuclear weapons.” A spokesman declared:

“The reality of today shows that we must stand against power with power and it proves a million times over that our decision to strengthen our nuclear deterrence has been the right one.”

In reality, Pyongyang’s limited nuclear arsenal has only provided US imperialism with a pretext for a massive build-up of its military forces in Asia, which are not primarily directed against North Korea, but China. Trump is continuing and expanding the Obama administration’s “pivot to Asia” in a bid to ensure the continued US dominance of the Asia Pacific region.

While North Korea is not the same as Syria, the US will not hesitate to use military force against Pyongyang to further its strategic ambitions. US Defence Secretary James Mattis has already warned North Korea that any attempt to use its nuclear weapons will be met with an “effective and overwhelming response.” The Carl Vinson strike group alone has the capacity to carry and deliver enough nuclear weapons to obliterate North Korea’s industrial and military capabilities.

Moreover, no one should conclude that the strikes on Syria will preclude a US attack on North Korea. Damascus and Pyongyang are just the proxy targets for a far broader strategy of subordinating Russia and China—and thus the Eurasian landmass—to the hegemony of US imperialism. The bitter infighting within the American political, military and intelligence establishment over tactics—whether to confront Moscow or Beijing first—does not rule out attacks on both Syria and North Korea, with devastating consequences for humanity.

Wake Up, America- There’s Not Much Time Left Before We Reach The Zero Hour!

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes… known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.… No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. — James Madison

Waging endless wars abroad (in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and now Syria) isn’t making America—or the rest of the world—any safer, it’s certainly not making America great again, and it’s undeniably digging the U.S. deeper into debt.

In fact, it’s a wonder the economy hasn’t collapsed yet.

Indeed, even if we were to put an end to all of the government’s military meddling and bring all of the troops home today, it would take decades to pay down the price of these wars and get the government’s creditors off our backs. Even then, government spending would have to be slashed dramatically and taxes raised.

You do the math.

The government is $19 trillion in debt: War spending has ratcheted up the nation’s debt. The debt has now exceeded a staggering $19 trillion and is growing at an alarming rate of $35 million/hour and $2 billion every 24 hours.  Yet while defense contractors are getting richer than their wildest dreams, we’re in hock to foreign nations such as Japan and China (our two largest foreign holders at $1.13 trillion and $1.12 trillion respectively).

The Pentagon’s annual budget consumes almost 100% of individual income tax revenue. If there is any absolute maxim by which the federal government seems to operate, it is that the American taxpayer always gets ripped off, especially when it comes to paying the tab for America’s attempts to police the globe. Having been co-opted by greedy defense contractors, corrupt politicians and incompetent government officials, America’s expanding military empire is bleeding the country dry at a rate of more than $57 million per hour.

The government has spent $4.8 trillion on wars abroad since 9/11, with $7.9 trillion in interest: That’s a tax burden of more than $16,000 per American. Almost a quarter of that debt was incurred as a result of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan and Syria. For the past 16 years, these wars have been paid for almost entirely by borrowing money from foreign nations and the U.S. Treasury. As the Atlantic points out, we’re fighting terrorism with a credit card. According to the Watson Institute for Public Affairs at Brown University, interest payments on what we’ve already borrowed for these failed wars could total over $7.9 trillion by 2053.

The government lost more than $160 billion to waste and fraud by the military and defense contractors: With paid contractors often outnumbering enlisted combat troops, the American war effort dubbed as the “coalition of the willing” has quickly evolved into the “coalition of the billing,” with American taxpayers forced to cough up billions of dollars for cash bribes, luxury bases, a highway to nowhere, faulty equipment, salaries for so-called “ghost soldiers,” and overpriced anything and everything associated with the war effort, including a $640 toilet seat and a $7600 coffee pot.

Taxpayers are being forced to pay $1.4 million per hour to provide U.S. weapons to countries that can’t afford them. As Mother Jones reports, the Pentagon’s Foreign Military Finance program “opens the way for the US government to pay for weapons for other countries—only to ‘promote world peace,’ of course—using your tax dollars, which are then recycled into the hands of military-industrial-complex corporations.”

The U.S. government spends more on wars (and military occupations) abroad every year than all 50 states combined spend on health, education, welfare, and safety. In fact, the U.S. spends more on its military than the eight highest-ranking nations with big defense budgets combined. The reach of America’s military empire includes close to 800 bases in as many as 160 countries, operated at a cost of more than $156 billion annually. As investigative journalist David Vine reports,

“Even US military resorts and recreation areas in places like the Bavarian Alps and Seoul, South Korea, are bases of a kind. Worldwide, the military runs more than 170 golf courses.”

Now President Trump wants to increase military spending by $54 billion. Promising “an historic increase in defense spending to rebuild the depleted military of the United States,” Trump has made it clear where his priorities lie, and it’s not with the American taxpayer. As The Nation reports,

“On a planet where Americans account for 4.34 percent of the population, US military spending accounts for 37 percent of the global total.”

Add in the cost of waging war in Syria (with or without congressional approval), and the burden on taxpayers soars to more than $11.5 million a day. Ironically, while presidential candidate Trump was vehemently opposed to the U.S. use of force in Syria, as well as harboring Syrian refugees within the U.S., he had no problem retaliating against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on behalf of Syrian children killed in a chemical attack. The cost of launching a 59 Tomahawk missile-strike against Syria? It’s estimated that the missiles alone cost $60 million. Mind you, this is the same man, while campaigning for president, who warned that fighting Syria would signal the start of World War III against a united Syria, Russia and Iran. Already oil prices have started to climb as investors anticipate an extended conflict.

Clearly, war has become a huge money-making venture, and the U.S. government, with its vast military empire, is one of its best buyers and sellers.

Yet what most Americans—brainwashed into believing that patriotism means supporting the war machine—fail to recognize is that these ongoing wars have little to do with keeping the country safe and everything to do with enriching the military industrial complex at taxpayer expense.

The rationale may keep changing for why American military forces are in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and now Syria. However, the one that remains constant is that those who run the government—including the current president—are feeding the appetite of the military industrial complex and fattening the bank accounts of its investors.

Case in point: President Trump plans to “beef up” military spending while slashing funding for the environment, civil rights protections, the arts, minority-owned businesses, public broadcasting, Amtrak, rural airports and interstates.

In other words, in order to fund this burgeoning military empire that polices the globe, the U.S. government is prepared to bankrupt the nation, jeopardize our servicemen and women, increase the chances of terrorism and blowback domestically, and push the nation that much closer to eventual collapse.

Clearly, our national priorities are in desperate need of an overhauling.

As Los Angeles Times reporter Steve Lopez rightly asks:

Why throw money at defense when everything is falling down around us? Do we need to spend more money on our military (about $600 billion this year) than the next seven countries combined? Do we need 1.4 million active military personnel and 850,000 reserves when the enemy at the moment — ISIS — numbers in the low tens of thousands? If so, it seems there’s something radically wrong with our strategy. Should 55% of the federal government’s discretionary spending go to the military and only 3% to transportation when the toll in American lives is far greater from failing infrastructure than from terrorism? Does California need nearly as many active military bases (31, according to militarybases.com) as it has UC and state university campuses (33)? And does the state need more active duty military personnel (168,000, according to Governing magazine) than public elementary school teachers (139,000)?

Obviously, there are much better uses for your taxpayer funds than trillions of dollars being wasted on war. The following are just a few ways those hard-earned dollars could be used:

• $270 billion to repair U.S. public schools, and twice that much to modernize them.

• $120 billion a year to fix the nation’s crumbling infrastructure. With 32% of the nation’s major roadways in poor or mediocre condition, it’s estimated that improving the nation’s roads and bridges would require $120 billion a year through 2020, although it will take “many trillions … to fix the country’s web of roads, bridges, railways, subways and bus stations.”

• $251 million for safety improvements and construction for Amtrak.

• $690 million to care for America’s 70,000 aging veterans.

• $11 billion wasted or lost in Iraq in just one year could have paid 220,000 teachers’ salaries.

• The yearly cost of stationing just one soldier in Iraq could have fed 60 American families.

• $30 billion per year to end starvation and hunger around the world.

• $11 billion per year to provide the world—including our own failing cities—with clean drinking water.

• Use the $10 billion spent every year to provide arms, equipment, training and advice internationally to more than 180 countries to start paying down the overwhelming $19 trillion national debt. This figure doesn’t include the hundreds of billions spent each year on maintaining the U.S. military presence around the globe.

As long as “we the people” continue to allow the government to wage its costly, meaningless, endless wars abroad, the American homeland will continue to suffer: our roads will crumble, our bridges will fail, our schools will fall into disrepair, our drinking water will become undrinkable, our communities will destabilize, and crime will rise.

Here’s the kicker, though: if the American economy collapses—and with it the last vestiges of our constitutional republic—it will be the government and its trillion-dollar war budgets that are to blame.

Of course, the government has already anticipated this breakdown.

That’s why the government has transformed America into a war zone, turned the nation into a surveillance state, and labelled “we the people” as enemy combatants.

For years now, the government has worked with the military to prepare for widespread civil unrest brought about by “economic collapse, loss of functioning political and legal order, purposeful domestic resistance or insurgency, pervasive public health emergencies, and catastrophic natural and human disasters.”

Having spent more than half a century exporting war to foreign lands, profiting from war, and creating a national economy seemingly dependent on the spoils of war, the war hawks long ago turned their profit-driven appetites on us, bringing home the spoils of war—the military tanks, grenade launchers, Kevlar helmets, assault rifles, gas masks, ammunition, battering rams, night vision binoculars, etc.—and handing them over to local police, thereby turning America into a battlefield.

This is how the police state wins and “we the people” lose.

Eventually, however, as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, all military empires fail.

At the height of its power, even the mighty Roman Empire could not stare down a collapsing economy and a burgeoning military. Prolonged periods of war and false economic prosperity largely led to its demise. As historian Chalmers Johnson predicts:

The fate of previous democratic empires suggests that such a conflict is unsustainable and will be resolved in one of two ways. Rome attempted to keep its empire and lost its democracy. Britain chose to remain democratic and in the process let go its empire. Intentionally or not, the people of the United States already are well embarked upon the course of non-democratic empire.

This is the “unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex” that President Dwight Eisenhower warned us more than 50 years ago not to let endanger our liberties or democratic processes. Eisenhower, who served as Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe during World War II, was alarmed by the rise of the profit-driven war machine that emerged following the war—one that, in order to perpetuate itself, would have to keep waging war.

We failed to heed his warning.

Yet as Eisenhower recognized, the consequences of allowing the military-industrial complex to wage war, exhaust our resources and dictate our national priorities are beyond grave:

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some 50 miles of concrete highway. We pay for a single fighter with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. This, I repeat, is the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking. This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.

Wake up, America. There’s not much time left before we reach the zero hour.

John W. Whitehead, Newsbud Contributing Analyst & Author, is an attorney and author who has written, debated and practiced widely in the area of constitutional law and human rights. He is the president and spokesperson of the Rutherford Institute. Mr. Whitehead is the author of numerous books on a variety of legal and social issues, including Battlefield America: The War on the American People. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Arkansas and a Juris Doctorate degree from the University of Arkansas School of Law, and served as an officer in the United States Army from 1969 to 1971.

Canadians like to think of themselves as “progressive”.  They think that President Assad gasses his own people, and they think that Assad must go.

We already know what happens in terrorist-occupied areas of Syria, so presumably Canadians support this as well.

Terrorists appoint themselves as rulers in occupied areas, they do not hold elections, and they impose Sharia law.

They murder men, women, and children who do not obey. Women in particular are targeted. They are forced to wear burkas, they can’t leave the house without a male guardian, their educational dreams are shattered, and they are sold into sex slavery.

“Disobedient women” are whipped, and stoned, and placed in machines that literally squeeze them to death.

The reign of terror includes the demolition and erasure of Syria’s culture and institutions, and the genocide of Syria’s minorities, including Christians and Yazidis.

Reverend Andrew Ashdown visited Syria.  He described in a global Facebook posting, dated April 11, 2017 that

(w)hen I visited an IDP (Internally Displaced Centre) in Lattakia last year, everyone had horrific stories of the brutality they had suffered at the hands of our ‘moderate’ ‘rebels’. One of them said: “We don’t need the ‘freedom’ the Jihadists are calling for. We had a good life before. Leave us alone. We’ve had enough of your ‘freedom’. “Many others say they’ve seen the kind of ‘Democracy’ the Islamist terrorists will bring to their country… in the murder and torture of anyone who disagrees with their ideology. Those are the people whom our western governments are backing…

Reverend Andrew Ashdown

Ewelina U. Ochab describes the degeneracy of sex slavery in a March 2, 2017 article, “Sexual Violence As A Weapon Of War: The Story Of Daesh And Boko Haram”. She explains that

(d)uring my recent trip to Iraq, I was shown a document, dated October 16, 2014, listing the prices for the purchase of Yazidi and Christian girls and women. The prices ranged from 75,000 Iraqi Dinar (about $64) for a thirty- to forty-year-old woman, to 200,000 Iraqi Dinar (about $170) for a girl between one and nine years old. Overall, the younger the girl or woman was, the higher the price to be paid – the sight of such prices being paid for babies and young children filled me with unimaginable horror at the pain they would go through.

So, for as little as $64.00-170.00, Yazidi and Christian girls would become the property of Daesh fighters, who would then subject them to abuse on a daily basis …

In a report entitled “A visit to Syria by an independent group” (Reverend Andrew Ashdown, Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, Baroness (Caroline) Cox, Lord Hylton, Reverend David Clark, Ms Jo Simister, and Dr. Simon Fisher), the group explained that

“(e)veryone to whom we spoke is passionately against any Regime Change, such as that supported by the UK, arguing that the alternative would be disastrous.”

Baroness Caroline Cox

The authentic voices from Syria are screaming for justice, as “progressive” Canadians continue to support the black flag of terrorism and the lies of those in government who pretend to represent us.

The Rwandan political opposition coalition would like to condemn in the strongest terms possible the sickening cynicism of Rwandan Gen. Mubarak towards vulnerable people, like survivors of genocide, his sectarianism and incitement to hatred against survivors of genocide as well as the thinly veiled policy of regional destabilization and expansionist policies.

On April 1, 2017, while addressing members of the association of student survivors of genocide (AERG) and former student survivors of genocide (GAERG), Gen. Mubarak Muganga, new military commander of Kigali and the Eastern region, told them that their problem of unemployment is just temporary, because they will be the first to be picked to go to fight in any new external military expedition. He said that he was only waiting for his boss, Commander in Chief President Kagame, to decide where and when to move and hence end their unemployment. He reminded them that they were part of the Rwandan army.

Gen. Mubarak Muganga

In a thinly veiled expression of Rwandan expansionist policy, the general said any place that has one Rwandan is considered a Rwandan territory and anyone attacking him or her immediately becomes a target of the Rwandan military expedition.

In order to win their hearts, the Rwandan general told them that the existence of the Rwandan army was to protect survivors. He revealed that the president has bought enough arms to protect survivors of genocide and their children against anyone harboring genocidal ideology.

In a thinly veiled expression of Rwandan expansionist policy, the general said any place that has one Rwandan is considered a Rwandan territory and anyone attacking him or her immediately becomes a target of the Rwandan military expedition.

Indeed, the last job the young survivors of genocide want is to die in expeditionary wars to plunder resources of neighboring countries to enrich the current political-military oligarchy or to cause regional chaos in order to make Rwanda look like an oasis of stability, hence giving a new lease on life to the repressive RPF regime. They deserve better support and empathy.

In addition, by singling out young survivors of genocide as the primary concern of the Army and not every citizen of the country and bragging that the president has brought them enough arms to defend them and their children against people with genocidal ideology, the general is inciting the rest of the population against them, particularly critics of the government. We may recall that every critic of the government, irrespective of ethnicity or religion, is labelled as revisionist, genocide denier or someone with genocidal ideology.

Furthermore, the thinly veiled expansionist and destabilization policy declared by Gen. Mubarak is likely to arouse animosity against people of Rwandan origin in the whole region.

We call upon the international community, particularly donors, to ask the government of President Paul Kagame:

• to put an end to the cynical policy of using survivors of genocide and particularly vulnerable young people for political survival
• to refrain from recruiting forcefully or by deception young survivors of genocide
• to stop all the sectarian policies or statements used to elicit the support of survivors of genocide, which make them a target of hatred by other young people who feel excluded
• to stop its expansionist and regional destabilization policies.

Etienne Masozera, who chairs a coalition of Rwandan political parties, can be reached at [email protected].

Donald Trump has succumbed to a British intelligence fabrication intended to corner him into escalating the war in Syria.

In the above 31 August 2013 tweet, he recognised that the same scenario then confronting Barack Obama was a sure path to WWIII. The danger of world war is even greater now, as Russia is now present in Syria, and any US escalation risks a showdown between the world’s two biggest nuclear powers. Yet, in the face of this danger, the British and Australian governments are cheering Trump on.

Trump’s action is inexplicable. Until now, he has been emphatic in his opposition to regime change in Syria and fully mindful of the danger of WWIII. What is clear, however, are the motives of those in the broader US government structures and intelligence agencies, the British government and its agencies, and the Australian government, who hitherto attacked Trump for his stated desire for better relations with Russia but are applauding him now he has resorted to war. Their agenda has nothing to do with controlling chemical weapons—it is regime change, ultimately aimed at Russia and China. And as with Iraq and Libya, they will tell any lie to achieve it.

The big lie in this instance is the chemical weapons (CW) attack blamed on Assad. Rupert Murdoch’s war propaganda machine, which was instrumental in launching the Iraq war, has gone into high gear attacking anybody who casts doubt on the CW claim. Just as Murdoch’s atrocious Sun newspaper in the UK called opponents of the Iraq war “scum” and “traitors”, it is now calling those who doubt the chemical weapons claim “sick trolls”. Murdoch’s minions at Sydney’s Daily Telegraph have joined forces with Paul Barry at the ABC’s Media Watch to attack Australians who doubt the lie.

For the record, here is a partial list of prominent, “mainstream” people who outright question the claim Assad committed the attack and/or insist on a full investigation:

• Former UN weapons inspector and firm Iraq war opponent Scott Ritter—says al-Qaeda “played” Trump;
• Independent MP and former senior intelligence analyst, Andrew Wilkie questions Assad’s role in strike;
• Former British Ambassador to Syria Peter Ford—calls attack a likely “fake flag”;
• British Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn—is calling for a full investigation;
• Veteran British foreign correspondent and Mail on Sunday columnist Peter Hitchens—writes of “unproven claim that President Assad of Syria had used poison gas”;
• US Democratic Party Congresswoman and Iraq war veteran Tulsi Gabbard—demands evidence from independent investigation;
• US Republican Party Congressman Thomas Massie—insists chemical attack does not serve Assad’s purposes;

Add to that list UN Security Council members Russia, China and Bolivia, who rejected the wild accusations hurled by Britain to whip up support for regime change.

A British Manipulation

Contrast the credibility of those who doubt the Assad CW attack claims, and oppose a military escalation, with the source of the claims of a CW attack—British intelligence. Whereas the likes of Scott Ritter, Jeremy Corbyn, Russia and China also opposed the Iraq war, recognising it was based on a lie, it was Britain’s intelligence agencies which fabricated the key intelligence claims that led to that war, including that Saddam was procuring nuclear weapons, and that his non-existent WMDs were capable of being deployed to strike Europe in 45 minutes.

The British government has been manoeuvring for this US escalation since Trump’s unexpected election on a platform of opposition to regime change in Syria. A 12 November 2016 Telegraph article, headlined “Trump-Putin alliance sparks diplomatic crisis as British ministers demand assurances from US over Russia”, reported the British government’s “number one” priority would be to convince Trump of the need to remove Assad. The next day Murdoch’s Times reported “Britain’s plan to tame Trump”, revealing Britain’s US ambassador rushed off a memo to the May government on the night of the election in which the ambassador confided that Trump would “be open to outside influence if pitched right … we should be well placed to do this”.

Up until last week, that effort with regard to Syria was failing. In fact, on 31 March Trump’s administration had announced that regime change in Syria was no longer US policy. The alleged CW attack in Idlib occurred four days later.

Journalist Peter Hitchens described the area in which the alleged attack happened:

“No independent Western journalist could go there. He or she would be killed or kidnapped within hours. Any report which comes from that region is filtered through people who you never see in the film that does get out. … These are the Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, alias the al-Nusra Front, alias al-Qaeda, the Syrian ‘opposition’ which we in the West have been supporting for several years … the same movement which destroyed Manhattan’s Twin Towers.”

The supposed doctor who first tweeted claims of an attack is actually a British accused terrorist, Shajul Islam, who despite having been put on trial in the UK for terrorism offences and kidnapping was able to travel to Syria to join al-Qaeda’s fight to overthrow Assad. This indicates he is a product of MI5’s “covenant of security” with terrorist groups which has incubated an army of UK jihadists, many of whom are MI5 agents and informers.

Another British intelligence project, the so-called White Helmets, who are funded by the British Foreign Office and USAID, provided the graphic images of the victims of the attack that were shown at the UN and to Donald Trump. The White Helmets only operate in terrorist-controlled areas, as they are in fact members of al-Qaeda. Even Barack Obama, who funded the White Helmets, blocked their leader from travelling to the USA last year due to his connections to terrorists.

Britain then used the unverified footage from the White Helmets as “evidence” to instigate a fiery confrontation at the 5 April UN Security Council meeting. Britain’s UN ambassador, Matthew Rycroft, made wild accusations, even that Russia and China, by opposing regime change, gave “encouragement” to Assad to use chemical weapons. China’s ambassador rebuked Rycroft for distorting China’s position, “untenable” logic, and “using the Security Council in an abusive manner for his own political purposes”.

As the Citizens Electoral Council has documented in the Australian Alert Service magazine, British intelligence has also been the source of all of the major claims of Russian collusion with Trump’s campaign. The McCarthyite hysteria this has incited is intended to drive Trump from office, or corner him into the kind of action he has now taken in Syria. The British and their accomplices in the US intelligence community have got their way in this instance. However, if the world is to avoid a dangerous showdown that could escalate to nuclear war, it is imperative that all people of good will in Australia, the UK and USA demand their governments drop the regime change agenda, and work towards improved relations with Russia and China.

In what may have been the worst day in Sean Spicer‘s life, the White House press secretary first drew a storm of criticism and ridicule Tuesday after butchering Godwin’s law, when trying to compare Syria president Bashar al-Assad to Adolf Hitler by saying that even the Nazi leader didn’t “sink to using chemical weapons.”

“We didn’t use chemical weapons in WWII. We had someone as despicable as Hitler who didn’t even sink to using chemical weapons,” Spicer said. Later when given the chance to elaborate he only made it worse: “I think when you come to sarin gas, there was no – he was not using the gas on his own people the same way that Assad is doing,” Spicer said. When reporters interrupted to note the millions of deaths in concentration camps, the response made even less sense: “there was not in the – he brought them into the Holocaust centers and I understand that,” he said.

Spicer’s bizarre attempt to make Assad appear worse than Hitler promptly drew demands for Spicer’s resignation from the likes of Nancy Pelosi, the Anne Frank center and various Jewish groups.

That in turn prompted Spicer to appear on CNN to apologize for his earlier comments, when in yet another stunning implosion, he only made things worse by saying, or rather admitting, that President Trump is trying to “destabilize” the Middle East. Specifically, when speaking to Wolf Blitzer, Spicer said that he did not want his comments on Hitler to distract from Trump’s attempts “to destabilize the region.”

“I came out to make sure we stay focused on what the president is doing and his decisive action. I needed to make sure that I clarified, and not was in any shape or form any more of a distraction from the president’s decisive action in Syria and the attempts that he is making to destabilize the region and root out ISIS out of Syria,” Spicer said.

While Spicer later corrected himself for this dramatic Freudian slip, according to The Hill others reported that this was the second time Spicer has said “destabilize” in recent remarks on the region. During Monday’s press briefing, he said one of the goals of U.S. policy there is “to make sure we destabilize Syria — destabilize the conflict there, reduce the threat of ISIS.”

We eagerly await Spicer’s explanation for the upcoming mushroom clouds over Pyongyang.

While Moscow continues to call for a thorough and independent probe into the Syrian chemical attack, the White House has “declassified” an open-sourced report that pins the blame on Damascus while accusing Moscow of “sowing doubt” over the US narrative.

“We have gone back through and looked at all the evidence we can and it’s very clear who planned this attack, who authorized this attack and who conducted this attack itself,” Defense Secretary James Mattis said Tuesday adding that he has “no doubt” that Assad was responsible.

On April 4, toxic gas, believed to be sarin, killed dozens of civilians in Khan Shaykhun in the Idlib province of Syria. At the time of the attack, the town was under the control of Tahrir al-Sham, formerly known as the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front.

Witness accounts on social media in the immediate aftermath pinned the blame on an airstrike by Syrian government forces. Reports from the scene also captured civilians foaming at the mouth, with witnesses saying a white smoke spread across the town. The chemical attack was immediately used by the US as a pretext to launch its first unilateral retaliatory strike on a Syrian air base.

Both Moscow and Damascus called for a thorough and independent probe to establish the full picture of the tragedy. Russia believes that Syrian planes bombed a terrorist munitions depot which contained, among other arms, toxic agents that remained under jihadist control following the UN-supervised destruction of Damascus’ sarin stockpiles in 2013.

The US, however, continues to insist that it could only be the Syrian air force that used the chemical weapon under the orders of President Bashar Assad, dismissing any alternative scenarios. Mattis refused to share the evidence the Pentagon used to reach its verdict, while the White House noted that it had plenty of social media and open-source material to back its hardcore conclusions.

“The information we have downgraded and declassified includes a wide body of open-source material, both social media accounts. It includes open-source videos, reporting, open-source imagery, et cetera, as well as our own geospatial intelligence, our signals intelligence, and it includes physiological samples of victims of the attack,” a senior White House official said during the briefing Tuesday.

READ MORE: Airbase hit by US missiles ‘heavily involved’ in anti-ISIS campaign – relative of strike victim

An official “background” document about the attack released by the White House accused Moscow of disseminating “conflicting accounts in order to create confusion and sow doubt within the international community.” Roughly half of the 4-page paper was devoted to “refuting the false narratives” vaguely attributed to “Moscow” or “Russian state media.

Based on “pro-opposition social media reporting” the White House is “confident” that an SU-22 that took off from a Damascus-controlled airfield dropped “at least one munition” containing chemical weapons. After further investigation of “open source” imagery Washington firmly dismissed the scenario of a conventional munition hitting jihadists’ chemical stockpile as “inconsistent.”

The White House also noted that the symptoms suffered by the victims of the chemical attack were consistent with sarin exposure. According to the US “assessment” neither Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) or other terrorists in the area has access to sarin.

While Mattis rejected unsubstantiated claims that Russia knew of the Syrian chemical attack in advance, the White House accused Moscow of trying to cover the attack and “sow doubt” over the US narrative.

“I think it’s clear that the Russians are trying to cover up what happened there…To cover up Syrian regime culpability in a chemical weapons attack,” the White House official noted.

Russia however never denied or attempted to hide the incident, but on the contrary and from the very outset, tried to get an international team of UN experts to visit the site of the alleged chemical strike to get an expert conclusion. Moscow also insisted, prior to US retaliatory strikes on Friday, that specialists visit the Shayrat Airfield – the base bombed by the US.

The US-presented evidence and logic were dismissed by Colonel-General Sergey Rudskoy, who questioned the “authenticity” of information concerning the attack circulating in the media. He said that the course of events reconstructed through the means of social media evidence raised “serious doubts” not only among the Russian military but also “among many respected experts and organizations.”

The Syrian Army has no chemical weapons and has “no need” to use any such arms, as it has already been conducting a successful offensive on militant positions, the Russian General Staff official has said. Rudskoy also noted that after the 2013 OPWC mission which supervised the surrender of Damascus’ chemical stockpiles; terrorists are the only actors which have access to Syria’s remaining chemical agents.

“Out of 12 facilities used for storing and producing chemical weapons, ten were destroyed as confirmed by the OPCW experts. The Syrian government has no access to the remaining two facilities as they are located on a territory controlled by the so-called opposition,” Rudskoy said at a briefing, adding that it remains unclear if the chemical weapons stored at these two facilities had been destroyed.

Earlier on Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin called the attack on Khan Shaykhun a “false flag” operation aimed at discrediting the Assad government and warned of similar incidents in the future.

“These actions are aimed at creating a new pretext for accusing the government of Syria of more chemical weapons attacks and provoking more strikes by the US,” added Rudskoy. He said militants were transporting toxic agents into several parts of Syria, including Eastern Ghouta, the site of the 2013 chemical weapons incident.

In appearance, Trump’s April 6, 2017 missile attack on Syria is the first step towards a regime change, a massive regional conquest, and World War 3. In appearance, the event marked a point of no return for Trump’s presidency.

We have entered uncharted territory, with the future of humanity at stake.

Murder in the name of propaganda

What is clear is that the chemical attack was a false flag operation, staged for war propaganda purposes, with intelligence operatives, the Deep State, the political elite, and the corporate media working in unison.

Syrian jets hit a rebel position. Chemicals used by the rebels (US-backed terrorists, CIA) were stockpiled at the target. The target was hit.

Out of this came the fabricated narrative that President Assad released a chemical weapons attack on civilians, despite the Syrian government having no sane political reason to do so. The Assad regime had recently been given assurances by the Trump administration and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson suggesting that a regime change was not in the Trump administration’s plans, and that “the Syrian people would decide” Assad’s fate. There was also no sane reason for Russia to have participated in or condoned a chemical weapons attack on civilians.

Syrian-Russian anti-terror operations were succeeding, and Putin was looking forward to cooperation with the new Trump administration.

The White Helmets (left), who play a starring role in the subsequently staged “humanitarian crisis” spectacle, are US/UK-backed terrorist/intelligence assets and propaganda agents.

All signs point to a setup using tired old tricks. A repeat of previous similar staged “humanitarian crisis” pretexts, from the “incubator babies” to “Aleppo Boy”. Elements of the current #SyriaHoax includes clumsy staging of the “chemical attack”, starring a doctor who is a known US-backed terrorist, dead and injured people laughing (because they don’t think the cameras are running), actors playing “dead children” opening their eyes. The Twitter page of a fabricated 7-year old Syrian girl Alabed Bana is ridiculous propaganda that is promoted by major Fake News media, including Jake Tapper of CIA-connected CNN.

As written by Michel Chossudovsky:

While there is no evidence that president Al-Assad ordered the chemical weapons attack, there is ample evidence –including a comprehensive UN report– that the opposition “rebels” (supported by US-NATO) have since 2012 stockpiled and used chemical weapons against Syrian civilians as well as SAA soldiers.

There is also evidence that Washington and its allies had previously planned and supported “False Flag” chemical weapons attacks perpetrated by the “rebels” (including the 2012 East Ghouta attacks) with a view to incriminating the Damascus government.

As Ron Paul and many others warned, the propaganda must be questioned. According to the sources of former CIA operative Ray McGovern and numerous other current and former intelligence officers, the White House was extensively briefed, and CIA director Mike Pompeo “played it straight”. Trump “knew”, or should have known, “was persuaded”, and ordered the missile strike anyway.

National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster and Defense Secretary Mattis (image right) pushed for the strike. White House advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner and daughter Ivanka Trump reportedly also pushed for the strike. White House advisor Steve Bannon advised against the strike, and was rebuked.

Who ordered this operation to frame Assad?

Was it the Deep State and corrupt players, and the unhinged warmonger and Al-Qaeda/ISIS favorite John McCain, who visited Syria in February?

Was it to force the Trump administration to act?

Was it the Trump administration itself, setting up a multi-pronged deception?

Was it conducted by other forces or governments (Israel, etc.)?

What did Russia know, if anything? Who benefits?

The strike

Trump fired 59 Tomahawk missiles on Shayrat air base. Trump continued entertaining Chinese president Xi Jinping in Palm Beach while the operation unfolded. Nine civilians were killed in the attack and several more were wounded.

Donald Trump committed a mass murder, and is now officially a war criminal. What is also a fact is that the strike and the resulting narrative politically benefits terrorism— ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and the CIA— in opposition to Syria, Russia and their allies, who are fighting terrorism. It was also a glorious moment for the Deep State and the New World Order.

Both Russia and Syria were warned in advance. No Russians lost their lives. Only 23 missiles hit their mark (why and where did the others go?) The damage was “relatively minor”. The runway was left intact. Syrian military planes were able to conduct sorties from the same runway against rebel targets the following morning.

In his statement following the attack, Trump spoke of the “slow and brutal death of beautiful babies, cruelly murdered in a barbaric act”, and declared that there was no question of Assad’s guilt. He left no room even for investigations or questions. Tillerson, former head of Exxon-Mobil (and major player in past wars in which Exxon-Mobil benefited greatly) stated that there will be “no role for (Assad) to govern the Syrian people”, and “there was no doubt Assad was behind the chemical attack”. Defense Secretary Mattis also declared “no doubt” that Assad did it.Trump also stated that his attitude towards Assad “has changed very much” due to the alleged chemical attack. And to further exacerbate tensions, the Pentagon was ordered to begin an investigation into Russia’s role behind the chemical attack.

Was Trump’s attack “real”—or a one-time fake retaliation, in response to a fake chemical attack? Was Trump acting on his own, or was he deceived or forced to order the retaliatory strike? Was Trump naïve and ignorant enough to be manipulated by the Deep State propaganda, and act recklessly out of emotion?

Or was he playing a game?

Trump’s crazed 180 degree turn

The world remains confused about the attack and its meaning. Even more baffling is Trump’s apparent total reversal of principle.

According to former State Department counterterrorism coordinator Daniel Benjamin, Trump has

“completely flipped from one day to the next on the issue of significant national security that he’s been talking about for years…I have very little confidence that he is thinking one, two or three moves ahead, which is what a president has to do.”

Why did Trump take what appears to be a sudden and unwarranted step towards regime change in Syria, globalism, and World War 3 confrontation with Russia. Why, after having won the presidency for advocating the opposite?

Why this, from the anti-globalist/anti-regime change/anti-corruption choice was (unlike the deeply corrupt neocon-backed war-loving Hillary Clinton and her network) believed to be the president who would not start World War 3?

Why this, from someone who knows he won the election because the vast majority of American voters who responded to the message that “Americanism, not globalism, will be our credo”?

Why this, from a man who lambasted the Obama administration for meddling in Syria, and said attacking Syria was a bad idea at least 45 times? Why this, following months of insistence—over the violent opposition of the Deep State, Obama/Clinton Democrats, the Fake News corporate Media and endless “Russiagate” noise— that cooperation with Russia was critical to Middle East stability and world peace? Trump and his administration are now leading the anti-Russia and anti-Putin propaganda effort, launching daily attacks at Putin via the corporate media.

Why this, mere days since Rex Tillerson stated that Assad’s future would be decided by the Syrians, and regime change was not planned?

The missile attack on Syria sparked immediate outrage from the largely anti-war Trump base, which denounced the strikes as a gigantic betrayal.

A typical example:

Veterans and alt-right turn against Trump

Most of the leading alternative media voices supporting Trump are, and remain, staunchly anti-war, including Mike Cernovich, Paul Joseph Watson, Stefan Molyneux, Jack Posobiec, Lee Stranahan, and many others. Some are ready to “get off the Trump train”. Even Trump’s blindest followers are going into contortions coming up with rationalizations.

Richard Spencer condemned Trump for his betrayal, and organized an anti-war rally in front of the White House. (This rally was violently attacked by pro-war Soros-funded Antifa thugs.)

Adding to the confusion is the fact that the Trump presidency, despite being embattled, was winning on many fronts. Much had been, up until April 6, moving in his favor.

• The Deep State’s all-out war on Trump was being met with effective pushback from those in the Trump camp. Simultaneously, the Deep State is being fought independently by whistleblowers, including WikiLeaks.
• “Russiagate” is backfiring. Attention has been turned toObama/Democrats illegally spying on Trump and private citizens, leaks, and numerous corruption scandals possibly implicating current and former Democrats and Republicans.
• Investigations into Hillary Clinton, the Clinton Foundation, the Obama administration, and the Democratic National Committee remain open and ongoing, with the FBI and the Justice Department sitting on thousands of pieces of incriminating evidence.
• Large numbers of human trafficking and pedophilia arrests are taking place nationwide, under the direction of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, towards the exposure of the larger pedophilia network and political blackmail apparatus that controls much of Washington (Pedogate/Pizzagate).
• The destructive activities of Antifa and anarchist groups funded and controlled by neoliberals and Democrats aligned with Clinton and Obama have failed to turn public opinion against Trump.
• The intelligence-controlledestablishment corporate media aligned against Trump is losing on all fronts to independent and social media sources, and is now derided as Fake News.
• Trump’s presidency is a guiding example inspiring anti-globalist nationalist movements around the world, supported by Nigel Farageand the forces behind Brexit, and nationalists such as Marine Le Pen in France. These movements are gaining momentum.
• Many elements of his Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) agenda are being put into place, despite obstruction and violent opposition by adversaries.
• Most importantly, Trump had been fully supported by his base, through every difficulty.

Does it make any sense for Trump to squander these gains and alienate his vital support base? Why did he suddenly do the one thing that would lead to his demise: an act of war that only a globalist neocon of the highest order would pull off; the one thing that can unite both Left and Right against him?

Why does it seem that Trump is abandoning MAGA altogether?

Why would he toss away an alliance with Russia that would have ensured, if not at least contributed greatly, to a true world peace?

We are left with speculation.

Scenario 1: Trump has lost to Deep State

In this interpretation, Trump has given up the fight against globalism. He has “been flipped”. He has sold out. He has surrendered to intimidation from the Deep State.

The Syrian false flag was set up by the Deep State, and Trump was ordered to finish the war of conquest begun with 9/11, or face consequences. He was threatened into doing exactly what Hillary Clinton wants done. Forced to abandon principles. Forced to commit political suicide. Forced to abandon his base, and accept being a politically isolated, impeachable lame duck president. The Trump presidency is left to collapse from both external attack and internal undermining. The Deep State triumphs, and the Bush/Clinton criminal network gets the last laugh.

A variation on the theory: Trump has cut a deal to end the civil war that has grown too damaging, threatening the existence to the system itself. Both the Deep State and Trump prefer to end the fight.

In exchange for the allowing the war to take place, Trump will be lavished with the rewards of all of the corrupt White House puppets who preceded him, as long as he follows orders. If he does a good job, he will be the next ceremonial “war president”. He will get some of his domestic agenda passed, be permitted to live, be treated “normally” by the media, and ride off into the sunset. But MAGA, and the “swamp draining” of Flynn, Bannon, etc. is over.

What appears to be the White House’s sudden“shift to the center” smacks of this capitulation.

Scenario 2:  McMaster, and Deep State White House coup d’état

Is Trump in danger, is he in control, or is he an isolated dupe?

In explosive new stories broken by Mike Cernovich, national security adviser H.R. McMaster, acolyte of disgraced former CIA Director David Petraeus, has taken over the National Security Council, and is manipulating intelligence reports to Trump and wants 150,000 ground troops in Syria. McMaster is plotting with Petraeus to is purging all who oppose a ground war in Syria.

In this consolidation of power, Trump loyalist K.T. McFarland has been removed. Sebastian Gorka may be next to be removed by McMaster.

McMaster is also close with scandalized former Obama national security adviser Susan Rice, and it is reported that Rice herself pushed McMaster to remove Steve Bannon from the NSC. Bannon, who is against regime change, is gone.

Petraeus himself was considered by Trump for the NSC post, following the ouster of Michael Flynn by the Deep State, before McMaster got the job.

In the words of Cernovich, it is now “Trump supporters out, pro-war Petraeus puppets in”. 

These disturbing new developments, and the McMaster takeover of foreign policy, come in the wake of months of White House infiltration and sabotage.

Despite continuous warnings of Trump loyalists for the past months, Trump chose to surround himself with enemies and those who seek to undermine his original agenda: Republican/Bush neocons, Obama/Clinton infiltrators (“West Wing Democrats”), Deep State operatives, globalists, Goldman Sachs denizens. He has filled the “swamp” more than he has “drained” it.

In the internal civil war between Trump loyalists and the globalists, the Trump loyalists appear to be losing, leaving Trump isolated and surrounded by seasoned criminals, saboteurs, and spies. National security adviser Flynn, the most powerful operational member of what was the inner circle, was effectively forced to resign, perhaps not coincidentally after spearheading operations against the Deep State. The influence of advisor Steve Bannon, leading force behind the anti-globalist/anti-establishment agenda, has been greatly diminished, and there were rumors that he has considered leaving the White House.

Meanwhile, the influence and power of the CIA/Clinton/Obama/Soros/Goldman Sachs/Israel-connected “West Wing Democrats”–Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump, Gary Cohn, and Dina Powell is on the rise.  Poisonous Bush neocons such as Vice President Mike Pence and Reince Priebus, and the neocon generals, remain securely in place. Trump has shown no signs thathe will fire family members, despite Kushner’s questionable background, and regardless of his leaks of anti-Bannon stories to MSNBC. Hecontinues to praise Priebus, despite evidence of sabotage, and despite thefact  that the recently fired Priebus aide Katie Walsh was caught leaking anti-Trump stories to the enemy Fake News media.

Now comes word that the Trump presidency is “reset” towards a “centrist” globalist platform and the end of MAGA; the end of the “deconstruction” and reform efforts represented by Bannon.

According to former CIA operative Robert David Steele, this is Trump’s “Bay of Pigs” moment,  in which Trump either reverses course and opposes the Deep State forces pressuring and manipulating him, or he gives in to them—thus rendering himself an immediate lame duck president. This is the moment in which Trump must take on his enemies, at risk to his life. Or not.

Scenario 3: Trump playing high-stakes “4-D chess” games

Here is the “optimistic” scenario.

Was the missile strike itself a limited one-time staged propaganda deception—a fake response to a fake chemical attack— done with the back channel cooperation of the Russians and Syrians, who were warned in advance? The fact that no Russians were killed, “relatively minor” collateral damage was done, and the runway was left intact all suggest this possibility.

It was a noisy show of military strength and resolve—professional wrestling-style theater—to pave the way for Rex Tillerson’s April 11, 2017  diplomatic trip to Russia, which will focus on the Syrian crisis. It was also a symbolic “shock and awe” gesture , to impress and intimidate visiting Chinese president Xi Jinping, a message to North Korea, and future US-China relations, including tensions in the South China Sea and US-Chinese trade.

The provocative noise is a planetary game of “chicken”—“peace through strength”, “don’t mess with us”—will improve US advantage in negotiations, and ultimately result in future victory. There will be tensions, but no world war. According to Mattis, “tensions with Russia will not spiral out of control”.

This version of events is embraced by Steve Pieczenik, as well as Alex Jones and Roger Stone. Stone does not believe that the limited strike signals the beginning of a wider war. But both Jones and Stone agree that if Trump does widen the war, “he is done”, and Trump “becomes George W. Bush”, and “part of the Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama continuum”.

Here is Mike Cernovich’s astute analysis:

Trump, Syria and the 4-D Chess hypothesis

Numerous other possible “4-D chess” scenarios are put forth by Scott Adams. This is the mythical Trump, keeping allies and foes alike off balance, many steps ahead.

It was also a “wag the dog” distraction, designed to erase Russiagate from news headlines (he has now “proven” that he is not “buddy buddy with Putin”), quell the media, temporarily quell the political opposition, and rally heretofore skeptical world leaders.

Trump also benefits from a “Bush Iraq-9/11 moment”, and becomes a “war president”, avenging an atrocity committed by an evildoer. Even if he loses the support of much of his base, perhaps Trump believes that it can be replaced by new support from those who might warm to him “in a time of war”, against current boogeyman Assad.

Jack Posobiec speculates that Trump and Putin might have cut some sort of back channel deal.

Wikileaks’ Julian Assange wonders that if the end game is that Russia pulls out of Syria, the quagmire will be left for the other nations.

Would Russia to go along with the removal of Assad, along with a carving up of Syria that includes Russia?

But these questions cast doubt:

Why would Russia give up its military bases without a war, give up its extensive, entrenched and vital oil-related interests in the region, and give the Anglo-American empire absolute primacy in the region?

Scenario 4: Trump as neocon Trojan Horse

Is Trump, in fact, a neocon globalist, in the long line of neocon globalists (Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama/Clinton), who is now casting aside his populism, because it is no longer useful? Is Trump controlled by higher elites?

Has Trump been lying to the Russians and Putin for months about cooperation, while preparing major military moves against them? Has Trump used the Russians to get rid of ISIS elements, while plotting to get rid of the Russians once they stop being useful?

Is Trump, in fact, out to prove that he can outmuscle the “weak” Obama/Clinton globalist agenda, and do them one better, by 1) actually conquering Syria, 2) beat Russia and China, and drive them out of the Middle East, 3) take the Grand Chessboard, and also 4) scare China in compliance? Is this the “peace  through strength” total war that Trump and his generals envision?

Trump is also a fervent militarist, who “loves generals” and loves the idea of wielding American military muscle and supremacy. This is evidenced by his incessant fawning overtures to Pentagon and CIA, and surrounding himself with generals and warriors. He is genuinely a fan of the intelligence community and law enforcement. As it probably pains him that any factions within these institutions oppose him, he is eager to win them over.

Trump has never stopped accusing the Obama/Clinton regime of “weakness”. The Trump foreign policy will therefore display“strength”.

Trump must certainly know that war is insanely lucrative, and an economic multiplier that could boost a stagnant US economy. He is pushing a huge increase in military spending.

War makes it all happen.

Who benefits from regime change in Syria? Who benefits from confrontation with Russia and world war 3?  None other than the Deep State, the CIA and the New World Order.

There is also the oil. And the pipelines and transit routes.

How could Trump and oil man Tillerson ignore the Grand Chessboard and its spoils?

Has World War 3 already begun?

Judging by the latest provocations, the Trump administration is foaming at the mouth for war:

White House accuses Russia of cover-up in Syria chemical attack

AP: Senior US official says US has concluded that Russia knew in advance of chemical attack

US forces on Jordanian border, standing by with Jordanian special forces

McMaster calls for Syria regime change

US weighs saturation strike on Syrian government

Trump discussed with king of Jordan Sunni/Kurd coalition to stabilize Syria

Russia warns Trump they will respond with force if Syria red lines crossed again

Boris Johnson spearheads diplomatic drive to get Russian forces out of Syria

UN ambassador Nikki Haley: getting Assad out not only priority in Syria

Tillerson: no role for Assad in Syria

In statements given during April 9 press interviews, Tillerson repeated that defeating the Islamic State remains the top focus, and the strike has “not changed US priorities towards ousting Assad”. Haley repeated declared that regime change in Syria is a priority and “inevitable”. McMaster promised that fighting ISIS and ousting Assad are “simultaneous”, and did not rule out additional strikes.

On every front, severe damage is quickly being done to US-Russian relations, too much to be forgiven or easily reversed. There are few voices of reason, and none from within the Trump administration.

Secretary of State Tillerson makes the Trump administration’s first official trip to Russia on April 11. (If a state of war exists between the US and Russia, would Tillerson be making this trip at all?)

The result of this negotiation could decide the fate of humanity.

But is it smoke and mirrors? Is it all a moot point now?

US military forces are ready. According to Jack Posobiec’s well-placed sources in the military, there will be boots on the ground June 1 or earlier.

“Let the jury consider their verdict”, the King said, for about the twentieth time that day. “No, no,” said the Queen. Sentence first – verdict afterward.” – Charles Dodgson ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.’

The pictures of dead and dying civilians, including children, their suffering allegedly caused by a Syrian/Russian chemical warfare attack, has once again caused the western media to renew their demands for the removal of Syrian President Bashar al Assad.

In the Sydney Morning Herald of 6 April 2017 the SMH’s chief Washington correspondent Paul McGeogh, refers to Trump meeting with Egyptian President el-Sisi and a parallel declaration by the US UN Ambassador Nikki Haley that the removal of Assad was no longer a US priority. These two incidents, he argues, sent a signal to Damascus that the Syrian government had a licence to do as it pleased.

Although McGeogh did not acknowledge it, that thesis was exactly the same as that being argued by arch neocons Senators Lindsay Graham and John McCain. The latter was recently described in a SMH editorial as ‘widely respected.’ Which is one measure of the parallel universe the SMH occupies these days.

McGeogh goes on to say, “we’ve been here before,” referring to the 2013 poison gas attack in Ghouta, Syria. That was blamed on the Assad government by the western media at the time. The fact that the allegations were later discredited.

The rush to judgment by McGeogh and his counterparts elsewhere in the mainstream media overlooks a number of alternative explanations that are at least worth considering, especially when actual hard evidence is in such short supply.

One such scenario is that the Syrian air force bombed a factory that was storing chemical weapons for use by one or more of the multiple terrorist groups operating in the area.

The fact that the terrorist groups have used such weapons in the past and had strong motives to use them again is entirely missing from the western media narrative. The stockpile of chemical weapons at Khan Sheikhoun had previously been shipped to fellow terrorists operating in Iraq, as confirmed by the Iraqi government.

It is also known that three days before the tragedy at Khan Sheikhoun a convoy of TOW missiles, gas masks for up to 2000 persons and chemical warfare suits from Saudi Arabian stockpiles left Hatay, Turkey for Hama, Syria where al Nusra are waging a major battle for control. This raises obvious questions about the intended use of the gas masks and chemical warfare suits by the terrorist groups. This information, released by the Russians before the Khan Sheikhoun tragedy, was ignored by the western media at the time and certainly does not appear now.

To disclose that information would raise wider questions, such as the role of Saudi Arabia and others in the Gulf region in supplying and financing the terrorist activity in Syria and Iraq. Certainly no hint of criticism of Saudi Arabia escapes the lips of Australian government spokespersons from PM Malcolm Turnbull down. This is also the case with the illegal war being waged on Yemen by the US and Saudi Arabia.

In all the fury mounted against the Assad government for their alleged conduct, no one has raised a single plausible reason why the Syrian government would risk such international condemnation for so little military benefit.

Assad is not a fool and he would know that such an attack would provide ammunition for the very powerful neocon element in the US for who massive civilian casualties are a matter of indifference when committed by their side, as they repeatedly demonstrate, but are ever willing to use tragedy whether at their own hand or by others, in pursuit of their geopolitical goals.

The very astute analyst who writes under the nom de plume ‘The Saker’ expresses it this way:

“The Neocons, apparently backed by the CIA and the Pentagon, want to go at it solo: just shoot up all of Syria OK Corral style and they seem to be convinced that they can somehow scare the Russians, the Iranians and the Syrians into submission. If so, then they are both stupid and ignorant.” 

Syria does not exist in geopolitical isolation despite the best attempts of McGeogh et al to make it appear so. In 2007 General Wesley Clark revealed previously secret US plans to topple seven Middle East and North African countries in a five year period.

Those seven countries make revealing reading in the light of recent events: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen and Iran.

Five of the seven have been or are currently being attacked, occupied, and/or destroyed by the US and its allies, including Australia. During the recent US Presidential campaign both Trump and Clinton made no secret of their intense dislike of Iran. For a number of reasons outside the scope of this article Iran is unlikely to be attacked directly. It is however, the victim of asymmetrical warfare through sanctions, assassinations and support for the terrorist organisation MEK.

Lebanon will probably be left to the Israelis who have attacked it on multiple occasions and occupied the southern portion for a nearly two-decade period.

Israel also plays an important role in the attack on Syria both directly through the bombing of Syrian Army positions, and also by providing medical aid to wounded ISIS fighters in military hospitals in the Golan Heights.

The Syrian Golan Heights themselves have been occupied by Israel since the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. They remain, in defiance of UN resolutions and international law, with the support of the US and Australia. Their reasons for the continued occupation of Golan are multiple, including the fulfillment of part of the Yinon Plan (O. Yinon Directions Kivunim Magazine February 1982). That plan called for the breakup into ‘statelets’ of Syria, Iraq, Egypt and Lebanon and the dissolution of Jordan.

Recent discoveries of huge reserves of oil and gas in the Golan Heights are another reason for staying. Genie Energy, a company based in Newark New Jersey, is carrying out the exploitation of those resources. Its strategic advisory board includes such luminaries as Dick Cheney (former US vice-president), James Woolsey (former director of the CIA), Larry Summers (former US treasury Secretary), Bill Richardson (former US energy Secretary) and Rupert Murdoch (media baron).

The latter’s role in Genie Energy is probably one of the reasons that criticism of Israeli policies rarely blemishes the pages of News Corp publications.

The other driving force of US policy in Syria dates from the latter’s refusal to allow transit of a pipeline for Qatari gas to Europe. The US plan behind the pipeline was to use Qatari gas to wean Europeans off their reliance on Russian gas, thereby undermining the Russian economy.

None of this geopolitical context is given to readers of the mainstream media. Their reporters, editors and our politicians find it much easier to regurgitate the clichéd and self-serving memes that flow from Washington and London.

The reporting of the tragedy from Syria is but the latest illustration of an all too common phenomenon: a pre-determined verdict on little or no evidence.

James O’Neill, an Australian-based Barrister at Law, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

More than two dozen ex-U.S. intelligence officials urge President Trump to rethink his claims blaming the Syrian government for the chemical deaths in Idlib and to pull back from his dangerous escalation of tensions with Russia.

MEMORANDUM FOR: The President

FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)*

SUBJECT: Syria: Was It Really “A Chemical Weapons Attack”?

1 – We write to give you an unambiguous warning of the threat of armed hostilities with Russia – with the risk of escalation to nuclear war. The threat has grown after the cruise missile attack on Syria in retaliation for what you claimed was a “chemical weapons attack” on April 4 on Syrian civilians in southern Idlib Province.

2 – Our U.S. Army contacts in the area have told us this is not what happened. There was no Syrian “chemical weapons attack.” Instead, a Syrian aircraft bombed an al-Qaeda-in-Syria ammunition depot that turned out to be full of noxious chemicals and a strong wind blew the chemical-laden cloud over a nearby village where many consequently died.

3 – This is what the Russians and Syrians have been saying and – more important –what they appear to believe happened.

4 – Do we conclude that the White House has been giving our generals dictation; that they are mouthing what they have been told to say?

5 – After Putin persuaded Assad in 2013 to give up his chemical weapons, the U.S. Army destroyed 600 metric tons of Syria’s CW stockpile in just six weeks. The mandate of the U.N.’s Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW-UN) was to ensure that all were destroyed – like the mandate for the U.N. inspectors for Iraq regarding WMD. The U.N. inspectors’ findings on WMD were the truth. Rumsfeld and his generals lied and this seems to be happening again. The stakes are even higher now; the importance of a relationship of trust with Russia’s leaders cannot be overstated.

6 – In September 2013, after Putin persuaded Assad to relinquish his chemical weapons (giving Obama a way out of a tough dilemma), the Russian President wrote an op-ed for the New York Times in which he said:

“My working and personal relationship with President Obama is marked by growing trust. I appreciate this.”

Détente Nipped in the Bud

7 – Three-plus years later, on April 4, 2017, Russian Prime Minister Medvedev spoke of “absolute mistrust,” which he characterized as “sad for our now completely ruined relations [but] good news for terrorists.” Not only sad, in our view, but totally unnecessary – worse still, dangerous.

8 – With Moscow’s cancellation of the agreement to de-conflict flight activity over Syria, the clock has been turned back six months to the situation last September/October when 11 months of tough negotiation brought a ceasefire agreement. U.S. Air Force attacks on fixed Syrian army positions on Sept. 17, 2016, killing about 70 and wounding another 100, scuttled the fledgling ceasefire agreement approved by Obama and Putin a week before. Trust evaporated.

9 – On Sept 26, 2016, Foreign Minister Lavrov lamented:

“My good friend John Kerry … is under fierce criticism from the US military machine, [which] apparently does not really listen to the Commander in Chief.” Lavrov criticized JCS Chairman Joseph Dunford for telling Congress that he opposed sharing intelligence with Russia on Syria, “after the [ceasefire] agreement, concluded on direct orders of Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Barack Obama, had stipulated that the two sides would share intelligence. … It is difficult to work with such partners. …”

10 – On Oct. 1, 2016, Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova warned,

“If the US launches a direct aggression against Damascus and the Syrian Army, it would cause a terrible, tectonic shift not only in the country, but in the entire region.”

11 – On Oct 6, 2016, Russian defense spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov cautioned that Russia was prepared to shoot down unidentified aircraft – including any stealth aircraft – over Syria. Konashenkov made a point of adding that Russian air defenses “will not have time to identify the origin” of the aircraft.

12 – On Oct 27, 2016, Putin publicly lamented, “My personal agreements with the President of the United States have not produced results,” and complained about “people in Washington ready to do everything possible to prevent these agreements from being implemented in practice.” Referring to Syria, Putin decried the lack of a “common front against terrorism after such lengthy negotiations, enormous effort, and difficult compromises.”

13 – Thus, the unnecessarily precarious state into which U.S.-Russian relations have now sunk – from “growing trust” to “absolute mistrust.” To be sure, many welcome the high tension, which – admittedly – is super for the arms business.

14 – We believe it of transcendent importance to prevent relations with Russia from falling into a state of complete disrepair. Secretary Tillerson’s visit to Moscow this week offers an opportunity to stanch the damage, but there is also a danger that it could increase the acrimony – particularly if Secretary Tillerson is not familiar with the brief history set down above.

15 – Surely it is time to deal with Russia on the basis of facts, not allegations based largely on dubious evidence – from “social media,” for example. While many would view this time of high tension as ruling out a summit, we suggest the opposite may be true. You might consider instructing Secretary Tillerson to begin arrangements for an early summit with President Putin.

* Background on Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), a list of whose issuances can be found at https://consortiumnews.com/vips-memos/.

A handful of CIA veterans established VIPS in January 2003 after concluding that Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld had ordered our former colleagues to manufacture intelligence to “justify” an unnecessary war with Iraq. At the time we chose to assume that President George W. Bush was not fully aware of this.

We issued our first Memorandum for the President on the afternoon of Feb. 5, 2003, after Colin Powell’s ill-begotten speech at the United Nations. Addressing President Bush, we closed with these words:

No one has a corner on the truth; nor do we harbor illusions that our analysis is “irrefutable” or “undeniable” [adjectives Powell applied to his charges against Saddam Hussein]. But after watching Secretary Powell today, we are convinced that you would be well served if you widened the discussion … beyond the circle of those advisers clearly bent on a war for which we see no compelling reason and from which we believe the unintended consequences are likely to be catastrophic.

Respectfully, we offer the same advice to you, President Trump.

***

For the Steering Group, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity

Eugene D. Betit, Intelligence Analyst, DIA, Soviet FAO, (US Army, ret.)

William Binney, Technical Director, NSA; co-founder, SIGINT Automation Research Center (ret.)

Marshall Carter-Tripp, Foreign Service Officer and former Office Director in the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research, (ret.)

Thomas Drake, Senior Executive Service, NSA (former)

Bogdan Dzakovic, Former Team Leader of Federal Air Marshals and Red Team, FAA Security, (ret.) (associate VIPS)

Robert Furukawa, Capt, CEC, USN-R, (ret.)

Philip Giraldi, CIA, Operations Officer (ret.)

Mike Gravel, former Adjutant, top secret control officer, Communications Intelligence Service; special agent of the Counter Intelligence Corps and former United States Senator

Matthew Hoh, former Capt., USMC, Iraq and Foreign Service Officer, Afghanistan (associate VIPS)

Larry C. Johnson, CIA & State Department (ret.)

Michael S. Kearns, Captain, USAF (Ret.); ex-Master SERE Instructor for Strategic Reconnaissance Operations (NSA/DIA) and Special Mission Units (JSOC)

John Brady Kiesling, Foreign Service Officer (ret.)

John Kiriakou, former CIA analyst and counterterrorism officer, and former senior investigator, Senate Foreign Relations Committee

Linda Lewis, WMD preparedness policy analyst, USDA (ret.) (associate VIPS)

Lisa Ling, TSgt USAF (ret.) (associate VIPS)

Edward Loomis, NSA, Cryptologic Computer Scientist (ret.)

David MacMichael, National Intelligence Council (ret.)

Ray McGovern, former US Army infantry/intelligence officer & CIA analyst (ret.)

Elizabeth Murray, Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Near East, CIA and National Intelligence Council (ret.)

Torin Nelson, former Intelligence Officer/Interrogator, Department of the Army

Todd E. Pierce, MAJ, US Army Judge Advocate (Ret.)

Coleen Rowley, FBI Special Agent and former Minneapolis Division Legal Counsel (ret.)

Scott Ritter, former MAJ., USMC, and former UN Weapon Inspector, Iraq

Peter Van Buren, U.S. Department of State, Foreign Service Officer (ret.) (associate VIPS)

Kirk Wiebe, former Senior Analyst, SIGINT Automation Research Center, NSA

Sarah G. Wilton, Commander, US Naval Reserve (ret), DIA (ret.)

Robert Wing, former Foreign Service Officer (associate VIPS)

Ann Wright, U.S. Army Reserve Colonel (ret) and former U.S. Diplomat

The US does not rule out the possibility to conduct new missile strikes on Syria, White House spokesman Sean Spicer has said at a news conference on Monday. “The sight of people being gassed and blown away by barrel bombs ensures that if we see this kind of action again, we hold open the possibility of future action,” Spicer stated, adding that “Not just Syria, but the world saw a president who is going to act decisively.”

US Defense Secretary James Mattis claimed that the US missile strike on the Sha’irat military airfield led to the destruction of 20% of the Syrian Air Force’s aircraft.

Mattis added that the Syrian government “lost the ability to refuel or rearm aircraft at Sha’irat airfield and at this point, use of the runway is of idle military interest.”

Unfortunately, the mad dog forgot to check some videos on Youtube, which reveal the air base to be operational and Syrian warplanes using it to conduct airstrikes on militants. The destruction of 20% of the aircraft also appears to be an overestimation.

Meanwhile, the mainstream media continued their propaganda campaign against the Iranian-Syrian-Russian alliance. Now, some anonymous US official told Fox News that,

“a Russian-operated drone flew over a hospital in Syria as victims of the attack were rushing to get treatment. Hours after the drone left, a Russian-made fighter jet bombed the hospital in what American officials believe was an attempt to cover up the usage of chemical weapons.”

According to the media, the presence of the drone couldn’t have been a coincidence. Investigation is not required when an anonymous US official is always near to provide such hard evidence of any allegations.

The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) and its allies retook the town of Maardes and the village of Iskandariyah from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda) in northern Hamma. Then, government forces launched an advance on Souran.

In the Palmyra countryside, the SAA captured the Al Taj hill, a number of points in the Mazburad Mountain, and the Syriatel tower.

The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) captured the villages of Abbad and Ayid Qabir which had been controlled by ISIS in the province of Raqqah.

Both of the villages are located near the important ISIS-held town of Tabqa. Tabqa and the Tabqa dam are important ISIS defense sites in the western countryside of Raqqah. The SDF successfully isolated them and is now readying to storm them.

Meanwhile, the US Special Forces and their proxies repelled an ISIS attack at al Tanf in southern Syria. From 20 to 30 ISIS members had attacked the US-led forces after a VBIED attack. All terrorists were killed in the clashes according to the US Central Command.

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Selling war requires inventing enemies, fear-mongering, substituting fake news for truth-telling, manipulating public opinion, and manufacturing consent.

Media (MSM) play along, feeding the public a steady diet of managed news misinformation, suppressing full and accurate reporting – featuring state-sponsored press agent journalism instead of the real thing, most people none the wiser.

Since GHW Bush’s 1991 Gulf War, America raped and destroyed Iraq, Somalia, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and Yemen. 

It colluded with Kiev’s war on Donbass, partnered in three Israeli wars on Gaza, and toppled governments in Haiti, Honduras, Paraguay, Ukraine, Egypt and Brazil, along with other coup attempts.

Obama terror-bombed seven countries, destabilized others. Hostile Sino/Russia policies risk nuclear war. In the last generation alone, US aggression caused millions of casualties, endless chaos and horrific human suffering.

Trump so far continues reckless policies of his predecessors, escalating wars instead of ending them. 

His April 7 naked aggression on Syria appears prelude for greater war, risking direct confrontation with Russia.

The accusation is false, yet AP reported it with no due diligence checking, saying

“(t)he official wasn’t authorized to speak publicly on intelligence matters and demanded anonymity.” 

The source claimed a Russian drone overflew a Syrian hospital, treating CW attack victims. Hours later,

“a Russian-made fighter jet bombed the hospital in what American officials believe was an attempt to cover up the usage of chemical weapons.”

Fact: No evidence suggests Syrian responsible for the Khan Sheikhoun attack.

Fact: No evidence suggests either Russian or Syrian aircraft bombed any hospital any time during over six years of conflict.

Fact: AP’s report is fake news, part of a campaign to build public support for escalated US aggression on Syria.

Fact: As president and commander-in-chief of America’s military, Trump bears full responsibility for ongoing US wars of aggression – the highest of high crimes against peace.

On April 8, investigative journalist Mike Cernovich said National Security Advisor McMaster “is manipulating intelligence reports given” Trump.

“He’s plotting…a massive ground war” on Syria, aided by former CIA director/convicted felon General David Petraeus.

“The McMaster-Petraeus plan calls for 150,000 American ground troops in Syria. Many special operations veterans including General Joseph Votel have raised serious concerns about McMaster’s plans for Syria.”

“Sources also suggest that McMaster is sharing classified information with Petraeus, whose security clearance was revoked.”

Other administration officials oppose the diabolical McMaster/Petraeus plan. If Trump buys it, “America will find itself in another massive” regional war.

A Final Comment

On Monday, The Hill cited an unnamed senior administration official, disputing the claim about alleged Russian foreknowledge of the April 4 CW attack, saying:

“At this time, there is no US intelligence community consensus that Russia” knew about the CW attack in advance, adding:

“We don’t have positive accountability yet, but the fact that somebody would strike the hospital potentially to hide the evidence of a chemical attack, about five hours after, is a question that we’re very interested in.”

Neither Russia nor Syria had anything to do with what likely was a CIA-orchestrated incident to enlist support for escalated war.

It’s likely coming with potentially dreadful consequences.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. 

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

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

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.